another setback on my journey to adulthood

Saturday was the big day. The big day being Jesse's family reunion. After my post on Friday, I totally expected to blog about it today, telling you about how wrong I was and how accepting his family was and how everyone was nice to me. I wanted to tell you that I indeed wore the brown dress and that Jesse did ask me to cover my cleavage. I wanted to tell you that Jesse and I danced the night away.

But I can't. Because we didn't go.

On Saturday morning, I left early to go to the salon to get a pedicure and eyebrow wax. I wanted to look my best for the reunion. I ran a couple of errands and returned home. When I got home, Jesse was still in bed. As inviting as it was, I resisted Jesse's invitation to join him in his wanton laziness. A few minutes later, I made breakfast and brought it to bed, where Jesse continued to be. After breakfast, I determined that my nails were dry enough to get under the covers and I joined Jesse.

A couple of hours later, Jesse asked me, "Do you want to go to the reunion?" I said, "I want to go if you want to go." After all, Jesse did read my post on Friday. He already knew what my fears were all about. But I wanted to go to support him. If it was important to him, it was important to me. Surprisingly, Jesse said, "I don't want to go."

Part of me thinks that he came to this conclusion because he had a strong desire to just stay in on Saturday. At that point, we had been comfortably in bed, reading or watching TV, for hours. But a bigger part of me knows better. I didn't know what to expect of the reunion so I expected the worse. I think Jesse wanted to spare me any possible discomfort. And of course, I love him for it.

However, avoidance is not the answer to overcoming anything. I have a real fear of experiencing adversity because of my ethnicity. On Saturday, I let my fear win.

Next time, I'm gonna fight back.