Exhibit one:
Two years ago, I decided to join a local fitness center since my second-floor apartment in Plainfield wasn't conducive to aerobic exercise in the winter. During the intake interview, the staffer asked why I was joining. I explained the second-floor dilemma.
"But why are you choosing to exercise?" she asked. "Because you want to look better and fit into smaller clothes?"
Nope. I just wanted to feel good, that kind of good that comes from moving.
She kept insisting it was related to me wanting to be thinner and look better.
I finally told her, "Look, I'm not into self-loathing, if that's what you're looking for here."
Exhibit two:
Last year, I started going to a Joliet dental office a friend recommended. The dentist was indeed great. My only complaint: All of the staff seemed hung up on the fact that I wasn't interested in cosmetic procedures, to the point that they kept reiterating for the dentist and other involved staff members that I "wasn't opting for whitening," etc.
I love iced tea, but I don't have yellow, witchy teeth. And my teeth are straight enough that most dentists think I've had braces.
Exhibit three:
"The Body Project," by Joan Jacobs Brumberg, looks at New Year's resolutions in the diaries of teenage girls throughout the years. There's a definite shift. Years ago, girls resolved to be better people. Now, they resolve to be better by losing weight, getting braces, dying their hair, etc. "Girls today grow up believing that 'good looks' - rather than 'good works' - are the highest form of female perfection," Brumberg's Web site says.
The conclusion:
We're obsessed with keeping up appearances. It's infiltrated most facets of life, and environmentalism is one of them.
You might agree that pesticides and fertilizers are wreaking havoc on our waters and wildlife, but will you let your lawn look different than your neighbors' perfect velvety yards?
You might agree that antiperspirants have some questionable ingredients. But will you try natural alternatives or are you too scared that someone might find out that you, gasp, sometimes perspire?
Did that shirt that got a drop of bleach or a rip in it end up in the trash, because you didn't want to wear it even around the house in case someone stopped by and thought you were unfashionable?
Are you worried about how things will look or are you worried about what things will do?
If you want to be worried about appearances, look here, or here, or here.
Everything from natural wonders, waterways and mankind will be affected if we mess up this good thing we've got going with the earth.
So next time you make a decision, choose green ... even if it isn't pretty.
Are you just keeping up appearances?
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Julie Todd
Julie Todd is the night editor at The Herald News in Joliet. She and her
husband are looking to cut the chemicals and get back to basics -- minus the
granola and hemp clothing. They live in a home they bought last year in
Plainfield, where they're making changes to create their own little patch of
utopia.
Wow! In the gym scenario I would have walked out. You have to wonder if the facility promoted the attitude that you need to look better/get thinner to be there, or if it was simply the staffer's personal beliefs getting in the way. As for your dentist, I have no patience with that. You've said "No" to the whitening at least once, maybe twice, so why is it they have to mention it again and again? I realize the whitening service means more income for them, but it's almost an underhanded insult. It's as if they are actually saying that you need their services but won't use them. UGH! I realize that's not the point of this particular blog, but I get irritated when people do that to me.
I think part of the solution to this issue is that we have to come to terms with being who we are and not worried about how we are judged by others. We also have to understand that life is not perfect nor should we expect it to be. Clothes will get stained; colors will fade; skin will get blotched or freckled; wrinkles will happen; dishes will get broken; and the list goes on. We are a nation of consumers and our view on life is when anything isn't perfect we should replace it with something new and perfect.
My grandmother used to make quilts. She didn't do it as a hobby or to make a masterpiece for the bed, but rather she did it because her kids needed blankets and she had leftover fabric after making clothes and other household items. She didn't toss out the fabric scraps. The approach was waste nothing. In these tough economic times the waste nothing approach would serve us all well.
I can't help but think that if there was some way to quantify a person's green-ness and then publicy display the level of green-ness we would all compete to have the best community levels. Perhaps we need communty level thermometers on display that show the amount recycled by each community. Maybe water usage signs, signs showing the number of trees planted, pounds of clothing donated, most garage sales, and so on, would help. If we start making reduce, reuse, and recycle something we track and reward I bet we'd all get a lot better at it, immediately.
Julie, How right you are. We are not allowed to love ourselves as we are. For example, everywhere we look, including the Herald News website, are the obnoxious "skinny tummy" ads, featuring before and after photos of bellies. We're supposed to identify with the before "blobby belly" and feel ashamed. I stopped watching television years ago to avoid ads designed to make me (and my daughter) feel fat and ugly. Who needs it?
I just wanted to follow up on this. The VERY night I read this, I dropped a nail polish brush onto my light grey jersey knit shirt. The nail polish was brick red. No, I wasn't putting it on my nails, but I like to paint things and I was painting a bottle with nail polish. Anyway, I got spots in 3-6 areas on the shirt. Just before going to bed, I tried to remove the polish from my shirt with nail polish remover. That doesn't work so well on knit material. I considered doing more but then thought, "Why?" The spots are only noticeable if you really look for them. I know they are there but you might or might not. I washed the shirt as usual with the rest of the laundry and hung it back in my closet. I guess I don't care if you don't like my shirt. :)