Crow! It's what's for Breakfast.

I have about 5 followers on Twitter.

Because of the lack of exposure, I tend to be a little more blunt on twitter. Nobody's paying attention, I think, I may as well say something incendiary, something a little naughty, a little more daring.

I mean, nobody's been paying attention for the last five years, who could possibly be looking now?

So last night, after spending about an hour on Instagram looking at accounts ranging from the super body positive and incredibly encouraging to the magnificently stylized ones that generally make me feel like crap about myself, I started thinking.

Now, we all know that thinking gets you into trouble in general, but let's add to that the fact that I was on my way to falling asleep with a baby nursing at my side, and I had a kind of long and emotional day (thanks to some shitty personal biz), and I just started thinking about all the things that women are sold to make themselves seem unnaturally pretty.

I thought about how acrylic finger nails, hair extensions, false eyelashes, photoshop phone apps, tummy control leggings, make up and all the other stuff marketed toward women by images that tell them if they leave the house in their "natural state" they aren't "good enough".

I realize this is my personal opinion.
I realize this is my personal opinion as a white, cis-gendered female, with a history of low self esteem.

I wasn't thinking about that though when I lazily pulled up my twitter account and decided to write the words:

Dear Women,
Fake eyelashes, hair extensions, and acrylic nails 
are another way of saying 'I don't think I'm enough.'

I typed it because it was what I felt at that moment.
It was what I wish someone would say to me at that moment.

I was thinking I would say something along the lines of,
"Hey Girl, I know it's difficult to feel good enough about yourself in this world without a whole industry designed to sell you shit to make you look slightly better telling you that you need a bunch of items to accentuate what you naturally have already because that's not good enough."

But you know, 140 characters, tiredness, pigheadedness, whatever.
That's not what I typed.

I fell asleep and forgot I wrote the tweet.

Around three in the morning, when my baby got me up, I was settling him down, and I thought I'd diddle with the social media again to pass the time. I opened up Twitter and I was shocked. I had 17 notifications.

Again, I would like to repeat how few people actually follow me on there. 17 notifications is a big deal when you're used to oh...none.

So I curiously swiped through them, and I was shocked and dismayed when I saw that they were all from various people telling me what a jerk I was.

I looked at my tweet.

Yeah...it was a bit rude...

Then I looked at the responses.
One was a woman in the beauty industry who was angry because without things like false eyelashes, acrylics, and hair extensions, she'd be out of job.
Another was a feminist who very eloquently said I had no right to tell anyone what they do with their body, male, female, or otherwise.
Another was a person who quite simply posted a video of Kristen Bell flipping someone off.
Shut the fuck up. They said.

And you know what...

They were right.

I should have realized.
No matter how few your followers are,
no matter how ignored you feel,
your words matter, especially when discussing something as delicate as what women use to tell themselves "I am enough".

As long as they aren't hurting anyone, whatever anybody does to make themselves feel good is really none of my business.

I thought about how I have friends who've gone through chemo, who lost all their hair and for whom wigs and false eyelashes are a way of reminding themselves of their natural beauty.
I thought about how insensitive I was to those women.
I thought about children with Alopecia and how they deserve to wear whatever makes them feel better.
I thought about how there is no excuse to make anyone else feel bad about what they decide to do with their bodies. I mean, I've been calling myself a feminist since the 10th grade! This is stuff I already know! And yet, in the face of my own insecurities I decided to pass judgment, glib, unfair, prejudiced judgment. How many people have I seen do this exact same thing? Hundreds, and I've been disgusted by them.
I have stood next to girls who refuse to shave their legs, boys who love eyeliner, non-gender conforming individuals who practice self care and beauty regimens they have developed like armor to shield and protect themselves so that when they walk down the street, they feel good about themselves regardless of who does or does not approve.

I am so proud of anyone and everyone brave enough to wear and walk their truth, and far be it from me to tell them anything.

What I should have said in my tweet was that I felt the current standard of beauty put forth by the media in this country is impossible for the majority of women to reach.

What I should have said that the cult of youth, and the pressure to look a certain way are bogus measurements of anyone's worth.

What I should have said was that I am a human who has struggled with feeling like I am never going to be 'enough' and that sometimes means I pass judgement on people who adhere to that standard of beauty. I am not speaking for anybody else, just me, and sometimes I am wrong.

What's funny is my previous tweet (before the one that got the negative attention) was about how I wanted to see Dustin Hoffman's Hook and Bette Midler's Winnie Sanderson do battle, so if that's any reference point for how clever I think I am, there you go.

Anyway, I just wanted to say, I'm not going to delete the offending tweet because I think that would be easy. It would also be cowardly. I said something without thinking, and it ticked people off.
I feel awful about this, but it even hurt some people's feelings.

It stays up as a reminder to me not to be so glib, not to be so judgmental, and not to take for granted that even when you have very few people paying attention to what you say, you should never take for granted that those people deserve every consideration you would like given to yourself, your loved ones, your children.

Thanks for keeping me honest.