i really also think about how much boys are taught ways to perform masculinity & how it is legitimised through tangible things like building a career etc but with women i find that from a young age our identity, behaviours, & thoughts are always spoken about in relation to other people/things ā gender roles within the family, how weāre perceived by men, our friendships with other women, our relationships with material things etc etc ā and this shows up in the labels that women are often given too! so and so is someoneās daughter, girlfriend, wife, mother etc etc. i envy the freedom of boyhood so much, the freedom to just be (this is not to discount the toxicity of traditional masculinity, i just think that boys are still afforded more āplayā and therefore have more opportunities to develop their sense of self).
maybe i am also biased because of how iāve grown up & whatnot but i never really understood what it meant to quote unquote be a woman or perform femininity. i only saw this modelled within my nurturing friendships with women as iāve gotten older but when i was younger, in church it was always āok well donāt do this or that because x y z will happen to men if you doā or within my extended family it was often āare you seeing anyone? when are you having kidsā. damn what happened to asking about how iām doing or what my dreams are!!!
long rant sorry !! but thatās my long winded way of saying āi feel youā haha
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thank you for being vulnerable. but yeah, as a cis woman, boyhood always made me wistful in a way that i couldnāt really place. i am a woman and am comfy with that. personally, girlhood and womanhood are an important part of my artistic vision and practice as that experience has its own lessons and experiences that i wouldnāt trade for the world. however, i think the (what seemed to me when i was little) lack of societal pressure from the helicopter of culture for boys was something i was for sure envious of. as i grew up, i realized men and boys have plenty of their own societal pressures to reject or succumb to. i have two younger brothers and the novelty of boyhood sort of wore off for me as i watch them grow up. but thereās still a piece of young me that longs for the potential of earnestness in young male friendships and adventure. i think it would also be cool to walk around at night with headphones on in a lot of places.
Jun 28, 2024
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and I feel lucky about that; it made me who I am today!
But as an adult woman I can definitely relate and I imagine what it would be like to feel that sense of freedom from being perceived as a woman and the societal expectations that come with that. Sylvia Plath said it best in her journals:
āYes, my consuming desire is to mingle with road crews, sailors and soldiers, barroom regularsāto be a part of a scene, anonymous, listening, recordingāall this is spoiled by the fact that I am a girl, a female always supposedly in danger of assault and battery. My consuming interest in men and their lives is often misconstrued as a desire to seduce them, or as an invitation to intimacy. Yes, God, I want to talk to everybody as deeply as I can. I want to be able to sleep in an open field, to travel west, to walk freely at night...ā
I do think though that itās fruitless to fixate on these things, imagining the grass to be greener on the other side and essentially wishing you could have grown up and lived as another person, because 1 itās not possible 2 the life you imagine has so many downsides to it too that you canāt even imagine not having experienced itself and 3 if you were a different person then the You you are now wouldnāt exist, and that would be a shame! I also think men are having a tough time now and many of them are probably just as neurotic, inhibited, and fearful as women.
Obviously people are free to reject these notions and live life as whoever they want, and I respect and appreciate those who choose to do this, but Iām not interested in doing that for myself. Instead, I challenge the boundaries of what it means to be a woman in the ways that I can, which feels like the right choice for me!
Jun 28, 2024
š©°
i cannot relate to women who miss their girlhood. when they felt carefree, happy. for me adulthood has been the first time i've experienced feeling carefree and happy. i work an 8:30-5:30 job and I pay my rent and I buy groceries and I take the bus and this is the happiest and safest and least stressed i've ever been. girlhood was awkward and uncomfortable. restrictive and quiet. sexualized. I didn't own my body, my space, my time. i was scared of my dad, i just wanted my mom to understand me. i didn't feel pretty and boys were mean. girls too. womanhood has been freeing and healing. I wear what i want, i eat what I want. my home is so safe, my body is too. i wish i could miss girlhood. but I can't, so I give my adult woman self the joy and safety and pink bedroom walls and stuffed animals and girly dresses she never had as a child. i give myself comfort. i listen to and I believe myself. i hold my inner little girl and tell her she is so beautiful and so loved. i try to give my adult woman self the girlhood i didn't have
May 13, 2024
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i know it sounds so clichĆ© but i work for a climate organisation & i just came home from a work event so iām feeling very inspired/energised/refreshedā¦please find your community because it is tiring, draining, & almost impossible to drive social change alone. you donāt have to do it alone.
A community helps your cause. We protest, meet, rally, & cry in numbers for this reason. š
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i am starting to realise how detrimental & unfair it is to not only myself but also the people around me because i then hold them to unreachable standards.
we are learning!! not there yet but slowly and surely
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I have the worst fear of staying in one place for too long (both literally & metaphorically) but I think whatās even more dangerous than that is the desire to stay in that rut forever even though itās not serving you !! That happens to me because Iām so scared of failing or to be seen trying for something but not reaching it in the end.
I am feeling so inspired after coming home from a concert & I am allowing myself to bask in that sense of renewal !! Like wow itās okay that I want to write again despite not doing so for months now! Itās okay that Iām getting into photography again after not honouring my commitment to practise it in the past few months! I am learning more and more from personal experience + observation that some doors only open at the right time and there are times when the right thing to do is to actively pursue something, while there are times when we have to sit still + wait and see
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