Saturday, November 19, 2005

   Cinderella
I stood there, my heart aching as I watched everyone greeting each other in the foyer of the academy. All the boys looked very nice in their suits and ties. I gazed enviously at all the girls with their beautiful gowns, and there hair done up in curls. How pretty they all looked! How happy they all seemed to be! And then, there I stood in blue jeans and a plain white t-shirt. The apron I was wearing was stained with gravy and turkey grease, and latex gloves imprisoned my carefully manicured hands. My feet were not crowned in sexy silhouettes as all the other girls, but confined in an old pair of sneakers. My hair was not sculpted perfectly on my head for such an occasion, but simply pulled back in a messy pony tail.
This was not me! This was not were I was suppose to be! I am not a behind the scenes kind of young lady. On the contrary; God had instilled in me a need, a purpose to be on center stage! And I asked myself as I stood in the kitchen, exactly why I had signed up to work. I looked to my left, and there was Peter, wearing a plastic apron, scrubbing grease off of a dirtied pan. I scoffed. This had to be one of the stupidest things I had ever done. What was I thinking? Did I really think that just by giving up my senior Thanksgiving banquet to work in a kitchen would prove to him that I wasn’t some social twit?
Peter didn't believe that conversation was relevant when there was work to be done. I guess he is too good for me to ever understand him. He’s happy to serve others, and work hard, and to do all things that a good, honorable, Christian should do. I wish I could be like Peter. For a moment, I felt guilty that I couldn’t be content working. But then I looked out the kitchen door and saw my friends laughing and having a good time. My eyes filled up with tears and I carefully wiped one off my cheek with my wrist. I glanced over to see Peter quickly look away. I wondered if he saw that tear. I wondered if he saw right through me and knew how much I wanted to be out there with everyone else.
I thought about how beautiful I could have looked tonight while I dried some just washed dishes. Oh I had so many gowns I could have worn! There was the coral pink dress with the Spanish hem, or the silver and white one that was a Wendye Chaitin original! I even had the red dress that was a Fioni, that I hadn’t even worn yet! The hot plates scorched my fingertips as I imagined hungrily over high heels. How much fun I could have had that night! I could have been charming, witty, and just daring enough before being crude.
I felt terribly similar to Cinderella. I just wanted to go to the banquet, and not in the rags I was wearing either. I wanted to laugh, and tell jokes, and flirt! And instead I was scraping other peoples leftovers into the trash. I kept thinking how out of character I was.

Comments (0)