The Female Gaze
The other morning I was returning a book to the library on the way to work. I pulled into the parking lot and left my car idling as I jogged to the book drop, clunking loudly in my “shop shoes,” which are just Dankso clog boots that don’t make my feet hurt when standing on a cement floor for the better part of 6 hours. The heels are maybe two inches high, which makes me 5’10”ish on a good day (I have terrible posture).
I passed a little old lady on the path, and she looked me up and down in a way I’m familiar with. Once I’d dropped my book in the slot and turned around to return to my car, she was waiting for me.
“You’re the girl I wanted to be when I was young,” she said.
“Oh my god!” I cried, taken aback by the compliment.
“Tall, long legs, straight hair,” she continued.
“Thank you so much,” I said, continuing to my car because I felt bad about leaving the engine on. “I promise being tall isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.” She just laughed and did that little wave you do when you’re dismissing something someone’s saying in a nice way, and then got in her car too. I caught a glimpse of myself in the rearview mirror, and my cheeks were bright red.
I’ve always had a pact with myself that I wouldn’t write about appearances. Body image, beauty, etc. I just think it’s not that interesting and I don’t want to be another woman pigeon-holed into the subject. But some part of me also knows that I don’t want to write about appearances because I don’t like mine.
I was never the pretty girl. Growing up, I was taller than most of my peers, and therefore freakish. When you’re a girl, taller translates to bigger, and bigger is bad. I always felt too big. I didn’t have a mother who taught me about makeup and hair and nails and all the girly things, so when it came time to discover all of that, I was behind. I was also a late bloomer in the development sense apart from height. Come middle school my friends were all bra-wearing, hair-straightening fashionistas, and I was the tall girl with bushy eyebrows who wore a different color bow in her hair every day, because I had to express myself somehow.
It took me many years and many false starts to find a style and a sense of self beauty wise that I felt comfortable with, and now I genuinely like my clothes and how I dress and how my face and hair looks. I caught up eventually and grew some boobs; everyone else grew a few inches so I didn’t feel like a giant. But I still don’t think of myself as beautiful. I honestly don’t think about my appearance very much at all.
A couple of weekends ago I was at a wedding. My boyfriend was a groomsman, so I was invited to the rehearsal dinner. I wore a yellow dress that I’d been dying to wear—the last time I’d worn it was when visiting a friend in Midcoast Maine, and it was so hot that I sweat through it and had to change. I did my hair in a new way I’d finally figured out how to do, where you kind of curl it but with a flat iron, put on my usual moisturizer and mascara, and added lipstick because it was a special occasion.
After the rehearsal dinner we all went to a bar in the little Vermont town we were in. It was a warm, divey kind of place—my favorite—so we were way overdressed. One of the locals at the bar asked us why we were so dressed up. We told her we were in a wedding party and she said, “I thought so! Y’all look great.” The bride eventually showed up in her sleek night before the wedding gown under a sweatshirt. She looked so beautiful in a way I’ve always admired without envy; I could tell she’d thought about her hair that night and, like me, bought a special lipstick. She’d put real effort in, and it showed. She beamed.
“I have to tell you,” a friend said to me at one point, pulling me aside. “That man over there,” she gestured to the man at the bar sitting with the woman who asked us why we were dressed up, “I was ordering a drink and he leaned over and told me, ‘Your friend in the yellow dress is seriously beautiful.’”
I’m not being modest—it took me a minute to understand she was talking about me.
I guess I’ve always said I wouldn’t write about appearances because I didn’t want to sound like I fear I do here: a perfectly attractive woman going “Who, me?!” I mean, that’s literally what I’ve done here. But I’m not fishing for compliments, I’m trying to get at something deeper. I think there’s something to be said about the differences in these two encounters, which I had within two weeks of each other. I’ve always told myself that I don’t dress for men or the male gaze, but who am I kidding, I loved that some random man in a bar found me beautiful. I have never, not once, been hit on by a man in public—not that I want to be, necessarily—and my boyfriend is the only guy who’s ever asked for my number outside of a dating app situation where such a thing is sort of required. Quite frankly, a strange man in a dark bar in a town I am not from calling me beautiful in a room full of beautiful women felt awesome. I’ve gotten so good at not caring if I’m beautiful or not that I forgot how nice it is to hear it.
But the little old lady meant more to me. Women who are older than me love to remind me of how young I am. “You won’t care as much when you’re older,” or “It will be different when you’re older,” or “I wish I could be 28 again!” or “You’re so young, you have so much time!” I know they mean well, but it gets annoying.
This woman was different. She looked at me and she was reminded of her youth, but she was still acknowledging the privilege of getting older. It wasn’t about how young I am, it was about how young she once was, and how she’s grateful to no longer be the kind of young where you wish you were someone else. If I’d had the time and presence of mind to really stop and talk to her, I would have told her I wish I was shorter like her, wish I had curlier hair and smaller features. I would have told her that inside I’m still the big kid, towering over everybody, stupid bow in my hair. She probably would have told me I was beautiful. And so was she.
Sweet.
A lovely read, thank you :)