leg hair

sometime in October, with the assistance of literary criticism class:

Me: Hey, I don’t like shaving my legs.
My Inner Feminist: Who said you had to?
Me: Um.
My Inner Feminist: . . .
Me: Was it . . . the patriarchy?
My Inner Feminist: Bingo.
Me: Was it an ideology that compels self-modification for women on the assumption of inadequacy and reinforces the to-be-looked-at-ness of the female body?
My Inner Feminist: Yup.
Me: DANG . . .
My Inner Feminist: Dang is right.
Me: So, does that mean I can stop shaving my legs?
My Inner Feminist: Yes, yes it does.
Me: Oh, ok. Well then, I think I’ll stop.
My Inner Feminist: Good job.


November:

Me: I kind of resent that now I can’t shave my legs even if I want to, because you’d make it sound like collusion with the patriarchy.
My Inner Feminist: Tough. Such is the cost of cultural analysis.
Me: Yeah, I know. Fine.


circa January:

My Inner Feminist: How’s the leg hair?
Me: It’s good. I’m actually becoming rather fond of it now that we’re past that awkward prickly stage.
My Inner Feminist: Really? Would you say that it’s growing on you?
Me: Augh, don’t do that to me. You’re supposed to liberate women, not hurt them.
My Inner Feminist: Sorry. But anyway, it’s still winter, so no one has really seen it yet.
Me: Now who’s reinforcing to-be-looked-at-ness?
My Inner Feminist: Just sayin’. This isn’t very gutsy just yet. You going to shave when you wear a skirt?
Me: I dunno. We’ll see.


summer:

Me: Um, so I’m pretty ok with my leg hair now. Yay not having to shave.
My Inner Feminist: Huzzah! Down with the patriarchy!

Mother Deities

So, this last week I've encountered two songs that refer to meeting one's mother in heaven. One of them ("Poor Wayfaring Stranger") says in one verse "I'm going there to meet my Father" and in another verse "I'm going there to meet my mother" (note the capitalization). God takes the father role, but the mother is just a human mother rather awkwardly placed as a heavenly figure.

The divinity of fathers is understood to be metaphorical and refer imperfectly to God's divinity, but mothers don't have anywhere to pass the buck in protestant culture. I'm taking Victorian Literature, and the strain is especially acute in that period. Victorian mothers are supposed to be superhuman agents of goodness, taking care of their own work and everyone else's, and generally glowing with virtue. I'm not saying mothers or anyone else ought to slack off on virtue and goodness, but the expectations were pretty ridiculous and still are in many subcultures.

If we have a psychological or cultural need for a divine mother, promoting earthly mothers to the position isn't a fair way to deal with it. And it's not healthy for them or those around them. A mother who thinks she's supposed to be an angel or goddess is likely to be acutely disappointed with herself, or self-righteous, or both. Idealizing human roles gets messy very quickly.

So maybe we need to recognize the mother aspect in God more. Mothers should be able to see what they do as a reflection of (not a substitute for) the mother in God. Then mothering is meaningful but allowed to be imperfect, and mothers can respect themselves and be respected for what they are.