If they won't let us be pretty let us be breathtaking:

Black Girl Chronicles ~ a factual written account of important or historical events that have occurred in said black girls life. 

My brother was born in 2002 to our mother a Ugandan and his Irish father which would leave him to be mixed race. I was over the moon to find out that I would have a sibling and was anticipating his birth, Peering into the crib I wondered why he was lighter in complexion,I was five and didn't understand that a product of black and white makes beige but none the less I was still happy to have a younger brother. 

I asked my mother about this and she laughed saying if I scrubbed harder when I took a bath I would soon become as brown as my brother. 

Some may say that this was the perfect time for her to give me a 'no baby girl you're perfect just the way you are' speech which she has given me time and time again but really it was just a way to make sure I knew how to clean myself. she would fully motivate me, 'OH! you look lighter! scrub harder you're almost there!' 

Later I realised that it was impossible and I was stuck with this dark skin. 

I remember praying once for God to make me lighter. 

At the age of five without knowing I was already trying to be like 'Ashley and Amber' already wanting a different complexion. At the age of five I wished for my hair to be blonde and my eyes to be blue. Are these things a five year old should be thinking about?   

Black females have been programmed to think that lighter is better,the more Caucasian the better,The longer the weave the better.

Now don't get me wrong Erica loves her some good weave but really it doesn't compare to my own NATURAL hair. 

God made our skin dark like the earth which grows vegetation, dark like the night sky without it the stars wouldn't be seen,Our hair coarse as the wool of a lamb, Isn't God a shepherd? Why are we not proud of who we are? Can we stop trying to replicate others and look like ourselves?

I was lucky enough to grow up in a house where I was told continuously that I was beautiful just the way I was,but not everyone is as lucky as I am. One day I hope that young black girls will grow up to see themselves as queens to appreciate their skin tone,their curly hair,their deep brown eyes and their full lips All humans have these things yet black females are told that we aren't ''pretty'' What is pretty?  

If they won't let us be pretty let us be breathtaking. 

''You can't eat beauty,You can't rely on the way you look to sustain you,what actually sustains us what is fundamentally beautiful is compassion for yourself and those around you that kind of beauty inflames the heart and enchants the soul. I hope one day you will feel the validation of your external beauty but also get to the deeper business of being beautiful inside.''                                                          ~ Lupita Nyong'o