Beautiful

 

This is really a paltry post, but it has been on my mind for a long time.

No one ever called me beautiful until I was in my seventies!

Not my parents. girl friends, boy friends, husband or anyone else. Not when I was dressed up for holidays, or special events, or even on my wedding day.

Now there is nothing wrong with not being beautiful. One of my nicknames, until my sister was born, was pretty, but then she became the pretty one. As the oldest child I was always bigger because I was older. That seemed natural enough, but when I look back at photos from that time period? I am a perfectly normal, average size child. Not some behemoth. I always thought I was the biggest person around.

It makes me wonder about the people who call me beautiful now. Do the standards change over time? Are these people disingenuous? My eyes are my best feature, do people see the eyes of an older person more clearly because the rest has faded? 

It is a mystery.