Live and Let Live – 

         A Character Sketch 

From the moment that Cecelia had first noticed her own refection in the small, makeup mirror on Mama’s bedside table, she understood. She was cockeyed, plain as day. Though she was six at the time when she finally took a good, long look, she could tell things weren’t quite right. One eye was bigger than the other – the blue one on the right was larger than the hazel one on the left. Both were lined with thick, chocolate-colored eyelashes, and that was nice enough, though the lashes on the right curled up into themselves while the left ones were pencil straight. And her nose? It was small and well aligned until the very end where it turned up a touch more than slightly. She could look right into her nostrils and she stared initially for minutes wondering just what was up there hiding in the dark. 

Her mouth was another issue. When it was closed, she held it rosebud tight, but when she opened it, it gaped open, drawing up on the left as though tugged by an unseen puppet master. If she stuck out her tongue, that in her assessment was amazingly normal, it curled into a perfect U. Maybe that wasn’t so bad. The straw to her Sippy cup always had fit her mouth to perfection. 

Her teeth had no intention of cooperating in any ordinary manner either. They erupted through swollen gums much too slowly and in crooked disarray until she was twelve. Temporary braces had helped, but an annoying retainer had become Cecelia’s partner for life. The moment she abandoned it, every tooth developed a mind of its own.

Cecelia’s first look at herself certainly had not been the last. For years afterwards, she had been drawn to mirrors, to window reflections, to any looking glass she could find. She simply could not understand why she, unlike anyone else in the family, had been created in such a misaligned manner. Why look at my ears. One lies flat against my head like a gnarly, old growth of some kind and the other pokes out . . . and a little too far to my way of thinking. Well, at least my hair covers them.

Her hair. That was another issue altogether. It grew it seemed, in fits and starts, at times taking months for a nest of unmanageable curls to appear; at other times, it grew inches in a month, the locks falling into wild, tangled, waves. Oftentimes, Cecelia simply pulled the mess back and tied it in a ponytail at the nape of her neck with a ribbon of some kind . . . always making sure the ears were hidden though. 

Cecelia’s muddled proportions did not stop with the features of her head, however. Her arms were not even, the left being at least half an inch longer than the right; her right hand was thicker and fleshier than the left; and her feet were not the same size either . . . at least a half size difference in length according to the grouchy, shoe salesman at Macys down at the mall. Well, what am I supposed to do? Buy two pairs of the exact shoes? 

By the time she was sixteen, after ten years of marking the discrepancies of her body, Cecelia gave up – not with life, but with judging herself. I am who I am. Folks can take me or leave me.And her outlook worked. Despite the fact that Cecelia’s features were a bit askew, everyone who knew her overlooked them just as she had learned to do for her personality was one to be emulated. She bore life on an even keel. Oh, she had normal ups and downs but overall her disposition was one that was balanced and calm, a complete contrast to her awkwardly put-together figure and visage . . . and that was a paradoxical juxtaposition all to itself. 

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