I must admit that I am drawn to sad girls. Sad girls have the unexpected effect of making Sleepy E feel downright positive. Suddenly he is full of life and vigor and purpose! And the purpose, dear readers, is to make these sad girls understand the shimmering brilliance of our existence.
Say what?
Seriously, though, I just don't trust anyone who is too positive. There is nothing more relentlessly draining and stressful than having to be positive all the time. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, not even my enemies. I can't figure how these boppy LA bims do it all the time without indulging in a good brooding funk now and again.
Lately I've been seeing quite a few women sobbing in public. One I saw in her car waiting at a stoplight, one was at the store, one was at Carl's Jr (insert your own joke here). Sobbing women are not attractive, but Benevolent E is still drawn to them. I want to help them. I wouldn't say I want to reform them, like the foolish women who want to catch the most dangerous, sexy men around and modify their behavior--"I can change him, I WILL change him!" And I wouldn't say that I find their distress intoxicating or alluring in any way. And I definitely wouldn't put any moves on these people. But I do want to help them. I want them to accentuate the positive and eliminate the negative--some very foreign concepts that suddenly feel right at home in my noggin. If only I can cheer them up then I will be useful.
I also like women with big noses, but that is another story. And women dressed up in the cold of winter (the boots, the long scarf, the cute stocking cap, the mittens). There is nothing better than a Northwesterly sad girl with a big nose coming in out of the wintry night.
A side question for the ladies: When I first entered my very PC university, I was chastised at a party for referring to someone as a "girl." The girl (or grrrrl or woman or womyn) in question was probably 18 years old and still very much a girl, but I took the lesson to heart and have been calling any female of majority a "woman" ever since. Now that I'm in my mid-30s, however, I find myself backsliding and referring to women my age as "girls" again. Is this still incorrect or upsetting? It feels right somehow--now that we are all fast approaching middle age. I mean, I'll call them whatever they want--"ma'am" or "mistress" or even "master"--if it makes them more inclined to talk to me.
4 comments:
I have given this post some intermittent thought and have this to say: the save the sad girl thing is fine as long as it doesn't get, y'know, pathological. Just as a matter of curiosity: are these girls wearing a lot of black and listening to emo? Just checking.
Northwesterly sad girl with a big nose coming in out of the wintry night--isn't that a Bob Dylan song?
As long as it's not some patriarchal type, especially not a managerial patriarchal type, being referred to as a girl is secretly charming and endearing. Speaking only for myself.
You lived here; you know there are no girls in black listening to emo in these parts. And no, I wouldn't want to save them anyway, not those people, not even if they listened to way too much Morrissey.
Personally, I prefer "girl" to "ma'am". If a teenage boy at a fast food counter, for example, calls me "ma'am" it makes me want to cry. In which case, I would be a sad girl, I guess. I like to be called girl. Perhaps because, as a girl, I was often called "boy." I think it was because I was so flat chested. That's for a different blog.
This reminds me of years ago when I was at the beginning of my Masters program in Marriage and Family Therapy. Little did I know at that time about PC or feminism or patriarchy. I recall writing a paper in one of my first classes, and when it was returned to me, every single "mankind" was marked through in red with "humankind" written above.
It was a good shot in the arm for me, after growing up in conservative Texas. However, years later I too have found myself sliding back into previous linguistic patterns. Maybe it is a rebellion against PC (which seems to be as oppressive as its opposite), or maybe it is like Zen. I have seen through the ilusions of patriarchy and now see both the illusions and the reality and am comfortable with both existing simultaneously. Or, I am full of it :)
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