Eccentric Flower:199806/if you met columbine
From Eccentric Flower
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twenty-four june ninety eight three p m if you met columbine I wrote to someone today describing some aspects of Columbine. Here's what I said. I apologize a fair amount and self-denigrate constantly. Sometimes I don't mean it, but I was taught to do it as a social grace. I have great respect for my own capabilities but I'd never admit that except to very close friends. To me hubris is a male characteristic, and one of the ones which I don't care for. I try to never boast. Also, men are skittish about female achievement - it makes them nervous. So it's best to be polite and humble ... and then make your way up the ladder anyway! I try to be calm, collected, and demure, but it doesn't always work because of my personality and twisted sense of humor. I prefer long skirts, long hair, very little makeup, and a small amount of perfume, usually something citrusy - I don't like musks or animal scents. I am likely to agree to do what the other person wants, since aggressiveness is unfeminine to me. But since I'm also very strong-minded, I'm likely to steer them so they want what I want, or to quietly arrange things the way I want when they're not looking. Even when I disagree, it's likely to be a persuasive argument rather than an arms-crossed standoff - how male. Or, once in a great while, I'll pout - if I know that's the most effective way to reach that person. Old men don't stare at me on the subway because I'm too tall and skinny. They prefer the more well-curved ones. So do I, but my metabolism won't permit. High-fashion types love me because I'm too tall and too thin. I hate the high-fashion types; they're responsible for the idea of ideal women as skinny boys with plums in their shirt pockets. I find that I have to defend myself sometimes; other women think that because I have the tall skinny phenotype, I'm endorsing that ideal. I'm not. Any standard of beauty which excludes eighty percent of the women in the country is a flawed one. I do not get patronized by professional men more than once, because I have an acid tongue and a sharp temper that I'm not especially proud of. Walking the fine line between pliable princess and stubborn shrew is difficult. Sexually, when flirting or such, I'd rather go toward the first extreme - I like being ultra-femme when courting. But at work, I am not afraid to let the shrew come out and scare the snot out of them. And if it's someplace I go for goods and services - like a bank - I will simply take my business elsewhere if provoked enough, and I make them aware of this. I like being stared at when I want to be stared at, and I don't when I don't. I can go from sub to dom at a moment's notice - if you meet my standards for manners, sir, and seem to behave yourself, then I will happily be pliable for you and fawn over you and so forth. If I don't think you will play by my rules, though, watch how fast I can bring out the bullwhip. My voice climbs at the end of sentences when I'm excited and drops at the end when I'm not. You decide if Columbine is someone you'd like if you met her in person. © columbine |
