Its Time To Let The Other Shoe Drop

There are women that, if given the ability, would buy every pair of shoes in the store if they could. Others, such as myself, would be drawn to only one particular pair. It doesn’t matter if its a red stiletto that screams sex or a pair of black square toed flats that might has well be standard issued at a nunnery. The point is that women have a chosen method of picking things they desire whether it be shoes or men. Either way, somewhere along the line you are going to wind up with a heel. 

I recently made the mistake of entering the heart-hazardous world of dating. Being a one shoe kind of gal the dating world is leaving me with nothing but blisters. It feels wrong somehow to go out with a man, exchange intimate details about one another’s lives, kiss and then somehow just go about your separate ways and begin the process again anew. I’m assured by friends that this is how its done and more importantly that this is how I find someone who is the perfect fit for me. No matter how hard they try to sell the process to me, in the end, it comes out sounding morally repugnant. 

In old black and white or technicolor films you never see Fred Astaire of Frank Sinatra lean into their dates, whisper sweet nothings into their ear and then disappear. No. Never. Granted, one doesn’t exactly expect men today to burst into a musical number the moment we answer the door for them or pick up the phone but you have to admit the romance is definitely gone in today’s society. Its not as though women have dropped the ball. We, from all accounts that I’ve seen and heard, are still out buying first date outfits, spending hours on our hair so that it will look just so, smiling beautifully even if we’re utterly exhausted and even sucking in for hours at a time just so that we can wear our “skinny jeans.” And for what? Its time to exhale ladies. Save your breath.

Since my last relationship I’ve been on dates with a few different men. None of which I can explain or rationalize post-date. Its not as though they aren’t interesting people in their own rite, its just that, in the shoe store analogy of things, they would be the half sizes. You know very well that you are a ten but for some reason you find yourself trying to walk out with a nine and a half, or worse yet, a ten and a half. One leaves you feeling cramped and uncomfortable and the other leaves you feeling loose. Believe you me, loose is a great sensation for a little while until before you know it you’ve lost your “sole.” You get the picture. In such I bide my time and wait for my own personal Cary Grant, minus his unfortunate choice of sexual orientation, to arrive. A man I won’t need to break in or worry about return policies on. I want an MGM technicolor come to life. I’m a woman desperately in need of something light, happy and romantic where I’m swept off my feet by a charming, caring gentleman who doesn't leave me feeling like the other shoe is going to drop at any moment. The downside? I don’t think he comes in my size.

Putting Things In Spinsterspective

In the South marriage and children are taught as stepping stones during a young girl’s life that without accomplishing make it seemingly impossible to continue the journey to adulthood and beyond. Without marriage and children one is considered incomplete as a woman. Its accepted knowledge on this side of the Mason-Dixon line that most are to marry in their early twenties. At thirty the stepping stones that, as girls, we are taught to reach for seem harder to find than a yankee at a Nascar race. Some find them. Some think they’ve found solid footing and then slip off faster than syrup on a hoecake. Others, simply give up or bide time with girlish hopes of china patterns and designing bridesmaid dresses. Personally, I’m partial to the women that face facts. Then again, thats probably because I am one of “those women.” I didn’t find my stepping stones and in such, at the fated age of twenty-nine, I am no closer to marriage or children than I am to understanding why its so all-mighty important here in the land of Civil War reenactments and Piggly Wiggly’s that anything with a uterus and a sufficient bank account be a member of the Junior League. 

You can cover them in eyelet and lace and let them serve you icebox cookies and lemonade all day but deep down in the heart of every cornbread loving Christian lady there lurks more judgement for the single girl than a Baptist preacher standing over a pew of sinners. We, the unmarried, are marked by our bare left ring finger. Although, at certain social functions this naked finger isn’t the one we wish we could thrust at people but rather the finger just to the right of it. Why? Married women have the unique ability to make situations unbearably uncomfortable for bachelorettes. Conversations centered around car seats, strollers and husband’s bosses either become increased in your presence, or worse, halted as they smile at you and inquire how your dating life is going. Because yes, thats always the topic one loves discussing at social gathering with relative groups of strangers. No. To be clear, there is no way to win on this subject of discussion. Either A, dating is incredibly successful. This means, at least in the bible belt, that you’ve met “the one” and pretty soon you’ll be able to join in on their witty repertoire regarding car seats. However, a girl must be careful on how enthusiastic she is regarding her successful dating or she will wind up regarded as the town tramp and treated like a social leper. The only other option is answer B, dating is not going well. This means that you are securing your social status as a spinster and once your back is turned the woman who just lovingly told you, “He’s out there somewhere, don’t you worry.” is going to shake her head and ask if anyone else noticed just how old your looking these days. This leaves you to linger by the punch bowl questioning your life choices and wondering just how many inches, and how long, it will take for your breasts to drop to your waist. 

There are certain social circles in which women have skipped the first stepping stone of marriage and leapt right into having children, however, in the land of sweet tea and honey butter biscuits this doesn’t win you any favors. However, you do get the gift of enjoying at least part of the two step process we are brought up to believe makes us complete as a woman. Even if it is just the latter half. You might say I’m like a bowl of cold grits. Socially, I’m no longer viewed as hot and “on the menu” but somewhere along the line someone might just warm me up. Who’s to say? I myself never felt comfortable with the concept of marriage and children making me complete as a woman, probably because the idea of my requiring a man for anything I needed in life infuriated me, but even now the concept still feels unjust. Perhaps it is true. I can understand where having a child would make you feel like more of a woman. I’m willing to even allow the idea of a man falling in love with me making me feel more like a woman. Its just the word “complete” that trips me up every time. Maybe its because I can’t reach those last two stepping stones on my journey to womanhood and that its no fault of my own. Either way, its like a plate of beignets without powdered sugar on top. Its just not right. 

The life of a bachelorette is exactly like that of a bachelor except for one key difference, just like they missed out on the humiliation of the training bra and the all night maxi pad they also escape free and clear from any social stigma. Rather than pitied bachelors are practically heralded and passed around as beacons of manhood and desirability to we unmarrieds. Amusing. The single man is considered more enticing than a sale on camo at Wal-Mart while the single woman is considered tragic. The Southern bachelorette fends for herself at parties and other social events. Holds her chin up at the office. She manages to attend countless bridal and baby showers not to mention the weddings and christenings that follow them. Some manage these socially harrowing tasks better than others, some end up crying in a darkened corner of a screen porch into their sweet tea, I myself do just fine. I’ve learned over time, and despite the scarlet S for spinster seemingly emblazoned across my chest wherever I go, that even though I’m not considered complete as a woman that I do consider myself complete as a person. I don’t need exact stepping stones to my life. I didn’t set that path, some hoop-skirted mammy raised society types did back in the days of chaperones and coming out balls. Dixieland be damned, I’m going to make my own trail. And if you don’t like it, you can kiss my grits!

The Girdle Hurdle

What is it about a diet that will drive educated woman relatively insane? In efforts, often futile, to tame and maintain the female form we are willing to try just about anything if it will take off that last ten pounds. Lemonade diet. Cabbage soup diet. Grapefruit diet. Hell, if you told certain women that they would knock off five pounds instantly  by simply soaking in a tub of pig urine for an hour I can almost guarantee they would be stripped down to their knickers and ready to hop in before you could say, “oink.” And why, oh why, do we treat fitting into our “skinny jeans” once again as though it were an event that should merit national attention on Fox News or CNN? What's led to this girdle hurdle? 

Once during college, in attempts to lose some of the weight accumulated by my late night ritual of cheese fries at Denny's, I tried the vegetable soup diet. I like soup. I like vegetables (granted I preferred them deep fried but thats beside the point). The diet seemed like a no-brainer. After five days of eating nothing but homemade vegetable soup (essentially watered down broth and a very specific list of veggies) the only thing I had lost was my self respect. I checked the mirror first thing every morning, certain that at least one of my three chins would be missing, but nothing ever changed. Aside from losing a few pounds of water weight, presumably from tears cried at the sight of others eating solid foods, the only change my fad diet gave me was an odd orange tint to my skin courtesy of the obscene amount of carrots in my system. Could I have gone to the university gym for a week and worked out to lose weight? Sure. But wheres the absurdity in that? I’d sooner drink nothing but water with lemon and cayenne pepper for three days. Which, amusingly enough, I did sometime later. 

Diets have more rituals than the Catholic church. The Pope himself would be impressed at the time and reverence certain women, including myself at times, hand over to the dieting gods. For example, the night before the diet starts there is always a last supper. This generally carb-laden artery stopping dinner is the female farewell to the foods she will no longer allow herself to eat in order to lose weight. Another ritual is to find your motivational source. Motivation rituals vary from woman to woman. I’ve seen everything from bikinis taped to refrigerator doors, bathroom scales with the word “Fat” emblazoned across it in red sharpie, buying clothing one to two sizes too small and then vowing not to stop until it fits, I’ve even seen collages made from photos of the woman during her skinnier (and if you ask her, surely happier) years. My own personal favorite I learned from a sorority sister when I was a freshman. I place a bathroom scale in front of the refrigerator. If I have the nerve to step on that, read the weight, and still make a grab for the Ben & Jerry's I figure there’s a damn good reason. In those instances its best not to stand between the pint and myself and just hand me a spoon. After all, as I’ve said before, sometimes diets drive educated women relatively insane. 

Working out and eating healthy. Calories in equal calories out. Its a lifestyle choice not a diet. All of these saying are infuriating to the dieting woman. Its not rocket science. Eating nothing but celery sticks and drinking a gallon of water per day is clearly not a recommended way to live, at least if you would like a bone density level stronger than your ten calorie cup of Jello. However, I can guarantee you there is a woman out there in the world right now cutting up a grapefruit and rationing out her portion for the day. Why? Because that is all she will be having today. None of this makes sense but it doesn’t stop us. Its the same mangled mentality that has me going through the Whataburger drive-thru and ordering a number six with a diet Coke. Its nuttier than the woman drooling over a loaf of bread because she’s been on a no carb diet, yet this urge to drop weight and drop it quickly has been going on for years. When I was younger my mother was in a constant search for how to shed those last few stubborn pounds as was her mother and I’m sure her mother before her. Apparently with ovaries comes absurdity. Who knew? I’m certain, just as I’m certain that diet pills do nothing but make you shake like a Parkinson's patient, that most women will always share a common desire to lose weight. Blame media pressure to be thin. Blame husbands and boyfriends who don’t understand the concept of gravity and stretch marks or even blame your next door neighbor’s wife who had the nerve to lose ten pounds in a week but won’t tell you how she did it. Be it five pounds or fifty dieting history shows that most anything will be, and has been, tried. In the dieting olympics of womanhood we are all vying to bring home the gold. To win. To triumph over the evils of back fat and cellulite and laugh in the face of love handles. However, its those girdle hurdles that get us every time. 

If Jesus Was Southern Would We Break Cornbread At Communion?

Nobody likes a church pew. Unless God has granted you the gift of a well cushioned rear end, sitting on a wooden bench for a Sunday service is like unscrewing the seat off of your bicycle and taking it for a ride around the block, uncomfortable. However, in the South thousands of sweet tea drinking, hallelujah shouting, cornbread loving Christians file into these pews one by one to hear the good word. Being a Southern woman myself I recently joined these ranks once again introducing my rear to the dreaded pew. Now, being a carb lover from way back I love any event that features a line to receive bread dipped in wine however lately I seem more interested in my own spirituality rather than my religion.

One might blame this turn inward with my newfound love of yoga. Slap a mat on the floor, filter in a little Eastern meditation music and dim the lights and I’m like a dieter before a flashing “Hot Donuts Now” sign at Krispy Kreme, I see the light. The whole yoga process is just so organic, theres no filter, no mood breaker like the collection plate at church or some crazy woman in the congregation belting out hymns like Aretha Franklin with strep throat. The time spent on that mat is priceless. Granted I have the flexibility of an 80 year old woman with rickets but the beautiful thing is that it doesn’t matter. I can go at whatever pace of process I like and achieve whatever my body lets me that day, somedays my “tree pose” is strong and proud and sometimes my body calls timber. 

The resolution for learning more about myself in 2009 through spirituality doesn’t end when I roll up my mat though, it continues on and can be found at home. Be it a newfound collection of books or a refrigerator full of organic and vegetarian fare it is clear the owner of this home is on a mission. Perhaps its the tofu going to my head but eating healthier and eliminating meat from my diet seemed just as natural to me as yoga. I would feel slightly ridiculous coming home from the yoga studio and picking up a Whataburger value meal on the ride home; it would be like a nun wearing a red Fredrick's of Hollywood water bra under her habit, on the outside I would appear soulful and dedicated to my practice but peel back that layer and you would find an entirely different type of person. 

I don’t think my vegetarianism, newfound yoga addiction, and recent church and Sunday school attendance is going to change who I am, thats not the point of any of it. The new years resolution to learn more about myself is about sifting through my life and thoughts and coming up with not only a better version of myself but identifying, for my own sake, who that self really is. Am I ever going to eat meat again? Its entirely possible, particularly when you take into account that I was a vegetarian during graduate school until a fateful drive thru window purchase and a guilty peeling away of a P.E.T.A sticker off of my back car window. Am I going to keep going to yoga? Stranger things have happened. However even if I don’t attend as regularly as I do now or if my yoga mat comes across a little dust along the way it will definitely stay in my life in some form, even if its just meditation. How long am I going to keep my Sunday dates with the pew and early morning Sunday school? That is entirely up to me, which is a nice change. As a child Sunday morning consisted of white tights being rolled up my chubby little legs like a sausage casing and then kicking me out into the blistering Florida heat only to sit in that pew-o-pain in a dress with more ruffles than Scarlett O’Harrah’s petticoat. Times have changed. I now don’t wear tights or hose to church, a fact that would make my great grandmother roll over in her grave. I don’t only go to Sunday school for snack nor do I look at communion as a chance to stretch my legs and get a better view of how many other children were forced to wear headbands with bows attached to them, despite knowing full and well that I was the only one. I go to services because I want to. I woke up, got dressed (minus frills) and drove there myself. The fact that I still sit in the same church I was dragged into as a youth is just an added amusement that brings a smile to my face each week.

Its going to be an interesting year, with every downward facing dog I feel a little more hopeful and happy about the way things are going in my life. Will I start wearing clothes made of hemp and bragging about my latest colon cleansing, weaving purses out of recycled newspapers or having images of Buddha appear to me on the freezer section of Publix? Doubtful. I’m still the same sarcastic girl with a desire for deep fried foods and an unbridled love of luxury items, I just concern myself more with my health and karma now. Although, odds are if you sneak a peak inside that reusable canvas grocery bag of mine you will still find a box of Quaker instant grits.

* Taken from my previous blog site (from January 09'), my apologies to any of my previous readers who have seen this before. The title alone always makes me smile so I felt compelled to place it on the new site. Plus, it gives you a little more insight into who I am as a person (aside from an embittered spinster)*

Date Adoptions: Do You Want Him?

Dating is a lot like adopting a mutt from your local animal shelter. You can’t quite tell what it is or where its been but you genuinely hope the two of you will get along, and that he won’t hump your leg. After swearing off men for life my hormones have once again granted me parole and allowed me to date yet again. I can’t say whether or not this is a good turn of events, technically there is something to be said for solitary confinement (not to mention the fortune you save on razors and lingerie), but I find myself once again at the mercy of the aforementioned mutts. One can only hope that putting myself out there again will lead to meeting interesting and well-mannered men and not leave me silently wishing for the ability to neuter my date.

To add extra fun to an already anxiety producing situation this is the first time in my life that I have dated outside of my safety circle of college friends. Collegiate dating was very similar to high school, just with a much larger senior prom dating pool, the very same pool I had been fishing in for the past eleven years. Outside of the safety circle you have to know your date based solely on what your date tells you about himself. The fact that I am having to rely on a man, a gender who would sooner sell his soul to the devil if promised that it would ensure him an eternal resting place with 4,000 virgins, scares the bejesus out of me. However, I’m trying to trust my instincts and hope for the best. Could he be lying straight to my face? Certainly. But I try to keep things in perspective. We, as women, aren’t the most honest dates either. Men have no idea that they are oftentimes talking to a pushup bra, Spanx wearing, foundation spackled, hairspray lacquered date. We don’t apologize for that do we? When was the last time you took off your 36C pushup bra in a moment of intimacy, tossed out two silicone inserts and said, “By the way Sam, I’m really a 36A.”

Theoretically the point of dating is to lead to finding, “the one”, and in such getting married. As a self proclaimed spinster I clearly have a strong lack of belief in that fairy tale. I figure if I’m going to start believing in the idea of some wonderful man getting down on bended knee and asking to spend a lifetime with me I might as well start believing in unicorns. In which case I’m going to sell my SUV and start riding my newfound mythical creature to save gas and protect the environment. Forming relationships though, despite my sarcastic ramblings of female empowerment and self preservation, remain an important part of life. A date isn’t just the occasionally free dinner, although that is a bonus, it is also a means to finding conversation and a feeling with someone in which you would have never known if you had stayed in solitary confinement. Sometimes you discover the mutt you’ve adopted is a fantastically faithful labrador and collie mix, oftentimes its a disturbing hybrid of hyperactive chihuahua and pudgy pug. Take what life throws at you, just make sure you give your new “pet” a trial run before you sign any commitment papers. Nobody wants to accidently fall in love with a leg humper. 

The Dog Days Of Spinsterhood

At a certain point in a woman’s life it becomes socially inappropriate to openly inquire about her age. Uninformed men who often make the mistake of asking find themselves in a number of situations ranging anywhere from being ignored, slapped or even lied to. Baffled by trying to calculate in their heads how their girlfriends could possibly be celebrating their third twenty-ninth birthday one can only hope that they eventually keep quiet and try to understand their loved ones plight. Whereas men age gracefully and single men are referred to as playboys and bachelors. Women simply age. Single women are not called playgirls or bachelorettes, rather we are called spinsters. The aging process itself even changes. One human year is the equivalent of seven spinster years. Sound familiar? It should, its the same aging process used to gage dog years. Nothing could be more appropriate then linking a spinster with a female dog, as the whole process truly is a bitch.

Every time I turn on the television I’m assaulted with commercial after commercial for wrinkle creams, stretch mark reducers and hair dye. I don’t mind the products. I even own some of them. I intend to be a trophy spinster after all, trophy wives do their part to maintain their image, I do mine. I just get the satisfaction of knowing that my preening and oftentimes senseless hours of grooming are because I want to look good for myself, not my husband’s boss or friends. Trust me, self-righteous smugness helps when your having to sit still for thirty minutes with a wrinkle reducing mud pack on your face. The fact that these companies advertise is fine by me, hell my possibly now prevented laugh lines are thankful for them, but its to whom they advertise that really rubs my mud mask the wrong way. To women. Only women! Think about it, when was the last time you saw an Oil of Olay ad or a Garnier ad with a man preaching the wonders of the product? Why? Are bachelors not wrinkling? Because the last time I checked, you could stick quarters in some of the lines on George Clooneys face. Why doesn’t Biore hire him out for an ad? We have Cover Girl, can we have a Cover Boy?

Granted Cover Boy is a bit of a reach that I’m not even sure I’m comfortable stretching out for but the double standard remains. Is it not bad enough that we have to lie about our age and spend our nights involved in a series of elaborate grooming rituals to decrease the signs of aging? Do we have to be the only ones targeted by the media too? The commercials and magazine adverts, one after the other after the other, start to hit you and before you know it your running around buying everything short of a Indian tribal dance to ward off wrinkles. Meanwhile men watching t.v, men the same age as the women watching, aging and wrinkling at the same pace (despite my beloved dog year theory) seem immune. They don’t worry about any of it. In such, they don’t lie about their age when people ask them. You will never find a man celebrating his third twenty-ninth birthday. They don’t go home after a night out at the bar with the boys and use their new cellulite reducing body scrub. People even tell them how well they are aging. The same people that wait until we’re out of the room to point at our ovaries and question our sexuality. Personally I told my ovaries to take a vacation years ago, but thats another story entirely. My point is this, because less pressure is placed on men by society regarding their age and relationship status they age with more grace than we do. Granted they wrinkle and grey the same as women, that is when our secret Indian tribal dances don’t do the trick, but they do it with dignity because they never truly cared about it in the first place.

Media never told men that they needed to be young forever and look like a walking talking model of fertility until the day they lay you in the coffin. Bonus points for continuing that look at your open wake service. Media and society in general impress upon women and young girls on a daily basis the importance of beauty and youth. The importance of marriage and motherhood. Its an unjust world. Its no wonder I feel like seven years have passed for every one year of my life. But then again, I’ll take any excuse to liken spinsterhood to being a bitch. The important thing to remember is to always sit up straight, put your eye cream on every night before bed, and never ever celebrate the same age more than three times in a row. Men are slow enough to be duped by a push up bra and girdles ladies, but not about everything.

The Wonders of Wal-Mart

What is it about the local Wal-Mart that instantly brightens my day? Is it the abundance of fresh fruit and veggies? The wide selection of paper towels and glade plug-ins? Perhaps the array of various lawn and garden tools. No, no...Wal-Mart brightens my day because I know that no matter how bad off I am, there will inevitably be some overweight, middle-aged man buying a cubic zirconia engagement ring at 9pm on a Monday night that has to be worse off than me. Walking through those automatic doors you know that you will invariably run into at least half of the seven deadly sins. Gluttony demonstrated by the three hundred pound woman in her do-rag and flip flops fighting over the "best" piece of fried chicken at the deli counter. Slothfulness shown by the middle-aged seemingly healthy man insistent on using the 10mph electric chair with basket. Greed from the elderly woman single-handedly harboring the cities entire supply of Aquafina bottled water. You get the picture.

So there I am amidst the grocery store section pushing the saddest most blatant example of the "single-girl shopping card" ever (half gallon of milk, bag of lettuce, three oranges, tampons, diet Dr. Pepper, and three Lean Cuisine cheese pizzas). You would think this would get to a girl. A woman of twenty-five surrounded by other women shopping for their families...kids in tow...husband lost on aisle 12, but the opposite occurs. You start to realize that even though your going home to an empty house to heat up a frozen lean cuisine for dinner - these women have a multitude of other things they are going to have to be confronted with; diapers, bills, children fighting, faking headaches to their significant other, etc. You on the other hand need only walk your dog and eat your pizza while watching TCM. Plus your not nearly as sad a sight as the group of Mexicans on the toilet paper aisle counting out Charmin coupons in Spanish and throwing 12 pack after 12 pack of toilet tissue into their carts. These were carts that should merit questioning....not mine. I started to look at other carts....the fifteen year old girl with a mid-drift top, where no mid-drift top ought' to be, carrying a handcart containing Cosmo magazine and a large box of condoms. The thirty-something girl with a basket full of cat food and frozen dinners. The woman in the middle of the store (past the grocery section) seemingly ecstatic over the concept of getting "anything she wants" airbrushed onto a white cotton t-shirt. These are baskets and individuals to question, not mine.

There you have it....a moment of single-girl realization that could have been depressing, rescued due to the increasingly more tragic lives of those around her at the local Wal-Mart. The grocery trip was not a total brightening of my day, there was still the awkward whistle and mumbled Spanish encountered when walking past the Mexicans on the toilet tissue aisle...but all the same Wal-Mart was just the pick-me-up I needed on a Monday night. Because even if I'm an unemployed graduate student, unmarried, no kids, and am only going home to an overweight black cocker spaniel named after an alcoholic beverage....at least I'm not the lazy moron in the motorized basket-cart backing up (complete with obnoxious "beep-beep" sounds) to grab a second bottle of Hydroxycut off the diet/exercise pill aisle.

* Apologies to my previous blog's readers who have read this piece before. Its an oldy but a goody and in such I felt compelled to put it on the new site *