Diana Unplugged

Dear Internet,

Remember when I started using you? Remember when I set up my very first Hotmail account at my friend's house, and was pretty sure it was the coolest thing in the world? Remember when I was totally impressed that I could use Ask Jeeves to learn anything I wanted? Those were the good old days. Endless hours of looking up pictures of dreamy teenage celebrities and exploring MySpace.

But now, things have changed. I feel like we're getting too close. I wake up in the morning and compulsively check Facebook, Twitter, and the front page of Reddit. It's like I can't stop myself, I have this sick compulsive need to know what happened in the world while I was asleep. Sometimes I'll check CNN, too, just to make sure the world didn't fall apart immediately after I drifted off. Did one of the bloggers I follow post something new? A post about different kinds of French bread pizza? Time to read that, too....

It's gotten to be too much, Internet. In the evening, scrolling through interesting posts on Apartment Therapy, or checking out a new recipe over on NomNomPaleo. Scanning through mostly redundant images on Pinterest, or getting sucked into some mostly useless collection of photos on BuzzFeed featuring 25 huge dogs that are acting like they're the size of a chihuahua. It needs to stop.

Honestly, Internet, it's not all your fault. My iPhone is definitely my enabler. Waiting for a table at a restaurant with Kevin? Time to pull out my phone and check the weather for the next 6 days. Sitting at the doctor's office waiting to be called back to the tiny room? Time to refresh Twitter to see if Wil Wheaton has posted another Vine video featuring his adorable dogs.

Internet, I feel like you're killing my creativity. Sometimes I feel like I'm yoked to my phone. Granted, Kevin and I don't have a home phone, so my constant obsession over making sure my phone is within earshot is not totally unjustified. But this constant checking all the time? Unhealthy.

I think it's time for a break, Internet. I think I need to unplug from social media for the rest of the week. I think I can skip the frothy articles peddled on HelloGiggles for the next few days, and focus on more wholesome things like picking up where I left off in Jane Austen's Persuasion. Time to work on some more of the paper art I've been experimenting with. Time to listen to more music. Time to bake a batch of cookies, and sit outside in the backyard without reaching for my phone for entertainment. Time to finally sort through my clothes and figure out what I don't wear anymore. Time to stop making to-do lists, and actually DO stuff.

So, Internet, it's been real. Maybe I'll be back this weekend, or maybe next week. Don't take it personally, it's not you - it's me.

Diana

ps: Yeah, I totally get the irony that this blog post is posted on Facebook and Twitter.

Gender Roles

Gender roles. Yeah. This is not the lightest topic to write about, but I found myself in my office last week talking to two coworkers about gender roles. I work in the field of Student Affairs, so this stuff is bound to come up once in a while, and since my background is decidedly not in student affairs (I sold lightbulbs before I started this job) I rarely feel like I have much to contribute in these situations. 

Nonetheless, I have been finding myself thinking about the gender roles conversation this past week or so. I even consulted Wikipedia in preparation for this blog post so I wouldn't sound like a total idiot: 

A gender role is a set of social and behavioral norms that are generally considered appropriate for either a man or a woman in a social or interpersonal relationship. There are differences of opinion as to which observed differences in behavior and personality between genders are entirely due to innate personality of the person and which are due to cultural or social factors, and are therefore the product of socialization, or to what extent gender differences are due to biological and physiological differences.

Thanks, Wikipedia! I would cite my source, but the last time I did that on a paper was when I was in high school, and it was called a bibliography back then. Bibliography. I'm pretty sure nobody uses that word anymore. I guess I could put "Bibliography" into Wikipedia, but then would I need to cite that? This is making me tired. 

So I've found myself wondering: am I living my life according to what I feel like is my role as a woman? Do I feel like I should be channeling Donna Reed every minute? Well, I'm not sure if I feel like I'm being pressured to feel that way, but I actually do really like pearls, I sort of wish my closet were full of circle skirts and crinolines, and I actually really enjoy cooking and housekeeping. 

The problem is, though, the more I analyze whether I'm being influenced by gender roles, the less I care. I know that's totally not the right answer. Don't get me wrong, it's important that people don't feel forced into traditional gender roles, but at the end of the day, I am actually okay with being the kind of wife that legitimately enjoys taking care of my husband, and cooking, and making the house pretty and comfortable. I generally like dresses better than pants, not because I am a crazy person who thinks that it's wrong for a woman to wear pants, it's just that dresses are more comfortable than pants. Seriously. It's the best kept secret of women and cross-dressing men the world around. If I lived in a world where the world was trying to convince me that women should only wear Nike shoes, and that wearing them would make me a real woman, would it be wrong for me to wear Nike shoes if I actually tried them on, walked around in them, and preferred them to other shoes?

I know there is the argument that generations of women fought for the right to vote, and the right for equal work opportunities, and the opportunity for equal rights. I applaud them for this, and I thank them. But I also like to think that those same women would have fought for the right for women to make a choice about the kind of woman they want to be. And for me, I like to be the kind of woman that comes home at the end of a long day at work, make the house nice for my husband, pour him a cold beer when he walks through the door, and serve him a delicious dinner. That's my gender role, and I love every single day of it. 

Jane Eyre and Thoughts on Parenthood

Sometimes I worry about silly things.

We were sitting at home last week, relaxing after a delicious meal of baked salmon and seared scallops. I curled up under a blanket (it's been unseasonably cold here in Atlanta lately) and opened Jane Eyre to lose myself in the story for a while. I love Charlotte Bronte to begin with, but I love this story in particular. It got me thinking about how I've always loved classic stories. Pride & Prejudice (I read it at least twice a year), Sense & Sensibility, Little Women, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Picture of Dorian Gray....I even still love some of my favorite books from elementary school, and sometimes when I'm feeling nostalgic/lazy, there's nothing I like better than grabbing my worn out copy of Anne of Green Gables or breezing through Nancy Drew and the Secret of the Wooden Lady, because apparently I never stopped being 9 years old. 

Then I started to wonder what would happen if our future kids don't like to read the way I do. What if he/she/they are not shy like I was, and what if they don't get the same thrill out of the smell of old books as I do? What if they're the 'cool kids' at school? How will I relate to that?

I just love these stories, and can't imagine not being able to share them with my future progeny. Maybe we'll have a little girl of our own someday. If we do, I hope she comes to regard the Bennett sisters (particularly Jane and Elizabeth), Edmond Dantes, the March sisters (all of them...Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy), and Nancy (and Bess and George) as dear friends that she can visit whenever her heart desires.