Speaking of Ithaca College, I periodically check their Intercom page and caught the announcement of the 2006 presentation of WomenSpeak. This year's theme is Women and Beauty.
This isn't normally the kind of thing I would be likely to pick to sign up to speak on. The one time I did present at WomenSpeak the topic was Women and Nature (I believe). I probably spent more time on that short artistic presentation than I ever had on a long academic one. I really enjoyed it.
But that was Women and Nature.
Women and Beauty? Beauty is not high on my priority list.
Which may be a very good reason to examine...why? There is a a stereotype of the dumpy cat lady. And you know, it is a stereotype with some truth in it (as I sit here in yesterday's slacks, a fur-covered blue sweatshirt emblazoned with the Colorado Association of Animal Control Officer's logo, and, I admit, I failed to take a shower today). I have seen dollars that I used to spend carefully at the sale rack of the Bon Ton buying work clothes get siphoned into cat rescue.
I've seen my diet run toward McDonald's because, after all, I'm catching cats on a fast food strip. When you destroy your nice clothes crawling under a trailer...well...you stop wearing nice clothes. You stop eating at the table, and choose food that is best consumed from bowls on the couch.
Now that I telecommute and the time requirements of my job are also more demanding, I find that the checks and balances of personal neatness have vanished. There is no one to see me, so if I choose to be neatly dressed, it is entirely to please myself and my husband. I don't have to take a shower by 7:00 am...I can take it at noon, or in the evening or even (gasp) skip a day. Dress clothes are uncomfortable when you are plopped in front of a computer all day so my chosen wardrobe is....soft and dumpy. Clothes that are perfectly good but sat in the drawer unused because they were unattractive, are now worn. Who is going to see them?
I will always remember the afternoon this summer when I realized I needed cat litter and jumped into the truck, drove to the local store, jumped out of the truck...and realized I was wearing short (soft and warm but quite silly) wool socks decorated with tiny yarn poodles with tinier yarn floppy ears. They were amusing at home, but appalling in public. I stripped off my poodles in the parking lot and slipped my sneakers back on, sans socks.
At what point will I jump out of the truck, look down at my poodles, and think instead, "What the hell?" and leave them? Will people look at my poodles and think "Busy telecommuter?" Or "crazy cat lady?" Even my sloppy sockless state could be considered sliding toward the cat lady stereotype.
At the party last night I ran into an administrator who mentioned she was now neighbors with a former student who knew me in Biology (at the height of my cat rescue frenzy, probably during the Kitten Year from Hell). Martha told her I used to work in the Provost's office, in skirts, pant suits, and heels. I understand the graduate expressed astonishment.
What is beauty? Why do we aspire to it? Why do we sometimes give up on it? What makes us scrabble at fragments of beauty. To whom does it matter? Ourselves, or our perception of ourselves?
In Rome, cat women are titled gattare and I am as of yet not able to determine if it is a title of respect, ridicule, or cultural romance. But when I first heard it, I thought "How beautiful." The dumpy ladies of my imagining instantly became more beautiful to my mind's eye because they were in Rome, and were called "gattare." I always thought gato and gatti were beautiful words. To find the term associated with the women who care for them...well. How beautiful.
(anyone remember Don Gato? Come on now, sing along in your mind... The words were silly, but the music was oh-so-poignant).
Any thoughts, cat folk? About beauty and cat ladies?
3 comments:
For me, the advertising phrase "the natural look" has always set my teeth on edge, because they are always hawking makeup. I am often complimented on my skin and get asked "So what do you do with it? What products do you use?" I use nothing but a lot of hot water and the occasional soap. As soon as I use any form of makeup, my skin breaks out horribly. So I have that "natural look"- the looks I was born with, and that's fine with me.
As for fashion, I decided years and years ago I wasn't going to wear anything that hurt or itched. So I wear a lot of T-shirts and men's lounge pants (they have pockets!). And I have 5 cats and a dog, and I'm proud to wear their fur.
Frankly, I think I'm beautiful enough. What's on the inside is so much more important. A big smile and confidence are the best accessories any human can have. But then, with a name like Georg, I'm a wee accustomed to bucking social conventions. And why yes, I did go to Wells. I am more interested in who I am than what I look like. And I simply don't want to waste my time wondering what others think of me or my looks.
I do dress up for special occassions though. I'll even duct tape really quick before I walk out the door to collect fur. :) But I don't do makeup.
To be gaunt and clad in expensive clothes, impractical shoes, tons o' makeup, plus surgery for enhanced breasts, reduced wrinkle lines make me conclude today's standards of beauty are completely unrealistic and painful. I don't adhear to them at all.
Due to my job as a non-traditional full-time student, most of my days are spent in my PJs. I work at my computer, sit and read at my desk with no one but The Beasts to see me. Each morning I run down to the post office, still in my PJs, unshowered and if my fellow town residents say anything about my attire, I have no idea of it, nor do I care.
There are times I dress up--wedding, funerals, other important transitions, but for the most part "dressing up" means a nice pair of jeans and a sweater or blouse. And like georg, I'm always covered in fur, no matter how hard I try to keep my "nice clothes" fur free.
I'm envisioning a t-shirt with a dog and a cat and lots of loose hair flying around, with the caption "Proud to Wear Fur"
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