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Friday, December 19, 2003
ILOVXS
That’s Southern California. Driving down the street on a gorgeous sunny day in December and seeing a Lexus SUV with an American flag decal, and a license plate that reads ILOVXS.
Ah, what would life be like if there were nothing to complain about? Nothing to rail against, or feel slighted or dehumanized by? After all, to be happy is to be complacent, to risk being an unsuspecting dope. For so long I have derived satisfaction out of healthy cynicism toward everything. When you’re a cynic, you’re never taken by surprise. If you only expect the worse, you’ll never be disappointed.
Woke up at the crack of dawn today, 6:55 on a Saturday, on all counts a considerable, masochistic crack that should never be experienced by anyone, much less me, for any reason other than rolling over and going back to sleep. Screwed in contacts, munched breakfast cereal, picked up my friend to go surfing. Arrived at beach, all longboarders, sure to be a fun time for me and my 6’6”. I almost paddle out without getting my hair wet, but my poor timing saves me from missing out on the exhilaration of hypothermia.
I actually saw a surfer in a Santa suit today, no joke. And it wasn’t some crazy derelict who had stolen a board and was soggily paddling out past the break – it was a legitimate surfer, whose Santa suit was a legitimate wetsuit, which was even crazier. And he had a matching surfer Santa hat, to boot. Too bad I never saw him catch a wave, that would have been a trip.
What do you do on 2:15 on a Saturday when you only got six hours of sleep the night before? It’s too early to go to sleep, too late to go back to bed. Perhaps you go wash your car, which has two ash storms and five rainstorms in the process of forming limestone on its hood.
That’s Southern California. Driving down the street on a gorgeous sunny day in December and seeing a Lexus SUV with an American flag decal, and a license plate that reads ILOVXS.
Ah, what would life be like if there were nothing to complain about? Nothing to rail against, or feel slighted or dehumanized by? After all, to be happy is to be complacent, to risk being an unsuspecting dope. For so long I have derived satisfaction out of healthy cynicism toward everything. When you’re a cynic, you’re never taken by surprise. If you only expect the worse, you’ll never be disappointed.
Woke up at the crack of dawn today, 6:55 on a Saturday, on all counts a considerable, masochistic crack that should never be experienced by anyone, much less me, for any reason other than rolling over and going back to sleep. Screwed in contacts, munched breakfast cereal, picked up my friend to go surfing. Arrived at beach, all longboarders, sure to be a fun time for me and my 6’6”. I almost paddle out without getting my hair wet, but my poor timing saves me from missing out on the exhilaration of hypothermia.
I actually saw a surfer in a Santa suit today, no joke. And it wasn’t some crazy derelict who had stolen a board and was soggily paddling out past the break – it was a legitimate surfer, whose Santa suit was a legitimate wetsuit, which was even crazier. And he had a matching surfer Santa hat, to boot. Too bad I never saw him catch a wave, that would have been a trip.
What do you do on 2:15 on a Saturday when you only got six hours of sleep the night before? It’s too early to go to sleep, too late to go back to bed. Perhaps you go wash your car, which has two ash storms and five rainstorms in the process of forming limestone on its hood.
Thursday, December 18, 2003
My baby hates me. This is the most ornery, colicky, spoiled offspring that has ever sprung its ornery, colicky, spoiled self from my body. I prefer to think it came out of my forehead, as Athena from Zeus. Except she was the goddess of wisdom, and my baby surely belongs in some underworld of truly cranky and uncooperative progeny.
My baby has an identity crisis. In fact, my baby has been having an identity crisis for a long time. At first I thought it was just being a little bit picky about its appearance, but then I realized it was having drastic second thoughts about existing substantially in the same form at all. It’s driving me nuts.
Here’s the problem: I am submitting my baby to a magazine that once did an issue, a whole issue, on gay people. I am straight. I have no problem with gay people. But I am very, very straight. Secondly, this magazine is a feminist magazine. Will they run an article in which I admit that the only reason I get a Brazilian wax is because my boyfriend prefers it that way? The only reason, I tell you! Believe me, I have racked my brains for any respectable reason why I might be performing this monthly act of masochism, and I cannot think of anything else. It’s not in solidarity with ancient Greek women (who used to singe their pubes by lamp). It’s not because I heartily embrace it as part of what it means to me to be a woman. Because honestly, how could I say that with a straight face. I’m sorry, people who say that are bimbos who believe every piece of crap beauty mags try to sell them. There, I said it. That is how I truly feel. And I can say this! Because I didn’t hear about it in Cosmo! No, thankfully, it was my boyfriend who informed me of the extent of my backwardness. My God woman, how can you countenance such shrubbery? – Who knew I was such a drastically hairy being? Shouldn’t there be public service announcements about this or something? And it’s not that I truly am a hairy being. I’ve been to the lockers at the yoga studio. I’m normal, I tell you! He’s the sicko! But what is “normal” these days? Is normal what you read about in Glamour or is normal what everyone you know is doing? What if they are completely at odds?
Second thoughts about being very, very straight. I just filled out a survey today voting in favor of gay marriages for the Family Life Organization or some such nonsense. Maybe I feel very, very straight because I watched too much E! today. Maybe it’s because my roommate gets Glamour, Marie Claire, People and Vanity Fair, to add to my occasional Jane or US (I swear, it only happened once!). Normally I would never call myself that. But I feel very, very straight when all I can come up with as a reason for tearing out my ass hairs once a month is that my boyfriend likes it.
I mean, how else can you really talk about it, except as a consequence of gender relations? It’s not like women decided to do this all on their own. By contrast, it’s very clearly the result of the White Male Oppressor, may God smite thee and thy irksome preoccupation with penis size. Sure, we decide to do it. But we decide to do it because they like it that way. Why do they like it that way? It’s a mystery to me. Where, in the beginning of time, did men develop a genetic predilection for unhairy women? It must have started somewhere. Perhaps it’s just to emphasize the differences between us. Men are hairy apes, thus women must be silken sylphs. We’ll all get along better that way, right? And over time, it has become embedded in our definitions of ‘male’ and ‘female,’ such that the trait has become genderized: hairy= male, not hairy = female. Nevermind that both men and women have hair and that it hurts like a mother to remove it. Besides being a pain in the ass, LITERALLY!
I really had to say that. But it doesn’t solve my problem. I still need to figure out how to write an article for a feminist magazine. And judging from the newsstand contingent of women’s interest magazines, I am pretty feminist. At least I’m not hooting about how the Brazo has improved my sex life. Because that would be a lie. It’s like wearing sexy lingerie. It’s a thrill for the two minutes he can see it, but once the lights are off, what difference does it really make? I’d be hard-pressed to find one. And then you just feel silly for spending so much money on something so girly. Well that’s me anyway. And I will never be caught dead in any lingerie that is pink or has feathers, I can tell you that much.
So. In a magazine that publishes first-person stories about women, how do I write an article about hair removal and avoid talking about my boyfriend? I’m convinced that my baby is made for the magazine, so don’t even ask me about that. I’ve read the magazine, I love it, and if I read it and loved it there must be other readers like me. Right? Right? Should I just own up to the fact that I have a boyfriend and go into the whole steamy sequence of events in which he introduced me to this extent of depilation? I say steamy because we were in the Guatemalan jungle, you ninny, don’t get all excited. But there it is: I recognize the reason I do it – I’m just ashamed to admit it. I have undergone this entire quest to justify something I cannot justify. I am completely ashamed that I, a self-respecting, sometime feminist, continue to do this. Because I think it’s bullshit. I think it’s offensive. I think it’s ridiculous. I think all women who do it are fools!!!
The healthy sarcasm of my article is constantly undercut by the pathetic fact that I engage in the very act I excoriate. You know what, I am tired of trying to fit the facts of my reality within my boyfriend’s worldview. They just don’t match up. It’s like a Cinderella slipper on a New York street. The proverbial round peg, the square hole. Different universes. And yet, if I am to date him, I must somehow contort my vision enough to see straight in his cockeyed world. Won’t he find me unattractive if I don’t do it? What do I think of a man who no longer finds me attractive if I don’t rip, strip and clip an inch in every direction? What do I think of a feminist who doesn’t take me seriously because I have a boyfriend? I think it’s time to find out.
***
The 2 a.m. Notes: baby still hates me. all my editing is only making the article worse. at end of rope. too depressing to contemplate further. perhaps the solution will magically come to me in dreams.
My baby has an identity crisis. In fact, my baby has been having an identity crisis for a long time. At first I thought it was just being a little bit picky about its appearance, but then I realized it was having drastic second thoughts about existing substantially in the same form at all. It’s driving me nuts.
Here’s the problem: I am submitting my baby to a magazine that once did an issue, a whole issue, on gay people. I am straight. I have no problem with gay people. But I am very, very straight. Secondly, this magazine is a feminist magazine. Will they run an article in which I admit that the only reason I get a Brazilian wax is because my boyfriend prefers it that way? The only reason, I tell you! Believe me, I have racked my brains for any respectable reason why I might be performing this monthly act of masochism, and I cannot think of anything else. It’s not in solidarity with ancient Greek women (who used to singe their pubes by lamp). It’s not because I heartily embrace it as part of what it means to me to be a woman. Because honestly, how could I say that with a straight face. I’m sorry, people who say that are bimbos who believe every piece of crap beauty mags try to sell them. There, I said it. That is how I truly feel. And I can say this! Because I didn’t hear about it in Cosmo! No, thankfully, it was my boyfriend who informed me of the extent of my backwardness. My God woman, how can you countenance such shrubbery? – Who knew I was such a drastically hairy being? Shouldn’t there be public service announcements about this or something? And it’s not that I truly am a hairy being. I’ve been to the lockers at the yoga studio. I’m normal, I tell you! He’s the sicko! But what is “normal” these days? Is normal what you read about in Glamour or is normal what everyone you know is doing? What if they are completely at odds?
Second thoughts about being very, very straight. I just filled out a survey today voting in favor of gay marriages for the Family Life Organization or some such nonsense. Maybe I feel very, very straight because I watched too much E! today. Maybe it’s because my roommate gets Glamour, Marie Claire, People and Vanity Fair, to add to my occasional Jane or US (I swear, it only happened once!). Normally I would never call myself that. But I feel very, very straight when all I can come up with as a reason for tearing out my ass hairs once a month is that my boyfriend likes it.
I mean, how else can you really talk about it, except as a consequence of gender relations? It’s not like women decided to do this all on their own. By contrast, it’s very clearly the result of the White Male Oppressor, may God smite thee and thy irksome preoccupation with penis size. Sure, we decide to do it. But we decide to do it because they like it that way. Why do they like it that way? It’s a mystery to me. Where, in the beginning of time, did men develop a genetic predilection for unhairy women? It must have started somewhere. Perhaps it’s just to emphasize the differences between us. Men are hairy apes, thus women must be silken sylphs. We’ll all get along better that way, right? And over time, it has become embedded in our definitions of ‘male’ and ‘female,’ such that the trait has become genderized: hairy= male, not hairy = female. Nevermind that both men and women have hair and that it hurts like a mother to remove it. Besides being a pain in the ass, LITERALLY!
I really had to say that. But it doesn’t solve my problem. I still need to figure out how to write an article for a feminist magazine. And judging from the newsstand contingent of women’s interest magazines, I am pretty feminist. At least I’m not hooting about how the Brazo has improved my sex life. Because that would be a lie. It’s like wearing sexy lingerie. It’s a thrill for the two minutes he can see it, but once the lights are off, what difference does it really make? I’d be hard-pressed to find one. And then you just feel silly for spending so much money on something so girly. Well that’s me anyway. And I will never be caught dead in any lingerie that is pink or has feathers, I can tell you that much.
So. In a magazine that publishes first-person stories about women, how do I write an article about hair removal and avoid talking about my boyfriend? I’m convinced that my baby is made for the magazine, so don’t even ask me about that. I’ve read the magazine, I love it, and if I read it and loved it there must be other readers like me. Right? Right? Should I just own up to the fact that I have a boyfriend and go into the whole steamy sequence of events in which he introduced me to this extent of depilation? I say steamy because we were in the Guatemalan jungle, you ninny, don’t get all excited. But there it is: I recognize the reason I do it – I’m just ashamed to admit it. I have undergone this entire quest to justify something I cannot justify. I am completely ashamed that I, a self-respecting, sometime feminist, continue to do this. Because I think it’s bullshit. I think it’s offensive. I think it’s ridiculous. I think all women who do it are fools!!!
The healthy sarcasm of my article is constantly undercut by the pathetic fact that I engage in the very act I excoriate. You know what, I am tired of trying to fit the facts of my reality within my boyfriend’s worldview. They just don’t match up. It’s like a Cinderella slipper on a New York street. The proverbial round peg, the square hole. Different universes. And yet, if I am to date him, I must somehow contort my vision enough to see straight in his cockeyed world. Won’t he find me unattractive if I don’t do it? What do I think of a man who no longer finds me attractive if I don’t rip, strip and clip an inch in every direction? What do I think of a feminist who doesn’t take me seriously because I have a boyfriend? I think it’s time to find out.
***
The 2 a.m. Notes: baby still hates me. all my editing is only making the article worse. at end of rope. too depressing to contemplate further. perhaps the solution will magically come to me in dreams.
