7 years old, screeching at the suggestions of haircuts because you want to have your hair long enough that you can be a princess, fairy wings at carnivals and pink dresses for school, teeth far apart and eyes frozen wide for photos because the worst thing you can do in life is blink.
8 years old, hair always tied, because its too unruly for school according to some, pretty dolls lining up the shelves, a maxi skirt put back into a closet, because you can't wear it outside for some reason, it's too improper, too much, makes you looks like a """gypsy"""
9 years old, communion, your hair curled to perfection, eyes looking straight at the eucharist when everyone looks down, because you don't feel guilty of anything when talking to God, and because someone said it was okay to do so, with a smile. You do your best not to blink.
10 years old, you play with dolls and figurines with your best friend whenever you can, and dress up and walk down a makeshift corridor runway and make up stories for playdates that take hours and you make plastic animals venture into mazes made of jenga blocks. You barely have any ken dolls to fill up the roles in romance stories, so you use the ugly vaguely-humanoid shaped plushies you have to save girls from peril.
11 years old, a boy has a crush on you, it's not the one that you like, not the one that treats you like a person, but the one that sees you as a girl to impress, and you raise your nose higher in annoyance when you see him again. The boy you do like gifts you a heart made out of glow-in-the-dark beads right before he moves away.
12 years old, your teeth are still far apart, especially in the front, and there is hair between your eyebrows and on your hands and your legs, darker than any other girl in class, and your friends never fail to point it out. You start wearing longer leggins to P.E. when you can.
13 years old, you have a friend that's like you in so many ways, and they're not in class half the time, which makes half the time just a little bit worse. The other girls are okay, but it's not the same. You didn't know it then, but that friend was never a girl in the first place.
14 years old, you start letting your hair down sometimes, but pink is no longer your favorite color, and all sequined shirts have switched to zip-up hoodies. Skinny jeans is all that you have and no one likes you in a way that would matter.
15 years old, you still have a gap toothed smile. You've been shaving your legs when you need to, and you hate it every time. You wish your hair wasn't so frizzy. Everyone says you're skinny, but you don't know when it's a compliment and when it's not. You feel that way often. You don't have an appetite for anything.
16 years old, you start picking your skin once acne really starts kicking in, not only on your face, but arms too. Your lip hair is more prominent still. You are uglier than you've ever been and people ask if you want to shave your lip, to fix your tooth gap with temporary metal. You don't.
17 years old, you're friends with someone like you again, thanks to an anime pin on your pencil case. You keep wearing flannels and nerdy gadgets, in hopes more people will see you, because appearance is the only thing that seems to matter to anyone, to everyone. But no one else does. You wear loose dresses then, sometimes, and bandanna headbands, because it makes you feel pretty, and it catches the attention of a guy that sits next to you sometimes in class. He keeps coming to your house and gives you chocolates when he asks you to the school dance. You take the chocolates, and you do not go to the school dance. You stop wearing the bandannas.
18 years old, your friend moves away, and at the last school dance, you're a walking corpse. You choose a yellow jumpsuit for it because you like the color, and you don't want to wear a dress, you want to be different, but all it does is make your olive skin look gray and ghastly against the bright yellow material. Someone else at the dance is wearing the exact same jumpsuit, only she wears it effortlessly, and your bones crack as you walk in yours. The dance is not very memorable in the end.
19 years old, you go to college, and you've never been sadder in your life. You wear black long sleeves and maxi skirts with tights because you don't have to shave then. It only works when it's cold out.
20 years old, at some point you get a drastic haircut, and at some point you go through a breakup. You don't remember what came first, but you wear makeup sometimes now, you cut your own bangs and wear more jewelery, sometimes. You don't need to wear bras most of the time, so you don't. Some gray hairs start popping up, and they're ripped from your head like weeds, but not by you. Soon enough, you do it yourself as well.
21 years old, you cut your hair into a mullet, and it objectively looks horrid but it makes you feel incredible. You wish that you could wear skirts and makeup the way a man does, rebelliously, without worrying about his body hair or lack of chest to be feminine. Maybe that means you're not a girl at all. You barely had what it takes in the first place. You take a liking to loose hawaiian shirts. You pluck hair from your body regardless of its color and placement.
22 years old, your hair got long but it's thinner on the top of your head, where you pulled at it. The feeling of it is akin to when you pick your skin raw. Everyone begs you to stop. You don't. But you meet someone again.
23 years old, and you're wearing sundresses now, and your love gifts you earrings and necklaces that you wear happily, and you like the summer because you can wear small shirts with flattering necklines and short skirts. The shaving is always cumbersome, but you only do it occassionally. Your partner says they love all your hair, including the gray strands, which you find profoundly strange, but fitting.
24 years old, you stopped plucking your hair all together. Your skin is still hairy and pale and spotted with red and you've gained weight and you have bangs again and you decide you want to keep them always and you'd like to grow your hair long, like a princess. You've never felt more like yourself. Your favorite color is pink again. You make your blinks slow so your partner's cats know you feel safe too. Maybe you are a girl after all.
Finding your identity can be a line going forward, ever changing and growing, and sometimes it's a circle. Regardless of what happens, it gets better.
