Good primping vs bad primping

-BDM has covered the genius angle on the late Dolly Parton*. This frees me up to discuss, instead, the persona.

I started thinking about the way that one did not see, even in the sea of sanctimony that is Bluesky, any kind of analysis of Parton along the lines of sombrely expressing how sad it was that she felt she had to cater to a male gaze. Doubtless she, like everyone else, would have looked more Andrea Dworkin-ish (or a gentile variant thereof; Daisy from Keeping Up Appearances-ish; Rose meanwhile was I suddenly realized doubtless modeled on Parton, even with some country-western looks) had she let things fall where they may. But, famously (if less famously than Joan Rivers, but not so far off), she did not.

It’s not that I think there ought to have been that type of critique. Very much no! It just struck me that this is the sort of thing one normally finds, but here, no. Not merely in a don’t-speak-ill-of-the-dead sense but also in a she-was-divine one. Adored for her self-presentation (not only, but not not), not despite it.

Under other circumstances, the right-thinking tend to divide beautification between good and bad, along the following lines:

Good:

-For some kind of tangible professional goal. (I.e. actress playing a role.)

-For certain tangible sexual goals. (Sex work, conveying membership in a sexual subculture, identifying as a man-eater as versus a basic-bitch man dater)

-Ironic, tongue-in-cheek, intentionally campy. (Bimbo reclaimed if hetero, queer femme if not)

-Gender affirming in the case of transgender women or AMAB nonbinary people.

Bad:

-Conformist (sorority girls in some video)

-Born out of self-loathing (e.g. ‘I think I baseline look bad but then I put on lipstick and do my hair and it’s acceptable.’)

-Born out of self-admiration but the bad kind (e.g. ‘I do myself up and think I look nice’)

-Untheorized attempts at looking ‘better’ where the woman, cisgender and probably heterosexual, has failed to properly interrogate what ‘better’ even means.

These divides are not about such things as whether the specific beauty interventions are or are not within a woman’s budget, whether they are or are not posing undue risks to her health. It’s teams and signaling. Which, look, I’m not into the politics associated with Mar-a-Lago face any more than is the next denizen of Bluesky, but I have trouble being mad at such women (not just women) for aesthetic reasons, while nodding approvingly at the proverbial progressive with tattoos, piercings, and dyed hair. I refuse to believe that only natural-looking OR unnatural-looking hairdye is the good/bad one.

I don’t like endlessly ramping-up baseline expectations, but we do all have our one life to live and yeah will sometimes want to wrest some control over what we look like for it. It might be nice if some of the grace extended in otherwise judgmental quarters to an unusually kind/successful/talented woman known in part for her iconic sexpot look could be extended to your everyday woman with big hair and long nails, and better yet, if this could happen without patronizing ‘see I approve because I do not wish to do any -isms.’

-Skirt update (as always). I tried on the skirt I had been visiting on the internet. It was SO GOOD. But also, a full-priced mid-range retail garment, and this is not my usual way. So I went to the closest of-interest vintage shop to see whether they had something better. They had a brown tweed flared situation I liked but that weirdly had no zipper or elastic or anything, just this rigid material not of a pull-on garment, yet pull-on it was, and I wasn’t able. They also had an orange mesh asymmetrical 100% polyester skirt that I was able to get into, but that seemed the direction I don’t want my wardrobe to go. I did the is this beautiful? do I feel beautiful in it? test, and while it was a maybe for the first, it sure was a no for the second. The denim one was a yes and yes.

So I decided to do the thing they always advise, where you buy the thing you actually want and not 10 mediocre lesser versions. I look a bit Modern Orthodox in it, or would if anyone anywhere around had any idea what that even was. Toto you’re not on West 96th Street, feels the way to express it, all the more so given that I will soon enough be pairing it with (what I hope will be) an elegant, grown-up-lady take on the Wizard of Oz ruby slippers.

-I’ve Substacks-noted more than anyone ought on the irrelevant-to-my-current-life question of maternity leave. I have learned that there are US mat leave aficionados, people who think there’s something great about a system where a handful of women get generous leave, most get none or close to that, and many leave the workforce upon having a baby because they want to be home with an infant and wind up home with a 10-year-old. No, not just one person, a bunch, it turns out! Hello to you all. The most I could grant to that side of things is that…