How girly do you have to be to be a 'girl'? Jen discusses the evolution of girly girls and why there's a bit of a girly girl in all of us.

My ex once told me that I had no "girl" friends. I had guy friends, some of whom had boobs. After throwing the shower this past weekend (see previous article) I have to wonder if he was right. I'm just not a girly girl.

As we grow older, the line between girls and boys blurs a bit. As kids, every girl was a girly girl, and if she wasn't, she was a tomboy. We were supposed to love the color pink, want to be a ballerina and think fluffy kittens were just the cutest. Meanwhile, my brother was showing me how to play with a butterfly knife. Maybe that's where girly girls and I parted ways.

But the girly girls remain.

Junior High. Girly girls have their own fiction section in the library. Sweet Valley High Books. I tried getting into these things, but I couldn't. Let's face it, Jessica was a tramp and Elizabeth was goody-two-shoes. Both of them needed to be smacked and honestly, Elizabeth Bennett (Pride & Prejudice) would have kicked their asses if given half a chance.

High School. They talked about boys and lip gloss. Not that I never spoke on those subjects, but geesh, those girly girls couldn't talk about anything else. For the life of me I couldn't understand the issues in picking between "desert rose" and "moonlight mauve." I didn't care but they did, and since they held the power of popularity, I submitted to their wisdom of what a girl should be.

College. Here girly girls reined supreme. They even gave them neat little letters for their chests, just incase their main focus (boys) wasn't looking in that area enough. But they were nicely grouped and we non-girly-girls could avoid them, Sigma Sigma Seeya. I of coursed joined a service fraternity with my best guy friend and learned how to do shots of tequila (definitely not girly girl). That is not to say that all sorority girls were girly girls. When you found one that wasn't, you noted it with surprise. They always seemed to explain it a bit with "my best friend joined last semester" or "I'm a legacy."

Now, I'm this married woman and still there is no avoiding the girly girls. They show up at baby showers and weddings. And, dear God, office Christmas parties wearing risqu� prom dresses. They titter when you start talking about having a family someday. They whisper urgently "are you trying?" At which point, I long to tell them that "yes we're having tons of unprotected sex and Andrew is dropping his buddies right off at the door!" just to see their faces start to twitch. We're not by the way (sorry, but my friends read this and they'll call). I honestly don't get them. I like some of this stuff. I loved planning a wedding, I want kids, and I can talk paint chips for hours, but sometimes I wonder �do I even qualify as a girl?

I am equally happy discussing why the Redskins can't get a decent quarterback, why Vertigo Comics just isn't as good as Image Comics (Athena Inc. is really good) and why Tim Burton is in desperate need of an editor. At the same time, I love to knit and crochet, I can make the best cheesecake on the East Coast and I know which flowers float the best in a lotus bowl.

Maybe it's just that I'm a hybrid. I'm a guyey girl.

Luckily, I'm not alone. There are lots of guyey girls out there like me. Girls who like guy stuff. We grew up as tomboys and know how to change the oil. We can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan�.sorry�.old commercial ringing in my head. But when faced with an onslaught of girly girls, even the best of us question whether there isn't something a little wrong with us.

So I turned to the person who would know best. "Andrew, am I a girl?" I asked.

He stared. Then he leered. And then he offered to show me exactly how much of a girl I was.

Then this non-girly girl�she tittered.

~~~~~

Jennifer Lofquist is a freelance writer and Gen �Xer in Sterling, Virginia. In 2001, she married "the Beloved," bought a house, and supposedly became an adult, though many of her friends would disagree. Her interests are writing, history, cooking, crafting, and her cat Jasper. She is convinced that she would have been able to make Henry VIII a happily married man.

Volume B Issue 11 November 2002 Copyright 2002 Gx Webzine All Rights Rsvd.

Volume B Issue 11 November 2002
Copyright 2002 Gx Webzine All Rights Rsvd.