You Don't Have To Be Beautiful; or Go To Hell, Trump!

The rain is back. We get so much rain in this city, that we refer to it not as rain, but as The Rain, the same way one would refer to The Sun, or The Moon: an inevitable fact of life, its return as natural as the return of night after day. I don't adore the rain but I don't mind it. I focus on the fact that it won't snow in winter, and on the year round green that comes with the rain, and I am content.

But I do prepare. Very few locals here carry umbrellas but we do like our hats. This is especially true for me, since carrying an umbrella is painful at best, and, when I'm using my mobility scooter, nearly impossible. 

When I put this outfit together, I was mostly thinking of some wonderful, 1970s fashion icons -- Carly Simon, Stevie Nicks, and Faye Dunaway -- and I had fun trying to emulate them. But then a tape of Trump arrogantly bragging about sexually assaulting women was released to the press, and I felt differently. These icons of mine are, like me, older now. To Trump and his ilk, they are used up, spent, valueless -- and so am I. In an environment like that, should I really be emulating women in their youth and not in their age too?

When that tape hit the news, I was in the middle of an extreme pain flare. I was using a wheeled walker just to walk a few feet in my own house, when usually I don't even need a cane at home. I was literally, painfully aware of what happens to the human body -- most often the female body -- when it is used as an object. And make no mistake: Trump was talking about us -- you and me -- as objects, and people, many people, were saying that his doing so was just a-okay.

It's been a long time since I've felt like an object, but I felt like an object that week. And I'm still getting over it.

Beau and I were overcome with helpless, frustrated rage. We talked to Beau's adolescent sons about consent and rape culture. I made my little memes and reshared important messages on social media, but it felt useless.

I just had to get my mind off it. So I started this blog post, just a light, fun emulation of older women in their beautiful youth. And I felt guilty. I comfort myself by reminding myself and you, dear readers, that I do often write posts about the beauty of older women, but that's not the point. The bloody point is that we don't have to be beautiful to matter! We are a hell of a lot more than our appearance, but try telling the world that. Just try. Heck, try telling yourself that and really, truly believing it.

So that's the back story to this post, just so you know. Now I'll try again to write it, with respect, for youth and age, for beauty and its absence -- with respect for women, all women.

So. I bought a new rain hat.

I was particularly excited that the thing actually fit on my massive head and puffy hair. It doesn't even give me a headache. I can even ... wait for it ... have a hairstyle underneath and the hat won't ruin it!

It's wool, which isn't water proof, but I treated it with a waterproof spray and it's served me well so far. Besides, I love wool. It's old-fashioned, classy, beautiful, warm, and a lot closer to being waterproof than you'd think. Trust me I know. I live on the Rain Coast, remember?

As with all my hats, I often add a brooch to it to match my different outfits. This brooch is such a pale pink, it almost glows ...

... as does this dress.

Dress: Jessica Simpson; Boots: Keen; Hat: Brixton; Sunglasses: Aldo; Earrings: bespoke, Etsy; Right hand ring, jacket, and brooch: vintage

... or, at least, it would seem to glow if it weren't so dark ...

... but, you know, you kind of have to expect that with all this rain. It can get me down a bit, but not too much. I hate long, cold winters more than I hate dark, rainy days.

I think it's no coincidence that people in my city seem to be far less afraid of wearing colour than people in other cities. It's our way of brightening up our dark days. I've lived in Montréal, Toronto, and New York, and in all three cities, I was struck by how much black, grey, and navy people wear there. It just seems so dreary!

So, to add to the glowing pink look, I wore the rose quartz, and pink tourmaline earrings that I got for our wedding ...

... and this pink, Lucite, reverse-carved bangle. I got the same one in lavender at a thrift store so, when I saw this one on Etsy, I knew I had to have it. Sometimes I wear them together. I love the 3D effect of the reverse-carving.

But back to the hat. It makes me feel like a cowboy.

I kept wanting to touch it and call people ma'am. You know, like Brad Pitt in Thelma and Louise.

I kept tipping my hat low to be cool. I have it in my head that's what cowboys do.

When I wear it, I'm also prone to singing, "I'm a cowboy. On a steel horse I ride," especially when I'm using my mobility scooter.

Beau kept telling me to lift my head, but I was having too much fun leaning on things ...

... and pretending I was Heath Ledger in Brokeback Mountain.

When I wasn't pretending I was a cowboy, I felt quite sophisticated ...

... like Faye Dunaway.

But the first person I thought of when I got this hat ...

... was Carly Simon, obviously. Her album, No Secrets, was around when I was a kid so the image of her in this hat must have been burned into my vast, internal, fashion rolodex.

Given my primary fashion inspiration, a 70s look was in order, so this brutalist, quintessentially 70s ring was a must. Plus, it picks up the darker reds of my boots and hat.

Faye Dunaway and Peter Wolf

I felt kind of bohemian too, as one often does when going for a 70s look. I'm the absolute last person to go for a hippie look, but I'm perfectly fine with the fact that I am and have always been quite bohemian. I have no problem with the floaty, pink, 70s thing, for example.

As with the fashions of any decade, I pick and choose what works for me, aesthetically, physically, and emotionally.

But, if I were to go for a hippie look, I would go for a Stevie Nicks look. Wouldn't everyone?

She was and still is the queen of gauzy, floaty, mystical fashion. It's not really my thing, but she does it so well, and with such sincerity, I have to respect it.

When such breezy fabrics match one's skin colour, they create an almost intimate feeling, an almost nude effect or, to be honest, an effect of wearing one's underwear in public, but in a good way, if there is such a thing. 

This underwear as fashion look was taken all the way in one of Faye Dunaway's most iconic looks: the one created for her in the wildly popular movie, Bonnie and Clyde. This movie was set in the 1930s so, ostensibly, its fashions were those of the 30s. But don't kid yourself. As with many historical movies, the outfits in Bonnie and Clyde were wildly anachronistic, very much of the time in which the movie was made, and not the time in which the movie was set. In other words, this is a 1970s look, through and through, so I have no problem using it as an inspiration for my 1970s sartorial choices.

Ginger Rogers

You'd have to squint a heck of a lot to see anything particularly 1930s about it.

Of course, I couldn't hope to really duplicate any of the looks that inspired me. I'm too old.

Carly Simon's iconic, fresh-scrubbed look was a look of youth and that elastic, buoyant beauty that comes with it.

Not even Carly Simon could duplicate this look -- anymore.

Still, I did my best, as many of us do, with my high boots and my fitted, pink jacket to accent my waist which is, let's face it, not as defined as it once was, especially not since menopause started.

Carly Simon now

Of course, many of us older women learn and employ various tricks ...

... to try to pretend we still have the same kind of beauty we once had. We learn about certain head tilts and photo angles.

Faye Dunaway now

We learn about using gauzy fabrics ...

... to disguise the crinkly skin of our décolletage ...

Stevie Nicks now

... and sunglasses to mask that tired look around our eyes.

We learn about poses that hide our double chins. Some of us resort to plastic surgery, something I refuse to do; I worry about the message it would send to girls and young women. I want them to know that it's okay to age. I don't want them to fear it.

But you and I know, know in our bones, that our culture is viciously cruel to the ageing woman. Some men, like a certain vile, American, presidential candidate we know, would prefer it if we older women would just disappear altogether.

But that's really not an option for me. Is it for you? I didn't think so. Not only do I continue to exist, I continue to thrive and contribute to society. I refuse to blend in to the background. I even, gasp, draw attention to myself with my fashion choices. 

What is wrong with a culture in which half the population is valued primarily for its beauty? And not any kind of beauty either. No, it's got to be thin, white, youthful beauty or nothing at all.

My God. Screw that!

I was thinking about all this when I posed with this statue at my local café (which, bless its owners, also sports statues of well-built, naked men, much to the amusement of -- well, everyone). When I posed, I was trying to create an image of mutual affection and friendship between my older self and this young, alabaster beauty, with her single, artful bum dimple. I've never been one to have adversarial relationships with other women, no matter how young or beautiful, or old and wise, they may be.

I didn't want to show you this photo because my face looks kind of wan and plain, a bit saggy and, well, middle-aged. But here it is. This is me. The way my face looks does not constitute my value as a human being. This should be so obvious, it is not worth mentioning. But it's not. In our culture, it's not.

Trump's attitudes toward women is so overtly, blatantly offensive, that it has caused me to reassess the importance I place on my own appearance. He divides all women into two categories: those he'd like to fuck (their consent or lack thereof being irrelevant to him), and those he wouldn't. The former have value -- as sexual conquests only. The latter have no value whatsoever. They -- we -- might as well not exist.

I am so deeply disgusted by this objectification of women, that I am noticing all the ways in which I objectify myself every day. In other words, I'm noticing all the ways in which I've taken my culture's sexism into my own heart and learned to value myself by my appearance, and by not all my other admirable and questionable qualities, faults, and quirks.

I didn't want to show you this photo because you can see my middle-aged belly in it. But here it is. That's me, personality, belly, brain, heart, soul, and all.

Many times a day, I catch myself worrying about some aspect of my appearance. This is not because I am vain or shallow. It is because my culture has taught me, in a million big and small ways, that my appearance is of the utmost importance. But now, when I catch myself thinking this way, I stop myself. I explain to myself why I feel this way, and why I'm working to free myself of my own internalized sexism.

Me, at about 27

I know what I'm talking about. I was a quite beautiful young woman, so I know, first hand, all the perks and advantages, as well as the prejudices and harassments that are heaped upon beautiful young women. I was aware of all this, and have so much to say about it, it should be saved for another blog post.

Me, at about 31

But I will say this: I knew that I was beautiful, or at least that a lot of other people thought I was. It's not polite to say this, but it's the truth. As soon as I became aware of this fact about myself, I promised myself that I would not let my looks define me. I would become the best person I could be and not coast on the perks afforded to me because of my appearance. I thought I did just that. I did do just that, I guess. But I did come to care about how I looked. I got used to the perks even as I disdained a culture that valued me more for my looks than for my degrees, my career, my good works, my writing, my courage, and all the other things that defined me far more than my looks did.

When my looks started to fade, I grieved. I wish I could say I didn't, but I did. I still do. And my self-esteem, my sense of self -worth, plummeted. How could it be otherwise, in a culture like ours?

But the events of the last few weeks have made me more aware of the cultural forces that cause me to feel poorly about myself, instead of honouring myself for all my many accomplishments. I have value as a human, no matter how I look. I am far more than my appearance.

So are you, and don't you forget it.

Kisses, darlings!

(I'm sharing this with Fashion Should Be Fun, Adri Lately, Not Dressed as Lamb, Tina's Pink Friday, High Latitude Style, Not Dead Yet, Style Crone, and Rachel the Hat.)

Believe! Rape and the Culture of Disbelief

So I did this. It was one of the bravest things I've ever done. I was at a rally in response to the aquittal of Jian Ghomeshi on choking and sexual assault charges. The brave women who came forward were only a few of his many victims. They were attacked on the stand and called "unreliable" and devious. 

People were outraged and saddened but not surprised. What else can we expect from a "justice" system that is not set up to help victims of sexual assault? What does a woman have to do, who does she have to be to be believed? It seems pretty clear that there is nothing she can do or be to be believed. In our "justice" system as it is today, disbelief of rape victims is the norm. 

The next time you feel inclined to ask, "If she was really raped, why didn't she go to the police?" don't. Just don't! If you listen to survivors, if you look at statistics, you'll know why many of us don't go to the police. 

I have been to the police four times about what happened to me. They treated me like a liar, asking me to show my veins to prove I'm not a junkie (as if that would mean I hadn't been raped), refusing to let me take a break for food or drink, and even asking me if, at fourteen, I had wanted one of my sexual abusers to leave his wife for me! I endured all that humiliation and emotional agony in the hope of preventing my abusers from raping more children. Not once did it get as far as being brought to court and, if it had been, I'm quite sure I too would have been attacked on the stand, and there would have been no justice.

Why is disbelief of rape victims the default -- in our families, in our schools, in our churches, in our police departments, in our courts, in our entire culture? What does a woman have to do, who does she have to be to be believed?

The next time you feel inclined to doubt someone who tells you she was raped, don't. Don't! It's long long past time to start believing. We're telling the truth. And rapists will never be stopped if we don't believe that simple fact. 

Believe! Just believe. 

What Would Rosa Parks Do? Facing Online Haters with Style

I think this an awfully pretty outfit. It was inspired by styles of the 40s and the 50s. In a way, that's it, the whole story of the outfit: I wore it because it's pretty. But, as I looked at the photos later, I found myself thinking a lot about the civil rights heroine, Rosa Parks. Let me explain why.

My first reason for thinking of Rosa Parks was my hair style.

Rosa Parks often wore braids pinned over the crown of her head ...

Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr. 

... or at the nape of her neck. I've always found that a very attractive hair style, and I've also always thought of Rosa Parks as one the most beautiful woman I've ever seen. She wasn't flashy about her beauty, but it was real and it was enduring.

I'm not as good at the hair style as she was, but I'm working on it.

Blouse, skirt, and shoes: Mod Cloth; Scarf: gift from a former student; Parasol: boutique; Barrettes: Stylize; Cane: fashionablecanes.com; Ring, sunglasses, bracelet, brooches, and earrings: vintage

My second reason for thinking of Rosa Parks was this 1957 bus on display at a recent "car free day" in my local 'hood.

I didn't actually make the connection to Rosa Parks until I saw this photo of myself on the bus.

It really made me think of Parks and her incredible dignity and bravery. In the southern United States in the 1950s, even buses were segregated, with African-American people (then called colored) having to sit at the back of the bus and relinquish seats to a white person if the white section of the bus was full. In 1955, Parks refused to do this, remaining seated when a white person wanted her seat. This seemingly simple but calculated (she'd worked with the NAACP to plan the act) and incredibly brave act led to the Montgomery Bus Boycott which played a central role in the ending of segregation in the south.

So I was already thinking of Parks when I got a few really negative, cruel comments on my last blog post.

In choosing to write honestly about the child sex slavery I endured, and its lasting impact on me, I do render myself quite vulnerable to attack. So far, the response to Sublime Mercies has been overwhelmingly and heart-warmingly positive, but, for some reason, this last post brought out a few haters. This included a non-Jewish woman who said I had no right to call myself Jewish, and accused me of using my blog as a "thinly veiled" effort to "get attention" for my past. She then banned my posts from the Google+ boards she moderates.

Wow.  Her first criticism is so absurd, I can't see anyone bothering to take her seriously. The second criticism is, I think, the real problem for her. Writing about vintage style and child abuse in the same post? But that's just icky. It's not nice.

I have never "veiled" the fact that my blog is, in part, about child abuse. It's right there in my "about" section. I don't write about child abuse to get attention for myself. That's hardly the kind of attention I want! Would you?

No, I write about child sex trafficking, PTSD, and the disability caused by abusers for an entirely different reason: to raise awareness of severe child abuse issues, and to try to end child abuse. I don't claim to be any Rosa Parks but, like her, I do feel it's important to speak up and fight for what is right, which often means speaking truths that people find distasteful and unpleasant. No, child abuse isn't "nice," but that's my point. Don't blame the messenger.

So, I speak up, even when I feel I'm doing it all alone, uphill, in a mobility scooter.

Fighting for what you believe is right comes at a cost. Rosa Parks is universally loved now, but this wasn't always so. She suffered for it at the time. She was arrested, she was fired, and she even received death threats. My few online trolls are nothing compared to what she endured.

But what else could she do in the face of such injustice?

What would I have done then?

I hope to God I wouldn't have been one of those white women sitting at the front of the bus and even demanding seats in the "colored" section if there was nowhere else for me to sit.

I've always tried not to be that kind of person.

My case is a bit interesting in that I actually belong to some fairly oppressed groups but I can "pass" as someone who does not. I'm bisexual but, since I'm with a man, I can pass for straight. I am disabled but my disability is invisible so, with effort and a lot of pain, I can pass as able-bodied. I'm Jewish but I can easily pass as a gentile. And I was sex trafficked but I can pass for someone who had a "normal" childhood. If I wanted to, I could keep silent about my life story and who I am; I could, metaphorically, sit at the front of the bus.

I make the choice not to do so, not for my own sake, but for the sake of others, especially children. I speak out about injustices. I always have. I seem to be hard-wired that way.

I choose to let people know I'm a back of the bus kind of person.

It's not always easy. This past week's attacks on my blog are a case in point. It would be a lot easier to shut up and blend in, invisible and silenced but no longer a target. But I don't do that. I choose the harder path because I think it's the right path, even if it comes at a cost.

That's why it really hurts to be accused of selfishness in my choices. If I were thinking only of myself, God knows, I wouldn't be putting myself out there the way I do. I would snuggle down with my honey and have a nice, quiet, life, invisible to the haters. But that's just not me.

But enough of that! Now back to the fashion.

I got the skirt, shirt, and shoes from Mod Cloth (who really should pay me for all my ringing endorsements!). This photo was supposed to show you how the skirt flowed elegantly in the wind, as if I were a damsel on horseback.

But I think this photo shows it better.

You know I love old-fashioned clothing, and I felt this blouse fit the bill.

Its colour reminds me of old, faded paper and its overall look reminds me of old seed packets from the turn of the last century.

I paired it with this adorable little brooch ...

... which, in turn, worked well with my ring.

If you read Sublime Mercies often (and, bless you, some of you do), you also know that I love pussy bows (though I loathe the term "pussy bow"). I couldn't really go wrong with this blouse, could I?

Isn't that brooch wonderful? I got it for $2 from a street vendor.

Here's a closer look at both brooches.

They're enough to make a gal like me glow all over.

You know what else is enough to make me glow? That font on that exit sign.

I'm like that. I can get all tingly inside at the sight of a really great vintage font, like the ones on the vintage ads on the bus.

Some of the ads were clearly not in keeping with 1957. Well, it was clear to me, anyway. For example, the girdle ad above me is obviously of an earlier vintage, probably the early 1940s; the sling back, peep toe shoes give it away immediately. But, oh!, aren't the fonts on it glorious?

Here's another glorious font.

Let's get a better look at that, shall we? Sigh. Tingles. So 50s!

But I digress again. Back to the hair style.

It's definitely not perfected yet and feels like it will fall down, even though it won't.

It still involves too many barrettes ...

... and still more barrettes, but the basic principle is a good one -- I think. I just need more practice. 

I borrowed the style from Frida Kahlo. I braid a scarf into my hair, then loop the braid over head and back down again, tying it at the nape of my neck. Frida, of course, tied it on the crown of her head, for a fancier look, but I'm not quite ready for that yet.

I like the pink of the scarf. I think it looks good with my pale skin but I also wore it because it was national Aboriginal Day. No-one else could see its Aboriginal images, but I knew it was there and that was nice.

Honestly, though, I think the scarf-braid style looked better here, with a dark brown scarf that blended in with my hair. I might stick with that till I get better at it. 

Speaking of pink, though, you probably noticed my parasol?

Yes, of course you did. It's rather eye-catching, is it not?

It's not a useless fashion accessory. I'm just a tad pale so a parasol is practical for me.

Even in the summer, I'm so pale that I have blue circles under my eyes which, curiously, have never really bothered me. They add character?

The best I can achieve is unhealthy freckles ...

... that almost look like a tan, if you squint.

So the parasol is a good thing, as well as a pretty one.

It's a bit awkward for my crippled body...

... but it was helpful on this bright, hot, Rosa Parks, festival kind of a day.

And so we say goodbye to the haters, goodbye to the trolls, and goodbye to the day.

(I'm sharing this with the Style Crone, Happiness at Mid Life, Sydney Fashion Hunter, and Spy Girl.)