i suppose i used to see womanhood through rose colored glasses. of confetti and trips to paris just for the hell of it. of loving and being loved. of ease. there’s only so many times you can be called a “boss babe” until the vapidness of that name becomes apparent and the rose coloring wears off. there was a time when i made a list of those who made me feel less than a woman, but it became so frequent that names no longer mattered.
did you know i never could stand the taste of coffee? i hated how long its bitterness lingered on my tongue. the ease with which you swallowed it always amazed me, so i choked it down and masked every disgusted face i was tempted to make because more than anything i did not want you to see me as a child. i resented you for it. sometimes i resent myself instead.
did you know i considered changing my lifelong dream career after the low score you gave me for being “too detailed” on my research project about that very career? “it’s just too much for some people,” you had said; only i had replaced “it’s” with “you’re” in my head, and it stuck. i resented you for it. sometimes i resent myself instead.
did you know i still sometimes think about what you said to me over the phone when i find myself filling with any emotion other than contentment? our nightly phone call ended with me crying to you for the first time over god-knows-what after our conversation about the possibility of growing up without each other. i suppose it was more of what you didn’t say, because the phone line went dead but i could practically hear your eye-roll from the other end. our friendship ended not too long after that with you telling me my “rampant” emotions were to blame, but attempting to cover it up by saying we were simply growing in two separate directions. i resented you for it. sometimes i resent myself instead.
did you know my stomach still sometimes flips when i scroll past a girl i deem to be perfect on the spot? on several occasions i’ve made myself sick trying to escape the false sense of perfectionism that social media so generously supplies. it’s easy to walk away from a rack of magazines, but near impossible to stop scrolling when content for comparison is endless. more than anything i just wanted to be good enough. we just wanted to be good enough. it’s maliciously cyclical; we know there isn’t a limit to “enough”, but we still destroy ourselves to reach it. i resented you for it. sometimes i resent myself instead.
for a long time, this is what i thought it meant to be a woman - to shut up and cooperate. to be defined by collective resentment, especially towards ourselves, that we could do nothing to soothe. and though i still sometimes do when my remaining internalized misogyny lets its wrath be felt, i’ve learned to separate what being a woman is and the oppression that comes with it. i feel that women have two coming of ages - the day we begin to grow and the day we realize the sound of our own voices are not the enemy. the people who feel threatened by our power are. and perhaps that is why i have always been afraid to let myself be heard - because the sound of our voices together is the most earth-shattering thing i have ever known. the happy ending is not when misogynists recognize this, rather when we do. i want to get there. i’ve just got a lot of growing to do until i am.