July 9 - Beauty

I watched part of an interview with Dustin Hoffman today wherein he talked about what it was like to try out the make up for Tootsie. He talks about how they made him look like a woman, but he then asked them to make him a beautiful woman and was told that they had done the best they could with his facial features. He cried to his wife, lamenting how he thought he was an interesting person as a woman, but he knew he would not have talked to himself as a woman had he met himself in a bar, and he wondered how many interesting women he has not talked to in his life because we are all brainwashed into thinking that only the beautiful people are worth our time. Take a moment and watch the video - he gets choked up talking about it. And what is brilliant, is that they titled the video "Dustin Hoffman Breaks Down Crying Explaining Something That Every Woman Sadly Already Experienced." Because we have. Women experience this Every. Single. Day.

I know there are those of you who would argue and say I'm one of the pretty people. Thank you for that. I am only now coming to the realization that people see me that way. I've not always been pretty, and it still kind of freaks me out to say I am because I know I am not Hollywood pretty, not Hollywood shaped, etc. Whatever. That's not the point of this.

What is striking to me about it is exactly how pervasive this is in our culture, even in places you wouldn't really think to notice it. Like actors. Think about the male actors you like and make sure to go see their films. I bet a bunch of them are "traditionally hot" - Brad Pitt, Chris Hemsworth, Taye Diggs, etc. Guys with muscles and symmetrical faces and soulful eyes. But there is probably someone in there who you adore who isn't traditionally hot. Dustin Hoffman is a great example. Or Tim Curry. Or Steve Buscemi. Or Phillip Seymour Hoffman. These men have also made brilliant careers for themselves with the odd tooth or the larger than average nose or the pot belly or whatever. We are so willing to give non-traditionally-hot men a chance in Hollywood, and we buy them in all sorts of different roles (hell, even Willem Dafoe has played a romantic lead). But then take a look at the women in Hollywood. Right now, we have the super skinny, super beautiful women who get lead roles, and then the other women who play supporting roles but who are also attractive. Melissa McCarthy is beautiful, but since she is heavier than some of her cohorts, she gets the buffoon roles now. Even if you look at former Saturday Night Live cast members (back when they had female regulars), Amy Pohler is gorgeous, Tina Fey is gorgeous, Kristin Wiig is gorgeous, Maya Rudolph is gorgeous, Gilda Radner was gorgeous, Jan Hooks is gorgeous, Cheri Oteri is gorgeous, Victoria Jackson is gorgeous, Molly Shannon is gorgeous, Jane Curtin was gorgeous, and all of these women were of a certain size and shape. The one woman I can think of in recent SNL history who is not traditionally beautiful is Rachel Dratch, and let's look at her career next to, say Tina Fey's. I'm not saying they are the same woman or they have the same talents, but one has to wonder, with so many funny women from SNL becoming A-listers, where is Rachel Dratch? Why isn't she along for the ride? I don't know - maybe she doesn't want to be or maybe she's miserable to work with or maybe it is because she is not as traditionally beautiful as the women around her so Hollywood doesn't know what to do with her. I don't know. But maybe.

We love seeing the ugly, nerdy guy kissing the super model in a Super Bowl commercial, but the thought of an ugly, nerdy woman kissing a hot guy (or anyone, really) is deemed repulsive and wrong and implausible. Anyone else see how messed up this is?

I want to know when it was decided that women aren't worth as much as men. I want to know when it was decided that a slightly odd looking man can still be a good guy with a heart of gold, but a slightly odd looking woman is crazy, undesirable and untouchable. I want to know why we are so forgiving of the genetic rainbow of male traits, and so disdainful of the genetic rainbow of female traits. Does it go back to caveman days when women would die in childbirth while men were out killing animals? Does it date back to when people figured out that men were involved in the procreation process and they decided they didn't want to rear someone else's kids so they had to put the lock-down on "their" woman? Because female repression dates back a lot farther than one might think and it is still very much alive and well in today's world. I'm not even talking about the horrors that women in some other countries have to endure; I'm talking about the raging debate in the United States about what women should and should not be allowed to do with their own uteri. Decisions being made by people who don't have uteri, for the most part. Frankly, I'm tired of it. I'm tired of all of it.

When I tell my friends that they are beautiful, I am talking about their souls as I see them - they are beautiful people. And my friends come in all different sizes, shapes, and colors, and I see them all as beautiful exactly they way they are. When are we, as a culture, going to embrace the beauty that is the female form with all of its variations and nuances? Because truly, to be female is to be gorgeous. We create life. What could be more beautiful than that?

I'm sorry. I'm rambling and ranty now. It just pisses me off that today, in 2013, as equal rights are being fought for and won for all sorts of minority groups, that it is still culturally acceptable to hold women (the majority of the population, by the way) to unattainable, outrageous standards. I'm tired of holding myself to those standards and hating myself when I don't meet them. I'm just tired of it. Can we be done with it now? Please?

June 20 - It Touches Me Not

Please note: this is my opinion based on what little I know of the world. I'm allowed to have this opinion, just as you are allowed to have yours, and if your opinion and my opinion don't match, well, that's okay, too.

When the whole Edward Snowden NSA surveillance story broke, I wasn't quite sure what to think. I'm not an expert on any of this stuff, I don't know Edward Snowden or his life, and I'm don't work for the government. So all of a sudden this news story broke and everybody was trying to paint one side or the other as the bad guy and being woefully uninformed, I didn't know which side to take. Not that it is necessary to take sides, but it would be nice to be able to weigh in if the subject comes up at a party or something.

But I found myself...not terribly miffed by the whole thing, and then wondering if there was something wrong with me because I wasn't terribly miffed by the whole thing, so I gave it some thought (though admittedly, I've still not done much research on the subject) and the thoughts that are gelling in my head largely revolve around human nature and personal responsibility. Let me elaborate.

So the NSA has been listening in on our phone calls and reading our emails for the last six years. I'm trying to think of anything I have said on the phone or sent in an email in the last six years that I would be mortified if someone other than the recipient knew and to be honest, I'm drawing a blank. I've flirted a bit. I've sent out I don't even know how many headshots. I've ordered things from Amazon. I told a former friend that I no longer had space for her in my life. I've made new friends with whom I've shared information about myself that is also readily available elsewhere on the interwebs. I've chatted with my girl friends in New York and Texas about the goings on in our lives and what Buzzfeed articles are cracking us up at the moment. I yelled at USPS and UPS customer service employees who were not at all helpful. I can't really think of anything super incriminating that if someone else happened to know about it, I'd be mortified or publicly humiliated or personally destroyed. It's like Hamlet tells Claudius, "...your majesty and we that have free souls, it touches us not..." Meaning if we have nothing to hide, what difference does it make if it becomes unhidden?

And the extension of that brings us around to human nature. That inherent belief that everything we say and do is of the utmost importance to everyone else, coupled with the complete disregard for the fact that everyone else is busy thinking everything they do is of the utmost importance to everyone else. In simpler terms, it's not all about you. Most people really aren't interested in what you have to say. It's like couples with kids finding that they're losing touch with their friends who don't have kids because secretly, the friends who don't have kids get tired of getting together to find that the soul topic of discussion on the table anymore is the children. You think your kids are fascinating; other people don't. (Usually. I actually like hearing about other people's kids because it is a life I don't know but I might have to portray on stage someday, so having something to draw from is cool. But I think it's safe to say I'm the exception that proves the rule, not the rule.)

So let's extend that to the NSA. Let's pretend that hypothetically, there is one NSA employee assigned to read every single email you send and listen to every single phone call you make and that is all that one employee does. After six years of phone calls to your mom to talk about birthday plans for your sister, and emails to your husband reminding him to pick up paper towels on the way home, and the occasional bit of "juicy gossip" you share with your best friend who is having way more sex than you, this NSA employee is going to become dreadfully bored with your life. He doesn't know you. He doesn't know the people you're talking about. He doesn't care about your sister's birthday, your friend's affairs, or your paper towel consumption needs. And for the love of all things holy, he's tired of pictures of your sleeping cat! He went through boatloads of training to get what he thought was a top notch job at this huge fancy security agency and he's tasked with reading your dentist appointment scheduling emails? Chances are, if you ever met this guy on the street, he wouldn't even recognize you or remember that you have a pedicure on Thursday at six. He's trained to look for certain key words, certain phrases that raise red flags, and unless he sees those things, I'm betting he has basically tuned out by now and just keeps reading and listening because somebody is paying him to do it.

Now, I know this isn't actually the case because the NSA doesn't have enough employees to assign one individual to each American citizen. So they likely have computers set up tracking all of this information. You know what? The computers probably care even less than the hypothetical employee did that your brother was a dick for not inviting you to his Friday night poker game. The computers are programmed to scan for certain words and phrases that raise red flags, at which point a live human being might start paying attention. Otherwise, the communication is likely stored on some massive server somewhere that looks like the digital equivalent of where the Ark of the Covenant is stored at the end of Indiana Jones and the Lost Ark. How is this so much worse than using a free online email system like Gmail or Yahoo! Mail, that also stores all of your communications on some large server somewhere that you'd totally flip your shit if it was all suddenly not there? You know what? Now the NSA has a backup of the receipt you got from the wedding cake place so you can prove they overcharged you since they only put in one layer of filling instead of two.

Okay, okay, I get it, it's an invasion of personal privacy to have someone or something (a computer) you don't know and didn't give access to scanning all of your communications. Thing is, if you have nothing to hide, they probably don't care about you and aren't paying that close attention. They're likely focused in on those people who are planning things like the Boston Marathon bombing so they can try to prevent those things from happening. We're all perfectly happy to take off our shoes, jackets and belts when passing through airport security on the off chance someone might be trying to sneak something on a plane. I guess I just don't see how this is so much worse than that. Maybe I've become complacent. Maybe I don't have enough scandal in my life. Maybe I've learned to pick my battles.

And yes, it is possible that there is an NSA employee somewhere out there who built up a collection of the nude pictures you sent to your girlfriend or boyfriend and he's enjoying them in a way that makes you uncomfortable. Personally, I learned a LONG time ago that if there is something you don't want a stranger to see, don't put it on the interweb, don't email it, and don't text it to someone else. Once it's digital, it's hard to get erase, and you never know where someone else might post it.

Which then brings me to Edward Snowden. I don't know him. I don't know his life. I know very little about his background. But I will say this - it strikes me as somewhat cowardly to flee the country before becoming a whistleblower and to then seek political asylum in another country for making a conscious choice to do something you know is illegal, after working for a company involved in practices with which you did not agree for many many years. If he was so strongly opposed to the surveillance, why didn't he quit when it was instituted and make his public announcement then? Why did he wait so long to say something? It strikes me as a power play and a cry for attention. And to be perfectly honest, I would respect him more if he was willing to accept the consequences of his actions as opposed to fleeing and seeking asylum. Because as much as he thinks he's helping Joe Q. Public, he has now alerted any potential terrorist cells within the United States that the government is on to them so they can find other non-digital forms of communication (carrier pigeon, maybe?).

I don't know. Like I said, I don't know the whole story. I don't know the NSA's reasoning for instituting surveillance other than to liken it to taking our shoes off at the airport. I don't know Snowden's motivations for collecting a paycheck (likely a cushy one) from a company he despised for years knowing he would sabotage them later. I don't know the circumstances of his life. I don't know what kinds of emails and phone calls other people are participating in that would be so detrimental to their person/reputation/relationships if overheard by a complete stranger. I don't know if I should be miffed. I don't know if I should think of Snowden as a hero or a villain. I don't know if I should think of the NSA as being helpful or intrusive and underhanded. I don't know. But I do think the NSA likely doesn't care about what online newsletters I subscribe to or have unsubscribed from in the last six years. As one with a free soul (at least one I consider free), this touches me not.

Is that wrong?

May 16 - The Powder Room

I think most bathroom designers must be men. What else could explain the extremely inconvenient placement of so many toilet paper roll holders? It's not that big of a deal for most men - they only use toilet paper once or twice a day when using the toilet, so if they have to twist and contort to reach it, no biggie. Women use toilet paper every time they use the toilet. Which often times occurs with greater frequency than men using the toilet. So to have to sit down and turn around almost 180 degrees to reach the precious loo roll, well, it's not my favorite.

So ladies, let's get a few more of us into architecture and interior design so we can stop this plague of inconveniently placed toilet paper roll holders in bathrooms. Awareness is the first step to prevention. Doing something about it is the second.

May 5 - Non-Issue

I wish I wish I wish I wish I wish physical appearance was a non-issue. Specifically mine.

I would like to think that in my life and my interactions with other people, a lot of the things that were once, I dunno, taboo? are now non-issues. I don't really care what your sexual orientation is or your religion or your skin color or your gender, if you are a kind person, we're going to get along just fine. I don't spend a lot of time thinking about my friend's sexual orientations because frankly, it doesn't matter to me who they choose to sleep with and who they want to spend their lives with. I don't care who my friends pray to, or if they choose not to pray at all. And I don't mean that to sound crass or dismissive or uncaring - I know that for a lot of people, these things are integral parts of their identities and these things are important to them. What is important to me in human interaction is communication and respect and kindness. If those things are taken care of, the rest of it is just the sprinkles on top of the sundae.

But somehow, I still find myself totally hung up on my own physical appearance. I realize that this blog is probably coming off very vain and self-centered, but apparently, I have some issues to work out at the moment. I'm sorry about that. But at the same time, maybe somebody else is having issues, too, and my talking about it might be useful to them.

I'm tired of having to think about what I look like, and what my clothes say about me, and how I'm being judged as I walk down the street for...whatever. For my pants being too lose or too tight. For my tattoo showing or not. For my preference for dark colors. I'm tired of it. I'm so freaking tired of it.

Side note for all the geeks out there: I tried to type "freaking" just now, but what showed up on the screen was "fraking," which I almost kept.

I tried to buy clothing today. I went to a bunch of stores I never go to and I went to one store I always go to and by the time everything was said and done, I walked out with pieces I think might work but I'm not really crazy about and an overwhelming need to go have a cry. Wait, let me back up a minute.

I read this blog post last week and fell in love with the author just a little bit. I think it is partially because I read that post that when I had to shoot myself in a video for work, I didn't cringe at the footage and pick it apart in my head, saying I should have worn different jeans or styled my hair differently or anything. I actually looked at that footage and thought to myself, "Hey, I'm actually pretty cute." It was a strange moment for me, but one that I felt meant I was making progress. And today, in rehearsal, I was standing on a platform on the stage and the guy understudying the lead was standing on the floor and he came over and picked me up in a fireman's carry. And I let him. I didn't grunt or groan or struggle or shriek, I let him pick me up over his shoulder and set me down elsewhere. He didn't break a bone or pull a muscle or anything. He just picked me up and set me down. So I was feeling good about myself. Comfortable. Somewhere along the way, I also decided that I don't like using the word "fat" to describe myself because I am not fat. I am not a size two, but I am also not morbidly obese. So I want to stop using the word fat to describe myself, even if it's in the context of a comment that never leaves my own head.

But then I went shopping. I needed a bathing suit, and something fancy and white. Honestly, trying to find a white outfit was more depressing than finding a bathing suit. I went to five or six stores, stores aimed at teens and twenty-somethings, stores aimed at the whole family, stores aimed at 30+. And in every single store, I had to grab just about the largest size on the rack. In some cases, those sizes were still too small. The pieces that did fit were not designed with a curvy girl in mind - the hem landed in the least flattering spot, or the waistband bulged in the back, or whatever. These clothes were designed for women with a very specific set of measurements - measurements I'm pretty sure most women don't have. Hell, even some of the sales people would obviously not fit into the clothes they were selling. One woman greeted me and it occurred to me after the fact that if I was buying the extra large bathing suit bottom, she wouldn't even be able to shop in the store where she worked. This poor girl probably never gets to take advantage of her employee store discount because none of the clothes they carry allow women to be any larger than a size 8 or 10. How fucked up is that? Seriously.

Now, I'm not advocating obesity. I'm not saying people with potentially life threatening medical conditions shouldn't seek help. But it has also been shown that overweight does not always mean unhealthy. Often times, yes, it does. But not always. And even for the overweight people who are unhealthy - they have to be able to wear clothes, too, right? Wouldn't it be nice if they could wear clothes that were comfortable and flattering?

The kicker for me in all of this is that I am not fat. I am not unhealthy. I am not a size four. And I can barely find an outfit in an entire mall full of women's clothing stores that is comfortable and flattering.

I know the fashion industry is a multi-billion dollar industry that provides jobs for thousands of people and a creative artistic outlet for a select few. But I wish it was a non-issue. I wish physical appearance was a non-issue. It shouldn't matter if I'm wearing this season's jeans or last season's jeans, and to many people it doesn't, but there are still enough people out there to whom it does matter that one afternoon spent in a mall can completely destroy the self-esteem of a woman like me. A member of Mensa. A musician. A brilliant actress. A kind and loving friend, sister, and daughter. And I can't be the only one who feels this frustration. I can't be. Which would seem to indicate that the issue is not that there is something wrong with me or the way I look or how I am built, but that there is something wrong with the clothing designers and the general belief that women shouldn't have breasts and hips because they are too hard to design around. Fuck that. Breasts and hips are amazing. My badonkadonk ass is glorious and deserves a pair of trousers that do it justice.

Or, the simpler answer, is to make physical appearance a non-issue. I don't care what you look like, or what you're wearing, or whether you have "gym hair" today or what. Let's just agree that we're both human beings and see where the conversation goes from there, shall we?

Please?

March 4 - A Little Bit of a Rant

I went to the movies last night with a couple of friends, and I had decided long before I even got to the theater that I was going to buy some candy to eat during the film. Going to the movies is still sort of an indulgent experience for me. You spend more money than you want to spend to get lost in some fantasy world for a couple of hours, and you might as well have a snack while you're doing it, right? At the very least, a beverage so you can stay hydrated while watching the movie (despite the fact that almost all available beverages at the movie theater are known to dehydrate people, but whatever. You know what I mean).

So my friends and I had a beverage or two in the bar before going into the theater, and I stopped at the concession stand on the way in, looking for Dots - those little gumdrop thingies - because in all honesty, I miss gummy candies. I don't eat gelatin, and most gummy stuff contains gelatin, so I miss it because I used to love the squishy sort of texture. Dots do not contain gelatin, so they are my go-to for when I want something chewy. So I went to the concession stand and looked at the boxed candy and almost didn't see the Dots because they came only in a 2.25oz box. Something smaller than a box of cigarettes. I was looking for the 16-20oz box they usually have a the movie theater. The box big enough to share with your friends. The box big enough to put you into a sugar coma and make you feel ill. The box big enough to make sure every single tooth in your mouth gets covered in gummy goodness that you have to use your tongue to peel off throughout the film and halfway home afterward. I almost missed the 2.25oz single-serving box - the box smaller in size than what you find at your local drug or variety store - hidden between the Twizzlers and the chocolate covered peanuts. But I found it, and bought it - two dollars.

Now, I realize that in general, candy sizes have gotten smaller to save movie theaters money and to discourage people from overeating. Like that whole outlawing of super sized soft drinks thing in New York City - people figure if only smaller portions are available, people will consume less. This may be a valid point - since I only had one serving of Dots to eat, I only ate one serving, as opposed to the two or three I would likely have eaten if the larger box had been available.

But at the same time, I was incensed that my movie candy was now only available in mini. What if I want to indulge at the theater? What if I want to gorge myself on sugar and get really hyper? What if, god forbid, I wanted to share with my friends? This tiny candy portion discourages sharing, unless you and your group are each okay with eating two Dots. Who wants to eat just two Dots? Yes, I know I could have purchased more than one box, but that then falls into the shame spiral - an effective method to keep people from overeating. And at a movie theater that still offers a 32oz soft drink and a vat of popcorn the size of a six-year-old's head, it seems a little odd to shrink the size of the candy boxes so drastically. If we're trying to prevent people from consuming so much sugar, shouldn't a 12oz or even a 20oz soda be the limit? It's like drinking a diet soda while eating ten glazed donuts - why cut back on one but not the other?

I realize that this totally falls under the heading of First World Problems. There are millions out there who don't have enough to eat in the first place, so the thought of getting a candy treat now and again is completely foreign and something they maybe dream of. Complaining that there isn't enough candy to eat themselves into a diabetic coma is the last thing on their minds. I know I have no right to complain. It just struck me as odd and cheap and a really strange marker of these changing times in which we live.

Now, if movie theaters wanted to start serving hummus and veggies in an effort to make things healthier, I'd be all over that. Until then, allow me my sugar coma. Please?

February 25 - Kitty's Rants: Lint

Someone who lives in my building put notes on the dryers in the laundry room saying, "Please be courteous and kindly remove your own lint after the dryer cycle." These signs have been there for a while now, but they still make me giggle. And here's why.

It's lint. Someone is completely grossed out by the thought of touching someone else's lint. Which is ludicrous to me. And here's why.

It's lint! It's fucking lint! It is little tidbits of someone else's clothing that came off in the dryer and stuck to the screen in the dryer. It is fabric. You are grossed out by fabric. Now, there are those who would say, "But it's bits of someone else's underwear - I don't know where it has been!" Yes you do! It was just in the washing machine! Being cleaned! With likely the same detergent you use on your own clothing which you trust to wash your own underwear! If this detergent is good enough to clean your clothes after, say, someone else has borrowed them, why is it not good enough to clean someone else's underwear to the point where the lint in the dryer is not gross? I could see being grossed out by the lint in the washing machine - that has all sorts of dirt and whatnot in it. But by the time clothing gets to the dryer, it is clean! Therefore, the lint coming off of it is clean. So what's the big deal about cleaning someone else's lint off if the dryer screen?

I know dryer screens need to be cleaned between loads to help prevent the dryers from combusting. I don't need a sign reminding me to be both courteous AND polite by cleaning up after myself. And if the person who used the dryer before me didn't clean it, I do not think them discourteous or impolite. I think they had other things to do with their day besides clean a lint filter.

Thank you. Join us next week for another exciting episode of Kitty's Rants.