The Girl in the Blue Overalls
Unlike my peers, at the age of ten, I was attending school six days a week. Rather than spending my weekends wastefully in front of the television, indulging in my Saturday morning cartoons, I begrudgingly woke up for Chinese school. Normally, I would have been outraged since no one came between me and Ash Ketchum. Yet, riding in the passenger front seat of my Mom’s Dodge minivan, I knew that underneath my fleeting bitterness, I was bubbling with glee. It's because I knew that when I arrived at school, I would see her - the Girl in the Blue Overalls.
Though initially we never made any contact, just being near her felt like cloud nine. In between dictation sessions, I would steal glances at her, always averting my eyes if she ever looked my way. When we went out for snack time, I would casually line up next to her, just to see if she would notice me. After school, waiting to be picked up by my older brother, I would sit patiently, watching her as she frolic by. The first time she looked my way, she proffered a gentle smile, as if she was telling me, “see you next week.” I melted because the Girl in Blue Overalls smiled at me.
What started as a weekly rendezvous for my heart became a recurring theme. As destiny would have it, our paths would cross again. On the first day of middle school, across the school yard, I thought my love sickness triumphed over me, fabricating mirages of her in the distance. My eyes weren’t playing tricks on me. There she was, before my eyes, my unicorn.
Knowing that this had to be fate, I wouldn’t allow myself to live if I didn’t summon the courage to speak to her. As if my very existence depended on it, I call upon what little valor I possessed to disregard my nerves and mustered a faint “hey.” That “hey” would transform into a hug, to holding hands, to heartbreak, to holding hands again, to another heartbreak until we decided it was much easier to just be happy, much much later.
Tiffany might have loss her blue overalls but her undying devotion to blue and colorful objects remain as vivid as always. Despite our uncanny relationship, she's still a burst of color in my life. Meet the Girl in the Blue Overalls, now the Girl in the Blue Blazer, my biggest cheerleader and personal muse.
*Thank you for always inspiring me to be a better person than I ever thought possible.
Location: Walt Disney Concert Hall
Gear: D700, 24-70 2.8
DCHU Photography
