My Inner (and Outer) Chelsea

When Clinton was first elected president, I always felt so bad for Chelsea and the way she was treated by the media. Of all times for your dad to be the leader of the free friggin' world, you're 12 or 13 and in the ugliest, most awkward period of your life. She (and Bill and Hil) seemed to handle it well, but I often wondered what if that had happened to me? Now, if it was when I was 12 or 13, I might have been okay, because I was a way late bloomer, and I still looked fairly cute. But come 14, freshman year in high school, THAT, my friend, was my Chelsea moment. Exhibit A (as if you need more than one):

Hi. Yeah, I know. Sorry for the poor quality, but you get the idea. There are several unfortunate things going on here:

• The Bangs. The Picture was taken about 6 months after my first ever trip to the beauty shop. I always had long, all one length hair, and my mom or my aunt cut it for me. I never wanted bangs, wings, or perms and was happy with my stick-straight Cher hair. But no. My mom HAD to convince me that my hair would look "cute" with "wispy" bangs and that she knew a "great" stylist who could cut it for me. After much cajoling, we went the Friday before Spring Break when I was in 8th grade, and in a matter of seconds, the great stylist grabbed about half of my hair, pulled it all to the front, and CHOP. I immediately started crying, and, as some sort of a twisted souvenir, the great stylist gave me the hunk of hair, which was thick enough to wrap my big ball ponytail holder around, and tried to "style" what was left of my hair as I sunk lower and lower in the chair. When she was through, I walked out without saying a word, leaving my mom to pay for this nightmare. As soon as I got home, I grabbed a barrett (actually 2 or 3) and pulled all of The Bangs back and sulked for the rest of the week. Flash forward to The Picture, taken a couple of weeks before I started 9th grade, and I STILL had this much to grow out.

• The Perm. In an effort to make lemonade out of the lemons on my forehead that were so thick neither sun nor water could penetrate them, and I had major breakouts up there for the first time ever, my aunt offered to give me a perm. At home. To take the edge off The Bangs. She used those metal rod rollers, and it stunk to high heaven. I was hoping the chemicals would just burn The Bangs right off, but better judgment prevailed, and she didn't perm them at all. THANK GOD. The good news/bad news was that while, yes, The Perm briefly made me forget about The Bangs, it turned out more like a Ted-Nugent-on-a-Really-Bad-Day body wave frizz. My aunt told me it didn't "take" because I went swimming the day after. I French-braided my hair everyday for the rest of the summer.

• The Braces. I only had braces on the top four or six teeth, and I only had them for about 9 months, but, of course, I had them in The Picture to complete the Trifecta from Hell. Add to that, I had never worn makeup up to this point and had yet to develop anything, anywhere, so I looked like a walking 2x4.

Now lest you feel too sorry for me, I have to say that, despite my pitiful appearance, I was a very happy kid, with lots of friends, and I had a great time at school that year. I just went about my merry dorky way and secretly prayed for my Chelsea moment to end. And starting somewhere around the spring semester, it did start to end. I started wearing makeup, I got The Braces off, The Perm fizzled out, and The GD Bangs finally all grew out. I grew THREE inches over the summer, and I started my sophomore year as a whole new me.

But here's the thing. You know how your yearbook comes out around Homecoming the year AFTER the one it covers? So they can include graduation and summer fun and all that shit? You see my problem. My sophomore year, I had several classes with juniors and seniors, many of whom didn't know who I was the year before, so when that damn yearbook came out, and everybody was passing them around for people to sign, I can't tell you how many looks of utter shock I got when people saw The Picture. I had more than one stupid football player say to me, "What happened to you?" or "Is that really you?" or "That's NOT really you." Thanks?

The Picture was a thorn in my side for a long time, mostly because my mom is one of those who puts every school picture up on the icebox, in order, so my beady eyes stared me down every morning until I left for college. I used to take it down and hide it and move the later pictures up to fill in the space, and damn if my mom didn't find it every time. Now, I can look at it and laugh my ass off, as I hope you are.

My thanks to Karla May for forcing my hand on this post. I have been working on it for a while, and after viewing her awesome hair journey, I had to humiliate myself, too.