It is 1990. I stand in front of the mirror and pluck the hair in the space between my eyes that should be a natural clearing in the forest of eyebrow.
The skin between my cheekbones all the way down to the small of my back is a teenage minefield of angry red pimples. People look at me, it seems, laced with pity.
My body has deserted me when I need it most. I am unconfident and unsure. At night I go to bed and pray, beg even, that a miracle is bestowed on me. If my skin is clear, one day I will return the favour in kind to those who need it most.
Typical Catholic boy. A miracle in return for some forgettable mortal act. Nevertheless, I find myself wishing I can pass through school undetected. Perhaps then even I could stop noticing myself in the mirror.
Girls find me awkward, I can be their friend. Boys find me sissy and don’t pick me for their team sports.
My friends find me quiet and I feel lost in a world I’m sure I am never going to fit into. Paranoia and awkwardness break the flow in my walk. I find it difficult to look up.
It is 2005. I am precariously perched in a corner in my first gay bar experience. I wonder why people are looking. I have more than 15 years of the gym behind me, I own two separate eyebrows and the skin that had been tried for treason has remorsefully restored itself.
There are no women in the bar, just men. The lingering looks, the red glow of light and mutual eye wrestles take their toll and I leave. I still feel awkward and obvious for all the wrong reasons.
It is 2011. I’m sitting on the side of my bed. It’s sunny outside and I momentarily remember the feeling of a time gone by. Maybe I was not the ugly duckling with the wrong family around me, rather a cygnet in a duck’s world.
Today, those closest to me see the teenage wish repaid in the way I thought best. Repaid in words. Sentences that remind us all that we may have grown up in or still live within the confines of awkward.
Fear not. Because today, you and I are the swan.
info: Follow John on Twitter @daddydearest_
you are indeed a magnificent, proud and beautiful swan – and don’t you dare, ever, let anyone tell you otherwise! x
Love it xxx “Spread your wings and prepare to fly, For you have become a butterfly… Fly abandonedly into the sun”