Sign of a person who, in the night, decided to have another growth spurt

She woke up outraged at 5:40 and immediately ate

• a pancake
• a container of yogurt
• a container of applesauce
• a serving of oatmeal
• two more pancakes

Every time I asked, "Aren't you all done?", she'd say, "No," and then tell me what she wanted next.

Damn.

Oh, look, a feminist post!

Back in the day--May, I think, before I came to realize how incredibly busy May and June were going to be for me--one of my funny, thoughtful friends asked me what I do when men on the street tell me to smile.  She wanted a good feminist comeback.  She wrote:

I've actually said once--this was in a bar, way back when, "it's not my job to smile for you." But that didn't have the impact I was looking for. The person followed up with "but you have such a pretty smile." Which, of course, he couldn't have possibly even known having never seen me smile....so annoying.

When I've talked to male friends about this--none of whom would ever say such a thing--they insist that the guy is just trying to "cheer me up." I've even gone so far as to speculate that I have a naturally turned-down mouth and it can look like I'm in a foul mood when I'm really not....but no, I don't think that's it because too many women have this same experience.  And what stinks is that these men actually think they're being nice with this comment! Ugh.

If you do come up with any interesting comeback, let me know. And of course, feel free to blog about it.

Let me just assure you that this person doesn't walk around looking like she's in a foul mood.  And she's right that many women have this experience.

Sadly, this is an area where I have little advice to offer.  It may be that because I'm so tall, I get this sort of comment less often.  And I'm such a Southern woman that sometimes when I do get told to smile, I smile!  Damn training.  I mean, I'm not opposed to smiling.  But it is an annoying phenomenon that men in the world think that women should be smiling, and that they--the men in the world--have the right to encourage them to do so.  It's a clear double standard.  How often do women in the world walk around encouraging men they don't know to smile?

Perhaps that's what we should do:  start asking men to smile for us.  Although that strikes me as quite creepy.  Okay, readers:  if you have great responses, share them!

Architectural Digest

Oh, look, the latest issue of Architectural Digest. That's cool. It has Elizabeth Taylor on the cover, so that's creeping me out a little, but it's such a reputable magazine, with beautiful stuff inside.

Well, I'll flip through and see what there is to see.

Hmm, the daybeds and coffee table pictured here are gorgeous. And they look awfully familiar...because I saw them being constructed piece by piece in the wood studio at the back of our house.

Biffle made them! And they're being featured in Architectural Digest!


Sadly, he isn't listed by name. Apparently in Architectural Digest, they only name the designers. Rest assured that as the maker, Biffle played a significant role in the design of these pieces. Not being named doesn't make this any less a cool accomplishment.

Congratulations to Biffle! On this blog we're all eager to say how cute Maybelle is, so for a change of pace, I'd like us to give a little nod to how beautiful Biffle's furniture is.

Alison at Girl w/Pen

Yo--check out a post (again, on time!) I wrote at Girl w/Pen.

Update from Alison:   Quick feedback over at GWP and in my inbox made me reread my post with new eyes, and I've added an addendum.  Please go back and have a look.

Aligned vulnerabilities

Biffle is responsible for the very useful concept of complementary neuroses.  He advises that, when you're seeking a partner, you try to find someone with neuroses that complement your own.  In other words, if you're an anxious, controlling person who is very effective at managing the various components of your life, you might not want to pair up with someone like that.  Far better to have a partner who is--to quote a friend's father--high thrill, low anxiety:  someone who might not be so good at keeping the bills paid, but who has a good time and can seduce you into doing the same.  Same neuroses = overwhelming anxiety (or no bills getting paid).  Complementary neuroses = balance.

I'd like to complicate this concept by adding the notion of aligned vulnerabilities.  Although I think it's great if one partner is calm while the other one is freaking out, I've also learned that it's often a real gift if both partners can share moments of vulnerability.  This can add additional depth to the relationship. 

Here's an extended story that will lead to an example:  Maybelle has started camp this week.  She's at Camp Baker, which is a great kids' camp noteworthy for the fact that they have trained Red Cross swim instructors, and the kids are in the pool twice a day.  You can see Maybelle here, sporting her new frog backpack.  (As a completely unrelated side-note, when we gave her the backpack, she immediately knew what it was, said, "Backpack!", put it on, and then said, "Go to work."  Her mother, as it turns out, wears a backpack when she goes to work, and Maybelle is paying attention.)

At any rate, she's going to camp.  And the first week of camp is transition time for everybody--including the adults.  On Monday, when Biffle and I went together to pick her up, he got teary, wondering how her day was for her.  On Tuesday, when I was taking her to camp, I got teary (and by "got teary," I mean, "Anybody looking over to my car would have seen me crying"), wondering how her day was going to be.  Since then, I've been reflecting on how nice it is to have a partner who sometimes shares your vulnerabilities--even goofy ones.  Biffle and I didn't have to worry that our partner would think we were being ridiculous, or would tell us to suck it up, or would comfort us while kindly rolling their eyes.  We got to share a moment of connection through our vulnerability.

The important ending to this story:  Maybelle is having a great time at camp.  She's not eating at all while she's there, but rest assured there'll be another blog post about that.

More from the Berks

Here's my final post about the Berks.  It was a great conference, but actually--and I know this is a controversial point to make*--I think NWSA is better.

Here's the breakdown, as I saw it:

BERKS:

• Really white
• Old school (they had a softball game!  Along with debates about whether we should be Women's and Gender Studies or just Gender Studies, or what about Women's Studies?)
• Striving for interdisciplinarity, but not with 100% success.  It was definitely a history conference.
• Very few men.
• Really, really reputable.  As Astrid pointed out, the only feminist historian who wasn't there was Gerda Lerner.

NWSA:

• Somewhat multi-ethnic, with institutional structures in place to support this.  Many more people of color than the Berks.
• Newer school (no softball, no dance, and a growing body of new scholarship)
• Truly interdisciplinary
• A few men, but not as few as the Berks.
• Getting more reputable.  And it should be!  It's a great conference.  And have I mentioned that our presidents are Beverly Guy-Sheftall (immediate past president) and Bonnie Thornton Dill?  And because of their work, folks like Angela Davis come to our conference.  For fun.

Here's Astrid hanging out in front of Emily Dickinson's house.  As it turns out, although the conference is called the Big Berks, we weren't actually in the Berkshires.  We were in Amherst, MA, which is a totally different part of the state.  We admired Dickinson's house from the outside, but we didn't go in, because we had to go to Northampton and have a fabulous brunch.  Priorities.



*You know, controversial if you're a feminist scholar.  If you're not a feminist scholar--if, for instance, you're someone who teaches college and has an office next door to a feminist scholar, you'd be likely to say, "What?  Berks?  NWSA?  What are you talking about?"

LH mercy, she keeps blogging, doesn't she?

Here's another update from today.  Our "third wave" panel (with scare quotes around "third wave") went well.  Some great panelists with really interesting observations and arguments.  In particular it struck me that much of the conversation with the audience was about teaching, and I reflected that "third wave" is something that often comes up in my classes, but not necessarily in other professional or personal contexts for me.  Has it become a teaching tool more than anything else these days?

After a day of thoughtful conferencing, Astrid and I went out and ate delicious Nigerian food with some conference friends.  One of the friends--an editor at a university press--is also an organist, and she'd heard of Stefan Engels, our famous organist friend!  I always enjoy soaking up other people's fame. 

After dinner, Astrid and I had a brief fraught moment of feeling like we should go to the Sojourner Truth opera, but we decided instead to have ice cream with Keira Williams, soon to be the recognized national expert on Susan Smith.  We will soak up her fame when the time comes.