The Lady with the Blue Stripe

As I made my way through the Washington, D.C. rush hour last evening, I got temporarily trapped behind a Metro bus.  I flashed my signal to try to move to the left and around it, but in the usual way things go in our uncivil society these days, there wasn’t a car that would let me in the left lane, probably because it would add 1.25 seconds to their drive time home.

I sat and sat and sat some more as the light changed to red.  Knowing I’d have my only opportunity to maneuver out of traffic prison when the light turned green, I flashed my signal again and poised my foot above the gas pedal for a speedy maneuver into the left lane.

Then I saw her.

She was generously overweight in her khakis, and she leaned to the left on a cane.  She appeared to be in her early fifties, or maybe older.  Still, she moved briskly enough through the cross walk and appeared to be whistling through a half-smile intended for no one but herself.  I was struck by her jauntiness.  And I noticed, too, she had a prominent, light blue stripe in her dyed blonde hair.

Wow.

I thought to myself:  That is a contented woman, comfortable in her own skin and sassy enough to know that a stripe in her hair would add just a little something to her life and the face she presented to the world.  She was the mistress of her own destiny. I was gob smacked by her and the sheer joy and confidence expressed in that blue stripe of hair.

This morning, I read in the New York Times about some hullabaloo regarding twenty-something starlet Shailene Woodley’s disavowal of the word “feminism” because she really “loves” men.  And she’s in good company –Taylor Swift, Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, and Lady Gaga, among many other celebrities, apparently feel the same way.

I love my man, too, but I’m also his equal in every way but, perhaps, one:  He’s much better at programming the DVR than I am, for sure. 

We supposedly live in a “post-feminist” society.  As many girls as boys now attend college, maybe more, so they don’t feel the same sense of urgency about their rights as my generation did in the 1960s and 70s.  Plus nearly half of the workforce is comprised of women, even though we make only 3/4^ths of what our male counterparts make, but still…. 

And sure, I know the maturation of the LGBT civil rights movement still confuses some in our society about gender roles and identity.  But a feminist being defined as someone who doesn’t like boys?

Really?

The fact that the word “feminist” is still considered politically fraught and polarizing baffles me.  What’s so scary about Lady Gaga saying she’s a feminist?  She probably made more money last year than the GDP of Greece; I’m guessing she feels pretty empowered most of the time. 

I’m with comedian Amy Poehler on this one:  I don’t get it.

Which leads me back to the woman with the blue stripe in her hair.  She may not call herself a feminist and she may not feel empowered every single day of her life but that blue stripe leads me to believe she wouldn’t be intimated by the word – or dismissive of it.  No sir, she’s far too playful and confident for that sort of patronizing poppycock.

I’m not brave enough to put a blue stripe in my hair, but I’m old enough and smart enough to appreciate one when I see it.  Just as I appreciate the real meaning of the word “feminist” every day I go to work and every time I come home to the man I love.