But I carry this feeling . . .

I have been spending a lot of time lately thinking. About my life. About my past. About my future. I never thought I would be where I am today. This was never where I thought I would be. That is not to say that I am unhappy with my life. In fact, it is mostly the opposite. I am pretty happy here and now. I can't really complain about most of it. But sometimes it doesn't feel like enough. Sometimes I want more. 


Lately I have been in an indie film, old music type of place. I miss my best friend. I read a lot about feminism and some about pop culture. I spend a lot of time thinking about women's roles in movies and music, about how our society treats women, about how the standards that women are held to are weighing down on me so much that I am unbelievably exhausted from trying to live up to the expectations. I question why it has to be this way. I question why it seems to be more important to the world at large how I look than what I know. I ask why there are so few positive portrayals of gay women around me, why there is such little visibility and I ask if anyone cares. Sometimes I get angry about it all. I wonder what Canadians got ourselves into with this Conservative majority government we are now stuck with. I wonder why there hasn`t been enough progress to make it easier to be a woman.


I am about two thirds through reading The Beauty Myth and it still rings so true today, 20 years after it was written. It is scary how often I would read things about the professional beauty requirement, or the indoctrination into the beauty cult, or how female sexuality isn`t really our own and feel it click with what I have known all along but been unable to verbalize before. All those things in my head that made me feel so crazy for so long aren`t just me. They are real external forces that are driving hundreds of thousands of women crazy. The more freedoms women win, the tighter the constraints on our physical appearance become. It seems so clear to me now. I am kind of angry with myself for buying into it, for falling for it, for letting it hurt me so much. But it is so nice to know that it is no just me, that I am not just crazy like I thought for so long.


I wish that I could go back in time and take Women`s Studies when I was a student. Maybe it could have helped me avoid some of the bumps along the road. Or maybe I had to take the long way to get to where I am before it could click with me.