It was a big problem. When I was 13, I had no personality.
I didn’t fit in anywhere.  I was so shy I felt invisible. My older
sister, the first and favored grandchild, was a talker. I was in
a class at school of bright children who were so eager to answer
a question, they raised both hands.

I wanted to be like somebody else. Anybody else. Like Betty in
Archie comics. Betty was popular. Everybody liked her. She had
blonde hair.

I had brown hair.  I thought if I had blonde hair, I would have
Betty’s personality. I decided to dye my hair.  Only floozys,
hookers, fallen women, and the Duchess of Windsor dyed their
hair in those days, but I was desperate.

I turned to peroxide to turn me into Betty. I was the only girl
in 7^th grade with orange hair.

Looks were as important as having a personality. As a matter
of fact, if you looked really good, you didn’t even need a
personality.  I knew that from studying movie stars like Betty
Grable, Lana Turner, and Rita ayworthHayworth. They had to look
gorgeous every minute of the day and night. Not like real
people. Everybody wanted to be like them.  Me, too. It was
much more important to me to experiment with Revlon
 make-up then to experiment in science lab at school.

I don’t know how I survived being me. Girls in my class were
wearing bras. I wore an undershirt. Some girls had their period.
Not me.  I forged a note that said I couldn’t take gym because I
had my period.

I had braces on my teeth so I never smiled and so nobody smiled
at me.  I was very near-sighted. Movie stars never wore glasses.
So I didn’t. A lot of times, I couldn’t see my classmates clearly if
I passed them in the hall and didn’t say “hi.” They thought I was
a snob.

I was always comparing myself to everybody else. I was always
falling short. When I started to go out with boys on double
dates with my beautiful best-friend Dora, I thought my dates
only went out with me because they couldn’t get a date with
Dora.

I couldn’t imagine anybody marrying me. But life is full of
surprises. Some good. Some bad. But somebody did marry me.
I had children. Everything was good and we had good times.
At least for a while. I even lived in a house that had more than
one bathroom and grass outside.

My children changed my life. I did things for my children I
never could have done for myself.

My children didn’t care about my personality or the color
of my hair. I didn’t care either.  I didn’t worry about fitting
in or looking like a movie star.

I didn’t need to be somebody else.

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