February 28, 2007

do these boots make me look smart?

Yesterday I wrote a post at BlogHer about MAC cosmetics new Barbie Loves MAC line, specifically about what it means for MAC to choose Barbie as the face for this line.

Thirteen years later, however, MAC has turned to Barbie as the new face of beauty. Unlike RuPaul, who was entirely self created (a man who becomes a woman through sheer force of will and great makeup and clothes), Barbie is a plastic mock-up of an unattainable female form. The models in the new Barbie Loves MAC ad campaign are styled to look like dolls; their facial expressions are vacant and frankly, a little frightening.

I don’t like the way MAC is marketing this line; aside from the fact that it targets very young girls, children who are too old for Barbie dolls but too young for makeup, it infantilizes adult women by encouraging them to think of themselves both as objects (”living dolls”) and as children. I’m not opposed to makeup, though, or even to MAC makeup; what I am resisting is this particular marketing gimmick.

But this begs the larger question: it is possible to be a fashionista AND a feminist? If I wear lipstick and heels will I be taken seriously when I assert that women should not be viewed as objects? Or is participation in the culture of style a capitulation to the patriarchy? What is the distinction, as one BlogHer commenter asked, between Barbie and Pam Anderson? Or between Pam Anderson and RuPaul? Or–go further–between Barbie and Molly Simms or Eva Longoria or any of the other models who are the faces of various cosmetics companies? IS there a distinction?

Am I less of a feminist because I think about what I (and you!) wear?

I would say no, of course; I don’t believe that at all. I don’t think that strong female role models have to give up beauty. In fact, I think it’s easier for stylish women to have their voices heard, which is a problematic statement in itself, but true nonetheless. I think there is a distinction between being thoughtful about how I present myself and giving in to some amorphous and unattainable ideal of female beauty.

But I also think a lot about what it means to say that I write about fashion or parenting, rather than about politics or literature or feminism itself. Real life feminism is a different animal from academic feminism; in the classroom, it is easy to talk about patriarchal oppression and resisting hegemony, but in the everyday world, we think more about the quotidian details of carpool and dinner and the checking account balance. Sometimes it is in these “soft” topics that we find the most powerful statements about how the world works for real women.

I think we’re seeing a cultural swing back toward a kind of pre-feminist world, where women were not expected to do much in the world because they were women. I see it in places like this MAC ad campaign, and it infuriates me. I agree that it is possible to read the entire beauty industry as essentially anti-feminist, but I also think that makeup and clothing can be powerful tools to help smart, thoughtful women get their voices heard. We are a culture that values beauty, and that rewards appearance; there is no getting around that. We can reject that or we can make it work for us.

I’m opting for working it. And I’m not going to feel bad about it.

You can see what I’m wearing today here.

February 27, 2007

admit it

I’m sure you’ve all been following the story of pianist Joyce Hatto and the mysterious recordings that have surfaced recently, yes? No?

Well. What HAVE you been doing?

The basic story is this: “A talented, conscientious pianist who had enjoyed an active if undistinguished career in Britain falls ill and retreats to a small town. Here in the last years of her life she launches a project to record virtually the entire standard repertoire for the piano. Her recordings, CDs made in her late sixties and seventies, are staggering, showing a masterful technique, a preternatural ability to adapt to different styles, and a depth of musical insight hardly seen elsewhere.” Then she dies, leaving behind what would have been the most comprehensive catalog of recordings ever, pretty much.

Except, of course, it wasn’t really Joyce Hatto in the recordings.

You’re wondering how I know all of this, aren’t you? Because Wade is a big geek and likes classical music and reads Gramophone, the magazine that broke the story earlier this month. “Responding to a tip from a reader, a critic with the British Gramophone magazine, Jeremy Distler, slid Joyce Hatto’s CD of Liszt’s Transcendental Etudes into his computer. His iTunes library, linked to a catalogue of about four million CDs, immediately identified it as a recording by the Hungarian virtuoso Laszlo Simon.”

God bless iTunes.

Now, of course, Hatto’s husband has confessed to faking the recordings, which has lead to other questions about why he did it and what Hatto herself might have known about what he was doing. The husband, of course, claims that he did it for her.

Why am I telling you all this? Because this morning, when I read about Hatto’s husband coming clean, I e-mailed Wade at work, and he sent me the link to another piece about why the husband might have done it. And I told him that if anything happened to me, he should feel free to fake entries on this web site.

You’re all kind of looking forward to that now, aren’t you?

February 26, 2007

just be sure you’re sincere when you say it

One Sunday last winter, we took the kids out for coffee. During the hour or so that we were at Starbucks, first one then the other child cried, whined, and asked for something unreasonable. I was reading a New York Times that had been abandoned at our table, and Wade was wrangling the kids and their various catastrophes. No sooner would he get one settled with milk and snack and napkins and something to do than the OTHER one would start up. On the way out, he looked at me and said, “It’s UNRELENTING. All the time. It’s either one or the other, but there’s no PEACE.”

And I said, “Duh.”

Today is one of those days. One of my children had a GREAT day at school, so great that it seemed to call for a small celebration, like perhaps a special snack somewhere other than our house. The other child, however, had a less good day, the kind that required me to have a Conversation with his teacher, and to say things like, “Oh, I see,” and “I’m so sorry,” and “I will absolutely talk to him.”

No I’m not going to tell you which is which, because it doesn’t really matter. Chances are that by tomorrow or the next day, they will have changed roles again, and the kid who had the great day will be the one whose teacher is asking to have a word with me after school.

Since the boys were born, I’ve felt like I should be apologizing to my parents every time I talk to them, not for anything in particular, just for being a kid and for making them worry. Also for driving them crazy on what I am sure was a regular basis. Of course, my dad is always telling me how much Henry reminds him of himself, so I suppose there is a certain kind of universal justice or karma or something, but really I just think I should start every conversation with them by saying, “Hello! I’m sorry! How are you all today?”

You can never say “I’m sorry” to your parents enough times.

Over the weekend, the boys were watching something on TV with Wade (basketball maybe? I don’t remember). Henry was sitting peacefully on the sofa, asking questions and using his inside voice, while Charlie stood with his hands on the ottoman and his feet on the floor and bounced up and down, yelling as loudly as he could. Wade kept asking him to be peaceful and sit down and use his indoor voice and FOR GOD’S SAKE JUST STOP IT! but he just kept bouncing and yelling. I watched him for a while and then said, “Now WHICH one is the hyper one again?”

Wade said, “I have no idea.”

I’m sure that when the boys are grown up, I will not remember every infraction from their childhood, but I do look forward to the day when one of them tries to stop his own little bundle of joy and energy from bouncing off the walls in a public place and calls me to say, “Mom, I’m sorry.”