Of damsels and distress
I'm going to get in trouble for this, but all women are damsels in distress. We've all got something we can't handle on our own. We've all got things we can't do without assistance. We all need a white knight to save us at some point. It's not big things all the time. My distresses are mostly to do with high shelves and spiders. Or at least those are the ones that happen day to day.
Our first white knight is usually our daddy. Sometimes it's mom, but for me it was always if there's a problem dad will fix it. As we grow older then the knight role shifts to mom for emotions and the T.M.I. about our bodies that nobody wants to read about. Then there's that dreamy guy on the football team, then the musician who looks like 50s Elvis in the leather jacket, then the geek who thinks it's cool we like Star Trek. They drive us around in there car. They open doors. They takes us to dinner and a movie. They make the mean girls jealous.
Then there's the most important thing we want them to do. We want them there to save us from some part of ourselves we can't face on our own. That's right. They save us from some part of ourselves. Problem is they're men (in my case - I know there are those that prefer women in shining armor, but I gotta go with what I know). Men only see the surface distress. They only see us struggling to get the Special K off the top shelf. They only see us standing on a chair screaming "Thomas! Thomas! There's that mouse again!"*
Now there are levels of self doubt that range from the pouting to full on heatbreak. When it's a box on a shelf or a spider coming along and sitting right down beside us, eventually we can get ourselves up to the challenge. We doubt our choices in jobs, cars, places to live, school, kids, everything. Sometimes though it involves our special Lancemealot and that is the worst kind. It gets in our heart and roots around in there looking for the most tender spots, replaying every single time mom told us to be careful or we'll get fat and no one will ever love us. The other dragons we can control, but when it comes to whether or not we should order the crazy cat lady starter pack, it gets bad. We can't control it and we need that white knight and he, being a man, can't understand what the big deal is.
They can't see us doubting ourselves. They don't see that once they make us feel special they need to keep making us feel special or make us doubt we were ever really special at all. That self doubt is the biggest dragon of them all and unfortunately it's only visible to the damsel and not the knight until it's too late. It's a stealthy fucker that will eat your white knight before he gets his loins girded.
The reactions have different levels to from "I think you take me for granted" to "I hate you! I hate you! You pig!"** Most of the former take place after you're used to knights missing the point. The latter take place mostly (god willing) in teens and twenties when EVERYTHING is srs bizniz.
Now I know how to get by without a white knight. I don't even want one around leaving his dirty socks on the floor and the toilet seat up on a daily basis. I'm good on my own. Women are strong and powerful and they can bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan without any help from Charlie or taking time to make anyone feel like a man.*** They're nice to have though even when they leave dirty socks on the floor. They're warm and they're cuddly and they have the power to turn frowns upside down when our egos need a stroke. They can make us feel like we're special when the world drags us down.
It feels good to be special. It's addicting. It's powerful. It's vulnerable and let's that doubt dragon off the chain when the white knight is playing XBox instead of asking how was your day and do I smell bacon? The doubt creeps in and we start wondering if he ever really wanted to save us in the first place. We start thinking we were just another mission of daring to add to his legend. We start wondering how many other damsels jumped on the back of that steed and said let's ride, cowboy. We wonder if that playlist is on several other damsel's iPod because it works every time. We believe we were too easy or not easy enough. We analyze. We cry to our other damsels and ask if our bacon is too crisp or not crispy enough.****
Sometimes I think I'm the dragon. That's a dangerous prospect with white knights running around. Caring is like handing the knight Excalibur and drawing a target on my heart. Maybe that's all our problem. Maybe the dragon doesn't eat the knight but we give him the tools to gut us then wonder why he did it. When I started this little treatise into being vulnerable it didn't occur to me that maybe we're the architect of our own destruction, but if you think about it it makes sense.
That said, we can't stop flying around handing out swords. We can't stop caring. We can't stop being vulnerable. We just need to pick our white knights more carefully. I'm also thinking I need, personally, to stop being so hard on the knights who have failed me and more importantly stop being so hard on myself. The knights didn't fail. They hit the mark I painted for them. I need to figure out how to keep my dragon in check so I don't get slain anymore while still not hiding in my cave all the time.
Also I need breakfast. All this bacon talk....
*If you didn't watch Tom & Jerry as a kid, you should sue your parents for neglect
**If you haven't seen Soapdish, you're neglecting yourself
***A commercial! Geez you kids need to learn your 70s and 80s pop culture
****No, I didn't eat breakfast. Why do you ask?
Our first white knight is usually our daddy. Sometimes it's mom, but for me it was always if there's a problem dad will fix it. As we grow older then the knight role shifts to mom for emotions and the T.M.I. about our bodies that nobody wants to read about. Then there's that dreamy guy on the football team, then the musician who looks like 50s Elvis in the leather jacket, then the geek who thinks it's cool we like Star Trek. They drive us around in there car. They open doors. They takes us to dinner and a movie. They make the mean girls jealous.
Then there's the most important thing we want them to do. We want them there to save us from some part of ourselves we can't face on our own. That's right. They save us from some part of ourselves. Problem is they're men (in my case - I know there are those that prefer women in shining armor, but I gotta go with what I know). Men only see the surface distress. They only see us struggling to get the Special K off the top shelf. They only see us standing on a chair screaming "Thomas! Thomas! There's that mouse again!"*
Now there are levels of self doubt that range from the pouting to full on heatbreak. When it's a box on a shelf or a spider coming along and sitting right down beside us, eventually we can get ourselves up to the challenge. We doubt our choices in jobs, cars, places to live, school, kids, everything. Sometimes though it involves our special Lancemealot and that is the worst kind. It gets in our heart and roots around in there looking for the most tender spots, replaying every single time mom told us to be careful or we'll get fat and no one will ever love us. The other dragons we can control, but when it comes to whether or not we should order the crazy cat lady starter pack, it gets bad. We can't control it and we need that white knight and he, being a man, can't understand what the big deal is.
They can't see us doubting ourselves. They don't see that once they make us feel special they need to keep making us feel special or make us doubt we were ever really special at all. That self doubt is the biggest dragon of them all and unfortunately it's only visible to the damsel and not the knight until it's too late. It's a stealthy fucker that will eat your white knight before he gets his loins girded.
The reactions have different levels to from "I think you take me for granted" to "I hate you! I hate you! You pig!"** Most of the former take place after you're used to knights missing the point. The latter take place mostly (god willing) in teens and twenties when EVERYTHING is srs bizniz.
Now I know how to get by without a white knight. I don't even want one around leaving his dirty socks on the floor and the toilet seat up on a daily basis. I'm good on my own. Women are strong and powerful and they can bring home the bacon and fry it up in the pan without any help from Charlie or taking time to make anyone feel like a man.*** They're nice to have though even when they leave dirty socks on the floor. They're warm and they're cuddly and they have the power to turn frowns upside down when our egos need a stroke. They can make us feel like we're special when the world drags us down.
It feels good to be special. It's addicting. It's powerful. It's vulnerable and let's that doubt dragon off the chain when the white knight is playing XBox instead of asking how was your day and do I smell bacon? The doubt creeps in and we start wondering if he ever really wanted to save us in the first place. We start thinking we were just another mission of daring to add to his legend. We start wondering how many other damsels jumped on the back of that steed and said let's ride, cowboy. We wonder if that playlist is on several other damsel's iPod because it works every time. We believe we were too easy or not easy enough. We analyze. We cry to our other damsels and ask if our bacon is too crisp or not crispy enough.****
Sometimes I think I'm the dragon. That's a dangerous prospect with white knights running around. Caring is like handing the knight Excalibur and drawing a target on my heart. Maybe that's all our problem. Maybe the dragon doesn't eat the knight but we give him the tools to gut us then wonder why he did it. When I started this little treatise into being vulnerable it didn't occur to me that maybe we're the architect of our own destruction, but if you think about it it makes sense.
That said, we can't stop flying around handing out swords. We can't stop caring. We can't stop being vulnerable. We just need to pick our white knights more carefully. I'm also thinking I need, personally, to stop being so hard on the knights who have failed me and more importantly stop being so hard on myself. The knights didn't fail. They hit the mark I painted for them. I need to figure out how to keep my dragon in check so I don't get slain anymore while still not hiding in my cave all the time.
Also I need breakfast. All this bacon talk....
*If you didn't watch Tom & Jerry as a kid, you should sue your parents for neglect
**If you haven't seen Soapdish, you're neglecting yourself
***A commercial! Geez you kids need to learn your 70s and 80s pop culture
****No, I didn't eat breakfast. Why do you ask?