The True Vyne

Pooh Bear and I were browsing in Kohl's when an older well dressed saleswoman stopped Pooh Bear in her little six year old tracks with the exclamation, "Ruby red slippers! What pretty shoes." The elegant lady lifted her bifocals up closer to her eyes from the silver chain on her neck to take a closer look, "You look like the girl from Wizard of Oz. What's the girl's name from that movie?"

Pooh Bear grinned up at her baring her partly grown in front teeth, "Dorothy." There's no other shoes my girl will put on her feet of her dozen handsome hand-me-down shoe collection.

"That's right" the woman stooped down to look into Pooh Bear's eyes and continued, "Do you know, when I was in jr. high school, I got a pair of ruby red slippers too. I wore them to the homecoming dance and got first runner up in the homecoming court. I was never a beauty queen, but I won. Girl, your shoes made me remember that day. It was the first day I felt that I could be something- I was something special. I'm glad you wore those slipper here, so I could think of that again."

The clerk then turned her gaze my way for the first time. I could see a question mark in her shining eyes.

"Aren't those the times we remember that give us confidence and pride, the good kind of pride? I see that in you now." I affirmed in all genuineness. Her clothes, her walk, her talk, spoke the word "beauty".

The saleslady gave me a long nod of her head before walking off to her work duties, "Thank you for blessing me today."

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When I look back on those awkward jr. and high school days, I remember three days when my opinion of myself changed to something of embarrassment to one of self worth. None had anything to do with winning first runner up at anything, but a transformation in the way I thought of myself.

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I'll share one. I might be mortified to write the others out loud.

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All my high school hang out buddies had chosen entirely separate colleges spread across the USA- University of Kentucky, University of Virginia, Johnson Bible College (TN), Eckherd (FL), Northern Kentucky University, Indiana University, and others I can't think of just now. We met at Reet's dad's for our final "Big Chill" gathering before the first of us left the next day. Much of my time in high school was spent with lounging around some one's living room singing to guitars strumming. Ritt, Marc, and sometimes Jim played lotsa Fogelberg's "The Reach", Joel's "Sadness or Euphoria", "Captain Jack" and Dillon's "You ain't going nowhere". Many homespun tunes hailed from those fine men too. That last night together we jammed together one last time, and someone, probably Reets captured the memories with the camera. She shot tons of pics and sent them out to us all.

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Helen and I sorted the photos from that night together. Helen stopped flipping through the stack abruptly at a picture of me on the floor, hair everywhere (still that way), in a college sweat shirt and short blue jean skirt, arms supporting my outstretched frame looking over my shoulder. She asserted, "True, whenever you start feeling like you are having an ugly day at college, get this picture out. Aint' no way the girl in this picture can't feel great about herself." I was taken aback. When had I ever taken a good picture? I may have rushed to disagree with her and searched to point out my flaws, but Helen was right, the picture was entirely me and entirely good. Maybe for the first time, I let myself see beauty in myself.

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If you are thinking, "Isn't that vanity or selfish pride?" then you would be quite wrong. This new found loveliness sank inside my being and prevented me from taking crap from those who considered me less.

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Helen probably doesn't even remember that day (till I ask her to read this post), but her comments made all the difference in my college experience and probably still even make a difference now. I gained confidence in self presentation which still follows me today.

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Do you have any important ruby red slipper or photograph stories to share? Make sure you share them with me even if you don't want to do so on my blog.