Feminine Mistique

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One is not born a woman, one becomes one. ~Simone de Beauvoir

So I mentioned a few weeks back that I was indulging in some massage therapy to help with…well with tension and the tight back muscles that come with all that. I don’t do it as much as I probably should. I really only do it as often as I can afford, but it has really helped and I can certainly feel when it’s getting to be time for another massage.

Now this is massage therapy, so there’s a certain expectation that it will be pretty “New-Agey” if you know what I mean. There are scented candles and a lot of books about cleansing your energy pathways and centering your chi or whatever. I find it a little abstract and ethereal sometimes – but who am I to judge? My back hurts, these people can help me so bring on the ocean wave music and green tea extract. But this last time I got some news that has stuck with me some over the past week or so since my last massage.

It’s pretty standard that my left side is more sore and tight than my right side. I haven’t really been able to pinpoint exactly why, but when I think back I believe it has ever been thus. This last time though, perhaps because I hadn’t been there for awhile, I was quite a bit tighter than usual and my massage therapist really had to work the lower left. At one point she said she was just going to step out for a minute. I thought from all the effort she’d was putting in that perhaps she was just tired and needed a break. But no, she wanted get her reference book and check out something about my body. Of course with my face squished into the face holder donut I’m thinking “Oh crap, what has she found back there?” When she came back she announced that the tightness on the left side in the lower back and hip area means, according to “the book”, that I have issues with femininity and could in fact be suppressing my femininity.

Issues with femininity?

Suppressing my femininity?

What does that mean?

I think I’m ok being a girl. I mean, I was a tom-boy growing up, but I wasn’t so much a tomboy that I didn’t enjoy getting a new dress. I’ve never been a really girly-girl, but I’ve always been ok being a girl – I’ve never wanted to be a boy that I can recall. On the other hand I don’t paint my nails. I don’t have my ears pierced. I don’t like wearing jewelry, I don’t like wearing floral patterns….or any patterns at all really. But on the other hand I enjoy making flowers and jewelry for other people to wear (like every other gay designer in the world come to think of it). And hey, I also own a pair of red suede pumps with 3 inch heels. I don’t take them out for a test drive much, but I enjoy looking at them from time to time (possibly something else I have in common with gay designers). I’m not currently married but I have been…twice and I don’t believe I’ve switched my gender preference without my knowledge. Daniel Craig + Russell Crowe+ Mr. Darcy still equal swooney heart palpitations. On the other hand, being single – let’s face it - I probably am suppressing something.

I must say all this confliction has been very vexing and hard to navigate. So maybe I should try a weekend of Bridget Jones’ Diary and Gilmore Girls and see how my back feels then. Or maybe I’ll just go shoe shopping - that's a pretty girly - feminine thing to do. And if I don't actually carry my 900lb purse that generally hangs across my left shoulder, perhaps then I'll start to feel more feminine.