Approximately 13 minutes into third period, Mr. C’s accelerated chemistry class knew I was wearing red and black plaid bikini underwear. Yup. Good times. I was proudly perched on my lab stool eagerly ready to learn when he began demonstrating the lesson. As soon as the smell hit me… thunk. That was the day I found out I was allergic to ammonia. And that my face is capable of turning the exact shade of red in that damn plaid underwear. It took until fifth period for news of my underwear sighting to properly reach the whole school. It took until winter before I would wear a short skirt again. With tights. THICK ONES.

Even a nerdy science girl gets that panty peekage as grand as that doesn’t happen every day. Laughter I expected. Laughter from those I thought were friends I did not. And I’m not talking in that laughing with you way cuz hello at that age there is a certain acceptable grieving period one must go through on such an epic incident of embarrassment before one can laugh at one’s self. Two periods didn’t quite cut that. Rumors blindsided me even more. You see, despite the red face, restricted airway and eyes swollen and watering for hours after, I had staged it you know. I was basically just an attention-seeking whore. Two terms that couldn’t be further from the truth. And you didn’t even really need to know me to know that just wasn’t who I was. People are odd creatures. They remind me of those lil Russian stacking dolls. You never know what you’re going to get when you lift the face off the top one. Sometimes all the ones inside are exactly the same, other times they are drastically different. You never truly know what the other faces will look like. Until it’s too late.

It’s Spring Cleaning time for me. I’m definitely not one of those people that takes great joy in cleaning. Don’t try to eat off my floor, I wouldn’t advise it. And yeah, still no ammonia based cleaners for me. This year, I’ve done things differently. I’ve decided to start Spring Cleaning my LIFE before my home. Ok, for a fleeting moment there was a small part of me that thought it would be a great diversionary tactic to avoid the tedious scrubbing of my physical surroundings. My gut and my heart knew it would actually be much more difficult. Truthfully though, Life had already begun to show me the necessity for it over the past two weeks and for once I wasn’t too stubborn to listen.

I started with myself and a simple question- am I happy? Then tackled the unpleasantries- who am I? Where am I going? How do I propose I am going to get there? What makes me happy?

Honestly, I was pretty proud of how I was working through all of it so quickly and comfortably. That should have been my first red flag. Then Life, that twisted lil skamp, started flipping the heads off the Russian dolls in my life. Two dolls in I knew I needed to switch gears and pull some off myself. Or gut check and make my best educated guess at what truly lay beneath. Which sucked. Hard. But I did it. I purged what I determined to be the false, the negative, the energy suckers, the constantly need ego strokingers. I thought I had gotten them all. The fact that I thought that and I worked through it rather comfortably as well should have been the sign the freakin’ apocalypse was coming. And not the fun zombie kind either.

For about a day I felt I had emerged from my Spring Cleaning confident, focused, surrounded by positive, loving friends. Yay me!

Then someone brought a jug of ammonia to my party. Thunk. A couple of conversations with a couple of people and my whole process was going to need to start all over again, face red, head spinning, eyes watering, self doubting, lil Russian doll heads popping off all over.

I would have rather just lifted my damn skirt and shown everyone my underwear. Again. After Spring Re-Cleaning, I’ve decided this time the underwear wouldn’t be plaid bikini. For starters we’re looking at boy shorts instead because this ass needs to be contained. They would be black and in red letters across my ghetto booty it would read I KNOW.

I know who I am.

I know that I trust until given a reason not to and some people may use that to their advantage.

I know that I love those I care about unconditionally without honestly wanting anything in return.

I know I am a genuine and kind hearted person.

I know I am flawed, but I am REAL.

I know when you look at all the other faces of mine behind the one you see-

I know who I am.

I know where I am going.

I know what makes me happy.

I know who really knows me and really loves me.

I know I am still allergic to ammonia.

And now I know I am allergic to mismatched Russian stacking dolls.