My forehead is sexy, damnit!

I have a large forehead. Not huge like from the movie Mask, but large enough. It's like when God finished putting me together he had an extra forehead left over (you know...like those few extra screws left over when you put together a piece of Ikea furniture?), didn't know what to do with it, and just slapped it on top of the one I already had.  I was in high school in the eighties right when an E.F. Hutton Law commercial was very popular. The slogan was "when E.F. Hutton talks, people listen." Well, one of my "friends" decided that I should be graced with the name E.F., which stands for extra forehead. Nice. Needless to say I wore bangs for decades after. My dad always tried to make me feel better about this by saying "in Africa, a large forehead is a sign of intelligence." Okay, two things: we don't live in Africa so my forehead was just a big ass forehead, not a sign of intelligence, and I sucked at math AND science. My dad's logic was highly flawed. Now that I am an adult, I have embraced this abundance of forehead God cursed, I mean blessed, me with. I kind of don't have a choice since I have chosen to embrace my natural hair. This means that I no longer get my hair straightened and now have a very cute little afro. But this also means that my forehead shows. People don't make fun of my forehead now (that I know of).  But now Ethiopians come up to me all the time hugging me. Imagine the scene.  You're in a store and you feel the heat of a stranger's stare. Now, you're a born and raised Jersey girl, so gazes fixed on you too long illicit an immediate "you lookin' at me?" response, with full-on Jersey accent.  Then this person smiles and proceeds to hug you and speak to you in a language that you don't understand. After confirming that you aren't having a stroke and losing the ability to understand the English language, the conversation goes down like this:

     "How long have you been here?" stranger asks.

     "Been where?" you ask. 

     "Here, in the United States," stranger responds. 

     "Oh, I was born here."

     "No! You're Ethiopian!"

     "Bruh. I was born and raised in Jersey." 

     "No!"

     "Yup."

Then I always get this stinky side-eye from them like I'm trying to deny my true heritage. This happens at least 3 times a month. Seriously, though? I need a shirt that says "no, I am not Ethiopian." There's nothing wrong with Ethiopians, I just get tired of them all thinking I'm a traitor. I will admit that the people that come up to me thinking I'm Ethiopian have foreheads like mine....and keen noses like mine....and eyes....like....mine. Excuse me, will you? I'm going to go order one of those DNA tests everyone gets (and I'll hold off on the t-shirt idea until I get the results back).