As I tossed the smoldering Hallmark card into my kitchen sink, I thought back to that crazy girl K told me about.
Does this make me crazy, I wondered, as I watched the flames eat away at the image of Sleeping Beauty that adorned the front of the card. Certainly not. K’s crazy girlfriend set things on fire to prove a point to K, I rationalized, while I am burning this card to prove one to myself.
The card curled and crumbled into an unseemly mess and I found myself wondering what would happen to Sleeping Beauty now that her beauty was gone. Would the prince still want to kiss her? Would she sink into obscurity because, to paraphrase some feminist scholar, every woman knows that she is an unspeakable failure if she is not beautiful?
I doused the remaining flames.
……….
The next morning there was no trace of the Hallmark card. Does this make me crazy?
(Several years later I would hear the story of a burn victim who walked into a plastic surgeon’s office and fell in love with the doctor, who worked painstakingly on making her beautiful. Once he succeeded, he, too, fell in love.)
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