2003-02-07 - 6:10 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "Yesterday Once More", The Carpenters

So, it snowed. Quite a bit, actually -- at least six inches. Poor Poindexter had to walk and take public transit to work. I spent the morning commuting time shoveling. I was really quite proud of myself, 'cause I did our walk and my next-door neighbor's walk. The neighbor was the one who shoveled my walk for me during the last big storm. Hopefully now we're even.

Problem is, I looked out the window a few hours later and found that they were doing that thing again where they basically shovel the entire little parking lot where their cars are, and halfway across the road. They're doing far more than the bare minimum to get their cars out; they're removing every flake of snow within five feet of their cars. One of them does all this with a BROKEN SHOVEL and SAYS he doesn't like SHOVELING!

So WHY!? WHY?! WHY CAN'T THEY JUST UNCOVER THEIR CARS AND LET IT GO AT THAT!? WHY DO THEY HAVE TO BE SO ANAL AND MAKE ME FEEL GUILTY BECAUSE I DON'T CLEAR MORE THAN MY WALK AND A PATH ACROSS TO THE CARS?! WHY!?

Why do I get so worked up about this? Why can't I just let it go?

Well, every now and then it's fun to get worked up into a snit. ;)

I was talking to a girlfriend over e-mails today about "Girls Gone Wild" -- I'll post my thoughts tomorrow, I think -- and during this conversation we touched on the idea of some of these girls being proud of their bodies and wanting to show them off. It got me thinking about my own show-offed-ness.

Here's the thing. There are times when I really like how I look. There are things I'd like to change, I suppose (longer legs, wider face, for instance), but if I had enough power to do something like that, I'd rather spend the power doing a lot of other things before I got around to changing my physical self.

There are also lots of days when I see myself in the mirror and see nothing but flaws and ickiness. When that happens, I just don't look. Ain't no point. I remind myself that what I'm seeing is not necessarily what other people are seeing, and certainly not Poindexter.

I am lucky enough to have a man who thinks I look gorgeous ALL the TIME, and I have absolutely no doubt about it. He's always calling me "Gorgeous Girl", looking at me and telling me, "You're gorgeous", and saying "Bye, Gorgeous" on the phone. And I basically can't walk past him without getting grabbed. It's a wonderful thing, to be that secure in knowing someone thinks I'm the most beautiful girl in the whole wide world, both inside and out.

So I wonder sometimes, why do I even care what other people think of my looks? Why does it warm my heart so much when people say I'm cute or pretty or "bootylicious"? Why should it even matter to me if other people think I'm attractive or not?

Well, maybe part of it is like a little bit of "justice" for my childhood. I'm a bit of an odd duck in some ways, while place like LiveJournal are a place to find other people with those oddnesses and revel in them, real life is not like that. Nobody paid any attention to me when I was in school. My only boyfriend in high school was from another school, where I had the advantage of just being ME instead of whatever label or social caste I'd been assigned to in my own school. There have been a lot of people -- including dozens of unrequited crushes -- who didn't think I was worth a second glance, much less dating. Fuckers. So it's still quite a pleasure to have people whom I admire think I'm attractive.

Poindexter also says that since our looks are the one thing we can't really control about ourselves -- aside from haircuts and makeup and attitude -- it's nice to know that other people like how we look.

One thing I also wonder about is, why does it sometimes mean more, or feel more valid, when a handsome stranger thinks I'm pretty than when my family or husband says it? Well, the family could very well be biased. Poindexter is also biased, but on the other hand, he once a handsome stranger. When I think back to those days, I still can't believe he picked me. He was always in the back of my mind, a sort of standard that I held other guys to, and they all failed. So it still feels miraculous that he thinks the same of me.

I don't really know where I'm going with all this. It's just that I have mixed feelings about putting up the booty pictures. If I have a nice picture of myself, I like to share it. Sometimes I feel guilty for being so vain. Then I think of how I love looking at pictures of Kitiara and how wonderfully unashamed of her vanity she is, and I think, "Well, why not?" Then I get those truly incredible compliments from people and think, "Jeez, do I really deserve that?" It's overwhelming to me, the reaction I get.

Oh well. I don't seem to be hurting anyone with it (particularly, neither me nor Poindexter), and I enjoy the positive reaction despite the weird guilt and embarrassment that goes with it. Since people keep requesting more and it makes me feel good, I'll keep putting them up. But like I said, they can't be booty pictures EVERY day. :)

With all that said, I'll go for a less flattering picture today. I'm still working on liking myself in glasses. Argh. Anyway, I'm playing cards with my nieces at Christmas. You can see the mole on my lip if you squint.

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