Eye of the Beholder

Do you remember when your mother was the most beautiful woman in the world?

I witnessed a small girl, maybe 4 or 5, who looked at her mother and said, "You're beautiful!" Her mother smiled. Gave the child a hug. Yet something in the mother's eyes made me wonder what she really thought.

The earnest words of a child can be so powerful. Parents are supposed to think their children are beautiful. That was something I always believed as a child. But is the opposite also true? That the children are supposed to believe the parents are beautiful?

I have no doubt the little girl believed her words. Did the mother? Is it something peculiar about the person to believe or not believe the words spoken?

When you look in the mirror, what do you see? Women, especially, seem to fixate on their flaws. It's part of the problem with family. Can you look at someone who looks so much like you, a daughter, a mother, and see the beauty despite those pieces that you hate? It's a nose, eyes too close together, or even simple color.

There was a photo of my mother in a dress, hands on the column of a patio. Her smile showed her happiness, though I don't know when or where the picture was taken. I've heard her since lament her flaws, but I don't see them.

Is this the human part of the condition, where one is not allowed to see the beauty without vanity? That women cannot see it within themselves? Is it our culture, or is it something deeper?