I almost painted my fingernails yesterday. They are long right now, and they’d look good with some polish. I can’t remember the last time I painted them. I have long, masculine fingers – my grandma’s – and they look better (more feminine?) when my nails are longer, but long nails are a distraction. They get in the way when typing or gardening, which is a bummer, because my nails are hard and they are nice. I tried to decide what color. We don’t have a lot of polish in the house. Jen has a couple favorite colors – white, gold and another white. I think.
I was wanting a red or a corral. I don’t know where this came from. But then I thought, people will notice because I never paint my nails. And, ugh, they’ll say something, and I’ll feel the need to defend my choice to paint my nails and why I picked the color I picked, and why I don’t normally paint my nails.
I thought of women who change their hair color or handbag or get a tattoo, and don’t seem to have a care in the world about whether anyone comments, and how freeing that must be. Or, most likely, they do care, but they don’t let that stop them.
And then I got tired, which reminded me of what it’s like to be in The Land of Pink.
Look at that sweet baby girl. Or is it a boy. Hard to tell when they are new. They smell the same. They act the same. They cry when they are hungry or they need to be changed. They cry when they are tired. That’s pretty much it.
Until well-meaning parents get involved and suddenly gender is projected on to this being that only cares about sleeping and eating and being comfortable. The Big Ones coo and smile and comment on appearance when they change diapers. “Oh, your soooo cute.” Their hearts are in the right place, but Bigs start to treat the girls and boys differently. They can’t help it. It’s in their genetic coding.
Baby girls are cute for different reasons than baby boys are.
Baby slowly starts to make a connection between her appearance and the mood of the Bigs.
Babies aren’t dumb. It doesn’t take them long to connect dots. Happy Big = more squash. If I coo or smile at Big, Big is happy, then I get squash.
Before she knows it, she has to be careful about not getting mashed peas on her pretty dress. She mustn’t get squash in her hair. She doesn’t care about her hair, she cares about fists full of food. Pretty soon, though, it takes more than a smile to make Big happy. Big likes it when we are cute or clean or quiet. If we do those things, we get more squash.
Now she’s old enough to toddle around in the yard. She’s amazed at where her legs will take her. She doesn’t care what’s on her legs as long as it isn’t itchy. This Disney Princess dress is itchy. She reaches for a fistful of mud and attempts to bring it to her mouth, but a Big tells her, “NO! Don’t eat that! That’s icky! Don’t get that on your pretty dress.”
It’s the first day of Kindergarten. Her tummy feels weird and her new clothes are itchy. She’s wearing a dress and she’s told that she probably better not go on the slide at the playground because the boys might look up her dress. Why do boys want to look up her dress? Whose idea was it to make her wear a dress today, anyway?
She’s no dummy. She can see that the teacher spends more time with certain kids – the cute ones. She notices that the cute ones are surrounded by more kids on the playground. What must she do to be cuter? She ponders this while sitting at a long, cold table, under florescent lights, eating a peanut butter and jelly that has been cut into quarters. She can’t wait to get home, get out of this dress and away from this need to be cute.
Years later, she’ll learn that the weird feeling in her tummy is called anxiety. Anxiety will become her life-long companion.
To be continued …
By the way, I cut my nails. It’s just easier, and I’m tired.