Talking about it: Me & Being Albino Part 1

I naturally feel comfortable in my skin (I've been in it for 21 years now).
Let me first start off and say, being different in anyway can be hard. Athough its these differences that make us all unique and give us all that edge above some. It can be a struggle for some, while others breeze through it unfazed by what sets them apart.

I fall in the middle because of two reasons.

1. My Family (25% parents 75% Cousin)

Its not hard to tell I'm the youngest of many. The youngest of 3 siblings and the youngest of "The Cousins". I have been well protected by the shield of "You Fuck with one, you Fuck with all" its evident in how close my cousins and I are now, almost like siblings. But that shield while good in public did nothing to protect me from them building and destroying my own self-estem.
Kids will be kids, and family will make you cry (on purpose too). They "picked" on me, teased me, would scare the hell out of me all just for a laugh. I felt as if they hated me at times, not knowing what they really were doing (they didn't know they did it either) was preparring me for that moment when that shield could no longer protect me.

Let me pause for a moment on "The Cousins'.

Now, I knew at an early age I was not like the rest of my family, I remember asking my mother when I was very little about 5 I think:

"Mommy, Why don't I look like you and Teron?" (Teron, my older brother)

My mom, so sweet in handling such a question from a very little girl, said the best answer I have ever heard, not wanting to go into the science behind it all went on to say:

"Well, you know how God made us from dirt and sand? When he went to create you he said "I want this little girl to be special" so he got his special white sand and made you, and then gave you to me"

 I had to have been no more then 5 when this story was told to me. I was young I didn't question it. The subject of me being different in anyway didn't come up again until 2nd or 3rd grade  when my cousins come into the story.

Press Play on "The Cousins"

Now in total it is 7 of us all together, for longest time we all went to the same school district in St. Louis, MO (same as our mothers).
(My grandmother has lived in the same place since the begining of time)
Everyone knew our grandmother, and our mothers, So in time the knew us also.

Story Time....

I was in about 3rd grade my two couisns and I would walk from school to my grandma's house. (Not far, Just through the park and bam we are home) this day it was nice outside, so we decided to make little detour to the gas station by the school for popsicles and then if we ran to the park we could play a little before grandma and the older ones would start to worry. Everything went fine up until the point when we are on out way to the park. my two cousins in front of me talking and me lagging behind just having my popsicle. Then, I felt something on my neck (its a bit hot outside I didn't think nothing of it, maybe a bug or something) then I feel something bgger hit my arm. My popsicle and I both fall to ground I yell, and then another rock hits me on my leg. My cousin stands me on my feet and says "TERRI, RUN!!! TO THE HOUSE AND GET APRIL AND 'EM" so I go running as fast as I can through the park and down the big scary hill (which to this day still scares me) and around the corner. My grandma outside watering her plants and my older cousin April talking with some friends from the middle school, she sees me running with fear in my eyes and tears and dirt on my face. She ask where the other two are and the only words I can get out are "Park 'bout to fight". I'm told to go in the house and calm down. I get inside and tell the other 3 what happend and they head outside too. But by the time they start up the hill the police are bring my other cousins back to the house.
Apperently where I fell and where the fight was about to start was right in front of City Hall and they saw what happened, so they brought the boys home knowing who they belonged to (My grandma, and My Aunt).
A boy from my class and his older sister were throwing rocks at me....

After that I finished out the year and Mom moved me to a school closer to our house and my shield was gone. But, they had left me a thick skin and with my mothers words tattooed on my brain "Those who want to know will ask, and those who tease you are just ignorant and a waste of your time and energy" I thought I was ready, but I wasn't ready for words to not hurt me anymore. I let them (words) break me numerous time and one phrase was the detonater to my bomb "White Girl".
Now it doesn't bother me, but when you go to a Catholic school and your cousins say things like;
 -Mary Katherine Gallagher (Superstar reference)
-You act, talk, walk (you name it) like a white girl
and then to go to the school and have some one call you a white girl after correcting people time after time "No, I'm not white, I'm Albino"....you start to get a little ticked off and then it becomes "I'm not fucking white!" to "Call me white and see what happens"
These where the times I would get in trouble for fighting on the playground or throwing chalk board erasers at someone.
I was not a bad person just a little lost in the adolescent feelings of wanting to be accepted for being what I was and am and not what you just see. I needed to learn more about myself before I could just be me and just "Go with it"