On Being Pretty

I have spent a lot of my life working really hard to be "pretty".

I have tried to buy clothes that are "flattering".  I have thought about how the "style" might "work for me".  I have tried to make my hair make sense in a world where wavy hair with fifty thousand cow-licks doesn't really make any sense.

I have struggled over favorite colors, perfumes, deodorants, shaving or not shaving, tattoo placement, lip gloss, make-up or lack thereof, and how to take the perfect selfie.

And last night I stood at a technical rehearsal for the experimental theatre ensemble I'm a part of with three of the most beautiful women I know, and we all stared in the full length mirrors of the dressing room and talked about the things that bother us about our bodies.

You know what?

I'm kinda done with that.

I've said this before, but now I think... I really might mean it.

I've come to a place where I actually like myself.

Not the person I think I should be, but the person I actually am.

I like purple.  My second favorite color is green.  I like sweaters and boots and scarves.  I like nail polish in weird colors.  I am bad at clipping my nails and remembering to groom certain parts of my body.  This morning I decided to shave my pubic hair into a weird shape.  I want at least four more tattoos.  I don't care if anybody else thinks they're cool or pretty, because they're for me.  Not them.  My eyes are just brown.  My hair is brown with streaks of blonde and grey and it is unruly and my husband cuts it for me at home.

I have ceased to be interested in pretty.  I am interested now in just being me.

I don't want to stand in front of the mirror with my three gorgeous friends talking about how much we hate our bodies.  They are beautiful.  I am beautiful.  And so are all of our flaws.  All the fat in the wrong places and the weird eyebrows and the armpit hair and the broad shoulders and the bubble butt.  Flaws are neat.  They make us who we freaking are.

I like to make weird faces.

I like to play character parts and dress in suspenders and newsboy hats and Doc Martens.  I like ripped up jeans.  I like vests.  I like swing dancing and little black dresses and silver eye shadow and painting random shapes on my face.

I don't know...  I feel like...  now that I get that just being yourself and living that out is one of the major points of being alive, I just want to get to it.  I'm so tired of hiding behind the things everybody else thinks I should be.

I've probably blogged about this subject here a hundred times, but I felt the need to blog again today because I think I've turned some kind of magic corner.  The other day I got an Instagram, and I posted a bunch of selfies today of me.  Just me.  Really tired me.  I was up til 2AM.  And I made a weird face.  And it wasn't pretty.  But it was great.  It was me.

Another Post About Beauty and Power

I know.

I know.

I owe you a bajillion (or like 4) more posts on the Beattitudes.

I know.

I've also been in hiatus for about a bajillion months.

I know.

My life has been changing at a crazy fast pace, and unfortunately, I've been too busy and too wrapped up in my new life and my truly unleashed brain to share it with my larger community.

But today there is a little something that I need to share, because it hit me this morning, and I feel like you might need to hear it.

Last night I had the opportunity to photograph a dance off event.

At first I was nervous.  Especially because my little theatre ensemble was participating and I had already messed the thing up once during rehearsal.  I was also nervous because I was surrounded by people I didn't know.  Not just any sort of people I didn't know, but people I would like to know, and that made it even more difficult, because I wanted to make friends, but I'm horrid at small talk, so I mostly sat in a corner with my camera and captured other people's moments.

I'm okay with that.

And maybe that means I have a whole slew of other issues I'm just not ready to talk about right now, but ignoring that, I want to get to the dance off and the things I saw and learned.

The most important thing was that there are so many empowered, talented, amazing women in the world.  Smart, funny, women who don't honestly care two licks about what anyone else thinks of them.  Women who are assured in themselves and their sexuality and their sense of being.

I had met some of these women before.  They were often hanging out at the artspace where the performance was held and my group rehearses.  Just normal women.  Doing their thing.

I noticed little things.

Their tattoos.

Their unshaven armpits.

Their leg hair.

Their vibrant smiles.

Then last night, I noticed their talent.

I guess I knew they were talented.  They are a group of circus folk, after all, and I knew they were performers, but they were performers unlike any I'd ever seen.

They were able to just be on stage.  Just let everything hang out everywhere - the good, the bad, the ugly - their entire personhood was there, beaming brightly into the lens of my camera.

I was frustrated with my inability to truly capture the magic I felt.

That these were women.  In charge.  Tough.  Intelligent.  Charming.  Amazing.  Brilliant.  Lovely.  It was so powerful.

One of the craziest things was that the event started 45 minutes after the time listed on the invitations.  This makes me insane.  I always feel like it's so rude to be late.  I haven't changed my mind on that - but the way they handled it...  they made no apology.  45 minutes late, they took the stage and the microphone and handled it.  They were in charge.  They were commanding.  And no one cared one iota after the beginning of the thing that it started so late: empowerment.

It wasn't just the circus women.  It was all the women in attendance.  All the women who took the stage and awed me with their power and beauty and inspiration.  Their beauty had nothing to do with their physical appearance.  It was their energy.  Their prowess.  Their focus and ability and aura that just floored me time and time again.

When I thought it couldn't be any more empowering or amazing another woman would step up to the plate and bring me nearly to tears with the sheer magic of it all.

The best part for me was seeing my friend K take the stage.

We're still in the tentative stages of our friendship.  We work together in the ensemble of which I'm a part.  She's an incredible improv artist.  One of the best I've ever seen.  I love being on stage with her because she's so out there with her self.

But I know, because of some conversations had within the group, that K struggles with body issues.

Who doesn't?  I certainly do.

I've been feeling pretty darned horrible about my appearance the last few months and I don't seem to be able to muster up the self-discipline to really do something about it.  

Last night, she danced to Beyonce's Single Ladies.  My photography was terrible, really, at capturing her on camera.  I was stunned at her energy, her sexiness, her ability to go to that place with her dance, with her body.  She's gorgeous.  Stunning.  Sexy.  Fierce.

She has nothing to worry about.

I want that.

Even on stage I can't always get it.  These women can.  These women do.

It's my hope that every woman can get to that place of power.  Of empowerment.  Of strength.

It's enchanting.

Haiku for My Thirties

Chipped tooth in the glass
I stare at the former white
More wabi-sabi.

How To Be Beautiful

A few days ago I received an email from Danika Holmes, an up and comer in the music world who stumbled upon this blog and found herself excited to align with so many of the R.J. ideals and especially with The Mirror Project.

Her latest song is called How to Be Beautiful, and she asked me if I'd post it for you. 

Of course, I said yes.

The song speaks for itself:

And for you, dear readers, Danika also offers a FREE download of her song here.  Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, enjoy, and keep on being beautiful!

Oral Sex

I titled this "Oral Sex" because not only is that what this post is about, but I knew it would be eye-catching.  I also knew that when people typed it into Google hoping for some tips and tricks, they might just get this post instead, and gain a different sort of understanding.

I spent the past week at my parents' house, which gave me a rare opportunity to talk with my mom almost uninterrupted.

We talk via telephone often, but there are always chores or kids calling to me in the background, and my thoughts can get muddled.

We've become friends over these last several years, my mom and me.  It hasn't always been that way.  There was a lot of lost trust and argument and general dislike through the years... especially the teenage ones.  We have our differences now, but we've chosen the road of sorting them out over coffee, instead of estrangement, and I'm thankful.

This past week we got to talking about how things have changed since she was attending the public school system.

She told me about a movie that she watched on Lifetime that discussed oral sex in middle school, and how it is becoming so common - even at school.

I already knew this, unfortunately.

A school in our area ended up with separate lunch tables for boys and girls and banned recess because 11 - 13 year olds were using the time for, let's face it, blow-jobs.

For the girls, it didn't always feel like a choice.  Peer pressure was intense.  If you wanted a boyfriend, it was expected.  And when you're 12 or 13 and just slamming head-long into puberty, you desperately long for acceptance, especially by the opposite sex.  And the boys felt like - well - if he's getting it, then I deserve to have it too.  A dad even stood up at the parent meeting and announced that his son was just doing what he wished he could do at that age.

When I was in middle school I am certain this was happening, but it wasn't quite as common.  More common was groping in the hallway and during movies in the social studies classroom.

As a young girl I can't say that I enjoyed any of that, but I allowed it.

I didn't know what else to do.

I remember feeling incredible attraction to several different boys.  I remember wanting them to like me.  To choose me as their girlfriend.  To dance with me at the 8th Grade Dance.

I was a bit awkward, and so they didn't often choose me for for their girlfriend or their dance partner.  That would have been much too public an acceptance.  But they did grab my butt in the hallway.  They did touch my breasts in social studies class.  And so...  I thought... it seemed better than nothing.

At all ages, we women simply want to be thought beautiful, attractive, lovely. 

My daughter wears her dance costume covered in pink sequins and her pink hair bow and sparkly, strappy shoes and asks her daddy to dance with her.  Asks us to watch her put on a show.  Loves for us to delight in her beauty and personality.

We never really lose that.

It stays with us.  It just manifests in new ways.

We realize there is a great big world outside of our family and we'd like them to accept us too.  We want them to delight in us as we wished our parents would.  For some of us, our daddy's said yes to dancing.  Said yes to applauding our preschool shows.  For others, they turned away: ridiculed us, left our moms.  And for BOTH it is intensely difficult to navigate the pressures that lay before us when we hit middle school and are faced with boys who are riddled with hormones and educated by their peers and the pornographic media that is so readily available on the internet and all around us from the time we are born.

I don't blame the boys.  The media portrays sex as something they deserve in a dating relationship.  And it feels good... obviously.  Oral sex is "better" because it doesn't result in pregnancy.  It feels safer.  And it can be carried out under the lunch table or within a circle of your friends in the parking lot.

The thing is...  it's a really bad idea.  And without a serious committed relationship...  it's degrading.

First of all - oral sex can transmit the same diseases.  You can get them all, Ladies.  On the Lifetime program that my mom watched an STD infected so many girls there was a line stretching down the hallway outside the nurses office for treatment and testing.

But second, and really more importantly, this is about our dignity.

This is a huge loss for girls AND boys, and while boys shouldn't be asking for it, they're battling the urge to fit in, the screaming of their hormones AND the fact that YOU are allowing it.

If all the girls got together and said NO, then the boys would back down.

Sure, it would get ugly for a few days.  Maybe even a few weeks.  But girls need to stick together on things like this.  We are strong together.  You can take a stand at your school.

You're not a plaything or a cheap hooker.  You are a young woman of dignity.  You are beautiful and priceless and there will be a man someday who won't ask such things of you.  And those men will be much more common if you stand up for yourself today.  Should they get a clue about treating you like a princess?  HECK YES.  But as long as they aren't, it's up to us to tell them NO.  It's up to us to hold on to who we are and not give that away to a boy just because he asks, or pressures, or gets his friends to pressure.  Because after you give a guy a blow-job, you don't have a lot of other places to go, physically.  And he has already used you just to pleasure himself.  It's like masturbation with a doll.  You can't go places emotionally with a boy that you've already gone everywhere with physically.  If it happens, it's rare, and you've got to take a lot of steps backward to go forward.

Take it from a girl who's been there.  Who has felt the pressure and who has given in.  Who has been called "dirty" by someone she loved.  Who has tried everything to get a boy to stay - and they left anyway.  Guys respect you if you stand up to them.  If you use your smarts.  If you respect yourself.  It is okay, even today, even in our rape-driven, sex-on-the-first-date, Cosmo reading culture to look a boy (or man) in the eyes and say, "I'm not that kind of girl."  It doesn't matter how many times you've already given in.  You can change.  You can be bigger and better than you were.  You can be a leader and stand up for you and the other young women around around you.

You can walk away.

How to Save Our Daughters.

I just finished reading an article in Better Homes and Gardens discussing plastic surgery and "injectables" as viable options for "looking your best" for the holidays (November 2011 issue, for those of you who are curious, I couldn't find the article online).  I'm more than a little floored by this, and needless to say, I will not be renewing my subscriptions (one I've held for ten years).  More than just make me angry, this article shows just how mainstream the idea that we are not okay just the way we are has become.  We need cutting, injections, invasive surgery, tattooed eyeliner, more make-up that doesn't look like make-up, more hair dye, shinier hair, more product, more facial cleanser, skinnier waistline, less fat, ...  the list extends into eternity.

Besides my fury that ALL of this is corporate mumbo-jumbo to make us feel "less-than" so that we will purchase a particular product or line of products, I see this as extremely detrimental to the future.

Any of us who have daughters feel that those little girls are GORGEOUS.  Our daughters are beautiful.  We look at those long lashes and those pretty eyes and those rosy cheeks and adorable smiles and we see pure, innocent, loveliness.  And if we don't, it's time for a reality check, because your little girl is AMAZING.  A princess, ladies and gentlemen, is an understatement.

When we look at those little girls, we don't want them to grow up thinking that they need more make-up, more product, a nose-job, a boob-job, etc in order to "look their best".  We tell them that they are beautiful.  We long for them to see it themselves every time they look in the mirror.

But...  often...  they don't.  Why?

Because, Ladies and Gents, actions...speak...louder than words.

So...

What to do?

1.  Stop it with the daily make-up.  


I've said before that I'm not against make-up.  But you know what?  The more I think about it.  The more Lucky magazines I get in the mail.  The more re-touching I see my husband do when he does a head-shot series for an aspiring actor or model... the more I hate make-up.  After all, why do we wear it?

We wear it because society has established a FALSE idea of beauty.  Way back in the day, only prostitutes wore make-up.  It was a sign.  It was a cover-up for the ugliness, the pain, the hurting that was underneath.  The hope that it would be enough...

Cover-up was made so that you could go out in public and no one would know you really had the Bubonic Plague (Queen Elizabeth wore quite a lot of it).

There were times in history when men wore it.  Times when eye-liner was royalty.  Different signs and symbols.

Today, it seems, at least in America, make-up is an expectation.

I've had woman apologize to me because I've seen them with no make-up as though they were apologizing for running over my beloved dog.  As though they were committing a high offense.

Ladies... this is a problem.

And when we make it a point to put on make-up in front of that mirror and our little girls see it - that is what they think about adulthood:  that you can't be good enough once you've grown up.  That your skin has to be perfect.  That blemishes make us "less than".  That no boys will like them if they don't wear it.  They see what we do and they know that no matter how many times you tell them they are pretty they will never be all the way there until they can do what you are doing.  To them, YOU are the ultimate example of beauty.  How's THAT for responsbility?

2.  Stop it with the magazines.

Every. single. magazine. you bring into your home is a huge advertisement for product.  I have learned over the past year (and maybe this makes me a fool for not noticing before) that each and every article - each and every photograph, is about selling a product.  Not always a blatant advertisement, but at very least a proposition to purchase the next issue of the magazine.

And Ladies and Gents, it's all just. stuff.  Not stuff you need.  Just. Stuff.

Everyone is selling make-up and clothing and scent and all this STUFF they tell you will make your life better.

We worry about our children watching too much television or not learning to think for themselves...  be careful what you read, what you have in your home for your children to read... everyone is selling something.  Before you read it and have your children read it, be sure it's something you want them to buy.

3.  Stop making make-up a right of passage.

My mom took me to the make-up counter for the thirteenth birthday.  It was what I wanted.

It doesn't have to be that way.

I wanted it because all the other girls in my class were wearing it.

Parents tell their girls that they can wear make-up when they reach a certain age.  It's a Big Deal.  I've decided that if my kid wants to try the stuff at age 2 then so be it.  She has her very own lip gloss, thus far.  I am sure to tell her how pretty she is when she's NOT wearing it.

Make-up should be fun, not forced, not necessary, not expected.  And if you can help it, not present at all.

4.  Stop getting cosmetic surgery.


There are women who get breast reductions because their huge boobs are causing them serious pain.  This is NOT the kind of cosmetic surgery I'm talking about.

I'm talking about the women who don't like how their nose looks.  The ones who want bigger breasts.  The ones who are fed up with getting wrinkles.

Ladies...  God made you the way you are.  He doesn't think your nose is too big.  He doesn't think your boobs need to be bigger.

Wrinkles...oh, my Dear Readers!  I can see them gathering at the sides of my eyes and all along my forehead and when I first saw them I was dismayed and afraid but please know! - wrinkles are a sign of wisdom.  They are rivers and streams of knowledge, beauty, and power.  They are the signs that you have been there, you have experienced that, you have frowned in deep thought and smiled with such joy and cried tears that left permanent paths down your cheeks and all of those things make. you. even more beautiful than before.

Our daughters need to know.

They need to know that when they're 35 and look in the mirror and see those crow's feet it doesn't make them less of a person.  It makes them so. much. more.

5.  Stop hating on yourself.

Jesus said, "Love your neighbor as yourself."  We remember that loving our neighbor part...but we forget that we need to love ourselves too. We never stop to think when we look in the mirror and tell ourselves "NOT good enough" that this isn't what The Lord wants for us.  We would never dream of going up to our neighbor and saying "You are not good enough.  You are stupid.  You are ugly."  And yet we do these things to ourselves on a regular basis.

Stop buying into the lie that FAKE is beauty.

It's a LIE Ladies and Gents!!!  A big. fat. Satanic. lie.

And if we all stopped believing it, how much better would our lives be?

If we really believed that beauty came from the inside.

If we really believed that God made us beautiful just the way we are.

If we really believed that WE were empowered to make healthy choices.

If we really SAW what everyone looked like under the make-up and before the surgery and...  how differently we would see one another.  How differently we would see the world.

Ask yourself - if I was the only person in the world wearing make-up, would I feel the need to wear it?

If I went to the movies and SAW that Julia Roberts had a pimple that day...  would I think of myself differently?

When you love yourself - you are giving your daughter the most wonderful gift.  The gift of knowing SHE is beautiful all by herself.

And finally...

6.  Stop judging her based on her appearance.

How many of us grew up in a house where our moms mentioned the clothes we chose.  The weight we'd gained.  The outbreak of acne on our foreheads...  and told us just what we needed to do about it, even if we didn't ask.

Our moms wanted to help.

They KNOW what it feels like to feel less beautiful.  To be ridiculed by classmates.  To be mocked.

And so moms step in with facial cleanser and concealer and money for different jeans and diet ideas and Fat Camp and...

And where does that leave us?

What does it say to our daughters when we do these things we believe are loving?

It says, loud and clear, You. Are. Not. Good. Enough.  It shows how we see their flaws.  It shows that we are no different than the classmate who points out the pimple or the bully that calls us fat.  It shows that we, the mom, aren't making the effort to see the Girl Inside.  We feel the need to change her.  Cover her up.  Put her on a diet.

The fact is - self-esteem and knowledge that you ARE good enough makes all that unnecessary.  If you've got the confidence that your mom and (especially) dad see through any flaws to the true YOU inside the skin then you can face the bully head on.  You can take it all with multi-grained salt.  You can hold your head up high because you know that the people who you come home to love you unconditionally, and The World can suck it.



Moms and Dads... it's not too late.

Your daughter is a precious jewel.  Some of you already see her that way.  Some of you need to wake up and smell the sea salt.  Daughters are a fabulous gift from heaven.  But they are a fragile gift.  Don't break them.  And if you fear you already have...  break out the glue. 

Overheard on the way to the school bus-stop today.

From one elementary aged girl to another:

"I can tell those shoes aren't new.  Your mom just washed them so they would look like they were."

Dormant.

I've been dormant.  Writing dormant.  For the past few weeks.

There is the here and there.  The mundanity of life.

But nothing profound.

It is grey outside and rain comes in fits and starts and pitters on the glass.  The television drones.

I've been growing my hair for too long now and I find it only annoying.  Nothing spiritual.  No change.  I'm still me, just with annoying hair now, instead of totally weird hair.

I got a new pair of sweatpants at Old Navy the other day.  The kind of sweatpants I always envied on other mothers.  The kind you can wear and still look like you're relatively put together.  I've been wearing them two days now.  I wonder how many days they can go without washing and still look "put together".

I've been taking St. John's Wort and trying to fight this depression crap.  It works some days and other days, like today, it just... doesn't.  I don't feel like doing anything.

I watch tea-water swish around at the bottom of my cup and try to ignore the feeling of void in my stomach.

On the dreary days, it is sometimes easier for me.  But not this time.

Today I had hoped to take the kids outside.  To go for a walk in the sunshine.  To go running until it hurt in a bottomless sort of way.  But it is hard to be motivated to leave the house on dreary days that are also freezing.

I ran out to the mailbox.  Came back in the house.

A few days ago a former student of mine confessed that she had decided not to pursue a career as an actress because she didn't find herself "pretty enough".  I was stunned, because she really is very beautiful.  Of course I told her that it was nonsense and that she was gorgeous but somehow my words are not enough in situations like these and I never know what to say.

This isn't the first time.

Not the only young woman who has looked in the mirror and seen less than.  I want to take them years into the future and show them pictures of themselves now.  Show them how beautiful they look.  Show them how lovely and young and downright enviable.  I want to show them themselves at eighty and another sort of loveliness.  I want to show them the girls they wish they were first thing in the morning, before teeth brushing and hair combing.  I want to show them eating disorders and I want to just hold them and let them cry.

I hate this perfectionism in how we look.

This dwelling on the physical.

I note it as I look at my annoying hair and check my butt in the mirror with my new Old Navy sweatpants.

I note it somewhere in the bottom of my tea cup.

Not the root of everything, but part of it.

A few days ago a young boy (17 years old) died in his sleep.  No real reason.  He just died and there was nothing anyone could do about it.  Someone posted the quote from C.S. Lewis "You don't have a soul.  You are a soul.  You have a body."

I wish we could remember this more often.

I wish we could grab hold of it and look for our beauty there.  See like God sees.  Just for a moment.  Throw away our prideful selfish longings and see ourselves as we are.  As we can be.  As God sees us.

Excuse my somewhat incoherent stream of consciousness this afternoon.

It's time for more tea.

What flaws do you see?

Yesterday I was reading some articles on Helium and I came across an article (debate, really) about whether or not the media really effects the images young women have of themselves.

I think that you already know my stance on that particular subject, but I was newly struck by something one of the writers said:  "Years ago, advertisers realized that if they chose any aspect of the female body and called it 'a flaw', they could then make up and market products that were previously unnecessary, and make them sell like hot cakes."  This is why our hair is too dry, too oily, too shiny, not shiny enough, too curly, too straight, the wrong color... and the list goes ON - because advertisers have taken EVERY SINGLE characteristic we can have, and said that it's WRONG - so we need this or that THING to make it right.


I wanted to point this out because last night I was lying there in bed talking about it to my poor husband, who really just wanted to be sleeping.  The ones that got to me the most were the ones about hair - especially the one that says that there's something wrong with having grey hair.  Grey hair is so beautiful!  The Bible even talks about grey hair as a crown of splendor (Proverbs 16:31)!  But we bend to this advertising mayhem that there's something WRONG with aging!

The advertisers don't stop with grays - they also say your hair is too thin or too curly or too limp or too straight or too brown or too blonde or too red or too uneven or too even or...  pick a characteristic - there's an advertiser saying it's "unsightly".

They even tell us that our PORES are unsightly!  Really?  I have NEVER EVER noticed someone else's pores.  Back when I was watching commercials on a semi-regular basis I used to check my pores in the mirror - "Oh, gosh, they're so BIG!  I hate them!"  I did this.  I really did.  I bought into the whole thing.

The funny thing is, it wasn't a month later that I was reading about remedies to OPEN your pores to reduce toxins.

What's a girl to do?  They're unsightly but I need to open them...  better buy BOTH products and then I can open them and Quick!  Close them back up again!

What a disaster!

It hurts my heart to know that there are these LIES that we all buy into so easily.

It's not just us girls.  Men too are prone to all these lies.  A friend of mine mentioned "man-scaping" on a previous post  - where men get their chest hair, etc. waxed so they can get rid of the, you guessed it!  "Unsightly" chest hair.

What happened to eating stuff so you could GET hair on your chest?

And after-shave - truly, some horrible person invented that stuff - that stuff BURNS!  (not that I've tried it...you know...just watched Home Alone as a kid...)

And God forbid you should go BALD or have facial hair, or NOT have facial hair - or have long hair...or short hair, or wear glasses, or ...

Either way - both genders are attacked.  Ladies and gentlemen, be canny.  Look out for each other and know what you're watching.  Think about the five OTHER commercials that totally cancel THIS particular commercial out.  And when someone tells you that you really should worry about your stretch marks since your last pregnancy - check 'em out.  Really LOOK at them.  There is beauty in the battlescars.  There is beauty in all of our "flaws".  Without them, ladies and gentlemen, the world would be an awfully boring place.

Love.

Defined

Last night my husband and I were talking about a friend - let's call her Jane.

Jane was a friend of my husband's in high school, and is now a facebook friend with whom he keeps in some touch.  Last night while he was perusing his news feed he shook his head and said, "That poor girl."

Curious, I came over to the computer desk, "Who?"

"This girl from my high school, Jane."  He said.

"What's the issue?"

"She's one of those girls who completely defines who she is by who she's with."

I nodded.  Somewhat sadly.  This was a phenomenon I understood well.

He continued, "She just got divorced less than a year ago, and she's engaged again."

"Did she know this guy before she got divorced?"

"No," he said, "It wasn't like that.  It wasn't two months after she and her husband split she was posting on facebook that she needed a man, and she was surfing all the dating sites."

"Yeah."  I said.

I wasn't sure if I should post about this, considering there are a lot of women and girls in my life who do, in fact, define themselves by who they are with.  But, as per usual, I figured that was a pretty good reason to post about it.

Sometimes, that whole, defined by your boyfriend thing works out for girls.  They find themselves genuinely interested in the things their boyfriend is interested in and the changes are sometimes positive.  Sometimes those girls end up married to that man and he cares enough about her to work hard to discover who she really is underneath all that insecurity.  I've seen this happen.

The truth is, however, this isn't the norm.

Most of the women and girls I know who are defined by their relationships are on a serial dating track that seems to spin in an endless circle and lead to nowhere.  When they get married, they end up supremely unhappy, because the person they are inside has been so suppressed.

It reminds me of that movie, Runway Bride, with Julia Roberts and Richard Gere.  She kept balking when she walked down the aisle and running away, because at the wedding she realized that she wasn't who she was at all.  That she had become who that person wanted her to be.

The most poignant scene for me was when Gere's character went to all of her exes and asked them what sort of eggs she liked.  All of them said the type, and then, "...same as me."  She had changed even the sort of eggs she liked to fit the man.  When he questioned her, she didn't even know what kind she liked all on her own.  They had to do a taste test to figure it out.

The movie was a good example of how this can happen to a woman, and what it makes her feel, though I must say I was a little disappointed that it made it seem like she needed ANOTHER man to figure out who she really was.  It just continued the cycle of dependency stereotype that has been propagated forever.  The very stereotype that made the woman who she was in the first place.

I guess what I'm trying to say is two-fold.

1.  If you don't know who you are when you're single, you probably don't know who you are at all, and you'd better take some time to figure it out.

2.  If you think you need a boy to make you complete, or a man, for that matter, then you need to go somewhere else to fill that void.  It's not fair to a guy to require them to complete you.  To be your whole world.  To define you as a human being.  That's too much pressure for any man.  Maybe that's why the relationship cycle has become serial.  They run scared.

Can you blame them?

Ladies, I want to tell you - the only One who can fill that void is Christ.

I know this seems like a cop out answer.

I know that when you're down there in the dating trenches it feels like that boy is the whole world and sun and stars.  That if you could just be with him, you could be happy.  That if you could just be with someone, you wouldn't have to feel alone.

I want to say that there are girls I know who had that philosophy.  And now they are married to that boy.  And feel more lonely than singleness ever felt.

Juliet's question, "Dost thou love me?"  Am I beautiful?  Am I lovely?  Women have asked them since the world began and we keep going to men to answer that question for us.

The problem is that you can go to every man in the world and he will falter.  He will mess up.  He will hurt you somehow, sometime.  Maybe that relationship can be patched and there can be healing.  But if your worth is totally tied up in what that man thinks of you at any given second of the day the chances are high you will be disappointed.  You're talking about a human being.

The only One who can consistently answer that question, Juliet's question, "Dost thou love me?" with a resounding yes, unconditionally, every single time, is Jesus.

So take it all to Him, ladies.  He can take it all.

May you find peace and comfort in this.

Peace.

The Lord says,
[Return to me]
Then I will heal you of your faithlessness;
my love will know no bounds,
for my anger will be gone forever.
I will be to [you]
like a refreshing dew from heaven.
[You] will blossom like the lily;
[you] will send deep roots into the soil
like the cedars of Lebanon.
[Your] branches will spread out like beautiful olive trees,
as fragrant as the cedars of Lebanon...
O, ...stay away from idols!
I am the one who answers your prayers and cares for you.
I am like a tree that is always green;
all your fruit comes from me.  - based upon Hosea, Chapter 14, verses 1 - 8

Progress?

So I thought that there was a lot of progress when it came to how people were treated in the world.

I know - I'm naive.  I admit this freely.  I guess mostly I just WANT things to be better.  I WANT people to have more respect for one another.  I want men and women to treat one another as equal in intelligence and conversation and worth.  I want us all to show respect to one another as human beings.

But this week has proven to me time and time again that we are a far cry from respecting one another. 

I have been wanting to write for a few days, but haven't been able to bring myself to face the topic.

It's kind of stupid, I suppose, to make a big deal out of something that could easily be brushed off as nothing.  I would rather do that, pretend it didn't happen and wasn't happening, than write a blog about it and think about it for ten to thirty minutes while I compose this piece.  I've also pondered long and hard the fact that this sort of blog my be precisely the thing to fuel the fire behind what's been going on, so I won't be mentioning names or websites or anything else, just talking about the issue.  I'm sure that the one I've been witness to isn't the only thing like this out there.  In fact, I've done things like this myself - with boys - and I might as well just come out and say it.

There is this Facebook page from a high school that is posting pictures of yearbook pages and then posting rankings of all of the girls on a scale of 1 - 10 based on "hotness". 

This might be relatively harmless when you're sitting at home with your own yearbook with a few of your friends talking about who's hot and who's not.  I know these conversations go on.  I did my share of drawing hearts around boys faces and giving them numbers and drawing mustaches and devil's horns on girls I didn't like - but, honestly, I did that in sixth grade, and this is about the class of 2012.  Which means that most likely, whoever has decided to post this little gag is someone who is in high school. 

I know that high school is a hard place - but this is so juvenile I wasn't even sure what to make of it.  Literally, my sixth grade year book is the one with all the markings.  After that - really - what's he point?  Especially in the confines of your own home.

To put that yearbook onto a public forum?   To exploit the girls in your school for all the world to see with your opinions of their "hotness" blazened there mockingly - this is childish.  This is mean.  This is bullying.  This is wrong.  And on top of that - to do it anonymously?  Now on top of this childish meanness there is also cowardice. 

I understand the anonymousness, frankly.  There are girls who wouldn't lay down and take this kind of BS - who would find the culprit who thoughtlessly marked them as 1's and 2's and have no issue with knocking them to the ground with a bloody face.  It's not really those girls I worry about.

Does it still sting to a girl with self-confidence to see that she has a low number on this random ranking system and that everyone and their brother has seen this ranking system and that tons of people in the school have commented about how funny it is?  Of course it does.  Those are the girls who might knock you out if you ever reveal your identity.  Those are also the girls who nurse their wounds privately - shake off the sting - and post that it's a funny site. 

But there are other girls out there. 

There are the girls who can't recover.

Does it sound dumb?  That they take it so seriously?  Sure it does.  But is it true?  Yes.  It is.

Girls have been in tears over this site.  People have mocked them about their numbers, commenting on their rankings.  Taken the site seriously from all angles.  These are the girls about whom I most worry.  They might even laugh on the surface, but inside...  and alone with the mirror, they wonder - why am I a 2?  Why not a 4?  Why not something more?  Is this what people truly think of me?  And why is it worth it to get up in the morning?

From this perspective - the one where the years beyond high school seem a lifetime away and this seems the only world you will ever know...  there is great danger in tangling with a young woman's self-esteem.

To anyone reading this who attends the school of which I am speaking, anyone who might be male and reading this - I urge you to seek out those girls and let them know they are beautiful.  And mean it.

The hero to all of them would be the young man or group of men who passed out stickers with "Perfect 10"'s on them to all the girls in the class, because he could see beyond the surface.

If you've got the guts to be a hero to the girls in the class of 2012 - kudos and blessings.  I hope that you are reading this now, or that you have already thought of something equally special on your own.

You cannot counteract hate with hate, but you can counteract it with LOVE.  Love will win in the end. 

And if you're one of those girls - make some stickers yourself - you don't have to wait for a guy on a white horse.  Pass 'em out to the girls around you - let those jerks know who's boss.  You can't put a number on a person.  You can't "rank" a living creature.  You can't judge beauty.  You can't objectify intellect and character and have a meaningful existence. 

And to those who did this thing.  I get it.  I totally do.  Things are funny and fun and you don't think about the people you might hurt.  And you can rank your friends however and you can't make your own system and you can laugh about your secret as you walk through the hallways - and maybe you're not the most popular kid/s and maybe you are but either way, you've got to think about what you've done now.  You've got to look at it through the eyes of the people you hurt and you need to do something about it.  You screwed up.  It was a joke - and maybe you still think it's funny - but people got hurt - so the joke went sour.  It's a bad joke.  Own up and buck up and say you're sorry.  The fun ended when the first person took this seriously.  When the first girl felt the first sting and thought - people really think this about me.  This doesn't label you for life.  High school ends.  But if you keep on with something after others feel like it's hateful - life just keeps getting darker. 

I think the reason it was hard for me to write this post is because the entire premise goes against everything this blog stands for.  It was hard because it was so easy for me to put myself in the girls' shoes who were ranked...  and in the shoes of the person or persons who did the ranking.  Both shoes fit me at one time.  This blog has been about shaking off old chains.  As I perused the ranking page...  I felt...  guilt.  And pain.  Old guilt and old pain that compounded into shame and there I was - a ninth grade girl as my books were pushed from my hands.  A tenth grade girl who wouldn't date that boy because he "wasn't popular enough".  I shudder to remember the person I was.  The person I made myself into.  I am thankful that I was able to move past those years and hopeful that everyone has recovered who I hurt in the process.  There is life after bullying - for the bullied, and for the bully.  We don't have to live out our scars.  Here's hoping we can open our eyes.

YES.

She said everything I want to say: Katie Makkai, Pretty.

Plastic.

The last few days I've been listening to the radio as I drive.

Some days, I'm more interested in silence while driving, especially when the kids aren't with me.  I need that brief period of peace.

Other days when I'm alone I just want to be singing at the top of my lungs without anyone there to hear me.  Tons of freedom in the car.

These last few days have been more singing days and so the radio has been on.

Of course with the radio, no matter which station you listen to, you've got commercials.

There's this one commercial that's been making me insane.

In it, there are these two women who are out to lunch together or something, and the one woman says, "I feel like I'm still thirty, but when I look in the mirror I realize THAT'S not true!"  Then the other woman tells her that she can help!  All her friend needs to do is hook up with these local and affordable plastic surgeons and get some nips, tucks, and botox, and life will be all better.  Because "you should look the way you feel".

This bothers me with an intensity I can't even begin to express here.

So when I'm forty I should still look thirty?

How about when I'm sixty?

Or eighty?

Sorry to be a downer, but there comes a point at which a person should really NOT look thirty.  If you're eighty and you look thirty, you probably also look a bit creepy.

I wonder why it's so hard for people to accept how they look as they age.

I know.  People always tell me I have this great skin and I look so young and on and on.  And maybe that's true, but there ARE things I'm starting to notice.

I have horrifying dark circles under my eyes that don't want to go away.

My teenage acne is coming back since I stopped taking birth control pills.

I have ridiculous stretch marks from bearing my two children and a gut that just won't quit.

There are things about me that tweak at my heart a bit when I look in the mirror without my glasses on or think about how I look naked.

We've all got our issues with our bodies.

But I just can't be cool with plastic surgery to fix these things.

I think that there are things we can fix about ourselves.

For instance - I really should be getting more sleep.

Getting enough sleep would almost definitely help out with the dark circle issue.

And if I did a few more crunches (or ANY crunches, for that matter) I might be able to get rid of that last bit of baby weight.

If I filed my nails they might not look nasty and chipped and if I painted my toenails I might look more feminine.  HECK - I could even wear make-up if I wanted to!

But there's the plastic surgery thing that sort of sneaks into the back of our brains sometimes.

It's a scary thing, really.

You can alter your physique so much, if you want to, that you don't even look like you anymore: a whole new face.

Maybe to some this sounds good.  To me it sounds like a really scary movie.

The things that we try to fix with plastic surgery are usually things that either we could fix if we really worked hard or changed our habits (like my sleeping issue) or they are things we were born with that we have decided are not acceptable - like how my ears stick out from my head.

There are things that can be fixed that maybe need to be fixed for health reasons or so that we can see better or something that is growing somewhere that really shouldn't be there.  But then there are the things like my ears or something else's nose that are just things that make us...well...us.

It's taken me a long time to just accept my ears.  They still bug me sometimes.  Especially since I don't have hair to hide them anymore.  But God gave me these big stick out ears and that's okay.  And it's funny.  People who have these things that hate about themselves - their nose or their birth mark or their eyebrows or whatever - the funny thing is that other people either don't even notice them, or they think they're kind of cool..

Tons of famous actors and models have made their careers out of their strange facial features or physical differences that make them unique.  Blossom's nose, for example.

We forget that there is BEAUTY in the differences.

That God didn't make us all the same because that would've been BORING!  We're humans - we like to look at interesting things.  New things.  Cool things.  Funny things.  Pretty things.  Shiny things.  That's just how we're wired.  The color of someone's skin, the color of their eyes, their hair, the shape of their nose - these are things that add to the uniqueness of life - the beauty of life!

We come in all shapes and sizes.  Some girls have bigger boobs or smaller boobs or whatever.  That doesn't mean we need a boob job.  It just means that you might be able to wear a strapless dress and I might be able to run fast with nothing but an underwire - but we each have things we can do or not do or things that come more easily or are harder to come by.

I remember that TV show - The Swan.  Is it still on TV?  Gosh I hope not.

I never actually watched it, but people told me that they basically took "ugly" women and made them over and literally got them plastic surgery, and then they were "pretty" at the end.

Wow.

That's great for the chick's self esteem.

"You're really ugly right now, but that's okay - we'll just cut off part of your face and replace it with some skin from somewhere else on your body and then you'll be beautiful."

Sorry.  That disgusts me.  It really does.

I know some of you might be reading this and you've had some kind of appearance altering surgery.  Heck - I still wear my retainer at night.  But the reason for this particular entry is just to say that some of those things that we feel like are these huge flaws are really things that make us so interesting and gorgeous!

If you've got one of those amazing Greek noses - why hide that?  Why change it?  It's so neat to those of us who don't have one!

And there are so many other things just like that.  Things that others might make fun of us for.  Others who are insecure about their own appearances.  Others who are too ignorant to see what's really beautiful about you.  Fact is - those people are just dumb.  Really.  They're dumb.  And I don't use words like that lightly.

If you're fifty and you feel thirty - awesome - keep doing whatever you're doing.  FEEL thirty.  Heck - feel sixteen!  Whatever - but be proud of your wrinkles and your greys.  Those things are battle scars!  Those things are honor badges!  Those things are jewels in your crown!

I got my copy of Whole Living magazine a few days ago and I've been reading about Wabi Sabi.

It's intensely cool.

It's basically about finding the beauty in real life.  In old stuff.  In normal, everyday stuff that we don't tend to think about a lot.  In clothes that are tattered and care worn and threadbare.  How that hole in your shirt isn't something to be ashamed of - it's what makes the shirt an original!

A whole new way to look at the world.

I think that Wabi Sabi is something that we should take very seriously as people.

Old age should not be something to dread, but something to cherish.  Those who are older than me are wiser.  Have EARNED their greys.  And gosh - grey hair is so beautiful!  I wish more women would let their hair be grey.  I just love all the shades it can be, the way the light hits it and it turns silver.  That's gorgeous stuff.

And crows feet.  I hope I have more crows feet than brow lines so I'll know I smiled more than I frowned in my past.  I have always loved crows feet on people older than me.  Signs of joy and hope.

Maybe those of you who are older than me are sitting back thinking I'm just being an idealist and I'm just young and I'll change my tune when I'm your age.  But just think.  I'm thirty.  That woman on the commerical said she FELT like she was thirty and wanted to LOOK that way again - but I AM thirty, and I ADMIRE how you look now.  I aspire to be so naturally lovely as you ladies who dare to wear your greys and opt out of plastic surgery to keep your face "radiant" or whatever.  The women who are weathered - those are the women who truly shine.  To me, they look as though they have truly LIVED.

And just to everyone reading...

If we looked like Barbie - not only would we be eight feet tall and have a spine that could not support the weight of our breasts - but it would be awfully hard to play touch football or splash in puddles or catch snow flakes on our tongues or skip rocks if our feet were shaped like we were wearing heels all the time.

Reflections on the Mirror.

After starting The Mirror Project last week I've been doing a lot of thinking.

Why did I start this project?  Is it because I want it to catch on so I can be famous?  So I can be on Oprah or something talking about my blog?   So my blog can be listed somewhere important?  So I can afford my own domain name?

Or is this project something that I am doing because I care about the women and girls in my life and the readers of this blog and the women and girls around the world and I'm hoping that in doing this project and viewing these projects they will be able to see themselves for the gorgeous people that they are - on the INSIDE?

It's a soul searching sort of thing.

I want to be honest in my writing.  It's one of my biggest and scariest goals.

So.

Is there some little part of me that wants to be famous?

Yeah.  I admit that.  There is that part that thinks it would be amazing to have my blog recognized on a grand scale.  Did I think about the fact that if this catches on at all then that might happen for me?  Yes.  I did.

Is that the reason I started this project?

No.  It isn't.

I have been praying a lot for humility.  Which is a really scary thing to pray for, because, as they say, when you pray for patience, what you get are opportunities to be patient.  But I don't want this blog, at any point, to be about me getting famous.  That's insanity.  That's not why I'm writing.  It's not why I hope for readership.  It's definitely not why I started this blog.

This blog is a blog that has a lot to do with me.  Sure.  It's my writing.  It's my voice.  A lot of it is based on my personal experiences.  But this blog is about a journey.  A journey into womanhood and through it.  A journey about embracing something that in my younger years I had rejected: my femininity.

It's not some feminist manifesto.  It's not about my political bent.

In the end, the blog is about me trying to spread a message to the women around me that they can embrace the fact that they are women.  It's not a weakness.  It's something in which to find JOY.

So in my soul searching about my reasons for the mirror project, I asked myself a lot of hard questions.  I determined that if this project was really all about me and getting what I wanted and having people do my bidding then I would be taking it down.  Then it was a sickness.

So I prayed.  And I thought about it.  And I asked myself those questions.

And I analyzed the reasons for doing the project at all.

I looked at the pictures sent to me by all these women and I stared at the words I had written on my own bathroom mirror and I realized the why.

So often, when we look in the mirror, we look to check for flaws.

We want to see if that pimple is still there or if we have a hair out of place or if we've got some food stuck between our teeth.

With these words on the mirror it is hard to see the mirror as something negative. It's hard to stand there and study how your skin doesn't fall the way you'd like it to when you are faced with the reasons why you are beautiful and none of them have to do with your skin.  That's the first thing.

The second thing is - as I was writing my reasons - I realized that it was sort of hard.

It was easy to write down things others had said about my body - I could write down - unique hairstyle, pretty eyes, shapely collar bones... but when it came to the internal beauty parts, I found it more difficult.

I found myself coming up with cop-out answers that really didn't have a lot to do with me.  It actually took some time and a re-write to decide on the three things that I really wanted to have on the mirror and in my photograph.

I think the biggest point of this project is for women and girls to get inside themselves enough to figure out what it really is about them that makes them beautiful.  To take that time to come up with three things.

I hope that for many of you, it will be easy!

But for those of you for whom it is hard - those are the women I really hope take the time to do this.  To think about it.  What IS it that makes you beautiful?  What are your three things?

As I was doing all this soul searching, pacing around the kitchen in front of the computer, putzing around the house in general, and thinking about what I had written and why I had written it and wondering what the project was all about, I trudged back upstairs to the bathroom.  While I'd figured out the symbolism behind the Mirror Project, I still felt sort of weird about it.  Like I was missing something.  Like maybe it really was just some selfish self-indulgence.  I also figured, now it was evening, my writing had been there awhile, it was probably time to just go ahead and clean off the mirror.

When I got to my bathroom, this is what I saw:

The brown dry erase marker was lying next to my purple one, still uncapped.

The heart was from my son.  And it's message was so clear I could feel the tears welling up in my eyes as I stared at it right there, over my sink, and under my words.  A message of love.  Unconditional love.  The love of a child.

I realized in that moment a myriad of things - but more than anything it affirmed what I was doing.  That this project was a worthy one.  No matter how many women actually send a photograph.  My son wanted to reassure me that I was loved no matter what.  My beauty isn't just wrapped up in what I think of me.  It's wrapped up in the love that I am able to give to the people around me - it's part of our duties as women to make OTHERS feel beautiful... 

And when I went into the kids' bathroom, I saw this:

Hearts.  Hearts all over their mirror - and my two year old daughter's additional writing in purple (that's her in the bathtub).

To pass on this love to my children - to  understand and have them understand that to pass on love is the greatest thing that we can do, and to understand that when you pass on love you feel love in return, and that it is cyclical and beautiful and Godly...THIS is the lesson!  Jonah, my amazing six year old, got this simple truth when I couldn't wrap my head around it. 

My son drew that heart on my mirror because of the love that flowed out of him when he saw what I had written - he wanted me to know that no matter what the words said or what I was thinking about myself, I was loved.  And after he had done that, he wanted to spread that love even further.  To his sister, and yes, to himself.

It is my absolute feeling that to love is the greatest duty we have on this planet.  To love others.  And in order to love others - to REALLY love others we must first understand our own worth.  Our own worthiness of love.  To know that WE are loved.  To understand the great love that has been shown to us through Christ - yes, this is a part of my message.  I know not all my readers will follow here, but I think you get the point anyway - the great love WE have been shown can spill out onto us and into us and through us and out of us to those around us.  Gosh - this project really has NOTHING to do with me at all.

I'm just the messenger.

And a participant in something more.

So.

The Mirror Project is about beauty.  It's true.  But it's also about LOVE.  Loving ourselves.  Loving our children.  Loving the people around us.  Allowing them to love us.  To see us.  Knowing that we have value and knowing that everyone around us is valuable too.  And lovable.  And somewhere, sometimes very deep down, they are also filled with beauty.

Princess.

Yesterday my daughter dressed up as a princess.

She was truly beautiful, even glamorous in her sparkly new dress (from a bag of hand-me-downs from a friend) that was a little too big and falling off of her shoulders as she ran up and down the hall and twirled with delight.  She is two years old, and she knows what beautiful means.  She knows what it means to wish for the people around her to delight in her, to see her, to know that she is important and special, and yes...lovely.

It's not something that goes away when we grow up.  It's why we wear make-up and get our hair done and lavish over the prom dresses in the store even when we are far too old to go to prom.  It's why we get in a tizzy over the First Lady's inaugural ball dress and the wedding dresses of the stars.  We can live a little bit vicariously through them as we watch them walk down the red carpet or twirl across the dance floor with their husbands. 

I've been thinking a lot about beauty these past couple days because of my daughter and also because of the song that my husband wrote about me and about this blog.  I've been thinking about what it means to feel beautiful and to be beautiful and what it means for me, personally.

I've also been tossing around that whole, maybe I should grow my hair back, thing. 

It's funny - one day I'm certain it's what I should do and the next day I can't imagine having to take a brush to my hair or use conditioner or worry about rolling the windows down in the car.  It's a waffling decision at best daily. 

Reading the lyrics to my husband's song I almost cried - he talks about how he thinks I'm beautiful with the hair like this and just knowing he would think I was beautiful no matter what I did is a pretty great feeling. 

I wish that for all of you out there who are pretty sure that marriage is where you're headed.  If he wouldn't think you were pretty anymore after you shaved your head you might want to re-think that situation.

This is where a lot of people will say that we should want to please our husbands and be beautiful and whatnot for them.  I get that.  I think it's great to dress up for the husband - guys are visual creatures - that's why women are prettier than men (if you don't believe it, check out visual art for the past six hundred years), but I don't think you should have to be perfect all the time for the guy to love you.  The right guy is going to love you in your sweatpants.  Will he appreciate the little black dress?  Duh.  But he'll still find those sweatpants kinda cute. 

Wit. Chapter One.

"Hi, how are you feeling today?"

This is the first line of the piece I'm currently directing for the Newtowne Players.  I used it as the opener for this blog post at the request of my leading actress, Dawna Diaz.  I hope she doesn't mind my mentioning her here.  I am almost certain I will be saying only good things with regard to her personally - and professionally, I might add.

It was not my intention to direct this piece.

I submitted it for a friend, who now happens to be my stage manager, but when he couldn't direct it, he asked me to step in, having seen my work before.  I said yes instantly, because I wanted to see the piece done on the Newtowne stage - for the Newtowne audience.  I felt like they were ready for it and that they needed this nudge off of the artistic cliff so to speak - nurtured toward more after last year's Butterfly experience.

That and the piece is brilliant.  Not only is it a Pulitzer winner but it's also stunning, intelligent, pushes the envelope...  I guess what I'm trying to say is, while some plays that win the Pulitzer could be said to be lacking something...this play simply isn't lacking anything.  It is edgy.  It is humorous and terribly sad - sometimes together.  And the main character is a woman.

This has happened for good old Pulitzer a few times, and I have been privy to it before: Proof, by David Auburn, is another example of such a piece.  I had the privilege to direct the show on the high school stage and then, that same season, to play the role of Catherine. 

But I digress.  Wit is the piece at hand.

It is the story of a woman who is diagnosed with advanced metastatic ovarian cancer  - stage four.  "There is no stage five."  She checks herself into a research hospital, and she tells us, the audience - her students for just under two hours - exactly what happens to her along the way.

I see the piece as a Last Lecture of sorts.

What I find most intriguing is that Vivian, the main character - who speaks openly to the audience - shattering the fourth wall with her very first statement - while suffering from a female cancer, could be any of us.  I find this breathtaking.

There is no man to whom she clings for her salvation.  She is not having sexual relations "at the moment".  She is utterly alone in the world and she is successful in that way - and it is another woman who teaches her the art of kindness - the art of compassion - and really - how could it be any other way.

I applaud everything about this piece.

I admit that I am terrified of it still - even though we are just a few short weeks from opening night.

The night after I agreed to direct it I went home and had a complete panic attack.  I will be directing Wit.  What have I done?  This piece is too good for me.  It is too big.  It is too rich.  It is about things I don't understand - medical terms... I am...I will be...in over my head.

Wit is my twentieth directing gig.  I still feel like a novice in the face of it.  In my desperation to do it justice I am certain that I have taken on much more stress than necessary.  It is, after all, only art.

Of course I don't mean that.  It is only art.  But art to me...is something like breathing.  It's where I find God.  In art.  In His art.  Creation.  The gifts he has bestowed on others.

It is why I strive for excellence in this area of my life more than any other.  Because for me, it is a practice of holiness.

Some might find this blasphemous - but I think that other artists - other actors, dancers, painters, directors, musicians... I think that they will understand what I mean when I say that there is no where else I am closer to God than when I am surrounded by brilliance in an art museum - surrounded by our attempts to be like our Master.  Our futile attempts - but there is beauty in that.  Sheer, utter, complex beauty.  I am choking up thinking about it.

I know I am unnaturally sentimental.

Regardless - I am blessed with a most excellent cast, and things are going so well I'm afraid for the other foot to fall.  I pray that there is no other foot, and I am in fact dueling with a one-legged man.

the butt grabbing phase

When you're in middle school, you're trying to figure out who Juliet is. To figure out what the phrase "true love" really means.

It's a tough thing for a middle school girl.

In sixth grade, the butt grabbing phase began at my middle school.

As an eleven-year-old, I wasn't sure how to deal with this. There were a few facts to look into, in my sixth grade brain:


1. The butt grabbing is happening.
2. Boys like to grab girls' butts.
3. Boys give most attention to the girls whose butts they grab on a daily basis.

So here you are, and for me, it was pre-puberty, really, though I'd always liked boys. I had a "boyfriend" in preschool, for crying out loud... and you really do want the attention of boys. You don't get what it all means yet, but you want them to like you. Most of the other girls around you are talking about the boy they like, the boy who likes them, the boy they skated with a Skateland or walked around with last weekend at the mall. Lots of girls were getting their first kiss. It was all very exciting. And it's a hard time too. I remember when this kid, Shawn, grabbed my butt on the way out of English class. I remember feeling a lot of different feelings. I felt embarassed first. I wondered if the teacher had seen, if anyone else had seen.

 I felt confused - was I supposed to be happy? Was this supposed to "turn me on"? And what does that mean, being "turned on" anyway? And I felt accepted. I felt VALUED. I felt... loved?

Shawn passed me a note the next day and asked me to go with him to Skateland. I will never forget my devastation when my parents said no. They told me I was too young to date. I felt like my life was pretty much over. And I'll be honest. That was the beginning of the end for me. Shawn didn't want to be with a girl whose mom and dad said no to Skateland. To dating at age eleven. There were plenty of moms whose daughers were allowed to go to Skateland, the movies, whatever. Dating was definitely happening when I was a middleschooler. I wasn't allowed. I was left out. And I became an outcast.

Before the butt grabbing phase, I was a pretty popular little thing. I believed in myself. I thought I was pretty. I had a lot of self confidence in my intellect, my athletic ability, my acting, my singing, you name it. I felt damn good about myself. After the rejection I experienced at the end of my sixth grade year, my whole life took a drastic turn. From playing kickball with the boys at recess to being last picked in gym class. From sleepovers at my house with all the popular girls, to having my books knocked from my hands on the way down the hallway and candy thrown into my hair on the field trip bus.

My junior high years, through the end of ninth grade were truly awful.

So, looking back on it, what does it mean? Let the boys grab your butt? Pray your parents let you go on a date at a younger age? Sneak around and lie to your parents so you won't have to hurt later?

I guess the answer is, to put it briefly, no.

Everyone goes through pain during junior high. It might not be the rejection kind of pain that is so often portrayed, but there are other sorts of pain. Sorts that may not even manifest themselves until years later. The pain of feeling cheap. Feeling branded.

The truth is, I didn't just let that one kid grab my butt in sixth grade and then turn around and slap every other boy who tried.

Boys did all sorts of things to me - groping in the middle of class when the lights were off during the social studies movie, grabbing my breasts (or lack thereof) as I walked down the hall, asking truly embarassing questions about hair in inappropriate places, and generally taking advantage of the fact that I was this little girl who had no idea what love was or how to obtain it. She just knew it was something that she needed.

My first boyfriend told me that if we didn't have sex sometime in the next six months, the relationship was over. He said he just couldn't deal with it if I made him wait. I was fourteen. He told me he loved me. And I believed him. I didn't sleep with that boy. He broke up with me before I ruined myself completely, but I would have, you see. I would have, because I needed that love. I wanted so desperately to be accepted.

For a long time, that era of my life made me unfit for relationships. With any sort of boy. And yes, though sometimes few and far between, there are boys who don't go through the "butt grabbing phase".

I guess the deal is, I hope that there are girls out there who will stand tall through that period of their lives, and their whole lives. Who will keep their heads up and their fists ready to punch the first boy who grabs their butt square in the jaw. Might teach everyone a thing or two about what it means to be respected, because there is something I have learned over all these years. A few things, actually, but one of the most important is, if you don't respect someone, you don't love them. Not in the romantic sense. It's an impossible duality. If a boy doesn't respect you, he doesn't love you either, no matter what he says. And no, you don't have to let your boyfriend grab your butt to prove you care about him. Or any boy, for that matter. You have a right to be respected. You are a valuable thing.

That was something I didn't understand. I hope that I can help others to understand it. Girls and boys, men and women, so we can stop the cycle of hurt where it starts.

Redefined Beauty

I just finished watching The Tyra Show. I know. Day time talk didn't used to be my MO, but I stay home now and that's how I veg while my son is in preschool and my daughter is napping.

Today, Tyra was talking about redefining beauty and really looking at what is beautiful and why, what true beauty means, etc.

I guess part of it was good - Tyra did the show without make-up for the most part, and wore a zip-up hoodie and yoga pants with sneakers. I thought that was awesome. She also had husbands talking about what they think is physically beautiful about their wives, and I admit it, I cried over it.

But there were other parts that pissed me off.

She gave everyone in the audience lipstick and base. That was their little gift for being on there and talking about redefining beauty. So basically, you're beautiful without the makeup, but you sure as hell better put some on before you go out tonight.

It makes me mad.

I guess that's part of this blog too.


I hate make-up. I hate how it feels on my face. I hate how women feel like they need to wear it to be beautiful. I don't wear make-up. Ever. Unless I'm on stage, and stage make-up doesn't count because it's really a lot more like paint or wax or something. Either way, why do we have to pretend to be something we're not? Why do we have to cover up what we look like?

I find myself caught in the trap as well. I'm not trying to say I'm the most self-confident person ever. In my last post, I talked about feeling self-conscious when people look at me differently because of my hair. And I am. I don't want people to judge me based on that. To not talk to me because of it. To not invite my son to birthday parties because his mom is "weird" or to pity me because they think I'm ill. Why can't people just give other people the benefit of the doubt?

It's so hard not to judge based on appearance. I mean, that's what we see, it's the first thing.

I wish I had a gift for seeing the essence of people before their appearance. I need to work on that.

But really, I'd like to see beauty truly redefined. I'd like to see us all stop worrying so much about we look like and worrying more about how we feel. Healthy, or happy, or cozy, or whatever. And how we make other people feel too. I don't know. It all seems very idealistic.

I look in the mirror and I think, hey, she's kinda cute, but she needs to lose that baby roll hanging over those jeans. It's tough. We all want to be attractive to the people around us. We long to be loved.

I think all the women should band together and just stop wearing make-up. Like, every woman in the world, for one day, no make-up.

You know what's funny? I bet the guys wouldn't even notice.

Hazy Shade of Winter

Today is one of those days where it's really too warm to be December. Sickness hangs like fog over my family, over the area, over the friends around me.

I hate these days here. Humidity soars. It should be freezing outside. You look out the window and the wind is berating the trees, the sky is grey, dark clouds looming - but it's in the sixties when you check the thermometer. Hate it.

It's been interesting living life with a shaved head. I wonder what people are thinking when they look at me. Maybe I'm a cancer victim, or a lesbian, or maybe they think I'm just weird. Not sure. Most looks I get are negative in nature. Most people simply ask why I did it if they get up the nerve to talk to me. I guess I should be flattered to be a conversation piece, but I'd rather just be left alone.

To be honest, I'm not sure why I did it. I've just always wanted to. I felt like it would be freeing somehow. I felt like it would make me feel more like myself. And the truth is, it does. I like my hair this way. I like not having to mess with it in the morning, having to look in the mirror and be disgusted because I'm having a bad day or whatever. I like how it feels. I like that I'm saving $ on shampoo. God knows we all need to save a little cash right now.

I have this friend who has two cars. Not one for him and one for his fiance who lives with him. He has two cars that are his. They are the exact same make and model. The only difference is that one is red and one is black and I think maybe one is stick and one is automatic. So he just takes whichever one he feels like that day.

Now, I love this guy. He's one of my best friends and I hope we'll stay good friends til one of us kicks it, but I think that's nuts.

I don't want to have that much extra money. Just enough to go on the occasional backpack across Europe.

Either way, I don't want to feel like this anymore. Sick, I mean. I should drink some green tea or something instead of sitting in front of the computer blogging. There's something wrong with that. When you forgo breakfast and hydration to type a blog.

I guess most writers were certifiably insane. I shouldn't consider myself too special.

First Post

This is my first post here. I've written other places, but I wanted a space to really talk about the things I like to do, the things I'm doing, and to in general describe stuff. Basically, I'm a blog whore. I write different things on every blog that I do, and I write in four different places if you count this blog. I have a blog for the every day, journal stuff. I have a blog for trying to change the world. I have a blog for all of my friends to read. This blog, I'm not sure what it will be. I want to talk about God. I want to talk about the experiment that is our church's current deal right now, The Refinery. I want to talk about hiking and running and just being in God's creation. Maybe this is my blog about God. Who knows.

I do want to say that my blog's title means a lot to me. For a long time, I had a blog called Juliet's
Question. In fact, I still write there to journal, but the fact is, that title is sort of irrelevant now. Her question was in Act 2, during the balcony scene. She asks, simply, "Dost thou love me?"

While Romeo throw her flowery words and empty promises, THIS is what is on Juliet's heart. She wants a straight answer. She knows that she loves him, but she needs to know what he truly feels for her. Does he just want a date for the night? Is he just looking to get in her pants because he thinks she's kinda hot? Does he want to marry her? Juliet refuses to settle for the guy who just wants to get in her pants. She wants a man who is willing to be with her no matter what, who is willing to face the risks defined in their relationship head on...

The problem with Romeo was that, in reality, he couldn't face it.

I don't want to get into some sort of literary dispute about it, but the fact is, Romeo couldn't deal. He killed himself, in an extremely wussy way, I might add, because he thought that Juliet was dead, and he couldn't go on without her. This is not the strong man Juliet wanted. Is it romantic? Well...sort of. Did he love her? I really think that's still up in the air. If Juliet was dead, Romeo was banished for nothing, couldn't go back to his family, just didn't want to face life. Juliet kills herself as well, but it's because she feels responsible for Romeo's death. Not because she can't go on without him, but because she can't go on WITH the guilt of him killing himself for her.

Either way, it's kind of moot.

The fact is, I feel like Juliet has been redefined for me. Romance isn't what it was when we were fourteen, or even nineteen. I'm twenty-eight, and I'm sure Juliet will be redefined for me again and again. I have learned that true love is about choice, commitment, - not how hot the guy is or how much you want to sleep with him. I have learned that the greatest romancer of a girl's heart is God - what boy could paint for you the sunset? What boy could waft the scent of roses over your nose as you walk through the trees he crafted to shade you on the very day? And I've also learned that my second greatest romancer is my man, Michael, who has shown me that I am not made up of the world's definition of me. I am more than that. You just have to look deeper.