Never Walked In High Heels

Being an individualist is not terribly popular these days. There’s a lot of talk about what someone can do for society, how to help the faceless “others” who are less fortunate than you or even how to help charities of this nature by making a tax deductible donation to X. Theses are all good actions worthy of some (albeit often minimal) praise on some level. But even with the best of efforts to move towards utopia, something insidious almost always creeps in, and here is no exception.

Perhaps I simply see this because I am an American living in London. But recently it seems as though there is more attention given to the ‘toiling masses’ rather than the individuals who are either in need of help or those who can help. The power and the preciousness of the single human being has been replaced by concern for a faceless mass who seems to always be in need of help and never getting any. Charity has become an impersonal act of the bank account rather than requiring eye contact.

But the ‘faceless mass’ way of thinking has done more damage than simply disguising taxes as alms. We have forgotten that each of use are created and not generated. This fact has little to do with any sort of deity and more to do with just how many fingerprints and events it takes to form a constantly evolving person. Our current popular views on biology and society, taken to the next logical step, teach not only that life is random but also that each of us are not particularly unique. If we are nothing more than cells and labels, existing for eighty years or so, then the value our impact for the history of man is small, we can do little to change the world, and there is a vast amount of feebleness in any of our actions. Often when I talk to people is seems as if they refuse to hold their own sprit, the part of them which has yet to be defined by any scientist, dearly. The willingness to compromise to things which insult the soul for the security of feeling others standing beside us is rampant within ourselves.

If we stop recognizing the value of the individual and his unique spirit, we cease to acknowledge the most powerful natural resource in existence. It is not enough to try and help in order to ‘do good’ in the world, like everything else ‘doing good’ can quickly become yet another form of legalism. But when you look the individual, be he servant or the one in need, you begin to value that person until it is impossible to generalize a person back into a faceless mob. Looking at a person means understanding them, their conditions, and valuing him for it, rather than expecting him to relate in predetermined way which ultimately casts him back into obscurity.

Less and less people want to live forever. This is not to say they don’t want to die, they just want to go on surviving as a biological entity rather than being themselves to the greatest of their ability. A group of such people no doubt make a homogeneous mass which is easy to define and then dismiss. It is the unique individual who understands that he is fearfully and wonderfully made which makes the conditions of society better; it has never been the other way around. Most people who cannot acknowledge their own value, simply as people who will never again exist are content to live simply at the status quo. If you look at every civil rights movement in history and think of where it would be without the individuals associated with leading it, it doesn’t take long to see the value of the human spirit who sees people living rather than a group surviving.

Each person has value because man is an end unto himself. He needs to be nothing but himself to the best of his ability. Even if you don’t believe a part of you lives on forever, your own individual uniqueness acts as a form of accountability simply because you will never exist again. In some way, a person by being himself has value because he is one, and with that single man, he can only reach people by seeing what each person is.

There are few stories told today about women. An inspirational story has to have someone such as Sandra Bullock in it in order to sell, and even then there is something about these female characters which seem either glossy or angular; a rough mock up of what a woman might possibly look like. Recently, I’ve been looking for a fictional female character that I wanted to emulate. This meant finding a woman who was strong in the face of adventure and gentle in the eyes of loved ones. This is how I rediscovered Mrs. Kay Miniver.

Mrs. Miniver was a film produced in 1942 and follows one woman’s adventures during the opening of the Second World War. What would no doubt be looked down upon as being “a common housewife” by many today, provides the heroine ample opportunity for courage, grace, grief, and even humor within an ordinary backdrop which produces a most extraordinary life. Between the open communication she shared with her husband to her fierceness in finding the joys in life even in difficult times, we watch a rare sight in the unfolding of this movie. We see a woman in the fullest sense of the word.

We are bombarded by images of two types of women today. Surprisingly, I’m not talking about the vixens and the angels, which you’ll hear feminist academics drive on about at intellectual conferences. Rather, I see the two poles of femininity today as being victimized or being controlling. She must either have no strength left within her that she must depend on someone else to be happy, or, she must be steely and cold, demanding that someone else make her happy. Neither makes for a particularly stable or happy individual.

Today I think we see the controlling woman as the standard rather than the other. A woman must have her life put together and have a goal beyond her family which, she will, come hell or high water, succeed with. I’m a career woman myself and I’m not saying that a housewife is somehow superior. But the grace of a woman, I think, comes from fully facing the challenges which are in front of her… all of them. What makes Mrs. Miniver so special is that she can be facing a German gunman in one moment, and overjoyed at the return of her husband the next. For her, there is no point in fantasizing how life ought to be, when there is so much to discover within how life is.

In the movie, there are no sex scenes or cleavage shown, nor is there any room for a damsel in distress fainting at the most climatic moment. In this way, Kay Miniver’s story is remarkably modern. Oddly enough, I think hers is a life which most women have in front of them, were we not so preoccupied with fairytale endings and Hollywood love scenes. What we learn from Mrs. Miniver is that it is not in making things how they ought to appear which leads to a life of beauty, but in accepting things as they are. Or in the words of another admirer of Kay Miniver, “: What goes to make a rose, ma’am, is breeding… and budding… and horse-manure, if you’ll pardon the expression. And that’s where you come in…”

“Going out with you is like going out with the crazy girl,” my friend says on the other end of the line. “No I’m not. I’ve always considered myself more of the girl-next-door type,” I replied. I can’t help but laugh. I had just rescued my chair from a building in the center of London. While attending a class in the basement, the lift had decided that it would be an opportune time to break, trapping me and my wheelchair downstairs. I am fortunate enough to be able to walk up the stairs, but my 400 pound electric wheelchair had to be left overnight. The next morning I received a phone call saying that the lift would be broken for at least three more weeks as new parts had to be ordered. My wheelchair was still stuck within the basement.

Seeing that I needed it to get around London, I immediately called two of my guy friends who are able between them to get the wheelchair out through a secret passageway (I kid you not!) in the building. Apparently, this passageway, kept behind locked doors, was formerly used as a shooting range for the British militia. So through the super-secret, hidden, locked, forbidden passageway the three of us climbed after my wheelchair was taken up three small steps in order to enter. We even had flashlights in tow to make it more dramatic.

To say that trouble follows me is an understatement. Don’t get me wrong, it’s rarely anything I do. But between the collapsing toilets, the broken elevators, and a plethora of dead batteries at very inconvenient times, I am beginning to be known amongst my guy friends as Calamity Jane, someone who is always a damsel in distress. They answer the phone and immediately wonder what sort of sticky situation I have now gotten myself into. The thing is, it’s nothing to do with me. Really, it isn’t. I live as normal of a life as you can imagine. I go up and down stairs using elevators. I accomplish precisely what any able-bodied person does. And it’s not as if I’m trying to scale the walls of Big Ben or create some other mischief. Believe it or not I’ve come to the conclusion that things of this world are not particularly ready for someone in a wheelchair to conquer.

None of my friends realize until I tell them that we live in a world in which disabled people are not expected to go out much. At work they estimate that as much as 75% of disabled people go out of their homes once a week or less. This is the city in which public transportation can be a nightmare for anyone who doesn’t travel on two feet. Services such as Shop Mobility and Dial-A-Ride which as supposed to help individuals with physical disabilities to get around put a strict limit of using their services 6 times a month per person. For me and my career, I’m lucky if I don’t need to go to 6 different places a day. Such restrictions not only prove the point that disabled people are not mobile, it reinforces it, thus creating a cycle that London has yet to break out of. Unless you’re me, and then you run the risk of being trapped in the basement of a building whose lift has just gone out.

I once had a wheelchair vendor come to my house for a yearly tune-up. He was able to plug a computer into my electric chair and get a reading of exactly how far I had traveled in it within the past year and a half. When he saw the mileage, he dropped his computer. “You ride your wheelchair hard. It wasn’t meant to be used this much.” What does he expect? My life has taken me all over the city and actually all over the world. When I buy a wheelchair I expect it to keep up with my way of living, not the other way around.

I am often told by my friends that people still stare at me when we go out together. This actually is news to me as I usually don’t notice. But the fact that seeing someone out in a wheelchair still is a reason for stares, shocks most of my friends as much as it does the other party in seeing me.

I’m not Calamity Jane. I’ve always actually considered myself a girl-next-door type. But the fact that when my number pops up on the phones of my guy friends, they begin to itch, wondering what adventure will come next. And in this way, maybe my friend is right. I guess every neighborhood has one and I’m it. I am the crazy girl-next-door.

              When my roommate brought home a new fling, I didn’t pay much attention. In our house, boys come and go, and while most of them are friendly they all have their faults. So, we’ve learned not to get too attached, not to invest too much, and not to become too annoyed by the fault that one can see plain as day even when the other cannot. But this particular one got unexpectedly on my bad side so fast that he managed to permanently smear himself to my disfavor.

              It started when I was stupid enough to walk across the floor of our new flat barefoot and I received a splinter from an ill cared for floor. This unleashed a general barrage of comments about my landlord not taking care of the place and not being responsible for his investment. I was having various amounts of trouble with the property owner that week and the splinter just sealed the deal.

              “But Athena, you shouldn’t hold people responsible to their actions like that. People just do stuff, it doesn’t mean anything,” he said, reclining on the couch and lazily fondling my roommate’s hand. OK, I instantly went from having on opinion about the guy to utter disgust all in a matter of four seconds. This was an impressive record. My somewhat embarrassed roommate asked him to clarify what he meant, which he gladly did, by repeating himself. I looked to my roommate in utter disbelief, ready to punch the guy in the face, before I realized that he would dismiss the action as being “just stuff.” What was the point?

              I couldn’t imagine having a relationship with a guy who, when asked to take responsibility for his actions, refuses to due so. More to the point, I can’t imagine having sex with someone who behaved in this manner either.

              The link between sex and responsibility is an issue that makes modern audiences very nervous. In an age of birth control and condoms we’d like to think that we’ve removed any responsibility from having sex. And we’ve gotten rid of the big ones to be sure, but sex is something which profoundly affects every facet of life including economics and politics.

              For a woman to have a partner who refuses to take responsibility for himself and his actions is like a throw back to the days before feminism.  Its saying that she doesn’t deserve someone who is honest with her or respects her. If he can’t be held accountable for his actions, what will stop him from  becoming abusive or cheating on his partner? Why should his girlfriend have any value to him, if he doesn’t value his own actions. 

              Like so many of society’s problems, this commentary is meaningless without making it concrete. Most women will say “I would never go out with anyone who would say that!” Fair enough, but would you get involved with someone who subconsciously believed it? How many times do you tell yourself excuses for your significant other. Or are left trying to explain the unexplainable to friends when your partner does something stupid?

              But then let’s add sex to the mix. It goes without saying that this sort of attitude carries huge risks for my friend in terms of STDs. But the ramifications become much more distressing than that. If a man refuses to take responsibility for his actions, then sex is meaningless to him in every sense of the word. It is not an act of adoration, commitment, or even enjoyment. If “people just do stuff” then the intention cannot exist, even if the intention was/is hedonism. Sex is “just stuff” and as mundane as doing your laundry or emptying your pockets. When even the most exciting things become mundane  there is no longer passion or even a sense of life.

              Suffice it to say, the beau didn’t last too long after that. I think my roommate figured out they didn’t have that much in common. It was the first one in a while that I had learned anything from, so this boy had more sticking power than most in my mind. And for that I tip my hat to him…not that I expect that to mean much to him. After all, people “just do stuff.” 

I’m guessing its rare for most people to have a complete stranger come up to them and be informed that their old home was the perfect spot for skinny dipping. Add to that situation that I was at a wedding when I was informed of this fact and you may get some clue of just how bizarre my life actually is. But maybe I should back up a little bit.

My last year of college I lived on Lake Norman, foreshadowing my obsession with living on water in subsequent years.  We were surrounded by docks and walkways which made for amazing spring evenings and nighttime strolls spent battling bug bites. It was from the back porch that I wrote my thesis and various plays which were desperate to be born. And it was just the beginning of November when my friend Cristi and I discovered that the dock which lead from the back door of my apartment to the middle of the lake not only looked creepy because all of it’s lights were burned out, but also made the perfect place for skinny dipping,

Now I figure if peer pressure can be blamed for kids taking on drug use or drinking alcohol, there must be somewhere in the book that says you can blame it for suddenly finding yourself swimming naked in a lake at midnight just four weeks before Christmas. Our terry cloth bathrobes left in a pile on the planked wood while each of the five of us girls did our best to slip silently into the cold autumn water without giving sign of the icy shock. Our still changing figures cast shadows in the night as we discovered curves and lines we never knew we had. A waist which was still hidden under baby fat last summer, breasts we still crossed our arms to hide, all the insecurities of a teenager were still held up in defense and eventually had to be stripped away through a combination of proximity to other people and water which was so cold, it was violent.

Many of us girls hit puberty at ten or twelve and we look like women long before we feel like it. By college the rest of the world expected me to act like a woman and I had no idea what that was. Refusing to look down when we got into the shower, we hid under t-shirts and basketball shorts or, on some evenings, under the dock in a huddle, as a man with dog walked by. Most people assume that for young women, body image issues stem from a lack of self esteem or a fear of being ugly. I don’t remember it like that. I think my issues came from immaturity. I looked like a woman. I had all the equipment. Problem was, I was still a nineteen year old kid who thought jumping in the lake after Thanksgiving totally naked was a great idea.

This summer I found myself walking around the quays in my part of London most days. The unusually beautiful weather this year meant that I could walk around in a sundress and pretty sandals rather than pulling on some awkward combination of sensible but comfy outfit. Going along the quay one afternoon I noticed that I sat a little taller and greeted the men in the boatyard more confidently all the way around. I felt the breeze in between my thighs, a strong energy sliding down my spine and radiating through my hips. I suddenly wanted a pair of hands around my waist and someone who was as confident as I was to talk with.

Within five minutes I had met a man fishing off the dock and he and I were digging for worms. My sandals had been kicked off and I was eyeing his cooler full of orange soda. So much for being a woman.

At the wedding this weekend I looked from the stranger, who, at some point in time had jumped naked off my back dock, to Cristi in her white dress and veil. It may have been her day but I still needed an explanation.

“I don’t know. You must’ve been at an audition or something. Heck if I know, I did it all the time without you.”

“Cristi, I can’t have random people jumping naked off my dock. Do you know how much trouble-“

“Oh grow up,” said the new wife.

Girls don’t grow up in a consistent and straight line. Somewhere between the age we feel like, the age we actually are, and the age the world expects us to act, there is us, afraid to look down and see that our bodies seem much more confident than we are in them. And there are always women’s voices coming from the shadows of the banks. Strong voices of sensual women promise all the treasures and secrets of being a women. Many girls instantly jump in, desperately trying to grow up way too fast and taste the mysteries which tempt men and women alike. Others hide under the dock, afraid to let go into unknown waters. They do not know if they can swim or survive.

More often than not there are young women who jumped in naked just to be silly, only to realize later that nobody had a map of the lake. We get dangerously close to the sirens at times and then we flee to take refuge underneath the dock. There are entire days spent back and forth, restless and trapped in one’s foolishly mature body.

And there are days when we get closer to the bank than we can ever remember. And actually, we are quite comfortable just listening; we all know we are going grow up someday, but none of us know how to pass through the deep waters directly.

Up until last summer, I prided myself on never having seen an episode of Sex in the City in my life. But, within the course of a month, I have seen all six seasons and the movie. I blame a combination of my roommate and the inevitable procrastination that comes from having a dissertation due at the end of the year. It’s probably more the fault of the latter. 

I would not want to be like any of the main characters in the show. The obsession with shoes and handbags is something I will never understand. Not walking much means that my shoes last forever, and I just don’t have time to change handbags everyday. I’m just not apt to go through men like water. I won’t let my daughters watch it until… well, ever actually.

But there is something about them that is very lovable. The bond between women who have lived life side by side is unbreakable. I know two young women who can only be described as the Midwestern Sweet Valley Twins. They always have handbags which match their shoes. If I’m in my more opinionated mood, I can’t stand them. But they are always ready to talk to me. They are bright and kind, chattering on and on about everything imaginable while braiding my hair. Hearing their secrets lifts the weight of mine. And whenever I am with them, I feel about as normal as anyone else.

We all want friends like that, people who remind us that we aren’t the only ones going through this madness. Friends make us feel like we can be spontaneous, and girlfriends make us feel like we are all worth while. The brilliance of Sex and the City was that, by watching the friendship of those four women, we became their friends, too. In hearing about problems and ideas, which we thought were only ours, we cannot help but be drawn in. And after a bit, one can’t wait to see what comes in the next episode, just to make sure we’re all ok.