Whatever blows your skirt up...

As a rule, I don’t wear skirts.

A self-described rough and tumble tomboy, skirts have always been considered a nuisance since childhood. Climbing trees, building dams, riding bicycles-all these activities were much more comfortable in pants.

Adulthood finally caught up with me. Though I still have my tomboy moments, there are no real constraints that keep me from wearing a skirt or a dress on any given day. For some reason, though, I always reach for the jeans, the sweatpants, the dress trousers.

I hadn’t really considered my reasons for avoiding skirts until I returned to my hometown this spring. After some thought on the matter, I came up with a list of reasons most women wouldn’t wear skirts:

1. Ugly legs. Those knobby knees, flabby thighs, and hideously scarred shins. Swollen ankles are another. Some women don’t want to expose their varicose veins and cellulite to the world. On behalf of humanity, I thank you for this.

2. Feminism. If I looked hard enough, I’m certain I could find a woman who adamantly refuses to wear dresses or skirts because of the feminist movement. That imaginary conversation might go something like this:

“Skirts? Dresses? I’ve spent twenty years trying to prove to the world that I am every bit as intelligent as a man. I’ve worked countless hours to work my way to the top. To me, frilly skirts and dresses symbolize the stay at home wife that I am trying to escape.”

Okay, so it would be less of a conversation, more of a tirade. Even more moderate feminists and independent business women might balk at wearing a skirt for equality reasons. A woman might not wear skirts because of the implication she might be using her body (feminine attraction) to get ahead in the workplace.

3. Lifestyle restrictions. Pipefitters, welders, and Olympic runners might not wear skirts or dresses because they simply can’t perform in them. January in Siberia isn’t the time or place to be wearing a cute mini, either.

4. Dislike. Maybe some women just don’t like wearing skirts. No ulterior motives necessary.

5. Past trauma. That poodle skirt you were forced to wear, the frilly bridesmaid’s dress…we all have an outfit that we were forced to wear. Perhaps the trauma affected some of us more deeply. This also takes into account sudden gusts of wind at inopportune moments.

None of these reasons really seemed to apply to me, however. Browsing through stores and shops, I found so many cute and flattering skirts this spring. I decided I was going to buy several and start wearing them.

Upon arriving in New Brunswick, my skirts were unpacked and hung neatly in the closet. There they have stayed, untouched, for three weeks, except for a shopping excursion out of town.

Why is it I don’t want to wear a skirt here? Yesterday, I finally figured it out.

Growing up in this small town, the only people who wore skirts on a daily basis were members of the Pentecostal churches. Church protocol required these women to wear long skirts, forgo makeup, and keep their hair long. I went to school with many girls who struggled through gym class because they weren’t allowed to wear pants. Some would wear baggy shorts or pants, but most would simply sit on the sidelines.

I couldn’t understand why these women chose to put such restrictions on themselves. I still don’t, not really. It is my firm belief that everyone can believe or say what they wish, as long as they are not harming or impeding the rights of others to do the same. These women are welcome to live as they choose, but they stand in my mind as a symbol of oppression.

Most of my female friends in these churches were not encouraged into post-secondary education. The majority of them came from very poor families. They were expected to find a man, marry, and produce children. Many of my friends work, but many women are also discouraged from doing so.

This is why I have avoided skirts. The long skirt is representative, in my mind, of modern day, self-afflicted oppression that these women face. The skirt represents struggle, poverty, standing on the fringes of society. Women who don’t have the freedom to be the type of woman that I choose to be. And I’m tired of my mind behaving in this way.

To be sure, there are exceptions to this rule. Though these women may outwardly appear to be oppressed, many would not consider themselves so. They consider their lives to be full and happy. That is their choice, and they are welcome to it. It is this image, however, this childhood bias that stands in my mind whether it is truth or not.

So today, I’m going to open up my closet and pull out my cute little black skirt, a trendy t-shirt, and dispel my internal myths about what my clothing means.

Women being stupid

I don't have a link for this one, but I'm sure if I searched, I'd come up with something. Not sexist or ignorant, but other women realizing that we do damn stupid things sometimes.

I'm a woman, and I'm not trying to insult other women. I'm merely speaking truth. Women can be stupid. I know, because I am one and I do stupid things.

That doesn't mean I'm not intelligent. In fact, some of the most highly intelligent women I know are the reason I'm writing about this today.

The other day I caught myself musing about the future. It's something I do often these days. I've been pondering a move to a larger centre, to another part of the country. Thoughts of an extended overseas journey have crossed my mind as well.

After about fifteen minutes of blissful daydreaming, I abruptly stopped and slapped myself (figuratively, though I have been known to literally do so). Why? Because I was basing my musings around the whims of men, my chances of starting a new relationship. On assauging this guilt I've been handed down, telling me a woman my age should be married and starting a family.

Women have been defining themselves by their relationships to men for, well, ever. Girlfriend, wife, mother, partner...feminists tried to raise our consciousness. It's more than fine for me to be a single woman approaching thirty. We're supposed to be independent and strong enough to follow our own path. Why then do so many of us still use these labels to determine our worth?

I thought I was a strong, independent woman, until I started looking at my track record. This Christmas, my 28th, was the first in 13 years I spent single. Yep. Since I was fifteen, there has been a boyfriend upon which I have based part of my identity. That's not healthy for anyone. All it creates is a war inside me between the need to be a part of a man's world and the need to be myself. Push come to shove, fear always wins.

Now, I made choices for myself during this time frame. I made the choice to move far from my high school boyfriend in order to pursue higher education. I left bad relationships and made risky career choices in order to prove that I could do anything. In the end, though, the serial monogamist took over.

Even while in healthy relationships, I would adjust my behaviour and dreams to meet or compliment my partner. I would occasionally seem helpless in order to make a man feel needed when I was perfectly capable of performing the task at hand (and better then he ever could). For the most part, I have no problems telling men they are wrong, and proving I am right, unless that man is my significant other.

I shake my head now, but I thought at the time that compromise was how relationships worked. My problem was that I was the only one compromising, and all I was compromising was myself. I'm not the only one, either.

I know incredibly intelligent and capable women that are stuck in relationships with absolute assholes. Yet, they stay because they "love" them. They are comfortable, there are kids to consider, they are afraid to leave, afraid to be alone...they are stupid. They define themselves by this relationship, letting it determine their self-worth. It's enough to drive me crazy!

At the same time, fear holds me back too, affecting my choices in other ways. If I chose to do this, to live here, to chase this dream, would he still love me? If I reach my full potential, will men be intimidated by me? Would I end up alone, eating ice cream and pickles, watching romantic comedies and singing Pat Benatar songs? Actually, it doesn't sound that bad.

It's not the man's fault. He has no idea what all this is about, because he has no problems (usually) defining himself outside of his relationship to you. Talk to him about all this, and he'll just look baffled. He doesn't spend his days in a fantasy land where princess charming swoops in and looks after his every need. He's probably dreaming about the girl in accounting giving him a blowjob in the mail room.

I resolved, at the end of my last relationship, to chase my own dreams, not attaching them to someone else, to someone else's expectations of me. Until yesterday, when I caught myself doing that very thing. Stupid me.

Why do I do this? As far as I can figure out, it's a cop out. By not trying to recognize and achieve my own dreams, I can't fail. If someone asks me, years from now, why I never tried, I can point proudly to the self-sacrifice I made in order to be a good girlfriend/wife/daughter/mother.

What a load of crap. I may be pre-programmed to feel this need for a man, this need to please others and sacrifice myself, but I'm rewriting the code. If you can't handle a confident, beautiful, intelligent woman who wants to chase her own dreams and is most likely smarter than you, you probably aren't worthy of her time in the first place.