June 2000

Random Musings on Being a Chick

I saw the most interesting thing on the weekend. While I was rocking out to Sleater-Kinney on my power walk, there were a bunch of preteen girls on the other side of the canal, who appeared to be having an outdoor birthday party or something. It was the first nice day in June and these girls were set up in the back yard. I could hear them through my riot-grrl music because they were yelling and laughing and cheering constantly at all of the young men biking or rollerblading or running down the canal. When they saw one that they liked they would yell and then the courageous girls would follow him for a bit-- one girl kept trying to outrace bikes, if you can believe that. At one point an adult mom tried to contstrain them, but she gave up easily. There was no controlling this crazyass force composed of young female energy-- and belive me, I wanted to join them.

Last week I sat down to write my latest rant for this here website (seeming as I haven't produced anything new since bleeding February). I had written two-thirds of a miserably maudlin piece about how I wanted to stop hating my body and how resentful I was that being female was making me insecure. I was feeling suitably ranty and whingy but then I started to think a bit harder about the entire thing-- how it was my own stupid fault for internalizing a lot of crap from the media about what women should look like, and how none-- I repeat none-- of my boyfriends or lovers have ever complained about my looks or weight or height or anything. (Ha-- there's plenty of other stuff for them to complain about!). I put down my pen and I decided to focus on my blessings instead-- that I'm smart, sociable, and (oddly enough) wealthy. If my hips are a bit wider than the ideal, who really cares? Only myself.

We women beat ourselves up about a lot of stuff, especially our appearances. But if I'm standing in front of the mirror ten times a day to examine my rear view, what does that really say? That I'm victimized by the unrealistic body expectations played out in the media? That I have "issues" with my weight? OK, sure. But it also says that I'm choosing to be shallow and neurotic-- that I am waiting to be seen and judged, and, for that matter, rejected.

I'll be the first to admit that those girls on the canal were obnoxious, with their yelling and laughing. And to be frank, I don't exactly know how I would've felt if it was a group of preteen boys yelling at girls outside. But the fact of the matter was that there was something strangely admirable in their behaviour, in the way that they chose to take control. The fast running girl almost caught up to the bikes a few times. She wasn't waiting to be judged. She knew exactly what she wanted.