The Company of Women
When I was planning the launch party for my blog, I had heated conversations with myself about the gender ideology of the event. I have always been passionately against all-boy and all-girl-clubs: I find these segregated environments seriously unhealthy, at least in big doses. So it seemed right to have a gender-balanced guest list, the only problem being that I didn’t want one. Every time I started to imagine the scene, I saw only women.
I don’t think this has much to do with the blog, no matter that it happens to be mostly about clothes and lipsticks. I know that there are male readers and I would certainly have no problem whatsoever to invite men to a tea party. I believe the real reason is that I miss the company of women. Or, to be more precise, the company of cool, interesting, complex, wonderful women.
Because I live abroad now, I see my favourite women so rarely. Fortunately, I have my sisters here and a couple of other people who provide me with regular doses of female amazingness. But there’s nothing quite like 20 awesome women in the same room together. I really hate to use phrases like ‘positive energy’, I really do, but… there IS a special energy.
I find women fascinating. Not that I seriously think one gender is objectively more fascinating than the other, this in just a psychological quirk of mine. Every time I start writing a novel in my head, I get stuck because while I have no problem with imagining 10 female characters, I have no idea how to come up with even a single male one. I am scared of women, too, or intimidated. I think I’m at least mildly afraid of most of the women I like. But that’s fine. Cool women simply do terrify lesser beings, without making any active effort to do so. This is just a law of physics.
So after my fierce internal monologues, we ended up having some tea and Pavlova and talking about books – women only. This turned out to be one of the best decisions I’ve made lately. So if you haven’t done it for a while, I highly recommend throwing a party for the women you like and admire and maybe are a bit afraid of. It’s going to be great.
Photos: Marina Jekimenko (there will be more on Facebook soon)
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This is such an insightful post, and I had an aha! moment when you wrote that “cool women simply do terrify lesser beings.” I’ve recently developed a friendship with a woman like that, and it’s incredibly inspiring and freeing. I have the feeling that you are terrifying yourself.:) I look forward to being more of the same, and I sincerely thank you for encouraging it.
I think I would have done an all-female bash as well, and for the same reasons that you chose to do so. As always, I love your pics.
Thank you, Holly. I believe I’m too enthusiastic to be terrifying, I’ve never been especially cool 🙂 And I don’t want to endorse being too cold or scary, but I think that often we perceive other women like that because we feel inferior. And as soon as we replace envy with admiration, it turns out that all those intimidating women are actually quite nice.
Wonderful post! I would imagine that you inspire other women as well 🙂
In my youth I had numerous strong and inspiring females in my life that I thought were my friends. However, these relationships were often fraught with competition and taking advantage of my good nature. As I have gotten older I find that I would rather keep the company of one good friend- whether male (my husband) or female (my yoga teacher and mentor). With these two I can be myself (as they accept me for who I am and who I aspire to be) knowing that they are always honest and insightful about what is going on in my life and my mind…..having just two wonderful and truthful friends/companions makes me feel quite blessed and I would not want it any other way..
For me, there are many different slots in my life for many different people. My immediate circle is very, very small as well (how many deep relationships can a person sustain?). But there are quite a few people whom I don’t meet that often, but who are still very important to me. They may not be my friends in the Sex and the City sense, but they are still my friends. In any case, being used is not something I would tolerate either. A little admiration is one thing, exploitation is something quite different.
And thank you!