It's a War, I Say

The truth is that it's hard to be a woman.  A co-worker and I were joking today that if men had to go through with half the stuff that we have to, the world would come screeching to a halt.  I don't actually believe that, but since I'm dealing with the monthly curse today (and it is a curse), I suspect that there might be some truth to it.

Apart from just the physical aspects, however, there is also the cultural aspects.  Dismiss me as a hysterical feminist if you wish, but nearly every culture has waged war against women, making it more and more difficult to embrace our authentic selves, to fully enjoy our femininity--however we choose to define it.  I have several examples, but we'll start with just one for today. You'll be seeing the other two in subsequent posts.

I ran across this news article this week and was appalled for a number of reasons, most of them probably fairly obvious.  The quest for youth and beauty isn't new, of course, nor is it limited just to women.  I couldn't help but notice that most of those quoted in the article, or shown in the slideshow, were women.  I can't count the number of articles I've read about modeling companies wanting younger and younger girls (and I do mean "girls") to capture the essence of youth.  Where before 25 seemed young, now it appears as though that's old-maidhood.  The fact that one woman in the article was 26 when she started getting "preventative" Botox treatments to prevent the formation of wrinkles seems rather obscene to me, particularly when you consider what Botox really is.  I don't know about anyone else, but I'd prefer not to have a dangerous toxin injected into my facial muscles in order to destroy all lines--and expression.

The fact is that I'm 28, and I've started seeing the fine lines and wrinkles that seem so abhorrent to our culture today.  And I can guaran-damn-tee that I won't be getting Botox, nor would I choose to get surgical enhancements.  As far as I can see, there are way too many ways to go wrong, and when it does go wrong, it goes really wrong.  The only way you can hide those results, at least on your face, is by walking around with a paper bag over your head, which is like wearing a big neon sign announcing that something has gone badly wrong.

Don't get me wrong.  I'm not saying that you shouldn't take care of yourself. I've heard that moisturizing can do wonders, and if you could see my maternal grandmother, you'd know that staying out of the sun can do a lot for you, too.  I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with wearing makeup, or plucking stray hairs, whatever conforms to your sense of beauty.  But the idea of trying to erase all signs of aging seems downright wrong.  We're human; we age.  Eventually, we die.

Call me crazy, but I think that we as women should embrace every line, wrinkle and gray hair. Why, you ask? How many women die before they can show any of those things? How many women's lives have ended early? How many women have been killed by breast cancer or other forms of cancer? How many women have been murdered?

In short, how many women would have loved the chance to see another gray hair or another line or wrinkle? How many loved ones would have adored the opportunity to see their mother or sister or daughter or wife or girlfriend simply age?  Why should we as women (and men!) feel pressured to "not give into" the signs of aging, when those very signs indicate that we have been given a precious gift of time.

To me, the very emphasis on erasing wrinkles at the expense of real human emotion, at erasing laugh lines that evidence the fact that we have lived and felt joy, says a lot about our culture, and none of it good.  In my opinion, it's time we embrace our own humanity again, and that of others.  It's time to reject a culture steeped in the sort of shallowness that would call on us to reject who we are, who we have been created to be, to erase all individuality and uniqueness.

Maybe, just maybe, it's time to learn how to love ourselves and our bodies, imperfections and all.