Feminine Joy

by Cylithria Dubois

Those of you who read my column regularly know I am a rough-and-tumble type of girl. I can handle weapons and hunt and fish and trap. I have been taught proper logging techniques, carpentry skills and even some electrical work. I can help demolish an interior wall in your home to help you remodel, if I'm asked. One might think from reading such a description that I'm a tomboy.

I've always considered myself a tomboy. Given a choice between shopping and fishing, I'd be quietly hunched on the shore of some body of water attempting to catch Moby Dick himself. You won't find me in any store in a shopping mall, that is for sure. When I am socializing in a group of men and women and the men walk off to look at someone's rebuilt car or new fishing boat, I've got my head shoved under the hood just like any other gear-head. You won't find me sitting with my female peers discussing the trials and tribulations of labor and childbirth.

I guess I don't embody many aspects of being a woman. I will not dye my hair blonde or add light streaks to it so I look like some form of land-living striped bass. You'd be hard pressed to get me into any knitting club or quilters' circle. Although I adore the items made by both knitters and quilters, I can't imagine myself comfortable in those circles. Hand me a hammer, buy me a power tool, let me come rip out your carpet and discover beautiful hardwood floors underneath just begging to be polished back to life--that's heaven to me.

Sometimes I do feel like a failure as a woman, simply because the more genteel things in life bore the living daylights out of me. I will take blood, sweat and tears over soft, lacy, and frilly any day. I don't know why that is, but it is me, in all my flawed glory.

A few weeks ago while out in public I was approached by an acquaintance I hadn't seen in quite a long time, someone whose bathroom I had once helped remodel. He spotted me in a bookstore and came over to say hi. As we stood there and talked and exchanged family updates, I noticed his eyes taking in my appearance. He wasn't checking me out in a manner that a man might if we had been in a dance club; he was simply seeing me as I was.

"You are such a girly girl, Cyl. I still can't believe it was you who demolished that wall in our bathroom," he suddenly blurted out.

I'd tell you about the rest of our conversation, but truthfully, after hearing those words, I lost the rest of our encounter in the fog of my shock.

Me, a "girly girl"? That could not possibly be true... could it? That observation sent me on a soul-searching expedition. It took me a while to step back from my own ideas about myself and look with objective eyes, but I tried.

Physically, I can understand why so many people automatically assume I am retiring, feminine creature. Standing less then five feet tall without heels, and weighing less then ninety pounds, my frame doesn't exactly scream "lumberjack." My hair is long and curly and I usually wear it down. My fingernails are always perfectly manicured and painted in bright colors. I wear delicate jewelry, nothing big, bold or flashy. I dress in jeans and blouses, or if it is called for, form-fitting dresses in longer lengths.

Okay, from the outside, maybe I am a bit girlish. Of course, my mind battled against this notion because I have always felt like a tomboy. Feeling conflicted over this tomboy versus girly-girl distinction, I began searching deeper inside myself to see which of the two best suited me. I spent a number of days doing some serious self-examination.

You know what I found? I really am a girly girl. At first the discovery was disturbing. For 38 years I have thought of myself as tomboy. For 38 years I always felt slightly less than the women around me because I wasn't as "fill-in-the-blank" as they were. Then I realized that in a lot of ways I am more girly girl then my female friends. I also realized that "femininity" means different things to different women. It was an amazing couple of weeks.

I share this with my readers because as the holidays approach, I hope each of you can take a few moments in each day and embrace that which makes you uniquely feminine. This time of year can run us ragged. As spouses, mates, daughters, sisters, mothers and aunts we can easily find ourselves falling into the trap of doing for others and not for ourselves.

Thanks to an acquaintance calling it like he saw it, I recently found a lot of joy in discovering and enjoying my own femininity. No matter what holidays you're celebrating this season, my wish for you is simple: May you each find and revel in the Feminine Joy that is uniquely yours. I truly believe we can all be "Joyful Girls."