Today we were rolling down the freeway on our way back from a very cool 5-year old's birthday party, when I noticed a biker riding in one of the lanes next to us. It was not your usual biker, she was decked out in pink, from her helmet to the pink and white detail on her iron horse. It was all girl... on a typically manly contraption.
Surprisingly, this bothered me. Hubs and I got in a discussion about it, and I discovered my feelings as I spoke. Now if there is anyone who is into breaking tradition or ignoring the rules of cultural practice, it's me. I can be very traditional, but on the other hand, I resent assumed expectations to the MAX. For the most part, the traditions I participate in are those I've researched, thought through very well and decide I fully agree and they are what I want. I do them because I believe in them. Almost nothing else has my total commitment.
So, a woman riding a motorcycle, what's wrong with that? Well, nothing really, and to be perfectly honest there's always been a small part of me that wanted a motorcycle. I love trying new things, adrenaline rushes and breaking free of the mold, proving stereotypes wrong, even taking risks and part of me has always been that way. My dad likes to tell me about the time I was 2 or 3 years old and chubby. I set out to conquer the tallest sand dunes I could find and slide down them... but then, I grew up, and I got pregnant.
Anyone who's gone through it knows that pregnancy changes your body and mind. These days I get my thrills listening to programs like "Science Friday" on NPR. One of my favorite shows they've aired talked about the changes that take place in the mother's brain beginning in pregnancy and ending about 6 months postpartum. I LOVED this because it confirmed my suspicions... the brain actually rearranges to become more maternal!! Woo Hoo... (So mamas - your NOT going crazy forgetting everything... AND baby really is borrowing some of those grey cells in your noggin. Actually you're not getting them back, thank goodness for EFA laden foods).
ANYWAY as I was saying... the brain changes. Of course one of the changes we all notice is mom becomes more emotional, more sensitive. This really bothered me at the time. Now I really needed people to take me seriously - and how were they going to if I was crying all the time?? Crying while watching 101 Dalmations?? REALLY?? (true story) NOW I believe that emotionally, physiologically, we kind of go back to an earlier state - our callus shell starts peeling off and we become more as we were like children again. And it makes sense - our children have no filter for the first years, and it gradually develops until around the age of 7 when they begin to develop a sense of identity and moral compass. We are their filter. Everything they see or hear passes through us first. We wouldn't be very good filters if we were so far removed from our child's feelings that we lost all sense of what they can handle - I say.
Well, I digress.
Someone might say: 'well that's cool she's riding a motorcycle because she's doing what she wants to do - something different from most women...' For many women this may work - there was a time it would've worked for me. Not anymore. When we deny or try to change our feminine nature, (in this case, my maternal instinct which says the best place for me to travel is in a vehicle with a seatbelt, top and sides) we are the ultimate oppressors of our sex. Let me say that again. When we try to be something we're not to fit in or for any other reason - we deny our feminine nature and devalue it. We become our own enemy. We lose peace. When we devalue the things that most women generally tend to value - things that aren't so "cool", like feelings and sensitivity for example. To be taken "seriously". To not be "soft" and "weak". Actually - I'm talking about the stereotypical view of masculinity - which I think is skewed as well... for despite popular belief - MEN HAVE FEELINGS TOO! All of them.
Okay, I admit it, it's true. I am becoming like the older ladies in the neighborhood that were "oh so nice and sweet", maybe seemed a bit daft and naive, weak, YES (NO! -shudder-) I am becoming them! But if I don't, who will be the standard for gentleness in the world? For virtue? My pride and need to appear strong are not worth the cost, and strength can look differently than we think it needs to. Beauty is strength. Gentleness is strength. It takes a LOT more strength and discipline for me to speak respectfully and think clearly than it does for me to just yell at my family when my emotions would like to take me for a ride. I don't always succeed... sometimes I succumb to this belief that aggression is strength and appropriate. But I fight it, every day because I believe in Charity, gentleness and LOVE and I believe that I will overcome.
"Mothers who know are nurturers. This is their special assignment and role under the plan of happiness. To nurture means to cultivate, care for, and make grow..."
~JULIE B. BECK "Mothers Who Know," , (October 7, 2007)
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