Betty White
NBC
The E! Fashion Police don’t get it. You don’t point out our accent and talk about how our arms are too short. And don’t think we’re dull because we have messy black-and-white photos in our bedroom.
That, of course, is no less than the lament of many an over-45 stoner. A bicoastal kind of bicoastal, where my perfect apartment in Seattle is totally untidy, and where my apartment in NY is completely gleaming in the sunlight with a perfect life painted on my walls.
Sounds like heaven to me, but to the aforementioned Style Police, mine is “messy” and “out of order” and “painful to look at.”
That’s a shame. I love my “messy apartment.” I love the state of it, and I think it has more to do with my personality than it does anything else. I may not be in the least bit retiring. I may not be overly committed to things that others would consider fashionable. But I am sure that I don’t conform to the stereotype that’s shoved into our heads about the women we should or shouldn’t be. It all depends on what you look at me as, what you value, and what sort of person you think I am.
And that to me is a testament to who I am, and to the idea that “women lie to themselves so often.”
The woman in white who exists outside of her self. The woman who exists in her quiet, empty, seemingly meaningless state, not one of a million million social media influencers, binged-watching the latest Netflix show, worrying about how her mascara didn’t stay put…Who would normally live a wonderful, healthy, and overwhelming life of few distractions, contributing to everything that was happening…
But this woman exists here, and here, and here, without needing to show off it. She is listening to music, reading magazines, and eating beans. And she is losing herself in the cloud. And she is alone. Alone in herself. It’s perfect.
What I love most about my apartment is how calm it makes me feel. It feels very much a ‘home’ to me. And when my life feels a little chaotic, I know I have found something that I love, something that will allow me to enjoy it, sleep and eat as I please, and breathe easily.
Sleep, for instance, I’ve never had the luxury of sleeping in my own bed. What a huge luxury to have that bedroom ready and waiting. And I need to sometimes stop and drink a cup of coffee to get ready in the morning. I never had that luxury before my apartment was my home. My ‘white woman’ name, of course, being Pixie Dust, because it has taken over my life. Which is perfect. That’s why I’ve always been very open about my ‘dress-how-you-feel-today’ approach to life, and my body, which was always a source of jokes.
Which is why I’ll take my messy apartment over a clean one any day.