Only 15 years old. I crouched in the darkness underneath a cardboard box. Shivering and chilled to the bone. Recently kicked out of my home and with nowhere to go, my aching feet stumbled as they searched for a place to sleep for the night.
A man dressed in slacks and a polo slices an onion and holds it up to my eyes. It stings.
“Come on Bethany, you can do it.”
I strain and focus on the pain. Finally, out comes a sob. Then another. The funny thing is, I mean it.
“OK, cut!” he yells, and the camera stops whirling.
Let’s go back even farther.
At 5 years old I stare down the hallway at my mother screaming, and people dressed in white running around to the tune of sirens. Morning comes, and I stare adamantly at my parents and ask where my brother went.
Not a tear falls.
A “thick skin,” is what they call it. I was a tough little cookie. And that little cookie presumed that cookies should naturally just get harder with time. Then after the tumbles and turns of life, we become rock solid.
But hang on — look at elderly people who have hardened to the world. They’re not the ones baking cookies for the neighborhood. They’re not the ones giving out hugs and stories and candy. And they’re certainly not the ones still taking risks, laughing, crying and dancing.
During the last few weeks, the tumbles of life have been severe. Vulnerable to judgment, time and time again I’ve felt the need to be tough. But instead I’ve been learning to crumble. I’ve been learning to cry. I’ve been learning to feel the pain of people disliking me and leaning on the ones who truly care. It hasn’t been easy, but ironically, it’s been liberating.
From their emergence into the world, children learn to be tough, especially boys, who are told not to cry and not to care what people think of them, “Life’s tough, get over it.”
And then as if the daily knocks of life aren’t enough, up piles more self-imposed tougheners. Moving to the other side of the world alone as a teenager? That can do it. As can volunteering to help addicts in downtown Eastside in Vancouver while stuck outside the country waiting for a visa. I remember taking off to travel around the world for three months alone in trains with just one backpack, a smile and staunch independence. I thought I was a tough cookie then for sure. I guess we all need those times.
Another big toughener: politics. I wondered if being in Ghana and then representing its people in New York among hundreds of suit-clad youngsters, hardens one to things. I felt the disconnect between the real, on-the-ground people and the systems that talk about them from afar. Discussing human trafficking at an international conference in the Middle East — from lavish, air-conditioned rooms — had the same effect. It’s like watching the daily news in a way. We can become desensitized.
Perhaps we should mirror the weather in Moscow more. It’s certainly not afraid to express emotions, multiple emotions in the span of a day. It is happy one minute and bawling the next. Not that I’m encouraging people to be more bipolar — I’m all for balance.
But for the girl who used to have onions rubbed into her eyes just to make tears come out, this is growth. Learning to be vulnerable is just one step closer to being that old, cuddly lady who paints her nails blue, bakes cookies for strangers, dances to ‘90s music and cries during sad movies. She’s the cookie with the warm gooey center everyone wants.
Bethany Lowe can be reached at [email protected]