"I just want my kids to have a tree."

It was tradition in our house to get our tree two weeks before Christmas, and spend an evening decorating it together as a family, sipping hot cocoa and singing carols. 

But when I was five, it was Christmas Eve, and we still didn't have a tree yet. This was when I first discovered my family was poor. 

That Christmas Eve, my mom begged my proud father to ask his friend for a tree, any tree. The friend sold them in our small town, and surely would let my dad have one with a promise to repay him once business picked up again. 

Faced with disappointing his wife and children, my dad went to do something he had never in his life done before, ask for a handout. 

I tagged along, being a Daddy's girl. He firmly told me to stay in the truck, and I watched for a minute as my dad made small talk. I rolled the window down a crack, then an inch. 

"Please, just for my kids. The ugliest, smallest tree you have, I just want my kids to have a tree." My dad couldn't look his childhood friend in the eyes. 

The friend came over to the truck and opened my door. I was afraid I'd been caught eavesdropping. "Go pick a tree honey, any tree you want!" 

Being five, I picked the largest one there. 

We left, got home and put the tree up. As we started our traditional decorating, there was a knock on the door. 

A neighbor dropping off an extra ham they had in their freezer and said Merry Christmas. Another knock, this time it was handmade hats and mittens. Another knock, another neighbor. This continued well after us kids had gone to bed. 

Christmas morning, I was the first to get up, so I snuck downstairs to see if Santa had come. I found my father sitting at the foot of our Christmas tree, crying. The room was full of gifts, some wrapped, some not, each one labelled. 

I sat in my dad's lap, unable to understand how he could possibly be crying. 

"I asked God for a miracle, instead He gave us great neighbors, and a great town."

Thirty years later, my husband still can't understand why I cannot pass a Toys for Tots bin without donating.

"You're not going to get anywhere in life."

All my life, I knew that I didn't have the same religious beliefs my family had, but they never made it an issue.

Then one day in history class we were talking about different religions. When it came time to talk about atheism, I spoke up and shared my experience. 

My teacher got mad and told me, "If you don't believe in God, you're not going to get anywhere in life." 

It really hurt. I left school and stayed home for the rest of the week. 

"I'm going to make sure my grandbaby isn't going to hell."

I started dating my now-fiancé when I was 16, and his mother hated me from the start. She has said many hurtful things over the years, but one in particular sticks with me. We were barbecuing at my fiancé's house, and he went inside to help his dad, leaving me alone outside with his mom.

Ever since I told her that I'm agnostic, she's always gone on about how I'm going to hell. But that night she brought up children and baptism. I told her that I would not be baptizing my child because I believe it's a choice to be left up to them. 

She put her hand on mine and said, "You won't be there, but I'm going to make sure my grandbaby isn't going to hell, too." 

I never told my fiancé what his mother said, but it makes me scared to have children.

Nurse.

After I lost my virginity, I contracted my first UTI. I had no idea what was wrong. Being raised Christian, I was convinced God was punishing me for having premarital sex.

I went to my mother in the middle of the night on my hands and knees, crying in pain and fear.

She forced me to pray while reading the Bible and asking God for forgiveness for two hours, while I was still in pain, before taking me to the hospital. 

My mother is a nurse.

"Why can't you be more like her?"

Growing up with a twin sister, I struggled with my identity. My sister was everything I was not, and no matter how hard I tried, I could never measure up to her. 

People constantly compared the two of us. She was always known as the "better" twin. I can recall multiple conversations where my mother would ask me, "Why can't you be more like her?" She would explain to me why others liked my sister more than they liked me, and that if i just tried to be more like her, they would like me too. 

One day I was sitting around a table with my sister and some friends at a church event. Our leader asked us a question, "Who do you think is the best person in here?"

Everyone voted, and my sister won. I went home and cried for hours. Why couldn't I be good enough? Why did everyone see me as less than her? 

That day I decided it was pointless to keep trying, and that I would simply never be good enough. I felt so alone living in her shadow, just hoping one day that I could shine. 

To this day, I still get asked the question "Why can't you be more like her?" 

Comparison is a terrible thing, and that is something I will always have to live with.
 

"We can't sit next to her. She might be a Muslim."

I always thought that a campus library was a place people go to study quietly. That's exactly what I was doing. I was sitting at a four person table with my math textbook and notebook in front of me, quickly and accurately working out and solving math equations. Three seats were unoccupied.

You saw me and said, "We can't sit next to her. She might be a Muslim."

I don't wear a hijab, but that doesn't make me any less Muslim than a woman who does. And, to clarify, I am actually half Muslim and half Hindu.

Regardless of those facts, so what if I'm Muslim?
Does my brown skin offend you?
Do my tattoos and long dark brown hair suggest something?
Why does me being a Muslim deter you from sharing a public space with me?
Why does me being Muslim bother you?
Does my lack of a hijab make you think that I am some radical form of Muslim?

I just wish to understand why my religion is an issue to you. I guess it just does not make any sense...especially because you never once said a word to me in your life, and because well...this is a library.

I'm doing math homework.
You probably want to do homework as well.
The table is not going to hurt you.
Neither will I, nor will my religion.

Virgin Mary

I've been sensitive and insecure for as long as I can remember. But I didn't know how sensitive and insecure I was until someone pointed out a flaw I didn't know I had. 

I was what they would call a "church girl." I went to as many church functions as possible and I absolutely loved my church family. I also had one simple promise I made to myself that meant a lot to me. I was going to stay a virgin until the night of my wedding. 

I had no idea that over half of the world did not share the same thing with me. I thought it was so common to be a virgin.

Until one day it started to be something that was used as an insult against me. I got called things like "Virgin Mary," "prude," "chastity belt". 

Being a virgin was no longer something to be proud of. It was just another thing for me to hate about myself.