Pre-Graduation Preoccupation

Below is a column that I wrote for The Courier-Tribune of Asheboro, North Carolina. It will run on the opinions page on Wednesday, June 3rd.

Commencement is a ceremony steeped in tradition. Graduates enter and exit to the march commonly known as “Pomp and Circumstance” that became de rigueur shortly after Yale University included it in the graduation proceedings of 1905. Graduates wear academic regalia that dates back to standards set by ancient universities. Graduates receive diplomas of a style reminiscent of days when they were hand-scribed on thinly stretched animal skin. Academic institutions go to great lengths to ensure that the integrity of commencement is not marred by any disruptive deviations from precedent. As a senior graduating with the Gray Stone Day School class of 2009, I learned to what extent some individuals wish to uphold precedent.
A less famed, but omnipresent, aspect of graduation convention is the dress code for attire worn beneath academicals. Most institutions require formal attire and many institutions issue gender-specific guidelines. According to standard procedure, men are expected to wear slacks and women are expected to wear skirts or dresses with hem lines not below that of the graduation robe. I suspect that not many people are aware of this distinction; I certainly was not until several weeks ago.
While it may seem a petty detail, consider the deeper implications of imposing such restrictions on females: in the history of social oppression, skirts and dresses are the compulsory garb of disenfranchised women; in terms of functionality, the only benefit of such a requirement is displaying a woman’s bare legs for the viewing pleasure of all attendees; and, in regards to logical progression, the next level of dress specifications would not unreasonably be to require that all Arabs wear red cords.
The issue of a female’s right to wear slacks when an occasion calls for formal attire has been a source of debate at Gray Stone for several years. When I first began attending the charter school in 2005, females were disallowed from wearing slacks to school dances. Along with a fellow sophomore, I approached the school administration and successfully saw the policy altered to allow students equal opportunity of attire. The conflict reemerged in the late summer of last year when I chose to wear a tuxedo rather than the traditional feminine drape in my senior portrait. Before I was able to leave, I was obliged to have my portrait taken in a drape for inclusion in the yearbook. Several meetings between my parents and Gray Stone’s chief administrative officer, Mrs. Helen Nance, and a school board meeting later, it was firmly decided that the picture of me in the tuxedo would not permitted in the annual. Disinclined to acquiesce to what I perceive as a groundless restriction, I opted to have no picture at all rather than the portrait in which I am wearing a drape (and, appropriately, looking miserable).
When I approached Mrs. Nance about allowing my female peers to wear pants to graduation, if such is their preference, she cited the need for conformity as an important factor in why we would not be able to do so. For what purpose, I ask? If men and women are as equal in society as we are led to believe, then why must the genders be distinguished by such base means as attire? If education is truly meant to prepare pupils for the future, then why would the ceremony celebrating the culmination of twelve years of diligent study adhere to such antiquated expectations?
Because I have faith in my peers, I put these questions to the student body. For three days I spent mornings, afternoons, lunch periods, and every other moment of spare time circulating a petition stating that female graduates should be permitted to wear formal slacks beneath their graduation robes. Over the course of those three days, I approached approximately ninety percent of Gray Stone’s students; over the course of those three days, I gathered the signatures of nearly eighty-five percent of the student body. Many of my classmates unaware that the policy even existed.
On May 11, my family and I drove to the campus of Pfeiffer University, where Gray Stone is located, to attend the monthly meeting of the school’s board of directors. My father and I addressed the board in support of allowing female graduates the option of wearing slacks and presented the petition with the echoing voices of my classmates. Though they did not make a decision while we were present, I learned the following morning that the board voted to allow women the right to wear pants this year while deferring the establishment of an official policy until a later meeting.
Over the course of this conflict, many well-meaning individuals encouraged me to “go with the flow;” they advised me wear a skirt and leave the battle for someone else. Their intentions were good, but good intentions do not guarantee sound conclusions. One cannot go through life perceiving but ignoring injustices and expect for the world to become any more just. One cannot assume that someone else who cares will come along, or even that anyone else will come along at all.
For me, there was no thrill in challenging the status quo. There was no desire to undermine the formality of graduation. There was not even pleasure in “stickin’ it to the man.” I prefer to wear slacks when an occasion calls for formal attire because I feel that such garb appears more professional; that I or any other woman would be denied that option simply because of gender is well worth confronting simply on the basis of equal opportunity. Hopefully, the board of directors will recognize this and solidify their equalization of the graduation dress code in official school policy.
With a nod to that future, I will march into graduation on June 5th to the drone of “Pomp and Circumstance.” I will don robes in the tradition of generations of scholars before me. I will receive a diploma adorned with commendations and calligraphy. I will observe all the formalities of commencement, but I will do so in pants.

Love yourself, because

This is a revised and expanded version of the thoughts inspired by Kirstyn M. Harmon, my dear friend and ally. If you would like to see where it all started, the thoughts of hers that ignited thoughts of mine and what I had to say in the beginning before the light was nearly as bright, read her blog "Real versus Fake." Also, thanks to Davis Goodnight for encouraging late night/early morning productive thought and Caroline Schmitt for putting the spark in my head. No less thanks to all you other wonderful, beautiful people that I know.

From the theological standpoint: God made man in his image, right? So altering your appearance in any way would be worse than "touching up" the Mona Lisa. Worse, because we're divine self-portraits. I'm not advocating such extreem measures as never cutting one's hair or fingernails, there's hygeine involved, but cosmetic proceedures such as liposuction and collagen injections should never be undertaken. Not only do they involve health risks, but they're unneccesary. You're beautiful the way you are, and this is why.

From a humanist view: It really depends on who you want to be. If you want to be just another Barbie or Ken with no feature to distinguish you from the next overdone, underfed Joe or Jane in line at the gasoline pump, then by all means skip that meal! buy that blush! work those abs! get that surgery! But if you want a face and figure that won't blur into the margins of any lineup of your peers, then embrace every inch of your natural self from your complexion to your thighs. If you have self-respect, others will see it and in turn respect you. You're beautiful the way you are, and this is why.

From a materialistic assessment: Coin collectors. You probably know at least one. Ask him or her if a flaw in the minting process doesn't make currency more valuable. Don't fanatics worldwide scamper to gain possession of the nickel with the buffalo that has only three legs? The penny with the double-impression of Lincoln's profile? Why, then, should you settle for some pillar of perfection that is so over-scaled that achieving its summit is virtually meaningless? Ask your collector whether a coin with indelible grime and grit is worth as much in mint condition. You know that answer already. Why, then, devaluate yourself with proceedures like permanent makeup and laser hair removal? You're beautiful the way you are, and this is why.

From a moralist's take: Each day we add 265,000 babies, lose 75,000 acres of rainforest, add 46,000 acres of desert, lose 71 million topns of topsoil, add 15 million tons of carbon, and lose about 70 species. Every three seconds a child dies of poverty. Every six seconds tobacco use causes someone's death. Every fifteen seconds a woman is beaten. Every thirty seconds someone is hit by a drunk driver. And you want to spend $3,500 on a forehead lift? $5,000 on an eyelid tuck? $10,000 on liposuction? I suppose that if you want to be the master of your own appearance in a world otherwise filled with chaos, then your priorities are perfectly in order, otherwise... You are beautiful the way you are, and this is why.

From an artistic angle: Look at the statue Venus di Milo. Michelangelo's David. Peci's Reclining Male Nude. Manet's Le Déjeuner sur l'herbe or Femme nue se coiffant. Any of the works of Vermeer. Of Lisa Yuskavage. Hell, look at most of the people you pass on the street! Are human beings not beautiful enough on their own, without plastic, ink, powder, and pills? The masters thought so. I think so. Don't you?

I love myself, and you, and everyone, for who we are without the makeup and pretense. Please try to do the same.

People are dirty

And they insist on dirtying this beautiful planet with their existence. Myself included. I wouldn't be at all offended is some superior extraterrestrial race did decide to swoop down upon this pitiful planet and annihilate our entire species in order to preserve what decent spans of nature remain, just like those people from that convention are convinced will happen any moment now. I think we deserve it.
Let me explain:
I went for a walk today. I carried a couple plastic grocery bags with me. I figured I'd pick up a little trach here and there and maybe gather some recyclables besides. That was my neat little plan. Well! People quickly got in the way of that, they and their nasty, dirty habits did. I returned after eighty minutes with four grocery bags overflowing with refuse: only one contained recyclable materials. And I only picked up along one side of the road.
Care to guess how many cigarette butts I picked up? Go on, guess. Frankly, I have no clue, and I have no intention of counting them. Rest assured that I probably have a representative from every major brand sold in the United States, not to mention an empty packet to match! I appreciate the sentiment of whoever tossed the half-smoked pack. I do not appreciate that of whoever tossed the ziplock bag with the used condom. Styrofoam cups. Plastic cups. Fast food bags. Coke cans. Beer cans. Beer bottles. Milk jugs. (Milk jugs?!?) Cigar wrappers. Gum wrappers. Candy wrappers. Ambiguous rubber tubes. The tops of those cute little "Doggy Do-do" bag sets- y'know, it's all well and good to clean up your animal's excrement, but get real: it's biodegradable, the plastic bags are not. I found five of these. Maybe more. Stopped counting.
Plastic water bottles. Do you know how much oil it takes to retrieve, refine, shape and ship those bottles? How much it takes to retrieve, purify, filter, ionize, florize and whatever else they feel the need to do to the water? To combine the two? To transport the workers who carry out the process? To transport the finished product to 'convenient' locations nationwide? Worldwide? Dump all but about three quarters of that water (it's probably just tap water at best, laced with carcinogens at worst). That's how much oil. Per bottle.
I was passed by cars, trucks, vans, buses, delivery vehicles, and a single motorcycle. All chugging along, burning fossile fuels, filling what would otherwise be clean, healthful air with ozone-depleting, foul-smelling, physically harmful fumes. Few slowed down. Several honked. Whether out of encouragement or derision I care not to know. A couple informed me that I have a 'nice ass.' At least none were so indecent as to throw any half-full slushies from the 7/11 at me. At least.
These are the creatures that think themselves greatest of all the beasts- man has brain! man can think! These are the ways in which they demonstrate their superiority. Forgive me if I point out the inconsistency that it isn't exactly, um, intelligent to destroy one's habitat. If we observed such behavior in any other species we would be appalled. Well, start worrying! The end is near! They are coming! But, in the mean time, I'm going to keep picking up your litter. And if you've any desire to retain the right to inhabit a planet as bountiful and diverse as this, you better start, too. Those people from the convention have some pretty compelling proof.

The hypochondriac

My nose is dry, my eyes are wet
When I run I break a sweat
My head is round, my feet are flat
I cannot scratch my middle back
It's tough to swallow before I chew
My teeth are white, my eyes are blue
My hair gets longer every week
People listen when I speak
I bend my knees when I take stairs
and also when I sit in chairs
I cannot look two ways at once
I get hungry when I skip lunch
My throat gets sore when'ere I shout
My belly button's inside-out
My feet won't fit in doll-sized shoes
When I don't win I tend to lose
I've got ten fingers AND ten toes
My lips grew in below my nose
My fingernails just won't stop growing
My epidermis won't stop showing
I get wet each time I shower
I'm getting older every hour
I cannot digest cellulose
or fix the planet's many woes
I cannot see in dark of night

Oh, tell me, doctor, will I die?
Is it mumps or worts or plague?
Lock jaw? Pink eye? Clubfoot? AIDS?
Strep throat? Cancer? Dengue fever?
Phobia of rabid beavers?
Is it hopeless? Can I be cured?
I want the truth; I am not scared.

You can't be right! You must be wrong!
I've been this way all along?
You say that my diagnosis is
merely that I, human, live?

this is relevant*

"Dark gray clouds hung low in the sky. It was good walking weather, and a relief to be free from the still steamy sidewalks of the city."
The coffee was bitter. The subway was late. This book was obviously trash. Not a good way to start a morning. Sharon Combes. Jack imagined her as low and lonely, probably with cats. But then again, that's how he imagined anyone he felt particularly sorry for. She'd obviously never been out of the city. He discarded the book, his coffee, and his sorrow beneath the bench. Perhaps someone would come along who needed them more than he.
7:08. Seven oh eight. Why was six afraid of seven? Because seven ate nine!
Had he fed the cat? Of course he had. Careless he was not. There are few people you can really count on. None actually, once you consider what they expect in return. Take take take. That's all they do. Even the cat has expectations. People are lousy.
"Fuck you," said the wall. "Beck loves Anna (but you're alone), Jesus loves you (but you're a sinner), Call 555-867-5482 for a GOOD time (but you don't have the time)". Jack didn't feel like listening. That's another problem with people. They never really listen. They nod and smile and make response- synthetic, all of it. Social sounds. More expectations. (Conform, will you?!)
And so everyone gets caught up in who can speak the loudest and longest and most precisely and raise the most capital and make the most profit and have the most connections and the nicest flat and brag, whine, noses to the grindstone work work work to make it big and finally be happy and tell everyone how happy they are but no one is really listening to a word that is said and everyone is drinking bitter coffee and smiling and-

7:09. Seven oh nine. The number 26. Jack gathered up his book and coffee and got on board.


*This inspired by an earlier work by an acquaintance titled "there was more to jack, but nothing worth discussing too much.."