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Portrait of a Woman

By Reace Dedon, 2021

A photograph of a printed prose document titled “Portrait of a Woman” by Reace Dedon, dated 9/23/21. The first page begins with a narrative describing a thirteen-year-old girl navigating adolescence, self-awareness, and body image. The text discusses themes of maturity, innocence, sexuality, and self-perception, formatted in paragraphs with standard margins and a serif font on a white background. Text reads: Reace Dedon 9/23/21 Portrait of a Woman At thirteen, there are things she does not know. Her thoughts no longer match her face. It is soft and pre-teen, no lines and thin pores. She has small hands and lingering baby fat. Her body does not grow in sync with her mind where old thoughts persist, squished next to the ever-growing presence of her approaching adulthood. Barbies and ponytails. Partners and periods. Playgrounds and sexuality and body image and love and life and hate. There is no greater distance in a year than between twelve and thirteen. Who she is, she does not know, but she pretends. She convinces herself she is a woman, an adult. She says, “I know who I am. I know what I want. This is who I am.” But late at night, in the dark and the cold and the silence, she sits with herself. She stares and questions the new parts of her. One night alone, she reads the book her mother gave her. “You and your changing body,” it reads. It feels adult and vulgar. It feels sensual, but she knows none of these words. She only knows the ache and heat festering in her lower abdomen. It’s a feeling she hasn’t yet grown accustomed to. She skips a few chapters. She can’t help herself. Sex. Was she truly ready? She read and she read again, a furrowed brow deepening with each line. No, she thought. My parents didn’t do that. My grandparents didn’t do that. I don’t want to do that. Is she ready? Will she ever be ready? She has become an invasion of herself. She discovers new parts of her body, things she was sure weren’t there before. She is told she is beautiful now. She was not beautiful before. Before, she was cute. She was adorable. Now, she is beautiful, and she believes she likes that better. She goes to school with girls who are also invading themselves. She learns that there are different ways to be fat. She must lose her water weight, her baby fat. She finds fat in new places—her ankles, her underarms, her neck, her fingers—and if she can’t find it, someone else will find it for her. At home, she pinches and pulls her body. If I suck in all the time, maybe I’ll work off enough stomach fat to not have to suck in anymore, she thinks. She used to envy other girls her age with summer birthdays. They were allowed to celebrate with pool parties and sleepovers on weeknights. She once asked to celebrate her birthday in the summer, five months early, so she could have a swim party, too. Now, she’s grateful for a winter birthday. Any excuse to hide her body was a good one. It was at thirteen when she was objectified for the first time. At the time she didn’t quite understand it, but the off-handed comment was the first of many others that would follow her for the rest of her life.
A photograph of the second page of the prose piece “Portrait of a Woman” by Reace Dedon. The text continues exploring the protagonist’s transition into adulthood, moments of self-discovery, and societal pressures around beauty and behavior. It includes dialogue reflecting an uncomfortable encounter with an older relative and reflections on womanhood, identity, and emotional growth. The layout matches the first page, black text on a white sheet. Text reads: “You really grew up,” he said. “The boys must be going crazy over this one. Makes me wish I was your age again.” She smiled an uncomfortable grin but said nothing. Neither did anyone else. They only shifted between each other, very aware of the implication he made. Her mother quickly urged her to play with the other cousins elsewhere, but before she could walk out of earshot she heard her mother say words she’d never been allowed to say herself. She wasn’t allowed at her uncle’s anymore, and it wasn’t until many years later when she finally made the connection. There is no right way to grow. When she’s grown she will know all the things she did not know at thirteen, and she will wish she still didn’t. At twenty, she plays her life in her mind like a nursery rhyme. a is for adderall in a bottle not prescribed to me. b is for bed which i have not made. c is for calorie which I pretend that I am counting. Never has she felt to be made of so many layers. This is the phase for creating personalities. Alone, she is ubiquitous. She talks aloud to herself. She wears the clothes she likes but would never wear in public. She dances to the fridge and slides back to the couch on her socks. She yells; she calls herself an idiot, and then laughs. She takes long showers and longer baths. She touches herself and lets her body move freely. She cries. She screams. She lets herself feel sad and lonely. Her emotions are freely flowing and unashamed. Who she is, what she feels are singular beings existing together in harmony. She sees her private life like a beautifully structured diorama. In the kitchen, a pan sits on the stove with an immaculately garnished meal, steaming and ready to be eaten. A bottle of red, a cork, and a sparkling glass glints against the kitchen counter, waiting to be filled, then emptied, then filled again. The living room lays dimly lit in comfortable shadows of lit candle wick flickers. Slippers next to the coffee table. Throw draped over the couch. Player spinning records. She illuminates it all with soft golden light and warm tones. Panning into the bathroom, a tub sits filled and topped off with fizzing bubbles. Candles are lit around its edge, a structure of perfection and potential: a charming model fit for her ideal self. Oh, to marry rich and live this way forever, she thinks. I would make a great housewife, is something she tells herself jokingly, but beauty fades and this reality exists nowhere but here. At work, she reinvents herself. She is precise, cautious. Her hair remains strictly pinned away from her face. The ponytail pulled taut, an at-home face lift, her mom called it. She knots her shoe laces so tightly they leave impressions on the top of her feet. A mantra: leave no room for error. “Hey hun,” said a head popping over the counter. “A few waitstaff and some guys from the kitchen are going out for drinks later. You wanna join?” She is tempted to say yes. She genuinely enjoys her coworkers and their endearingness makes her sometimes regret avoiding being the slightest bit personable around them. Your therapist is right, she thinks, if you would just act like a real person you could make actual connections with people. Her coworker has always been the sweetest, once picking up her shift when she had the flu. This woman was older and softer. Her hair was never down either, but pulled into a neat, tight bun at the back of her head. If not for a few flyaway strands around her face, you would think she was bald. The hopeful, wrinkled smile across the woman’s face almost pulls a yes from her mouth, but she catches it between her teeth. “I can’t tonight,” she says, “but you guys have fun.” She left it at that and bussed another table.
A photograph of the third and final page of “Portrait of a Woman” by Reace Dedon. The prose describes the woman’s early adulthood, her internal monologues, emotional conflicts, and the performance of femininity in professional and social contexts. The text reflects on identity, self-loathing, and societal expectation. The document appears in standard academic formatting with black serif text on a white background. Text reads: She must constantly remind herself that at work she does not have a personal life. She does not have a home. She does not have a family. She does not have a partner. She does not sleep. She does not eat. She is born at 7am and dies at 5pm, living only for the shift. Her hourly wage constitutes no more and no less. At night, out with friends, she is an imprint of a single emotion. She compacts herself into one dimension, a silicone mold of an empty human. She loathes this person, this shell of a human who she believes is less of herself than any of her other forms. But somewhere dark and unopened, she knows this version is unbearably herself as much as every other version. And when the night is over, and she is alone again, she dreams of when she can throw this person, who she so fiercely denies is her, away. She lives with at least two inner monologues at all times: a solid voice and a distorted echo of the first. She gives her time to those who demand it but do not deserve it. She falls in love with attention before she learns to hate it. At twenty, she loses herself to others and to the dimensions she divides herself into.