We also talked in class…

We also talked in class about what we do to fit into society, to succeed in the workplace, dating, etc. What we're willing to do. I wear heels for the first month of teaching, so I look taller than my 5'0"; I feel like it helps with establishing classroom authority. I used to color the grey out of my hair. I have dieted.

My students largely claim they wouldn't have surgery to improve their looks to a societal beauty standard. My students are young (to me, at least). I wonder if they'd give the same answer a decade from now. I wonder if I'll be signing up for Botox in ten years, even though the thought sort of appalls me now. I am surgery-resistant, and mostly non-make-up-wearing, but I did have breast reduction surgery, and though the concomitant lack of back pain is awesome, the fact that way more clothes fit me now (than back when I was seriously top-heavy) is also a big benefit, I have to admit.

If I could wave a magic wand and change one thing, I would go back to my pre-teen self and give myself a more sporty mindset. I'd like to be the sort of person who exercises for fun, who just 'feels wrong' if she doesn't get in an hour or so of strenuous workout a day. It'd be a good counter to my mostly sedentary computer-based lifestyle. And yet. Does that desire make me part of the social-aesthetic-gendered problem?

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