December 1, 2009
Beauty Is….
Have you ever heard of the saying, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder”? To me, that saying means beauty is something beyond physical appearance and features. Of course though, the meaning of beauty differs from person to person because of our different perspective and mindsets. Beyond the attractiveness and appeal of someone’s physical features, beauty is a trait, something that is unable to be gazed at. To me, beauty is the ability for people to forgive and be accepting of other people’s flaws.
One of my flaws and something that I still struggle with is smoking. I started smoking with my friends during last April. I had tried it once before in September of 2008 but had not continued due to conflicts that arose between my friends and me. It first started off as a stress reliever and something that most teenagers experiment due to curiosity. But as I continued, I gradually became more hooked. The more hooked I got, the more I had to have which caused a problem because school was starting again soon.
Three months ago, my class went outside for gym. It was an A day, which means that I have gym fourth period, right before lunch. So I was outside and I could not be in a worse mood and I had a cigarette with me. I had promised my best friend a couple of weeks before that I would not smoke during school because she fears that I would get caught. She just wants what best for me; she cares about me and my future.
We’re human and we can’t help to make mistakes and be selfish. So me and my stupid, lung killing habit, and me being the selfish person that I am, I did not think of how she and others, who care about me, would feel if I got caught. I walked out of the field and into the property of the house that was next to field and started smoking. My thought was, “Technically, I’m not on school property”. But that did not mean I would not get caught.
The next thing I know it, a cop drives up the street and while passing, he sees me smoking. He stops in the middle of the road and he asks what my name is. After, he walks with me to my gym teacher and tells him what happened and so of course, Mr. Lutz would have to bring me down to Mr. G. During it, I was in shock that this was happening to me because my mentality is that nothing bad could possibly ever happen to me. But one of the things that I feared most came to be. My fear wasn’t the fact that I got caught because I knew it was bound to happen eventually, but the fact I did it and it’s going to bring a load of disappointment to the ones I love most.
Thankfully, Mr. G only gave me two Saturday detentions instead of suspending me. They also had to call my parents and inform them, obviously, and I knew that the word about me getting caught had gotten around in school. I thought I could handle it. But I was terrified of facing my best friend and my parents. I knew I disappointed them, again.
I walk in to the lobby after school and I see my best friend in the lobby and the expression on her face informs me that she knows. I don’t quite remember what happened after but the next thing I knew, I was outside on the side of the school, walking while crying. My friend comes after me and she tells me that I promised her that I wouldn’t, and how upset she was when she found out from people that she doesn’t even know. I started to cry more and she hugged me. A teacher walked by and asked if I was okay and she told him that I was crying because I lost my phone. When the teacher left, she asked me why I was crying and I told her that it was because I disappointed her and broke our promise. She told me that it’s in the past and hopefully I learned something from this.
She’s my best friend and I’m hers, we can’t help but to forgive and help each other. She helped me by staying with me, making me laugh, “buying” me pizza, etc. But we both knew that the worst was yet to come; facing my parents. As soon as I got home, they checked my bag and pockets. After they found nothing, my mom brought me into her room. She didn’t yell or anything but told me how she did not expect this from me and how it saddens her because she did not raise me to become a smoker, but of course, they forgave me.
Beauty is the ability to forgive and accept people’s flaws. Yes, we are all different and as humans, we can’t help but to make mistakes. We’re far from perfect. But because we’re far perfect and we have our flaws, we look at other people’s flaws and it’s hard for us to be accepting. The real beauty, though, is when we do forgive and accept other people’s imperfection.
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