Confessions of a Hot Chick

I’m saying it for the first time, but probably not the last: I am a compliant pawn of the Patriarchy. I cave to it’s wacky-ass pornographic beauty standards. I have my reasons.

Nevermind my brains, my skills, my work ethic or character: My face and body have brought me to where I am today. I was hired by red-blooded straight men in a relentlessly masculine, military engineering environment. My male supervisors are fine human beings; still, when I don’t dress up or wear makeup, they wring their hands and nervously ask me if I’m feeling okay, because “looks hot at all times” is written in invisible ink on the back of my job description. Although I am now middle aged I’m still one of the Office Hot Chicks and a reluctant Office Wife. Someday, after my training, night school, and several years of hard work I’ll be tenured and indispensible enough to say “f*ck it.” That day is not today.

I have no one to blame but myself, but my hobbies and/or moonlighting activities also require conformance to patriarchal beauty standards: Professional bellydancing, occasional artist’s modeling, and sex with the men of my social class. The bottom line is that so long as my beauty affords me temporary access to male privelege (in the form of dates, jobs, interesting experiences, gifts and cash prizes), I will invest vast quantities of time, attention and money in my face and body. This despite the knowlege that my success in this endeavor inevitably harms and alienates me from my sister-women. Game Theory offers up an explanation for why I persist at it. To quote Robin, who posted at I Blame the Patriarchy:

“If the “prize’ is to have a relationship with a man which does not obligate us to conform to sexbot standards of beauty, the best possible outcome would be achieved by full cooperation amonst all women to get off the damn train of pleasing the male gaze. This way men would have to accede to the fact of real womanhood and not pressure us to conform to the porn standard. But if there are any “betrayers”, that is women who still contort themselves to the sexbot standard, then the non-conforming/contorting women will be more likely to “lose” since men will still see the sexbot as a standard for us to aspire to. The depressing thing is that in the Prisoner’s Dilemma, according to game theory, the safest bet is to betray rather than cooperate.”

Depressing, but so true. Guilty as charged.

I am an overachiever in general. Still, at some fundamental level, I am lazy. I choose the “fix it and forget it” appproach to beauty: Plastic surgery. Laser vein and hair removal. Botox and Restalyne. I take this approach because 1) I can afford it; and 2) constant attending to imperfections real and perceived bores me beyond belief. I have better things to do than futz with myself in front of my bathroom mirror. So, if laser treatments, breast-reduction or an eye-surgery mean I don’t need to wear makeup, combat bras or glasses, I’m jill-on-the-spot with VISA card in-hand. Sign me up.

As I approach my 40th birthday I’m certain much of this blog-space will be devoted to my quest: Desperately holding on to my arm-candy status until I can no longer afford, or pull-off, the charade. That I’ve devoted this blog to life’s pleasures hides the fact that I do, in fact, have more important things to worry about than my relection in the mirror; for the most part however, you’ll never read about them. I hope this doesn’t cause me to come off as a shallow twit.

I’ve already told my teenage daughter that the day I start looking like a caricature of my former self, she is to fish me out of the dating pool and force me into retirement. I only hope that when that day comes, I’ll be able to afford to retire!

Unfortunately, she’s too busy reading fashion magazines to pay attention.