Due to a yellow bag...

For book club a few months back we read The Help. I'd give it two thumbs up, but there is one part, and somewhat insignificant in the scheme of the plot, that I've been really thinking about. One of the main characters is sitting by a pool with her friend who has recently had a baby. She describes her friend, Hilly, as looking somewhat flabby in her black swimsuit, but wearing it with an heir of inexplicable assuradness. She wonders how her friend can feel so unabashed with saggy mom parts, as if she should feel self-conscious about herself. And for the only time in reading the book I felt complete adoration and applause for the rather flawed Hilly. Paunchy tummy and all, she was confident.

There is a part of me, as I think there is a part of most people, that is hesitant to embrace the whole of myself. There is always something that can be bettered of coarse. But there is also this big part of me that feels like Hilly. Invincible, undaunted, confident in my strengths and abilities. I know there are those who look at me similar to the character in the story, like I shouldn't walk around being fine with me, because after all there is plenty wrong with me. But through the past few years I've decided to try and throw all apprehensions about myself out the window. I am genuinely content with being me, because I can see past what my swim suited body appears to be; I see something better.

And I've wondered how I came to be this way, to feel happy despite the flaws. And this past birthday of mine has made clear why I am the way I am: I got a yellow purse.

I've wanted this big, darling yellow bag for months now, ever since Christmas time when I saw it in the store where we bought some matching Christmas stockings. It was everything I wanted my purse to be, and I'm not even being dramatic. It spoke to me. And I was heartbroken when I saw the pricetag. I walked out of the store that December day with no yellow bag and instead carried a growing lust for its beauty. Think Anne of Green Gables and her desired puffed sleeved dress that she could barely fit through the door in. I was that smitten and the bag was that big.

Fastforward a few months. Like all petty things that really aren't that important, I stopped dreaming of that yellow bag. I hadn't forgotten about it, I just filed it away in the drawer of unresolved desires. Until. Until a few days before my birthday when my friend Mindi and I were browsing the booths at a Woman's Expo and I saw it hanging so sweetly and all those feelings came flooding back. I checked the pricetag thinking it would surely be on sale to find those bag sellers were a stingy bunch and it was still more than I could part with. I came home empty handed again, and lamented my woes to some friends who wondered how I didn't spend a dime at an event meant to draw every last penny from any attendees pocket. Nothing there could compare to THAT purse, I said. It's the only purse in the world for me and if I couldn't have IT I didn't want anything. I'm pretty sure I sounded that crazy and desperate. They consoled me with dreams of future pretty purses and beautiful things. And I again filed away my need for that yellow bag.

And soon came my birthday. Dave loves to inflict pain, and so he always makes the boys and I wait till the end of our birthdays to open our presents. Torture. I have no patience for pretty packages meant for me sitting idly away why I eat my way through yet another holiday or birthday. But this year Dave told me I HAD to open my presents as soon as I woke up. He commanded me to open up one specific box immediately. And of coarse I obliged, and promptly upon lifting the lid peed my pants. It was a purse!

It was so pretty and soft and yellow. It just wasn't as pretty and as soft and as yellow. It wasn't THE bag. Dave was quick to tell me that the bag was no longer at the store and that he wished it was THE bag but that he loved me so much and wanted to still give me a yellow purse I could love. I didn't even feel sad that this was a different purse, because my man was so sexy at that moment yellow purses weren't even on my mind.

A few minutes after opening my presents, Mindi texted me happy birthday, and I immediately called her to tell her that Dave had gotten me a yellow purse. She laughed.

Turns out she and some other friends had gone in together to buy me THE yellow purse, and she was on her way to pick it up at that moment. She turned around.

But let me tell you. I've never felt so loved. What kind of friends are that thoughtful, that generous, that kind? Mine are.

And all day long, I couldn't wipe a smile off my face. I kept thinking of Mindi, Chellese, Estella, Val, and everyone else who would sacrifice for me. Bratty me. I felt so desperately undeserving of knowing such remarkable woman, and also so happy that God would let me be their friend.

And later that day while shopping we found THE yellow bag. And Dave wanted me to exchange the one he gave me because he liked mine better and he wanted me to finally have it. And so on April 26th, the day I officially became an old lady to no longer return to her youthful twenties, I walked away with the bag of my dreams. And also with an even more precious gift; that of acceptance.

I know I'm desperately imperfect. Dave knows it too. And yet he sees something besides the nagging and worrying and OCDness for freshly moped floors. He tells me he sees sweetness. Me, sweet! Its laughable, and yet his eyes somehow take in the colors of compassion and kindness that seem to seldom exist in me. And because he sees past me, he gives to me. Things I couldn't do for myself. Things I don't deserve. Yet things I treasure simply because they are offered from him.

And my friends. They see an Iliana that is somehow deserving of a perfect yellow bag. They choose to ignore my flightiness and opinionatedness and make me feel good about myself.

And all my life growing up I was consantly praised and rarely criticized by my mom and dad. The focused on my good, and with much patience overlooked my bad. And they gave me a rock on which to base my self worth.

And so this summer when I'll march around Lindon pool like a brown braut stuffed in my swimsuit, I'll be ok with it. I'm okay with me. And my confidence in myself grows daily largely because of those who love me.

They give me gifts of yellow bags.