As a lifetime owner of society’s manual on womanhood, I have several questions and objections. 

Apparently, in order to be a woman, we must subscribe to a bountiful basket of paradoxical expectations. We must be successful and ambitious, but never break the glass ceiling. Sexy and seductive, but not too much or they’ll call you a slut. Too little and they’ll call you a prude. Don’t be too opinionated or you’ll be labeled as aggressive and angry; too quiet, you’re mousy and dim. If your skin wrinkles, you’re unattractive. If you get filler, you’re vain. You don’t want children? You’re selfish! You want 10? What a slap to the face of feminism and all our grandmothers fought tooth and nail for! Can women do anything without being scrutinized and judged? There is seemingly no right answer or way of being that satisfies the hive. And, I don’t just mean men (although, most definitely men). It is societally ingrained in even the most progressive women, from the moment they are born until the day they die. Be quiet. Put everyone else first. Make sure dinner is ready. Never ask for help. You should smile more. Keep sweet. 

Why have we normalized such bizarre contradictions? Somewhere along the line did we mistake cultural ideals with natural order? Women are supposedly “naturally” nurturing. Naturally better caregivers and parents. Naturally more emotionally erratic (this one truly boggles my mind because, like, have you met men?). None of this is inherently oppressive or even entirely untrue. It’s absolutely true of some women. Some is not all. It follows, then, at what point does the line between instinct and instruction lie? From a logical perspective, if patriarchy was the natural order of things, then why must it be so strictly enforced? Isn’t the natural order of things supposed to just… be? Why does society have to fight so hard to keep women in line if they are so naturally predisposed to bend the knee. It all seems wildly misaligned and dripping with hypocrisy. 

Women, and perhaps more specifically girls, are fed a version of womanhood far before they are old enough to question any of the validity of it. The girl-teenager-pretty young woman-girlfriend-wife-mother pipeline is present in everything that surrounds us. It’s in the movies we watch; the toys we buy for our daughters; the conversations we have and the books we read. All you have to do is read between the lines a little to see the grey area steeped in toxic and perpetual conditioning. Sometimes you don’t even need to infer, it’s there on the page, plain as day. Personally, I am fantastic with children. I love them. I have never really wanted any of my own; or, at least, it has never been a top priority in any regard. When I was a child, anytime I was asked about “if I was excited to grow up to be a mommy,” which is ludicrous to ask a child from my perspective, I would say I didn’t want to be one. This answer was repeatedly met with “just wait, you’ll change your mind.” Now, as an adult, “but you’d be such a great mom!” and “motherhood is a quintessential female experience!” Motherhood, and by way of that, pregnancy, is an exceptional feat and, I’m sure, a magical experience. Still don’t have any lifelong aspirations towards the idea. 

I have spent an obscene amount of money over the span of my life on running after unachievable beauty standards. Hair. Nails. Skin. Lips. Lashes. Unfortunately you cannot poke, prod, wax, laser, pick, and exfoliate away the fact that you are a human. The beauty industry makes a pretty penny by knocking women down and throwing a lasso of lies to pull them back up. Have any of the creams you’ve bought really erased your pores? I would, confidently in fact, put money on no. I will die on the hill that Korean skincare is a worthwhile investment, though. Maybe that’s my own conditioning talking. I have had my skin chemically burnt off, my hair ripped out by the roots, my hands sat under a UV lamp until they burn, syringes full of toxins poked into my face, squeezed myself into corsets that reconfigure my internal organs, and all kinds of other dastardly and painful things, every two weeks to three months for as long as I can remember. For who, me? Well, yeah. But who told me that equaled beauty? Why do I, even as progressive and feminist as I am, so strictly participate in a regimen of self-inflicted torture that costs me thousands. Why do you? The world isn’t going to stop spinning if you don’t have a BIAB manicure. Just food for thought. 

Historically, womanhood has been judged on a scale based off subservience and ability to demurely fade into the background. We were, and are, used as scapegoats for any number of mankind’s failures from the dishes in the sink to the declining birth rate. Expected to dirty our knees only at patriarchy’s holy altar and evaporate into everyone else’s needs in order to evidence our agreeability. Women across the world are treated as secondary. Opportunities stolen, dreams dashed, education forbidden; just because of the space between their legs. We call our Earth mother. Look how we have treated her. To be a woman is to be publicly crucified for every choice you make or don’t make. There is no right answer. Many a brilliant mind has been lost in the shadows of time on account of the breasts attached to the body that houses the brain. Half the world’s voices perpetually domesticated through hearing that’s not very ladylike, until eventually they are snuffed to a choked whisper. And then, of course, there is the Matilda Effect. We’ve spent centuries being told that a woman’s place is in the home and a step behind. Luckily, some of the furniture has changed. However, I’m not so sure about the architecture.

I have many times in my life been referred to as “not feminine.” Sometimes by men. Sometimes by women. Maybe it’s because I like bourbon. Or cutoff jean shorts and sneakers. Or the occasional cigarette, or that I have a foul mouth. Perhaps I don’t wear enough pink, have too many tattoos, or speak my mind too clearly. If you were to look at me with the picture I have painted for you, next to a girl in a satin pink dress with her hair in curls, would you think of her as more of a woman? If so, why? When did girly equate to womanhood? Seems like a bunch of bullshit to me. I wear skirts sometimes. Sometimes I curl my hair and wear pink. I spend the thousands chasing the beauty standards I pointed out previously, and I have a wedding-centric Pinterest board, too. I am not arguing that being girly, enjoying domestic tasks, yearning for motherhood or to be a wife, or anything of the sort is wrong. I simply beg the question: why must we assume that there is an accurate method to being a woman? Some women want all of what I have just mentioned. Some want only some of it. And some don’t want anything to do with any of it at all. Who are we to judge, or question, or even really care? Who gets to decide what a woman should be? Certainly not a hive mind.

So, as for the manual on womanhood. I suppose I’ll keep reading it. I will continue to reject and question a lot of it, though. And I always reserve the right to change my mind. 

I would imagine that’s the point. I don’t reject the menu. I’d just like to order for myself. 

Maybe you won’t like my cup of tea. 

That’s ok. 

Order your own. 

I’ll drink mine next to you. 

Xo, R.