#GirlsShitToo

Make Up Your Minds, Girls

On Saturday, Roy checked the mail and came back with some letters from colleges I had applied to, including different campuses of CSU. He called mom into the kitchen, and they both waited impatiently for me to open them. "Can't I do this by myself?" I asked.

"No!"

So I opened them slowly, making the wait even more excruciating for them. I was pretty nervous myself, even though I shouldn't have been; I was a pretty good student. I shouldn't have been surprised when the letters began similarly, "We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted..."

Mom and Roy both hugged me and told me they were proud, but I knew that underneath the pride was the financial worry, the "how the eff are we going to afford university for Josh and Dallas and eventually Jace"? But, like many people who worry about money, the two of them decided the best course of action at that moment was to spend more money, celebrating with dinner at a fancy Italian restaurant.

Mom spent most of the evening figuring out what to wear. She took around an hour just get dressed. She kept asking things like, "Should I wear a dress, or a top with a skirt?"

"Don't know, Mom."

"Does this necklace go with this?"

"Sure."

"These boots don't look good with this blouse, do they..."

"You look fine!"

"Ugh, I'm gonna change into pants."

"Mom! Hurry up! You seriously look fine!"

Dressing for the occasion took me much less time, less than five minutes. I hadn't worn a bra for a month, so I decided to wear one, hoping nobody who might tattle on me to Adree for not letting go of my femininity would be there.

When we got to the restaurant, I quickly concluded...bras sucked. They really did. They were so uncomfortable. I mean, why were girls forced to wear a piece of clothing with a metal wire in it? It was so restricting... like a prison for our boobs.

It was funny, because for the first two weeks of no bra wearing, I felt uncomfortable. I felt like people were looking at me and assuming I was a slut, like I was inviting them to try to make out the shapes of my nipples and more, just like those guys at the deli seemed to be doing. I felt uncomfortable in my mind.

But this...this was literally uncomfortable. How did ladies get used to this? How did I get used to this? Never again! I didn't care where I was...I was never wearing a bra again.

I was thinking that, for the next day, I should probably do a vlog about prison bras or something, but then I accidentally started eavesdropping on the couple—a man and woman—sitting behind us. They were trying to pick out an appetizer.

"What about clams?" he said.

"A salad sounds nice?"

"I think we should eat clams."

"Okay."

Then she was having trouble figuring out what entree she wanted.

"I think I might get the pasta?"

"Honey, you never like red sauces that much."

"Oh. Okay. What do you think I should get?"

"Well you like fish, don't you?"

"Sometimes."

"Why don't you get the salmon?"

"Okay. I guess."

I wanted to yell at both of them, to tell him to let her make her own decisions and to tell her to do a better job at making those decisions.

It reminded me of just hours before when I had wanted to scream at Mom to just make a decision, but I had refrained.

But now I realized that I shouldn't refrain...girls and women needed to realize that sometimes, they needed to be decisive, especially in the journey for equality. Because when we didn't make decisions, we let men step in to make them for us, and we let them stay in the lead.

Jace started crying because he was hungry, and Mom groaned. "Oh, I knew I should have worn that other dress! It's so much easier to breastfeed in."

I rolled my eyes. Later that night, my annoyance fueled the creation of my vlog. 

Make Up Your Minds, Girls

Published on April 3, 2015

Youtube Video Transcript:

Hi everyone! Dallas here with Girls Drool Too. Today I'm going to talk about indecision, which has been shown to be a girl thing, and a bad girl thing at that.

Now, I will apologize to my mom in advance for blasting her, so: sorry mom. Here goes.

Yesterday we were going out to dinner. We made last-minute reservations at this really delicious Italian restaurant for 5:30. Mom started getting ready at 4:00, which took her forever, and this wasn't including the shower she took in the morning. She only started picking out her outfit at like 4:45. And she tried on (I'm not kidding you) like nine outfit combinations. Some of them she tried on more than once. I was like, "Mom, hurry the frick up, we need to go eat pasta."

And yes, we were late for our reservation. We still got in, but I was starving.

Why are we girls so indecisive? Why can't we just make up our minds? If we utterly need to adopt a trait from masculinity, then it's the ability to make up our minds faster. To be decisive.

But most of us are hesitant, fearful, or unsure of ourselves. Most of us girls are so unsure of our own thoughts that we just let men dominate the conversation and our choices, we let them be the leaders. We don't feel our opinions are worthy, and maybe that's why our opinions aren't valued as much as men's. We don't put them forth with confidence, with aggression, not even to ourselves.

If my mom had had confidence, she would've seen that the first outfit she wore was just fine. She's worn it before with confidence, and it was fine then, too.

But nine outfits later...well, at that point, I was just hangry.