Why do I have to wear a mask and pretend or act a certain way just because you do?

The little girl says why do I have to dress a certain way when I visit those relatives? Why do I have to put on a dress and wear piggy tails. I want to have a pretty barrette in my hair and leave it down. They wear coverings and dress in black and look like they are going to funerals.

Why do I have to wear a mask and pretend or act a certain way just because you do? I am me and you are you. Maybe I want purple hair and wear shiny dangly ear rings. Smell like beautiful flowers. Who are you to tell me I am wrong? 

The religion you believe, the stories you believe, that are lies, lies to me. I have let them define me, down inside putting a bandage over something that healed looked like it was healed but inside it was raw and still hurts. I am tearing off that bandage and healing from the inside out.  Letting everyone see the sore and hear me cry. I am not you and you are not me it is plain to see. I do not want to be you. I want and need to be me.

You tried to protect me, I believed by isolating and telling myself I was not good enough, smart enough, enough that I would sleep, let me just go to sleep and not wake up.  Dream and know that there is somewhere inside of me that is secret and beautiful.  I don’t see it out there,  it is inside of me where I find comfort and belong. 

This body, I have tried to dress up and look a certain way to feel a certain way to look like others.  I don’t belong, where do I belong? How can I tell you to be something I cannot be?  God sees me and knows who I am, the creator has given this drive the belief of more. I may not find, like many because it is not real. No one can give it to me it is a metaphysical thing, like my thoughts, feelings, no one else can see them but they are as much a part of me as my teeth that I eat with or my tears that I cry. 

Religion teaches to believe and forgive and help others. I have most of my life done this but I need to believe, forgive and help myself to be able to do that for others. This circle that is my life It winds around into this prism of my life. It becomes tighter winding around me then loosens up for a while until it I am wound up again almost ready to hang myself mentally. 

Prisms of this life, my life like a kaleidoscope always changing, beautiful but chaotic full of pain, anger and rejection of myself. Always thinking there must be more, that I need to be more.  Where do I go, what am I waiting for, searching for? It is not someone else, something else. I do not need someone else to complete me. I do not need a house full of things to make me happy. The biggest house full of magnificent furniture, paintings and jewelry will not make me happier. 

The gardens of my mind I walk thru, I am calm looking for the next wonder around the corner. Full of ancient statues, ponds, swings and rest, rest I can find nowhere else. 

Where do you find rest? In the scriptures, beliefs that were passed down from your parents, memes? 

The neighborhood is quiet; the sun is not yet up. No lights on, but they are there in the dark maybe like me sitting with a cup of tea, thinking wondering what the day will bring. What will I pass on to the ones I love, what lies have I taught them to believe? Since I have been a little girl, I have searched and knew there was more than the farm I lived on or the one room school house I went to. 

The black buggies, bonnets and shoes all masking the beauty that hides within: the happy children, the long beautiful hair the feet that long to be running in the long grass and sand and beaches.