The feminine mystique

I love the female body. I can't really say why, other than I view it as a strange and mysterious thing. Being female, you'd think I'd have it figured out by now but I don't. Every woman is different and every woman's body possesses its own set of secrets.

The first woman I ever saw naked was my mother. I was probably four or five and I used to watch her while she took her bath. She used to come home from work and soak in the tub for what seemed liked hours. It was one of those old-fashioned, clawfoot tubs with separate taps for hot and cold. I remember when I was little, I could stretch all the way out and lie down with my ears underwater. I liked the way the world sounded then, muffled and distant.

My mother would lie back in the tub with a damp washcloth over her eyes, her knees bent to fit, and I would sit watching her. Sometimes I'd try to talk to her but mostly, I just sat there waiting while she drifted in her own world. It was then that I would study her, trying to pull apart the puzzle of what made her who she was.

She had small, narrow feet that were covered in thick callouses from working so much. She always kept her toenails painted, some shade of red or coral, a delicate contrast to the roughened soles and heels. Her feet were strong, tough, almost utilitarian but ladlylike, in their own way. She always had a peculiar habit of curling and uncurling her toes, and when she flexed her foot, the muscles in her leg would come to life. They were smooth and strong and perpetually tan, peppered with shiny white scars.

Her stomach was soft and round and almost perfect if not for the jagged red scar that ran from her bellybutton to her pubic bone. This crude red mouth marked the moment of my birth, when the doctors finally cut me free of her to keep from killing her. Her breast were large and full, and hung low on her body. They were threaded through with silver-white lines, stretch marks, more evidence of childbearing. Hers was no longer a girl's body but a woman's. I was awestruck by what I saw but also a little afraid. This was going to happen to me too eventually and once it began, I knew there'd be no stopping it.

A few years later, I discovered my uncle's Playboys, and their version of what a woman should be. Here were women who were not like my mother, women whose bodies were still intact, still perfect. They were strange and exotic and exciting and beautiful. These were women who were not going to grow old or get wrinkles or stretch marks. Instead, they would remain perfect, frozen on the page, vacant, glossy, unreal. For a long time, I thought that this was what real beauty looked like.

Now, at 27, I see these women for what they are. They're all the same, with their silicone breasts and chemical tans, their teased hair and heavy lip gloss. They're real but they're not. They're beautiful but they're not. They're what the rest of us think we should be but they're not. I've learned to look for beauty in other ways, to see it in the faces of ordinary women. I see it in the faces of friends who are moving towards life full of confidence and hope. I see it in the faces of all the women of my family, who are strong and fearless in their own way. I see it in the face of my mother, who will always be beautiful to me. And I see it in myself, in this face I've tried to run from for so long. It was there, this beauty, waiting to be discovered. I just couldn't see it until now.