The Pretty Girl

By the time we reach middle school, girls notice the attention paid by the boys to the few girls who are “easiest on the eyes.” They are born with the looks, the personality, a certain air about them, and soon, the rest of us come to accept this hierarchy of attention. Those of us blessed with “better personalities than looks” (thanks moms) have each wondered at some point what it would be like to be “the pretty girl,” to have the boys pay us attention. But as we mature and realize that our looks won’t change enough with age to bump us up to the next category, we accept that we may never know what it is like to receive that attention. So it was with me…
…until I arrived in Ghana.

You see, in America, white is ignored (it’s average, it’s common, it’s not exciting), but in Ghana, white is exotic.

It is a very rare occasion indeed if you (a girl) manage to walk around campus for the day, (let’s not even talk about the beach) without a thousand hellos, tons of shouts of “Obruni” (“white person” in the local language), several requests for your phone number (which you always pretend you do not own), and even a marriage proposal or two (after which you flash whatever ring you may be wearing).
So this is what it’s like to be “the pretty girl.”

At first, it’s flattering to be noticed, recognized, to feel special, but that quickly changes to annoyance as you begin to question how many people are interested in being your friend, and how many are interested in you being their friend. Who wants to get to know you and who simply wants to be seen with you?
Unreal. This is a struggle I never thought I would see.

It was middle school, not too long after I began to wonder what it would be like to be “the pretty girl,” that I began to understand the superficiality of the attention she receives. After a while, I became thankful, realizing that I was spared the daily question of “Does he/she really like me for me?”

So it’s ironic that here I am, nearly ten years later, fulfilling the curiosity that had provoked me as a child. And God is laughing, saying, “It’s all in My timing, Lindy. I always answer you, just rarely when you expect it.”