Nonfiction by Sheila Rittenberg

Nose

The first time I really saw it, I was ten or younger, looking into a hand mirror while standing in profile in front of a bigger mirror. My nose. It was hookish. Not just a kink. All of it. Short but bent. Like someone started something and forgot to finish.

I stared and stared. Until then, I’d believed everyone who’d said I was so cute, such a lovable face. And that was what I’d always seen in the mirror. Their praise lifted me in the mornings, tucked me into bed at night.

My sister had a straight, slightly turned-up nose. Not a ski jump. It was trim and neat, like a sweet goodbye or the perfect toast at a party. Flawless. My parents told me I had to be more like her, keep it up, and while you’re at it, be even better! I tried. I was at the mirror every night, searching. Would my nose change? Would it grow as I grew? I daydreamed myself into my sister. Compared my every move in sister terms – boys, friends, athletics. All beyond me. She was older. Teenage older. Cheerleader. Homecoming Queen. Agile figure skater and skier. Girlfriend of redhaired Bad Boy, Johnny F.

I faced up to the mirror always avoiding my profile. But that side silhouette was one of those things you can’t un-see. In frontal view, I was a little Irish girl with big eyes. Sideways, I was Barbra Streisand but without the allure, or the voice.

Mouth

When I was twelve and getting braces, the orthodontist told me my top lip would always look something like an upside down “U.” In the space from the base of the nostrils to the top lip there is a groove, he pointed out, and mine was too short. So my lip, whether I wanted it or not, lifted up above my teeth. My braced teeth.

“Start doing these exercises now,” the orthodontist warned as he showed me how to stretch my top lip down over my teeth, “or you’ll never be able to close your mouth.”

I looked up at him – mouth wide, elastic bands about to snap – and nodded. I didn’t care if my mouth was forever open. My bared teeth would be straight ones. No more taunts of Moose or Hey, Bugs Bunny as I walked the school halls. No more ducking behind opened locker doors.

The nose, the lip, and oh yes, the inclination to pudginess, were a lot to concentrate on. Every day. Between classes. During classes. After school. I walked the hallways, eyes racing from skinny girls to golden girls to those popular girls surrounded by friends and fans. Then home to my sister and the prom date she’d snagged, or the new cheerleading routine, or the simple certainty of her beauty. Her braces were long gone. One look at her and I’d well up. There had to be a reason I was inadequate. I just didn’t know what it was.

Brain

In university, I guzzled from the intellect of others. I, the girl from the suburbs, asked a million questions of new friends with cigarettes dangling from brooding faces. What’s behind Power to the People? Was Marx a good guy? What exactly is wrong with capitalism? We analyzed. We studied. Bob Dylan, Leonard Cohen, every lyric, joints passing freely, the room a sweet musty void. I joined the student occupation to protest faculty racism. Blankets and sleeping bags lay side by side, students strummed guitars, organizers hammered talking points through bullhorns. The world was at stake.

I’d show up at my sister’s in a bright gauzy blouse, torn jeans, beads and bangles, paisley bandana folded across my forehead. She and her blond bob and three kids, dog and harried husband, would’ve fit right into The Brady Bunch. I’d talk about the outrage of government. She was consumed with menus for the week.

The ’60s and You Say You Want A Revolution were calling. And I answered. I tackled slum landlords, drug use in high schools, inferior pay for corporate women. My parents thought I was radical. I liked that.

Heart

Babies. My babes. Now staring into infant eyes made me high. By my late thirties, pediatrician visits and weight gains, gurgles and chortles were all it took to be happy. I made baby food from scratch and talked nonstop to my little ones, explaining the world, even when all they could say was “Mama.” I played peek-a-boo and made goofy faces. I floated. Motherhood was a prize. First Prize. My sister made faces, strained ones, she too young with too much to care for.

I didn’t stare at myself in the mirror these days but I was okay with looking. I enjoyed the curls around my forehead, my skin, silkier than I’d known. I liked my blue-eyed moon gaze. A smile – no overbite – filled my face. All together my look was … well, evidently not so bad. The badass kid checking out groceries looked at me with desire. Same with the wild-bearded gas station guy, and the twenty-something cop who came to bash in my car window when I locked my son inside along with the keys. Maybe they’d been right long ago. Maybe I was cute, so lovable.

My face had made friends with my nose. I no longer tried to be just like my sister, or better. She was still older. I tried not to remind her.

Sheila Rittenberg retired in 2019 and became a member of the Pinewood Table, a critique workshop facilitated by mentors. She became a two-year Fellow at Atheneum, a masters level writing program at The Attic Institute in Portland, OR. Sheila writes short stories and “flash” creative nonfiction.