I want to be a woman who doesn't care. One of those women who doesn't notice. A woman who doesn't pay attention to girly stuff. To the stuff that women are supposed to care about.
I saw Marissa Mayer, one of the original Google employees (so now she's insanely rich), talk about her life. She described herself as oblivious. As a girl, she wasn't thinking about boys. She wasn't thinking about clothes. She told a charming story about her time at Stanford, when she was the only girl in a sea of computer science guys. She loved computer science, and, by her own account, she barely noticed that she wasn't one of the guys. Because maybe she thought she was. Someone made a comment about the "one blonde girl in the computer science lectures," and she thought, "Who is that?" and then, laughing, realized it was her.
Ha! Adorable! We all laughed along with her. She has that famous laugh.
A few nights ago, I saw Jill Abramson, the executive editor of the New York Times, interview her employee Jodi Kantor, author of the recent bestseller The Obamas. Abramson has this amazing voice. She sounds a little like a robot.
She sounds like some mad genius inventor from another planet devoted his life to constructing her in his secret workshop, and when she was finished he sat back, smiled a grim little smile, realized that he'd forgotten to make her care about any of the things that women are supposed to care about and so would possibly be recognized as non-human, sighed and said, "Well, it's too late now. My work is done." And then died. And then the brilliant robot woman was sent to earth, where she would either be immediately rejected as a fraud, or rise to greater power than any human was capable of. And she did that thing. The second one.
She kept cutting Kantor off. It was almost like she'd just get bored towards the end of one of Kantor's responses and wanted to move things along.
"So, anyway," she'd say, suddenly, in the middle of Kantor's sentence, "That leads us to a very interesting point..."
She seemed completely un-self-aware. She made jokes no one laughed at, chuckling to herself, she spoke slowly, in her drawn-out, mechanical voice. She said, "The Oval Office can be very intimidating, the first time you're in it. You must have been very nervous."
"The moderator was terrible!" said one woman to another, walking out of the lecture.
But I kind of loved her. I loved this powerful, oblivious woman, who wasn't anything that she was supposed to be. Wasn't polite, wasn't prettily dressed, wasn't self-aware, wasn't aware of others. Who just plowed ahead. Who had plowed her way to the top of the New York Times.
There are so many women like this. Sometimes they are the women who say, "Why are we still talking about beauty and fashion and gender? Let's talk about real stuff. Let's talk about the rest of it."
They are the women who can walk into a computer science classroom and feel at home, because they are thinking about the programming, not about the people. They are not thinking about what other people are thinking about them. Not enough for it to interrupt them, anyway.
I am not a woman like this. I care a lot what other people think. I want people to like me. Once I signed up for a linguistics class and it was full of guys who hadn't showered in a while and were probably brilliant. I felt totally out of place and I only went to one class. I care about so many girly things. The other day, I went with a friend to get my nails done. I agonized over the right color. I finally picked brown, and felt immediately boring, but resigned. I kept looking at it skeptically afterwards, wondering if I'd made a mistake.
"It will last for a month!" I thought. "The wrong shade of brown, for a month!"
That happened.
But there have been other, more serious, hints that suggest I will never be a fearless, fabulously oblivious powerhouse. Getting a nose job, for example.
And when I sat down, naked, on the bed the other day, and my fat squished against my other fat, and it was sort of amazing to me that I had enough fat for it to be both distinct and simultaneously squished together, I made my husband come over and examine it.
"Look!" I cried. "You have to look at this. Do you see this? Are you seeing this right now? Those are two rolls, wait, is it only two? There might be more. And they are squishing together, right there, see that? If I lean over, it's worse. I can't lean over anymore. I am no longer capable of leaning over. Is this when I'm supposed to start dieting? Is this the point? Who knew that my fat would prevent me from living a regular, normal life in which I could lean over like other people."
And Bear laughed and said, "You look amazing." And then, losing interest, he said, "But go on a diet if you want to. It does't matter either way."
"I'm not going to," I said, with an air of finality. Call in the heralds! Sound the trumpets! It has been decreed! A new era is upon us! I am not going to diet even though there are rolls of fat when I lean over, naked, sitting on the bed!
I am pretty sure this never happened to Marissa Mayer.
It has almost definitely never happened to Jill Abramson.
And even if, somehow, it has happened to them, they would never, ever mention it. Because they are focusing on other, more important things.
And I really wish that I was a woman like that. Focusing on the bigger issues. Running Google. Or the New York Times. Running the world. Or at least picking out the design of today's Google logo. Except that I would probably agonize over the color for a long time, and then settle on brown.
I guess I wish that "women's issues" weren't so separate from other issues. (I'm getting corny. I can't help it. Stay with me for a second here and I'll finish up.) I wish that everything was more integrated. That being boy-crazy didn't have to mean not being completely and totally sane about science. That women didn't have to be oblivious to miss the fact that they were out of place. Maybe they just wouldn't be out of place. Or that women didn't have to prove themselves in male-dominated arenas by not being interested in the things that women are supposed to be interested in. Maybe I just wish that things weren't so divided up.
Because sometimes it occurs to me that all of the embodied "stuff" -- worrying about weight and nails and hair and faces -- that's important, too. We are these bodies, every day. They are what we experience everything in the world through. They are how the world experiences us.
That's not a small thing.
But still, if I could be a little more oblivious... If I could be a little bit more of a robot from outer space... I think I would go for it. Because it looks like a lot of fun. And also, I just want to talk in that voice. Just for a day. To feel the power.
A version of this piece appeared originally on Eat the Damn Cake
Follow Kate Fridkis on Twitter: www.twitter.com/eatthedamncake
A keen observer would notice that the only thing that's changed is that those computer geeks got really really rich.
The predominant emotion I have seen you expressing here is that you don't get enough female attention. Telling that to women does not equal creating an emotional connection with them. It is whining and neediness and all about you. Women feel and emotional connection when they feel the guy understands them, empathizes with them, cares for them, is there for them, and is emotionally supportive and validating of them, without an expectation of sex in return for these.
At a certain age, many of my female contemporaries got very interested in physical appearance, nails, hair, fashion, gossip, almost to the exclusion of all else; I found their conversation and concerns boring, vapid, trivial and frivolous. Fortunately, there were other smart girls at school to befriend. Most of popular cliquely appearance-focused girls disappeared into early marriage to local boys and the diapers and mundanities of motherhood.
The smart girls from high school, those who focused on academics and learning rather than obsessions with appearance, went on to more education. Of that group, one became a doctor, one a lawyer, one engineer, one an entrepreneur, an editor, a professor. These women groom, dress well, but they do not spend time thinking about, obsessing over or discussing these things. These women married smart men, equals, and not men boobs obsessed with boobs. Do you think an Elizabeth Warren obsesses over makeup?
How much of mortal life should be wasted obsessing over appearance?
In my experiences I find this generalization to contain a large degree of truth. For instance, it's rare that a young woman with the looks of, say, Cleopatra, Halle Berry or Monica Bellucci will choose the life of Marie Curie, Sojourner Truth or Mother Teresa. There are exceptions of course, but the hard truth is physical beauty is an earthly commodity that human beings will always exploit.
Personally, I don't see this as an injustice to be in arms about (or a gender battle) but rather a reminder to cultivate more important qualities that will enhance our lives long after the outer beauty fades away.
Physical beauty occurs in smart women as often as in stupid women. There is considerable research indicating that one of the most important factors in whether a women develops her intellect and wide-ranging interests and becomes successful is having the encouragement of a father. Fathers who give their daughters the message that they are supposed to be pretty feminine sex objects end up with little Paris HIltons, while dads who encourage their daughters to fly get Elizabeth Warrens and Sally Rides.
Through history, the look of healthiness was considered beautiful. Small pox did not do much for the face, eh. Otherwise, what is considered physical beauty is arbitrary. In some places, the typical American beauty is considered ugly, artificial and plastic-looing. In some island cultures, overweight women with big legs are considered attractive. In some places, women with artifically-elongated necks are considered beautiful.
The obsession with fleeting and temporary appearance and looks uber alles is a strangely pathological phenomenon of modern American culture.
The kind of a girl/woman you describe is not average, however; she's distinguished by high intelligence, for one, and other character attributes that usually go with it (introspection, self-restraint, often introversion, independence of judgment, etc.) Unfortunately, our culture is dominated and driven by the average and its mores -- it is called "mass" for a reason -- where social popularity and skin-deep appeal (and interests) reign.
An extra fave, if I could, for bringing in Elizabeth Warren in this particular way. She is a great model for women of all ages. I caught myself thinking recently, "What would Elizabeth do?," when faced with some outlandish issue (I think it may have even been an article on labiaplasty here on HP; can you imagine? :))
Maybe you are right about the culture being driven by the average mass. In the degenerative stage of empire, a nation is no longer driven by dreams, visions and higher aspirations. I hear about stuff like labiaplasty and think this culture has gone totally berserk insane.
Elizabeth Warren is an outstanding individual, one wishes a thousand Elizabeth Warrens would bloom in the halls of government.
Women should think about men's issues, btw, instead of women's.
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I'd say you're setting up a straw man here, but you're a woman. So let's call it a straw woman.
So let's be really honest, just for fun: It's not that you'd be more robotic. It's just that you'd be less neurotic.
There's a big difference.
It's really possible to be a gal who gets her nails done without turning it into something to fret over, just like it's really possible for a guy who (say) likes to watch football without being a total maniac about sports.
Said in the ancient Chinese language of YIN and YANG, there is immature, neurotic YIN and then there is mature, integrated YIN.
Same with YANG for the guys.
Agreed...or not?
It's good to stretch ourselves and aspire to develop traits we admire in others. I've worked most of my life to be more diplomatic like my father and less self absorbed, after sticking my foot in my mouth on the internet and accidentally starting that guild thing what little diplomatic skill I've managed to develop has come in very handy. Really though, the most important thing any woman can do is believe in herself, love herself and learn to be comfortable in her own skin. The ones who really matter will only love us more when we reach that place.
I am that woman who doesn't care. I've always been more interested in power tools than cosmetics. Was the only woman in Wood and Furniture Design at RIT with 30 guys. At times I have been painfully aware of my inability to relate to "girl concerns" is there something fundamentally wrong with my makeup and am I missing by not fitting into the company of women? That doesn't mean I don't care how I look, I knew from an early age I would never be beautiful but... if I were exotic I would be seen as beautiful to the people who mattered to me! I have bridged the gap a little in the process of becoming wife and mother but I am also an obsessed artisan, founder of "The SeatWeavers Guild" and a bit on the lonely side. At 51 I still aspire to be exotic, my never dyed, once black now salt and pepper locks cascade past my derriere Why? because "Women my age shouldn't wear long hair, its too sexy" ( in my youth I once wore it GI Jane short).