Tiny Things Matter

A little over three weeks ago, I broke the pinkie toe on my right foot. I did it in the usual way (if there is a usual way to do such things):  I clumsily walked into a chair leg while barefoot.

Incidentally, I typically don't walk around barefoot because I've done this sort of thing before. So I, at a minimum, wear socks. But often I'm wearing house shoes or Crocs around the house so I do not, e.g., catch my toe on a chair leg.  I actually feel nervous with bare feet, worried that I will once again break a toe in a moment of carelessness.  And, well . . . so I'm not wrong to worry, it turns out.

Often, it's the littlest things that make the difference. You barely think of them, but little things matter.  The missed moment three and a half weeks ago when I did not slip my feet into the Crocs at my bedside mattered.  It was, probably, the moment that meant I would hobble around in Bass Oxfords for six to eighth weeks instead of, you know, not doing that. Tiny moment. A tiny slip of the mind, a tiny distraction, set the series of events in motion that led to a careless swing of my leg as I walked, which led to a popping sound as toe hit chair leg, and, finally, which led to a me flowing to my seat on the floor in pain saying, "Ow, ow, ow, ow" (or possibly some slightly stronger vocabulary), tears welling into my eyes.

By the next morning, my foot had turned blue across the top from beneath the little toe to just beneath the middle toe.  This seemed worse bruising than in prior years when I'd broken a toe. (Indeed, it looked worse than my husband's foot looked a few months ago when he broke his toe.)  And I was in considerable pain. It nearly made me sick to put weight on it, most shoes were intolerable, and walking was a farcical series of limps and hops. 

Nevertheless, that Monday, that morning, was my son's first day of kindergarten. I couldn't miss that. So I painfully slipped an Oxford onto my foot, took the maximum amount of Advil advisable, and hobbled the two-tenths of a mile from our house to the school while he rode his bike up ahead with his dad walking next to him.  Little thing, the first day of school, maybe, but a milestone, and I wasn't going to miss escorting my boy in for his first big day.

Later that morning, I went to the doctor to get the foot checked out. No physician could see me, but the PA could. She examined my foot and X-rayed it. Initially, she didn't see a fracture, told me it was probably a weird sprain or strain -- hence, the weird bruising. Two to three weeks to heal, she said.  Take Advil and stay off of it for a couple of weeks.

A few days later, however, she called and left me a voice message to call her back.  So I did:  my internist had read the X-Ray and saw a tiny hairline fracture in the second phalange in my pinkie toe.  The tiny break would take 6 to 8 weeks to heal. And meanwhile, I should treat it with care -- tape it to the next toe, if I wanted -- and take Advil for the pain, or they could prescribe something stronger.

So here I am three weeks from the minuscule break and, still, the only shoes I can really tolerate are the Oxfords, a pair of Keen hiking shoes, and a pair of running shoes.  For someone who likes crazy (if sensible) shoes, this is not an ideal set of circumstances.  You can imagine, then, how I have tired of working variations on the theme of this look . . . .

 Starting the fourth week of my broken toe-ness, I thought I'd try some block heeled Mary Janes.  They have a fairly ample toe box, and aren't THAT, high.  They're sensible shoes!  These should be fine, I thought.  I could ditch the Oxfords.

I felt fine in them until about half way between my parking garage and the office. That's when my not-yet-healed toe started to throb a bit.  By the end of the day I was discreetly hobbling, and cursing my shoe maven vanity.  So it was back to the Oxfords for the rest of my recovery.  Small thing, maybe, the choice of shoe, except when it's not. 

And that brings me to yoga.  The broken toe had kept me from attending yoga class for two weeks.  Too painful for a down dog!  But this past weekend, I thought I'd give it a go.  I missed going to yoga:  good for the body, good for the mind, good for the spirit.  I missed the stretch and the strength and the balance.

It was great to be back.  I felt refreshed.  I could painlessly do almost every pose and move I was asked to do, except I couldn't balance on my right side.  The first time I tried to balance on the right, pain shot up the right side of my leg from my pinkie toe to my knee.

See?  You use your pinkie toe to balance.  Even in your shoes, you grip down with that toe (and the other toes too) to give you a more secure balancing surface.  This is why in yoga you sometimes hear the instructor tell you to lift your toes up and spread them back down before you attempt a balancing pose.  It's meant to really activate those toes to help you balance.  And when I did that very thing this past Saturday, I learned that I could not grip the floor with my broken toe.  So, without the participation of that one small part of my body, I could not keep the rest of my body from tipping to one side or the other.  Balancing on the left, I was all grace and zen.  Balancing on the right, I was a little like Jerry Lewis doing a pratfall.

The tiniest things matter.  Tiny mistakes, tiny decisions, tiny moments, tiny bones.  It's hard to remember sometimes that, as the trite old saying goes, "The little things mean a lot."  But they do.  Sometimes the littlest things mean the difference between standing tall and gracefully, or falling flat on your face.

I'll be glad when I can balance on the right side again.

But, for now, as my toe continues to heal, I will appreciate the small consolation that I can at least balance on the left.  And I will draw what good I can from a painful and annoying bone break that has limited my sartorial choices:  This broken toe has taught me to be a little more mindful of all of the small things in my world and, I hope, made me a better person by hobbling me first.

Tolerance

I wanted to write a blog post today because, well, I wanted to.

A friend recently gave me the idea to write about all the wonderful benefits of age – specifically, the fact that age gives you the extremely blissful ability and desire to say of most thing, “aw, blow it off and get you a beer, who cares?”  Trivial stuff actually DOES seem trivial at this age.  And that’s a great topic, but then . . . .

The Federal District Court in San Antonio published its opinion/order in Deleon v. Perry, in which it finds Texas’s gay marriage ban unconstitutional on the basis that (broad over simplification of the opinion to follow) it violates the 14^th Amendment’s protections of due process and equal protection under the law.  So I thought I’d write about that.

But then I read this article about over-achieving mom/parent culture at school (and how we parents – and the schools too -- should all just simmer down a little bit), which, paired with all of the crazy things I’ve seen on Pinterest, lead me to concur that we’ve all gone just a little bit overboard on, e.g., our kids’ Valentines cards and gifts.

AND THEN, I read a story about a new study – a single study – that found that, basically, if you didn’t breastfeed your baby, no harm/no foul.  Your kid is not permanently damaged because you didn’t give him/her sufficient boob juice with all kinds of magical and beneficial hoosiewhatsits in it.  And for those of us who had a hard time producing enough milk to fill even one bottle, this was welcome news.  (It was also welcome news to those of us who have been milk-shamed for not breastfeeding or not “trying hard enough” to breastfeed.)

Then I realized something:  all of these things have something in common.

Tolerance.

I think that tolerance has gotten a bad rap in recent years.  Some people hear the word, “tolerance,” and they think that you mean “approval.”  And that’s not what tolerance is at all.  Tolerance is the ability to accept that something you dislike exists.  Think of tolerance, in fact, as endurance.  Something may be painful to you, or distasteful to you, but you nevertheless endure it with grace and aplomb.  I have tolerated many a continuing legal education lecture through the years....

You don’t have to like it.  You don’t even have to endorse it.  But humility, patience, and generosity of spirit can allow you to live in peace knowing that something you think is wrong exists in the world.

That’s tolerance.

There are a lot of people who don’t want to tolerate gay marriage.  They find it morally offensive.  I get that.  I tolerate that.  I can even sympathize with those feelings and thoughts.  Because there are a lot of legal things that I find immoral and/or distasteful, but I tolerate them because I live in this civil society that permits them.  (Example:  the death penalty.)  And it seems clearer and clearer that the law of equal protection and due process will extend to the marriages of same sex couples throughout this land, and sooner rather than later.  Not everyone has to like it.  But trying to find a way to tolerate it while remaining true to oneself is a virtue for which we can all strive.

As for the breastfeeding and the over-achieving parent behavior, well, let’s try to give each other a break, shall we?  Not everyone is going to make the same choices as you do, and that’s okay.  In fact, we make the choices that are best for us.  For some of us, that’s breastfeeding and making elaborate Valentine cards for our kids (sometimes simultaneously!).  For others of us, it’s Enfamil and dollar store Valentine cards with Dum Dums suckers taped to the front of them.  Whatever it is we choose, that’s okay.  No child will be damaged by a non-homemade Valentine card, nor will any child be damaged by elaborate homemade ones.  The worst thing that could happen is that the other grown-ups will talk behind their hands in judgment of your slackerdom or over-achiever syndrome.  (Something I’m guilty of myself, I confess.)  Rather than do either, we should gracefully nod, and tolerate the different choices of our neighbors.  “Gracious words are like a honeycomb, sweetness to the soul and health to the body.”  Proverbs 16:24.  (I love Proverbs.)  It’s good to remember that, when thinking of our neighbors.

All this being said, we should not tolerate everything.  Some things are worth the fight.  (For me, women’s rights, human dignity.)  And, I suppose, that we must choose what battles we will fight and what things we can tolerate notwithstanding our disapproval.  What is worth it to us?  And are there things for which we can turn the other cheek, or drop our untossed stones, understanding that we are also not perfect?

Which of course brings me to the first topic I considered writing about today:  the relaxation of care that comes with age.  In my forties, it’s true that I just do not have the fire in my belly to become indignant or fight back about every slight.  In my forties, I’m becoming more “live and let live” and less “you’re doing it wrong.”  It doesn't mean I don't have passion or that I'm world weary.  But my two-score-plus years have given me a lot of patience, gratitude and perspective.  So here in my forties, I tolerate a lot . . . mostly gladly.

We’d all be a lot happier, I think, if, rather than seethe and gnash our teeth, we would just blow it off and get us a beer when something irks us.  (Or a red wine.  Boxed, even.  I’m not picky, I’ll tolerate whatever you’ve got.  Cheers, friends.)

Comfort in Randomness

I don't like supernaturalism.

I remember being a little weirded out by the idea of Santa Claus when I was a kid. I would think about -- and I mean really ponder -- the lyrics to Santa Claus Is Coming To Town and get a little chill. 

He sees you when you're sleeping.

He knows when you're awake. 

He knows when you've been bad or good,

So be good for goodness sake!

Honestly, the idea of some old stranger knowing my every move -- and he's not God -- gave me the willies.  Sure, I liked the gifts and stuff, but the stalking was another thing entirely.

So there was a certain sort of relief when I came to accept that he was a fun construct and not a real guy. True, I was still sad on the day that the affirmation of that realization was trumpeted by way of derisive laughter by my entire fifth grade class in the cafeteria (a teacher had told us to be good or Santa wouldn't come, and seemingly everyone but me laughed), but life is full of contradictions.

So when I hear someone tell me or someone else that something -- especially something bad -- was meant to be, my heart dies a little. 

Because, deep down, I don't believe that there's always a plan in the works. I'll just say it:  I don't believe it is, for instance, meant to be that some tragedy strikes. If it was meant to be, that means someone ordered up that tragedy:  that child's death, that parent's cancer, that horrible murder. And that seems like a terrible way to make a cosmic point. For what purpose?  What lesson is being taught through, for instance, the death of that child that is more valuable to the world than the life of that child?  What benefit is derived?

No, I confess, I find comfort in chance, in randomness. It gives me no comfort that a horrible thing is preordained or intended by some invisible actor for some, to my mind at least, misguided educational purpose. Indeed, it makes me angry at the actor who ordered the tragedy. But random tragedy, which no one plans (or at least, no one loving and benevolent plans), which just happens because life (and death) happens. That gives me peace.

What's a mother to do?

A friend of mine posted a link to this blog post on Facebook. And I read it. And gave it a the big thumbs up.

In it the writer, mother of "the Hall Boys," explains how she and her sons sometimes look at the kids' Facebook pages and if the mom sees a girl dressed or posed in a way the she deems inappropriate, she makes the kid delete the girl. No second chances. She wants to protect her sons and help them stay "pure."

Regarding the "keeping your kid pure part," I think she's fighting a losing battle, no matter how much she talks to them, how many times they read the Bible, or how hard they all pray. Teenaged boys, throbbing away with testosterone, are going to want to look at scantily clad females, be they peers or in a magazine.  And I don't think anyone -- mommy or otherwise -- is going to stop them doing it by going through their Facebook pages and deleting all the 16 year girls who have taken unfortunately provocative selfies.  Come to think of it, you're lucky if those selfies are all he's looking at. 

But in a post-Steubenville rape trial era, I can sympathize with a mother who wants to protect her sons from the sexual pitfalls of social media. My kid's not yet three, and I worry about when his days as a walking libido arrive. So I get the impulse. You don't want your kid to be the one forwarding some girl's naked ta-ta shot or much, much worse. So policing his Facebook activity is a way to do it. 

And the author of the Hall Boys post offers some advice to the girls taking the provocative selfies:  she knows you're better than that. She knows you're a good, smart, sweet girl who really isn't as slutty as your Facebook feed suggests. And she wants you to act like it and prove that you are the kind of girl she'd like her boys to date.  

I get that too. Because when I see a teen girl with her boobs and/or her booty hanging out, I think about how no one cares about her brain or her opinions because her Ts and A are getting in the way.  And that's the sorry, sad truth:  when you dress provocatively, you will provoke. And when teenaged girls provoke, they don't really understand what they're doing or inviting. They can't understand it fully, they haven't been there yet.  I hate to drag out the tired old phrase "youth and inexperience," but their youth and inexperience necessitates that they don't really know what they're doing.

Hey, if nearly 43-year-old me wears a lacy push-up bra, I know what I'm after, what I'm communicating, and what I'm likely to get. A teenager, not so much.  And I've written about this before, on this blog:  how the way you dress affects how people think about you.  In a post where I mused on the 20-something young professional women bringing sexy back to the workplace, I wrote, "I think that, fundamentally, we [middle-aged female professionals] feel that a sexy appearance means that you are less likely to be taken seriously by your peers."  I stand by that statement.  And it goes for teenaged girls too.  You're not likely to be seen as the next Ruth Bader Ginsberg if your bra is hanging out, whether you're a 27-year-old attorney or a 17-year-old high school senior.

The bone I had to pick with the Hall Boys' mom, upon first reading, was that she basically had a zero tolerance policy.  One skanky selfie and the girl was consigned to the Facebook trash bin.  I'm thinking, hey, we all make mistakes and especially when we're teenaged girls.  Maybe give the girl's mom a call, instead, and say, "I just saw Suzie's tits on Jimmy's Facebook feed, you might want to check it out."  (I mean, I couldn't be on the other side of town without my mom finding out somehow, and that was pre-cell phone, pre-Facebook, pre-Internet.  Heck, some people still used rotary phones back then.  But the Moms Network was in full force in my hometown.  Does it not work that way anymore?)

So, anyway, I clicked "like" and moved on, because I sympathized.

Then, a few hours later, another friend posted this on Facebook, a link to another blog post by a different woman, directly responding to the Hall Boys' mom. This woman, also a Christian, takes issue with the tenor of Mrs. Hall's post that sort of buys into the notion that boys and men are victims of their own biology in need of protection from these teen vixens. This author advocates teaching responsibility to the boys, and not just blaming the girls for dressing seductively and posing in sexy positions. The boys are not victims and it's not that they just can't help themselves. They're equal participants in the teen titillation tango, and should be treated as such.

She writes:  "[Modest culture] teaches men to dispose of women who don't fit their mold, under the guise of 'keeping themselves pure.'  It teaches men that women exist on a spectrum of worth determined by their clothing and that is is there right as men to determine which women are worth more - and yet, modest culture masks it as 'keeping away from sexual sin.'  It teaches men irresponsibility and play it off as 'integrity.'"

I read that and I thought, "God, she's right."  She's talking about slut shaming, right there in the church, disguised as virtue.  Without any effort to understand the girl -- she gets deleted for the first offense, after all, because the Hall Boys can't be exposed to a nano-second of provocation -- she is blamed for the boy's impure thoughts.  And so I liked that post on Facebook too.

. . . . because I want my boy to be in control of his own body and responsible for his own sexual activities and health. And keeping provocative images from him will not teach him that sort control, nor will it teach him to respect the girls he is banned from seeing.  Being what passes for a feminist firebrand in suburban Dallas County, I certainly want my son to see his female peers as people first, and not objects.  (It may help in years to come that The Boy has lots of female friends who are very much his equals in every way except, perhaps, volume.  He beats them in "loud" every time.)

But the problem with the response blog post is that it does not pose an answer.

The answer is not to shame the girls who dress provocatively.

The answer is not to make boys feel that they are the victims of their libidos and that they just can't help themselves when they see a sexy picture.

The answer is also not to tell girls that they can dress like a Victoria's Secret model, but we'll still think of them as the Supreme Court Justice that they've got hidden deep inside.

The way you dress communicates something to the wider world.  Girls must understand this.

But the way a girl dresses is not everything that she is.  Boys must understand this.

So since yesterday, I've had these thoughts rolling around in my head, musing as to what the right answer is.  I've thought about how I would talk to The Boy about these issues, when he is The Teen, and, specifically, when the inevitable sexy pictures of some classmate or another shows up.  Man, that's going to be an uncomfortable conversation, but we're just going to have to have the conversation.  And it's going to have to involve what we think is going on in the girl's head and what she might be thinking and how the picture is not the only thing about her.  And I'll probably ask him what he thinks of her intellect and what she's good at besides doing fish faces into the camera . . .  or something like that.  And, yeah, I may be calling Suzie's mom to tell her about the picture . . . .  I'm old school like that.

But what about the girls?  There's a trend among feminist, I think, to call any criticism of provocative female dress "slut shaming."  This is crap.  I've written about this topic too:

I mean, don't get me wrong, a woman's sexy attire does not mean she's asking for a sexual assault.  But I just can't get from, "My short skirt is not a rape invitation," to total female empowerment.  I guess the point is that we can be what we want to be.  We are free women.  We can get our boobs out any time we want.  Slutty, empowered, independent me!  As an expression of outrage, I totally get the Slut Walks.  As an expression of female power, I really don't. 

Because we can't – we shouldn't – get our boobs out any time we want.  We live in a society in which people are judged by their looks, men and women.  I’ve touched on this issue before, the fine line between sexy and powerful that women seem to walk.  And I firmly believe that if you want to be respected by your peers – and that includes your female peers – you have to dress and act and talk in a way that commands that respect.  And that means sometimes, you have to put your boobs away when circumstances dictate.  I am not empowered because I have some powerful cleavage.  I am empowered because I am well-educated, articulate, professional, intelligent, witty and quick.  My powerful cleavage may have turned a few heads in its day, but it has never stood up to oral argument in court like my gray, old, wrinkly brain has.  Maybe I just don't get it, but the attempt to reclaim the word slut as a feminist power-word seem so retrograde.  Honestly, it feels juvenile, even fatuous.  These are not two adjectives I wish to be affixed to my sex.

So, yeah.  In other words, there's a time and place for getting your boobs out, and the time and the place for getting them out is not "anytime" and "anywhere."  It's not slut shaming to say that or admit that.  It just is.  When you get your boobs out at the "wrong" time or in the "wrong" place, there are consequences, which include that people don't think as well of you as they otherwise might.  And girls need to learn that.  Learning that lesson is an important component of learning about their bodies and how to control their sexuality.  And, preferably, they need to learn it from their moms or other female role models.

Umm.  Anyway.

I'm not sure what the answer is, but I'm pretty sure it's not an either/or proposition.  Girl Mommas gotta find a way to talk to their girls about the messages they're sending when they dress provocatively.  And Boy Mommas gotta find a way to talk to the boys about the messages they're receiving and try to turn them around to see the real person in that impossibly short skirt.  And we all will be very uncomfortable for about four to six years.  At least, I think so . . . Maybe if I start planning now, I'll be ready for this when it comes up for me in a decade or so.  I'll let you know.

(P.S., this all goes for Daddies too, which should go without saying, but I'm talking "momma" because the original two blog posts were by mommas, and because I'm a momma too.)