Dear Eyebrows,

 

The fuller you became, the fuller I did, and when you became sparse, I did too.

You have evolved drastically throughout my life and have probably been one of the biggest struggles that I have had to face in my life and in the mirror because when I look at you, you stare back with intensity.

You are like logs on my face, I could start a fire with you.

You are so furry, I could warm baby chicks in your dark brown hairs.

You are so bushy I could plant flowers in your roots.

You are the first feature people take in from me because you are striking, audacious, and lavish.

I am brown eyed and bushy-browed, every expression is a natural disaster.

Every surprise is a tsunami

Every concern is a landslide

Every anger is a forest fire

Every laughter is an earthquake

That all occurs just above my eyes.

I use to embrace how you were once just one eyebrow; a unibrow.

No matter how many kids would make fun of you or how many hacksaws my mom came at you with trying to split you down the middle, I refused to get rid of you, because you were what made me, ME.

You set me aside from everybody else. You were the only tree standing in a deforested environment.

You were odd, but that’s what kept you alive; people cut down ordinary trees, leaving the peculiar ones standing.

Eventually though, I began to hate you. I grew older and the kids got meaner and suddenly I wanted you to be cut down too.

I wanted two eyebrows like everybody else.

I wanted you to be thinner and much less noticeable.

I no longer wanted my branches to extend out further and fuller than all the others.

I plucked your leaves out, one by one. I got carried away though, because then suddenly there was none of you.

Coincidentally, when I lost you, I lost myself. I was torn down from all the hate I received because of your fullness, but after chopping you away, I felt vacant.

I was deserted, for I had destroyed something that I loved about myself because everyone else hated it.

I tried to fix you; bring you back to life.

I attempted to reattach your branches

Redraw them on

Reshape your leaves.

But nothing worked.

I hated you more now than ever, wishing I had never touched you in the first place.

I hated everyone for suggesting I do so

and I hated myself for listening to them.

I missed the old you, the bushy you, the full you, the dark, brown, dramatic, and beautiful you.

That’s when I finally decided to dig in my roots, where I originally stemmed from.

I began watering you a little more each day.

I waited and waited, and finally, you began to flourish again.

Your branches formed and extended upward and your leaves grew rounder and more vibrant.

The branches were sturdier and the trunk was stronger and more rooted this time.

There was no chopping you down this time.

You sprouted bigger, browner, stronger, and more fuller than ever, and as much of a struggle as you have been in my life, without you I would not be the voluminous, robust, and tenacious tree that I am today.

 

Love,

Thriving Timber