At age six my chin dripped with vanilla ice cream peppered with rainbow sprinkles 

Because they made me feel sparkly inside. My gap-toothed grin and drippy double

Chin are forever captured in my mom’s Shutterfly memories. My round face is

Dotted with untameable curls that fly away and sprout from my temples. 

Eight year old me was the first version that started tucking them behind my ear, 

For that had to do until I discovered the magical flat iron. Turning ten 

Gifted me with tight clothes that revealed every bump and roll on my soft body,

Holding me accountable. I was

Introduced to my flaws at 

Just ten years old. In middle school, I 

Knew I was a bigger girl, so I stood, contorting my

Legs to create the illusion of a gap between my thighs. I closed my 

Mouth to hide the only gap I did possess. 

Ninth grade taught me that my eyes look better 

Outlined in black, and not the

Purple frames of my clunky glasses, 

Quickly replaced by contacts that made my eyes glisten. Sophomore year me

Remembered nutritional labels better than the pythagorean theorem. And junior year was

Sponsored by a straightening iron, which  

Took up to two hours a day, and no one

Understood why I did it but me. I flattened my frizzy curls into an unenterable  

Void so maybe a cute boy

Would talk to me. I entered college with no stories of

X-boyfriends to entertain with. So I bleached my hair

Yellow because blondes are more fun and I wanted out of the friend

Zone.

Jordyn Libow