Don't Know What It's All About

For the first time in my life I have started actually noticing people’s bodies in pop culture. My research has kind of made me start looking at them more closely. It honestly seems strange to me that so many girls do this naturally; I’ve read a LOT of fashion magazines cover-to-cover and have never felt inferior about anything except my income. Same with movies; when people talk about how curvy Scarlett Johannsen is or how Keira Knightley is ghastly I really have never thought about it. I mean, they’re both skinny but not frighteningly so, beyond that I never noticed anything. I don’t mean to say that the images on screen don’t have an effect on me, I’m definitely more conscious about my skin, clothes, or social awkwardness after watching certain movies. Bodies of celebrities all seem just skinny to me, though.
Why do girls watch these bodies so carefully? In real life between the ages 18-21 I’ve fluctuated up and down at least ten pounds, but I know that regardless of how thin I am it’s my mood that pushes people towards (or away) from me. I have to think that this is pretty universal; obviously obesity is something else but society doesn’t really pick bones day-to-day between healthy-regular and healthy-skinny weight. Really, who notices? Even since my exercise regime started I dropped a few pant sizes and only N has picked up on it. So why are people so vicious about fluctuations of models or celebrities? I read a theory in a study that said that the obese are more likely to stay that way when they see these impossible images of what “skinny” is. I feel like Charlie Brown, it’s a depressing thing to think about and it makes no sense.

Because You Care

All of the classes I wanted were at the same time. Thus my fall schedule:

MWF Schedule
*Crafts of Writing Fiction MWF 10:50-11:50 10223
*19th Century American Lit MWF 3:30-4:30 10231
*Pilates 4:45-5:45 MWF 10657

TR Schedule
*Quantitative Thinking For Policy Analysis TR 9:40-11:10 10270
*Swimming I 1:20-2:30 TR 10642
*Revolutions and Evolutions 3:00-4:30 TR 10774

9:40!? Why even bother going to bed, it's practically still night! Thanks for nothing, Macalester.

Almost Famous

I saw one of my favorite bands the other day, the Brunettes. When asked to describe their music, I have to say twee. Then when people don’t know what that is, I have to say, you know, like the Juno soundtrack? Ohhh. Juno co-opted my music and culture. On the plus side, I now have an easy cultural category to be fit into. Anyway, it was kind of weird because I got there way earlier than necessary, and since I was by myself I had to sit and pretend to read the movie listings for thirty minutes before I got up the courage to say hi to the guy sitting next to me. He was an English teacher, so we had a good time talking. The opening act was an synth-pop DJ named Anoraak, which was kind of fun since I was into synth pop for about three days the week before. The next band was French but wrote their songs in English; they were kind of twangy Elliott Smith types. The Brunettes, however, were awesome. The girl is great, it’s clear that her expressiveness is what makes the band when you see them live. The exciting part is that they had a dance contest and guess who won? Yep, me! To be fair, the announcement was in English, so I may have been among a lucky few who understood. But I got to meet them to collect my reward, which was the end of a bottle of whiskey they had backstage. It was really cool!

Ana and Mia

I wanted to write my research paper on the effects of advertising and brand image. For example, if Chanel releases a campaign showing athletic women in their clothes, will people begin to associate Chanel with athleticism? Or elegance with athleticism? Will rich athletes be more likely to shop at Chanel? Unfortunately, after trying four of the best fashion institutions in Paris I couldn’t find a compendium of advertisements for any brand. So now I’m writing on the effects of anorexia on the fashion world, and vice versa. Original, right? Oh well, at least there’s already huge amounts of research. I kind of got sidetracked with looking at a bunch of pro-ana websites. This is apparently a huge phenomenon of mostly teenage girls writing fasting tips and thinspiration to one another. It’s pretty bad…no, it’s really bad. One woman wrote about how she was going to be deemed an unfit mother if she didn’t cut out her anorexic habits. A high school girl described how she had to break her fast for a salad at her parent’s anniversary dinner because it made her mom cry when she said she wasn’t hungry. There are people on the site trying to fight their anorexia and get back to healthy weight, mixed in with those who are trying anything to drop (one girl at 5’8” mentioned her goal weight is 96 lbs). These sites are really troubling, and haven’t been getting very much media attention according to wikipedia. France passed a law to ban any pro-anorexia websites last week, but facebook and myspace say it’s too difficult to draw a line between support to get better and pressure to lose weight on many of the sites. After seeing the livejournal one I see what they mean; when one girl posted her pictures (which actually looked on the skinny side of healthy) people were telling her she looked great, not specifying any suggestions to lose or gain. Anyway, I didn’t really realize how much the thinspo/mia/ana community comes together. The creepiest thing is that their messages sound like those of normal teenage girls, “OMG I feel like such a fatty I had ½ granola bar for breakfast and an apple for lunch. Hope I can get out of dinner if my parents let me but probs not UGH!” With maybe some frowning faces at the end. Girls with the same stats email each other to plan diets to lose four pounds next week etc. I’ve seen a lot of bulletin boards and web communities but never like this. My high school hypothetical internet equivalent would have been something like “UGH can’t get E Major up to 160 BPM my teacher says it’s too fast anyway but I’m stuck at 120! Anyone want to coordinate metronome speeds next week?” I don’t need to ask to know that those bitches on the clarinet board would never coordinate their metronome practice with me. I just think it’s sad that the ana group I looked at is the most supportive and friendly internet group I’ve ever seen. If these girls were getting this kind of emotional support in their school lives, would things be different?
The way one girl conceptualizes ana is as a girl who lives inside you and only gets the food that you deny yourself. If you eat too much, she dies. If you don't eat at all, you die. I think it's safe to say I killed ana. Whoops.

Slapstick

I fell down the stairs today. Not a little bit, I actually fell and then slid down maybe four stairs. And then I had to turn over onto my stomach to get myself up. I think tomorrow about half of my left leg will be purple. Hey, I just thought of something: is the book the Color Purple named so because she was bruised? I never got far enough in for the explanation.

Not Free To Pick Up

I went to the fashion and interior design museum again, which was great. I’ve never gone through the furniture part before, but it was actually really fun. The best part is a room full of designer chairs that you can sit in while you watch a montage of clips from movies featuring furniture in the museum. I sat in this bed type chair, and it was heavenly. The angle it props up at is really perfect. This makes me wonder what separates a really expensive piece of furniture from a regular one? That chair seemed really great, but I think it was the design and not the craftsmanship that made it so good. But really, I have no idea. I’m just wondering because I’ve been furniture hunting on craigslist and prices seem crazy for couches. I feel like it shouldn’t be that hard or expensive to make an okay couch.

I Can't Even Handle The Preview

I have been hearing a woman screaming on and off in the apartment building next to my office through the wall for the past week or so. Sounds like labor pains, not like a specific cry for help. I wasn’t sure what I should do, and felt kind of reluctant to call the police since I already called them once for a screaming woman about a month ago. In elementary school they told us if you call the police too many times they stop coming, is this true? They also said if you call for a fire and there’s not one then you go to jail. I guess I might find out the French laws about calling the police too many times by the time I’m through here. But the Funny Games trailer made me decide that I should take the risk of looking dumb. I looked dumb. They were actually really nice about it, but it’s on and off, and of course when they got there she was quiet. You would think the police would be able to go into whatever building they needed to, but they didn’t have the code for the apartments next door to me so they called it a day. Great job! Another thing the Funny Games trailer did was keep me up late two nights ago. Why do those guys want to hurt that family? And what is it about those all-white golf clothes that make them look so harmless? I will readily admit that if a serial killer in all-white golf clothes knocked on my door and asked to borrow some eggs I think I would let him in. Not anymore, though. Thank you, Funny Games trailer. You compensate for the ineptitude of the local police. PS just because I linked the Funny Games trailer doesn't mean you should watch it.