I'm sorry to hear that. It's a power thing, and this one seems so easy and accessible.
It's hard for anyone to find forms of power, but I do hope she finds others.
I always thought kate hepburn was gorgeous, especially when she was 80 something. simply gorgeous.
by the way, the everyone dies part... you guys are just deputy downers this week.
tlg
first thought that came into my head: amen to that! at 27, i'm not even old yet and somehow i feel old and do the whole close up examination for wrinkles and white hair thing. in my head, i know that's stupid and yet i keep doing that and thinking that.
thanks for the post.
women seem to have a much strickter definition of buty then men do....or perhapse im jsut odd, my range tends to go from not anoric to not obese. and age is a very large range...women in general as long as they are healthy are butiful.
ya im easy like that.
you guys are just deputy downers this week.
Well, I did think of posting the laughing babies video...
It's pretty well known by now how unhealthy for women the expectation to be wire-thin has been and continues to be. Britney Spears at the VMA, her poor performance not withstanding, actually looked very good for a woman who has had two children within a short period of a few years. But if you've seen the most recent cover of Star magazine (working in a grocery store, I can't help but see it), she's now approaching true obesity because she's dealing with the PR fallout of her poor showing at the VMA and with losing her kids by feeling sorry for herself.
On another note, one big reason why I have nothing good to say about the gay-male singles scene (known as "the scene" for short) is because it really little more than a cult of superficial beauty and unfulfilling promiscuous sex. The combination of those two things makes those who get their main identity from it into utterly, unbelievably vicious and vindictive people. And very shallow and empty too, it usually goes without saying.
I blame Twiggy. 
At least that was THE standard when I became aware, painfully aware, that pre-teen and early teen girls who did not meet the Twiggy standard, were fat. Oh. The girls today have it much worse I think so I'm happy for Dove to be doing something to point out the reality of touch up work. No one looks like that outta the box. Okay, well, maybe very few.
Thank God for AGE!!!! My hair lady told me, when I turned 40, that I really had to cut my hair as it was inappropriate to have past-the-shoulder hair after 40. Oh. Now, at 52, I'm so fucking inappropriate as to not only have long hair, but I decided to quit dying it 5 years ago. Loves it!!
Mama Gena says the most attractive woman is the one having the most fun! Let it shine! Indeed! 
I hear complaints over women self-image all the time, but very few solutions are proffered.
Ironically enough, the answer to this problem is the same as the answer to our political woes: elimination of oligarchy. There are only a few entities that command the airwaves and magazine and newspaper ads; if laws made it easier for the common man to break into not only television content but television ads, we could see change here.
Can anyone give us an alternative to this scenario? How else would one even begin to tackle the propaganda here? The only equivalent I can think of is black self-image, and the Black is Beautful movement was ultimately co-opted and crushed once formal discrimination fell out of favor. Now the only Pretty Black Women are actually very tanned Pretty White Women (girls, really). I would think that that is a case study on how not to do things.
Suggestions? Criticism?
@Myrtle June - Yer hairdresser says that because long hair == sexy and it's a way of reinforcing youth == beauty.
Myrtle June: tiggy falls into that small catagory of unatractive women for me....skeletor just dosn't do it for a lot of guys
Twiggy actually came out against anorexic models just recently. I don't have the link.
Frankly Susan Sarandon and Queen Latifah rock my world. The gaunt runway models do nothing for me. And while cute young things turn my head at times, mature ladies are far more interesting.
Anyway, when I see some supermodels I just immediately shift to the 10-20 years down the line overly made up types with horrific sun/smoking damaged skin. On the other hand when I see a lady who is comfortable in her own skin I'm much more turned on since she's likely to be herself all through her life.
My hairdresser is older and very elegant and comfortable with her appearance.
It's a bad day, that one that comes sometime in your forties (or, if you're really lucky, your early fifties), the one where you wake up and realize it's been weeks since anyone of the male persuasion winked at you or smiled that way at you or just sort of looked you over.
And then the weeks turn into months -- and you realize that you are now Invisible in a way you've never been before. The hard truth is right there in the mirror, and no matter what you do, the fact remains. The party's over. One day you still had IT. And the next, you didn't. And you won't, ever again. That part of your life is finished.
There are consolations. There are things old ladies can get away with precisely because they are sexually invisible. It hurts to watch the game go on without you; but there are also secret pleasures that come with not being quite so seen. You're no longer required to try to be nice, or cute, or sexy. So you can be who you are -- even if that person is sometimes uncompromising, firm, and prickly. It's a privilege that comes with age; and on balance, it's not too bad a compensation for losing your sexual mojo.
And, for those of us lucky enough to get to middle age well-partnered, there's a deeping sweetness in knowing that there's still one man out there who still thinks I'm Aphrodite walking, who has hung his fantasies on my body for so long that he doesn't even really see the way time has ravaged it. I'm the one who knows where all his secret buttons are, and can push them like nobody else. And vice versa. We're following through on that promise to grow old together -- and as long as I can still get that smile and look from him when I need it, that process is gonna be tolerably OK.
And I'm really grateful that I never was a grade-A beauty in the first place. Because, like SteveK says, those women go down hard on that final day. Beauty's all they had; and when it fades, there's nothing left of the lives they had, and they have no idea of where to go next.
But brains go on for a long, long time.
The best old ladies are the ones who seem like the beauty never really left them -- it just picked up and moved deeper inside. It's harder to see now: but if you look into their eyes, you can't miss it. It's still all there.
Myrtle June and Mz. Robinson speak kewl words!
There's a fest I and my wife attend, twice a year in CA. Strawberry Music Fest.
5,000 folks, mostly Boomer oriented with their children ranging from 20's to grandkids.
It's at 4,100 ft. in the Sierra's, just outside of Yosemite.
Been going there since Fall of '01.
There's a very, very sexy glow that the women get, and a playful look in the men's eyes. All of us, somehow, get that 'thing' and it shines!!
It's VERY invigorating, for husbands, wives, singles, thick and thin, young and old.
It's totally bitchen to have women of all types give you 'the look' when yer MY age, in MY condition. And the women, they know they are getting 'the look', no matter who they are, or how they are shaped.
I'm always amazed by it. My wife says shut up and enjoy it. I wonder who's been giving MY wife the look!!!!! :D
Coming home to Sacto and regular life, is a real comedown till we adjust. We both agree, we LOVE THE GLOW!!! :D
Beauty is NOT skin deep . . . that twinkle in a person's eye is borne from deep seated layers of life . . . and that twinkle is as sexy as nekkid people in a magazine . . more so, I dare say, as it's REAL! :D
Mrs. R: That invisibility can feel liberating, but it can also make you feel like you don't exist. Because I was always "the smart, funny girl" instead of the "pretty, fuckable girl", being the one who was ignored when I was with a friend who was more attractive cut like a knife. I learned early on that "pretty" is the currency of the realm. Somewhere around 40, when I no longer was noticed but hadn't become quite invisible yet, and gas station attendants were being polite because they saw me as Mom, it was kind of nice. I will say, though, that the "Ignore the Unfuckable One" is still alive and well, even in progressive men. Today, if I'm at a party or a gathering, and men refuse to acknowledge my existence because I'm not "the pretty one", aren't worth my time. It helps that I have a good husband who values having "the smart and funny one." If I'd stayed single, I would hate men by now.
Jill...... I see this a little differently. I'm GLAD for the pretty trophy women..... weeds the trophy/most fuckable hunters right out of the mix. Just makes things ever so much more relaxed and fun for the real people. I see them more as loser magnets :D
Loser magnets! That's the best line of the month, if not the year.
Ya know, that really needs to be taught in high school. If there's some way you could get the young persons to believe you.
Jill, this is a good point.
I was the smart, fuckable one -- pretty, in a sort of classic Monroesque way, and cheerful and easy once I got over myself in my mid-20s. And I liked (still like) glamour, which a lot of guys are suckers for at any age.
But I was always curvy; and after a couple kids, downright zaftig. Somewhere in my 30s, I came to pretty much the same conclusion that you did: my weight was a terrific bullshit filter, weeding out the vapid and shallow "trophy hunters" (good term, thanks) from my life. And I think I can honestly say it's been a better life without them.
Unfortunately, in the game business, there came a point in the early 90s when the geeks were no longer running the asylum, and the vapid and shallow young men had taken over. "Mrs. Robinson" was actually one response to that. Turns out that the shallower they are, the more easily they're intimidated, especially by a poised woman who's in full possession of her sexual power and got 20 IQ points on them to boot.
Through my late 30s and early 40s, I used that to very good advantage. Do not give me grief, or I will eat your balls for breakfast. And make you love it. Or not. Either way, it will my choice, not yours. And the fear you feel at that prospect just proves to us both that you're not worth my time.
But that only works as long as you've got your stuff. When mine vanished, then I had to change tactics. As you note, there's a lot of cultural juice in being the mom figure. Now, the mindfuck is more along the lines of
old-hippie-mom-who's-smarter-than-you, peering over my half-glasses to give 'em the hairy eyeball, with a matching half-smile that brings into doubt their whole sense of cool.
I was cool before you were born, junior. Been places you can't even imagine, because they don't exist anymore. But if you're smart, and listen up, I might be persuaded let you curl up on my big red velvet sofa and feed you tea and brownies while I tell you all about what it was like. And then you can tell me about the future -- which I also know will be cooler than you think.
But if you've seen the most recent cover of Star magazine (working in a grocery store, I can't help but see it), she's now approaching true obesity because she's dealing with the PR fallout of her poor showing at the VMA and with losing her kids by feeling sorry for herself.
Uh... do you really believe the cover of Star Magazine?
I've seen it. It screams that she's 160 POUNDS! Which is probably impossible, given that she maybe weighed 125 or 130 at the VMAs about 3 weeks ago. Plus, Photoshop.
In any event, is a double chin (if that's really hers, and more than just the product of a bad angle) really evidence of "true obesity"?
Further, what does it really matter if she is "approaching true obesity"? Is that supposed to be the end of the world?
Heh. I decided when I was 43 to start growing my hair again--back down to my knees. Still a foot and a half to go.
The main "you can't have long hair after age 30" refers to hair that is is down, but then mine is so fine I couldn't ever leave it that way (my hair has eaten more vacuum cleaner belts than I want to think of.)
And turning grey--yup. Wait until I have a full coronet of braids around my head a la Yulia Timoshenko. Can we say impressive hair? (Don't annoy this one, she might bite.) YEESSS....
I'm still getting the look-over and my body jumped at age 47. There are some guys out there who do want brains and wit. Hard to find, but they are there...
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