My Epicanthic Fold

For whatever reason, people often mistake me for having a non-Caucasian ethnic identity, when in fact my family, as far as I know, is as white as they come. Whenever anyone asks what my heritage is, I usually toss off the standard Irish-German-Scottish reply. However, there are people who are sometimes surprised by this as they thought I was Hawaiian or Puerto Rican (usually after some time spent in the tanning bed) or even Asian, which my boyfriend, whose family is originally from Hong Kong, thinks is hysterical. And my friends who have known me forever think it's funny too but hey, I don't make up the fact that people sometimes randomly ask me, "So, what are you"?

My guess is that usually these questions come because of the shape of my eyes, which have been described as almond-shaped or exotic, as my mom calls them. These eyes are one of the strongest genetic traits in my dad's family and while I was growing up in my small town, people were able to discern who my family was because of them. As for my own personal feelings about my eyes, I was always happy with the color but not necessarily the shape. I felt they lent to the feeling that I didn't fit the definition of what beautiful is (and sometimes these feelings still linger, which I continue to work through...). However, now that my father is no longer alive, I feel lucky that I have his eyes, as they are an everyday reminder of how proud I am to have been his daughter.



As is usual these days, I decided to put off doing school work tonight and do some research into whether or not I could put a name to these eyes of mine. It turns out I have an epicanthic fold, which according to Wikipedia, is a skin fold of the upper eyelid covering the inner corner of the eye. Although this trait is most commonly found in people of East Asian descent, interestingly enough many people of Slavic and Nordic descent have this fold as well. There was also a mention of the Saami reindeer herding tribes of Iceland...


So perhaps I will have to dig deeper into that family tree of mine someday and see what exactly I can find...

The World's Lamest Blogger

Has it really been two months since my last post? Sadly, yes. And I can't even say that it's been due to the complete and utter change to my life since August. While it's true that much has happened and I've been busy with school and work, I have still managed to waste quite a bit of time on Facebook, which as many others would agree, is quite addictive. One would think I would have been able to find one scrap of a moment to post about my excitement when the fall issue of Sephora's catalog arrived in my mailbox or about a thousand other little fun tidbits, but no. Behold, laziness at it's finest. And I would say that the fact I am posting right now has more to do with paper-writing procrastination than anything else...

What are the important events that have taken place since last I managed to write? Only the birth of my niece and the start of my new life as a graduate student, to name a few... But in my defense, I think both have been so monumental that I'm not even sure I could put my various thoughts and feelings into words that would make sense.

So perhaps, I will do a better job this time around... It remains to be seen.