The Muse
On the burden of female likability
“You should at least smile a little more!” says the old man as I walk by, his foul breath and unkempt appearance attracting far less attention from strangers than my refusal to make them all feel seen by giving away one of my pretty smiles for free.
I did not know I owed every person, particularly every man, the warmth and kindness I have learned to offer only when my existence feels uncompromised by my interactions.
Only when my body silently agrees.
Solely when I feel at ease.
There is something about my seriousness and the sharpness of my features that unsettles the average male.
Something in the way I have grown to enjoy the feeling of taking up space, precisely the one thing we, as women, become socialized not to indulge in.
Careful there.
You run the risk of turning into a bitch. The real kind.
And then? Who’s going to want you?
Better be the muse — an empty, approachable vessel where others pour their expectations, their hunger, their fantasies. And you, like the good, good woman you are, will help them make those dreams come true.
In the end, what else could you possibly be here for?
Of course I have been there. I have stripped myself of complexity a thousand times, all for the comfort of the male gaze.
Yet, after years of making oneself small, of silently agreeing to do what is expected, after enduring men who take what they want without warning, without explanation — time and time again — bitterness surfaces. And nothing cuts deeper than the dagger of distance, of unavailability.
But what is there left to do in a world that cannot bear the weight of our wholeness?