cultural construct

Vanity Sizing: The Travesty & Tyranny of the Dressing Room

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in Body

by Ann Dunnewold of Who Says?!!

 

“I’m not trying those on, they’re size 10!”

“I refuse to wear a size 12.”

“Wow, I fit into a size 6!”

“Let’s go in this store; in here, I’m a size 4!”

On any given shopping trip, put me and perhaps a daughter or sister or two into the dressing room together, and the chatter pretty much flows just like that. Then there’s the “I’m smokin’– look at me!” dance when a size 6 zips up neatly.

The feminist ref in my head may as well throw down the penalty flag since I’m guilty of having spiked the “size equals value as a woman” football into the end zone in order to get that little victory.

Who says a six (or a four or a ten) is a badge of honor–let alone a badge of shame? Then there’s that ridiculous size 0 or 00!! Does that make me a size nothing, or double nothing? Sounds like I’m invisible–or the incredible shrinking woman.

I’ve been every size from a 16 to a 4, and I definitely like myself better when I’m wearing the “right size.” However, too many women fixate on an arbitrary number as to what is the right size. The numbers are arbitrary, as I found out while learning to sew back in 1967.

The history of standardized sizing began with home sewing patterns back in the 1930s. Prior to that time, most clothing was individually sewn and tailored to fit the wearer. Then in an effort to standardize sizing for mass produced clothing,  the first large-scale scientific study of women’s body measurements was done.  About 15,000 American women were measured, 59 body points in all, as part of a USDA survey. Marilyn Monroe-esque curvy was the shape of most women at that initial assessment, with pronounced bust and hips and thinner waist. A size 12 then measured as a 30 inch bust.

In 1956, however, a new role model came on the scene–the Barbie doll–and sizing changed again. Now a size 12 was a 32 inch bust. (and beautiful bombshell Marilyn would’ve worn size 16!) In mid-1967, the standard changed once again and size 12 became a 34 inch bust.

Fast forward to today: sizes are firmly anchored in the realm of “vanity sizing.” Store to store, designer to designer, manufacturers  lure you in by labeling ever larger sizes with smaller numbers. In fact, the fashion industry resists any effort to standardize sizes, as was done in 1940, fearing loss of a customer if the size she wear gets upsized.

Upsized like a value meal? Who would stand for that? I try to forget this crazy numbers game! Do I like how I look? Do I feel good? Does this outfit feel like me? I’ve tried to define my style and stick with it and ignore the size, rather than let it make me feel bad about myself.

Photo credit: www.princecharmingsmadame.com/

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If I Don’t Put My Face On, Who Am I?

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in Makeup

So I’m on a @Delta flight to Detroit for @Ford’s annual marketing conference and I have this of note to report:  Aging has a direct effect on my vanity.  Or perhaps the truer statement is that I care more about getting a couple of minutes more sleep than I do about going into the world with makeup applied and hair fixed.  I had to leave the house today at 4:45 am to make a 6:00 am flight to LA for a 9 am flight to Detroit.  Was I going to get up at 3:45 am so that I would have time to put on makeup?  No, I would not.  I got up at 4:06 am and went out the door with a bare face.

I thought about how unlikely this would have been for me in the past and wondered what the difference is. It’s not that I care less about my appearance generally as that I’m less invested in how people perceive me.    Before I felt I had to present my best self to the world.  Before I felt insecure if I wasn’t wearing the “costume”, which included appropriate makeup that I had chosen for that day’s “performance.”

(Yes, I see the way I am–the way we all are–in the world as a series of performances.  So shoot me, it’s studying all that French philosophy in grad school that gave me that p.o.v. Actually grad school only put a theoretical perspective on it; I always knew that what I wore was a costume to match the persona I was performing.)

So my sense of self must have grown to the point where–hey! I’ve finally reached the I give a shit stage. And about bloody time too.

Of course I hit the ladies room at LAX and spread my wares out applying all my this’s and that’s before I met up with the friends I’m traveling with. It now occurs to me, irony of ironies, that they were wearing no makeup at all. And, it must be said, they’re younger than I am. Now what’s that about?

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Can We Talk: The Baring of Arms

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in Body

Every year I have this argument with myself:

Me:  It’s summertime–whee!–look at all the pretty summer clothes in the stores.

Myself: Yeah, look at how almost all of them are sleeveless.  You can’t wear sleeveless. You’re too old.

Me:  Says who?

Myself: Says all the fashion know-it-alls.  Top of the list of what not to do in the summer is wear sleeveless tops and bare your aging arms.

Me: Top of the list?

Myself: Well, maybe second, after Don’t Wear Short Shorts.

I tend to listen to myself in the early days of summer.  Until I get hot.  Then I start to rebel.  And I start to wonder, who or what am I saving by not forcing them to witness the exposure of my upper arms?

Why are the upper arms of older women considered so heinous?

  • Because they’re so flabby
  • And flaccid
  • And liver-spotted
  • And cellulite-dimpled
  • And, often, fat

How is it, then that sleeveless tops on overweight young women are not considered heinous?  Is it not the cellulite-dimpled and flacid that is the problem, but the liver-spots?

And what about men of every age who wear sleeveless tops.  Why are their flabby, flaccid, liver-spotted, cellulite-riddled arms not an offense as well?  Especially when you consider that there is generally a brush of armpit hair splayed out for the world to view.

Is this an ageist, gender-related issue?  Women must hide all aspects of themselves that may hint at the state of their reproductive capablilty.  If we are not to cloister our aging bodies in our rooms, at least we can save the populace from having to witness these signs of our uselessness to society.

Yeah yeah yeah…probably true, that.  But so what?  I have no desire to even try to change the cultural mores of the Western world.  Instead, I’ll change myself.

  1. I will wear sleeveless tops
  2. I will not judge the jiggly underarms of other women who are baring them.
  3. I will not envy those with taut arms (including Andrea Mitchell, and how does she do it?)
  4. I will not not view my image in the mirror with the critical eyes of the younger me.
  5. I will stop thinking, damn, what happened to my arms?
  6. I will work at forming a revised image of what an attractive me looks like wearing sleeveless tops, as opposed to the one I now have from years of nubile models.
  7. I will not give a shit what the fashion know-it-alls tell me I must or mustn’t do.
Except–I’ve just scrolled through hundreds of Google images trying to find one to illustrate this post.  At the worst, I found a couple of photos of the before and after of a young fit woman who had had liposuction. However, congenital batwings are not what I’m talking about here.
I found any number of taut arms, including those of our First Lady of the Biceps, Michelle Obama.  But pix of the crepey, slack, mustn’t-be-revealed in daylight older woman arms–nada. Which makes me realize how insidious is the nefarious and henious attitude my culture promulgates about my arms (and I don’t use those triple-barreled words lightly).
That in turn makes me realize I must double, if not treble, my efforts at # 1-7 above.  Especially #4.  And #6.  And, oh yeah, #7.
Where do you stand in the Sleeveless: To Wear or Not debate?

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Long Hair: Who says it’s wrong for older women?

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in Hair

I’m growing my hair.  I think.  I last had it cut about six months ago.  It was the third strike and out for that particular hairdresser, and I haven’t found anyone to replace her.  Well, I’m replacing her, actually.  I have some haircutting shears (they came with the dog grooming kit I bought for Molly) and I am, from time to time, using them.  I figure I can fuck my hair up as well as the next stylist and then I only have myself to blame.  Plus, my prices are low.

The real question is, however, how long should I go?  I love the look of very long hair that I see on celebrities. I fantasize about swinging my shiny, cascading locks like Kyle Richards of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. Or casually pulling it all back into a ponytail like Bethany Frankel.  Then I think about the reality of my hair, which is not glossy black and has never done that cascading thing. And I think about the admonishment we all grew up with: no long hair on older women.

Why is that, I wonder? What’s the deal with older women being restricted to short hair? It must be a relatively recent thing since until the early 20th century, women simply didn’t cut their hair, ever.  It was buns all around for everyone, young and old. At what point did the shingled style that was once the province of the young, with-it Flapper became the default hairstyle of older women?

It seems to me that the real question is, what is it about long hair that created the cultural rule that it  was improper for an older woman?  The easy answer to that question is that there is more money to be made by hair care producers when young women, who are more insistently involved in their grooming, are the focus. But I believe blaming advertisers or manufacturers or even our consumer culture is a kneejerk answer, true to a certain extent but it doesn’t go far enough to really answer the question.

If I dig down deeper into the issue, I have to ask: what are the images of long-haired women that come to mind: harridan, witch, grotesque, madwoman.

Let’s see if I can parse this out: Hair is a cultural symbol that we use to signify something about ourselves. As such, it is also a marker for the ways in which society works to inscribe cultural rules. Long hair is a symbol of women’s sexuality (or as Paul put it, “their crowning glory”) and as such, it must be restricted to those who are sexuality viable. That means women who are fertile. Long hair on women whose fertility is a thing of the past offends our sense of the natural order of things. When that happens, the adjudicators of our culture work to restore the natural order. They proscribe and punish those who transgress. Thus, you get the media, specifically women-oriented mass market media, advising older women that long hair is really unattractive on them.

Except. The times they are a-changing. Suddenly in 2012, something different is happening. You get Hillary Clinton, aged 65, with long hair.

And writer Dominque Browning on the Today show with long hair.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And this gorgeous model. And this one. And this one.

The thin end of the wedge these long-haired older women are, and I shall take them as my role models. Now I just have to decide whether long hair looks good on me. But that’s the stuff of another post.

What do you think about long hair and older women? More to the point, how long is your hair and at what age will you think you need to cut it

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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