When I was a little girl I spent a lot of time at my grandparent’s house. We lived there on and off for a few years and later...I just liked it there. They always had ginger ale and mint Oreo cookies.My Nana was a real lady. She would sometimes let me stay home from school with her and we would have little spa days. We would put cool masks on our faces for our complexions (at eight I already had dreadful laugh lines...horrid) and paint our toenails and wash our hair. We would eat butterscotch ripple ice cream out of tea cups with real silver spoons while we waited for our toes to dry. We listened to Fats Domino or sometimes Anne Murray, who I still love to this day I don’t care if she isn’t cool. And she would teach me The Ways Of A Lady.
Like how to walk like a lady. Heel-toe, heel-toe. A Nancy Drew book balanced on my head because that’s all Nancy Drew books were ever good for. God, what an idiot. Nana would practice for me and I still remember the scratchy wool feeling of our couch under my thighs, my knees drawn up to my chin, a towel wrapped turban-style around my head as I watched her. Her hips swaying, her toes tilted up just a little. Her shoulders back. And I felt then that she was passing on to me some of her power. An ancient knowledge that is a gift. The gift of being a lady.
She taught me how to speak to people, how to shake hands and make eye contact. My mother has that same quality about her, something I sometimes just about have but never manage to quite pull off. This direct femininity that is a power within itself. Nana and my mom could pull it off even if they were in their nightgowns....if I’m not in some sort of finery, I’m screwed. They wanted to pass this down to me not because they wanted me to catch a man or throw elegant dinner parties or become a perfect hostess. They just wanted me to enjoy being a woman. Which I do.
In Montreal, there is a new summer camp. It’s a makeover camp – and I’m not making that up, that is actually what they are calling themselves. (http://www2.macleans.ca/2009/06/16/it%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%98wife-camp%E2%80%99-for-10-year-olds/)
It teaches the girls poise, posture, conversation skills, wardrobe choices, make-up application and hostessing skills to list a few. So, like Geisha Camp. I mean – hey. I like Mad Men just as much as the next girl. Retro is in. But this? This is supposed to help a modern day girl struggling to find her identity?
Talk about a confidence boost! ‘You think you’re doing everything wrong and you’re being judged on looks and presentation alone? Well, guess what – you are! But we’ll help you fit into the mould, rather than the mould fitting around you.’
Why don’t we just go the whole nine yards. I could send my boys to Don Draper Camp, teach them to cheat on their wives, drink at work and smoke a pack a day. But as long as their hair looks awesome and their shoulders are broad – oh, and as long as they are good providers too – the world is their oyster.
Girls don’t need to be taught conversation skills...they need to be allowed to become interesting in their own right. They need to feel as though what they are in their skin is perfect and lovely and right. They need to think of make-up as fun paint – not necessary but a blast when you feel like it.
They need to feel the way I did when I was eight years old, soaking my feet in a tub of warm soapy water beside my Nana as she hummed softly to herself with cucumbers slices over her eyes.
That being a woman is a gift. Not a job.
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