is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.
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It works on some.
In one of the many boxes I carried up the stairs today, there was a very foxy pair of shoes. I wore them around the house all afternoon. They are black heels that are like a cartoon take, or maybe graphic novel version, of the shoes worn by a 40s pin-up girl. Sure, I do already have quite a few platformy round-toed fancifully colored shoes. But these are black, and square-toed, and the heels are really high and huge to the point of hyperbole (but still comfortable because there is a platform at the front). So it�s an exaggerated modernization of something that�s already a cartoon. In a good way.
I yelled at Hans Blix (the cat, not the UN weapons inspector) to pay homage to my hot shoes, and then I pretended to drop something and then pick it up while turning around to give him a demure look. He was unmoved.
The 40s pin-up thing may seem strange, I know. It has been a part of my aesthetic for a long time in a way that I�ve allowed to remain mostly unexamined. But a recent conversation about the Beatles may have, strangely, helped me make sense of it. It�s about some sort of grown-up innocence, even when it isn�t innocent. Or it�s about na�ve sexuality even when it isn�t na�ve. The paintings (for instance, those by Gil Elvgren) are sexy in a cute way, not a raunchy way. They are of clothed women with real bodies (you know, with some fat, and some curves). And they usually hint at sexual content without really portraying it. That�s why I like the look: it doesn�t just show everything. Some things just can�t be known by everyone.
It�s a restrained kind of sexy that is still unafraid to be sexy. It�s a hard line to tread.
There�s also often a silly element of surprise in the paintings, like, �ooh, you mean this sexiness is happening to me, it IS me?!� Ha. But something about it works because sexy is situational and not always predictable, and trying to force it is a bit like trying to command someone to love you.
And that�s why I laugh out loud every time I see that Victoria�s Secret commercial that asks �What is Sexy?� while showing models bumping and grinding in mesh underwear. When the question is posed in that setting the only thing I am sure of is that the answer is nowhere nearby.
However, plenty of people whose ideas of cuteness, sexiness, or beauty I do know and like wouldn�t agree with me about the pin-up girls. I have a good friend whose BF thinks 40s/50s pin-ups are sexy, but she thinks they are raunchy. Or something like that. We�ve never really discussed it, I just know she doesn�t like them hanging in the house they share.
But she always likes my shoes, my dresses, and my sense of humor.
There is, of course, a whole history of feminist analysis of the male gaze, and of objectification and exploitation and all that. It�s not that I don�t take that to heart. It�s just that I never once, in the history of my ever-changing relationship to feminist theory (and, really, it did change my life in a way that I will always be thankful for and will never regret), but still I never once thought being a feminist could possibly mean I couldn�t wear heels or lipstick, or have in my background of ideas about beauty a series of paintings about which it is very possible to disagree.
I don't tend to recognize others as authorities on what I should wear. In other words, I never once thought that being a feminist meant trading being told what to wear by a certain kind of man for being told what to wear by a certain kind of woman.
Then again, I never set out to be the loud woman or the frank woman or the woman most likely to be underestimated at your peril, and yet I get placed in that role more often than I�d like to admit. The world is full of ludicrous situations ready and waiting to smack me down and put me in my place, even when I barely have a place and I�m wearing the compromise shoes I wear for professional events. Sometimes it makes me wonder whether there are games I should be learning to play better. But that would be the worst betrayal, I think, even if it got me more job offers.
Anyway, my shoes, in general. They don�t work on everyone. Lots of the women I know love them, and some of the men. And then there�s the rest of the people.
11:38 p.m. - January 22, 2007
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