I never got to be that, dumb maybe, but never a kid. They called me “the little grown up” and I was so proud of that, of being good and following the rules. Anything to be the teacher’s pet, but then you grow up and there’s no teacher to please. Just some idea of what people expect from a pretty girl. You make a nice home and you raise well-behaved children. You don’t make waves, you don’t make trouble, you keep your voice down. And you go along like that and your wanting to be good makes you quiet, so quiet that you forget the sound of your own voice, people forget that you’re there, your husband forgets that you’re there. Maybe you aren’t and you meet someone who doesn’t like you very much, who doesn’t think that you’re kind of you’re good, who thinks that you’re ignorant or prejudice even, which maybe deep down you are. And this thing that you have been afraid of forever, someone thinking ill of you, it is almost a relief because at least someone is seeing you and you are not invisible.

Libby