You should be able to count on one hand the things that make you feel sexy. My list is as follows: lingerie, Aretha Franklin’s greatest hits LP and last season’s GAP blazer.
The latest addition to the list ”” high heels.
Something about those extra four inches can make a woman feel diabolically unstoppable ”” in the classroom, in the workplace and even in the bedroom.
Take French entertainer Jeanne Bourgeois, whose legs were insured for 500,000 francs and throughout the 1920s was the highest paid female entertainer in the world. Or the ultimate femme fatale Jessica Rabbit, the sexiest cartoon character of all time. Or co-founder and editor of The Huffington Post Arianna Huffington, who was named one of Forbes Magazine’s World’s 100 Most Powerful Women in 2010.
What do these woman have in common? They each rose to the top of their profession, all while wearing heels.
However, with any great success, pain and pleasure are necessary.
To my dismay, heels two inches and higher may, over time, contribute to joint degeneration and knee osteoarthritis, according to one of New York City’s premier Podiatric physicians Dr. Jacqueline Sutera.
The news was hard to digest. I have come to realize that heels are incredibly fulfilling, and just like pain and pleasure, are necessary. Plus, I just dropped a pretty penny on a pair of four-inch Sam Edleman wedges. What can I say, they made me feel capable.
I believe UK shoe designer Terry DeHavilland said it best: “People say they’re bad for the feet but they’re good for the mind. What’s more important?”
As I removed a pair of ancient heels to make room for the new, I was reminded of the words of a former professor: Get rid of every accessory, item of clothing and pair of shoes that you have not worn in the last three months.
I routinely follow his advice and I encourage readers to as well.
Rummage through your closets, dresser drawers and storage. Sort through the clothes that make you feel capable, from the clothes that make you feel buyers remorse.
What is the reason behind keeping clothes that you never wear anyways? Sentimental value? That designer label? Or the “it was a gift” excuse. If you are not going to rock it, give it to someone who will.
The Salvation Army distributes a tax-deductible value of any items donated, local consignment stores like Repeat Performance and Plato’s Closet pay cash, and if you are feeling charitable, donate to a campus clothing drive.
Wherever you stand, in whatever you are standing in, own it. Be sexy. Create a list of your own and ditch everything else.
SecretAgent • Feb 3, 2011 at 10:20 pm
Danielle doesn’t need high heels to look sexy; all she has to do is stand there and breathe.
SecretAgent • Feb 3, 2011 at 10:20 pm
Danielle doesn’t need high heels to look sexy; all she has to do is stand there and breathe.
Anna Jacobsen • Feb 2, 2011 at 11:14 pm
Did you know that heels trace their historic roots to the ancient practice of foot binding? So what used to be a symbol of female oppression is now a avenue of expressing female empowerment. Ironic, isn’t it?
Anonymous • Feb 2, 2011 at 4:36 pm
Q: “If it makes you feel sexy, why not?”
A: “heels two inches and higher may, over time, contribute to joint degeneration and knee osteoarthritis, according to one of New York City’s premier Podiatric physicians Dr. Jacqueline Sutera.”
This article is equally divided into two barely related subjects. High heels make the author feel sexy, at a price, and this is good for the author’s affect. Then there is a bizarre turn as the author begins to talk about throwing out clothes that are of little use anymore, or giving them to charity. Then, as if in a moment of clarity the author realizes that she has really written two smaller opinion articles, she brings it full circle with a couple of sentences about the importance of being sexy.
The puzzled reader is left haunted with a few questions after this shallow turn of phrase and rhetoric. Why does the author feel sexy when she wears high heel shoes or listen to Aretha Franklin? Is sexiness a product of the clothes that one wears, the stuff that one has purchased, or is it an inner quality, a certain confidence that transcends fashion and rather is sourced from some inner well of confidence? It is my assertion that the answer to the latter is yes, and that women with self confidence and self esteem do not need things like high heeled shoes to feel “diabolically unstoppable.”
Philosotroll • Feb 3, 2011 at 1:29 am
Normally I’m with you on this kind of stuff, but I think you’re actually missing the point of the article. It doesn’t seem to be extraordinarily well communicated, so let me take a crack at it (the author is welcome to respond for herself; correct me if I get things wrong here, please).
(1) There is a potential health risk to wearing high heels. (2) Wearing high heels makes the author feel sexy.
Now, the problem expressed in the article is prioritizing the two facts. Which takes priority? Whether or not the author wants to feel sexy or prevent long term joint degeneration? Frankly, I like the expression of the problem more than the solution, but both are there, even if it takes a little cryptology to locate them.
You can argue that the fact that the fact that high heels make the author feel sexy is indicative of a materialistic culture in which women are encouraged to be obsessed with shoes. That’s fine. It remains a fact about the internal, intentional states of the author. You may not have a positive intentionality towards the author’s expressed intentional state (or towards high heeled shoes, the object of that intentional state, themselves) but, as the agent, the author makes decisions based on the way that the shoes make her feel.
If the author was wearing high heeled shoes because they made misogynists (like me; and perhaps many of the other men that she’s around) more interested in her and, as such, more compliant (a word I’ve chosen to be generous both to the author and those of my ilk) then you might have a valid point about the role of social materialism in decision making. That’s a fine feminist argument; I agree with it (and I hope other people do too, because it’s a pretty tough one to fight against).
Also, I think that’s a false dilemma at the end. Firstly, sexiness isn’t expressed in this article as a “quality” (something that is a property of the person) but as a “state.” I prefer that usage, personally. But is there any reason that an inner state cannot be derived from external “stuff?” No. Actually, that happens all the time.