Ineligible

I have been reading old blogs and comments and two images haunt me: the super-capable Trad Catholic college girl whose intended's chosen career was "poet," and the happily employed young Trad Catholic woman who is called a feminist by the young Trad Catholic men around because she likes her job.

It has reached my ears that Catholic men are still teasing Catholic women by calling them feminists. As this first happened to me over 30 years ago, I wonder if it is not becoming a tradition in itself. It is intensely aggravating, especially if you are in the frontlines against feminist ire, as I was as a leading member of University of Toronto for Life. 

However, it is probably a natural development of the teasing boys do in elementary school: the hair pulling, the sticking-the-sharp-pencil-in-the-back, the daily declarations that "You're ugly," the bra-snapping and other forms of sexual harassment. It makes sense in the context of our societies' hellbent attempts to keep men adolescents forever. Yes, I do suspect that the men who still enjoy upsetting women have not entirely moved on from their elementary school days. 

I used to get furious and scold such men. My friend Stef, tall and elegant, merely smiled pityingly and ignored them. And now that I think about it, not a single one of the young men who enjoyed calling me a feminist in 1990 is happily married today. Possibly one way Trad girls could handle being called a feminist is to pretend the man has just said "I'm unmarriageable." 

Scooter: Hey, Suzie, what are you going to do with a Physics degree anyway?

Suzie: I think I'll work in a lab until I get married and have children.

Scooter: That's because you're a feminist. 

Suzie: Oh, don't say that, Scooter. I'm sure you have many good points. 

Now that I think about it, though, a man whose idea of a good time is telling supremely marriageable women--kind, modest, brave, hardworking, churchgoing, young Catholic girls--that they're feminists, really is saying that he is ineligible. It's hard to see this when he is young, slim and good-looking; it will be easier when he's fat, red-faced and fifty. 

Scooter (age 50): So, Suzie Junior, are you going into Physics like your mother did?

Suzie Junior: No, Mr. Campbell. I'm thinking about Law.

Scooter: I guess you're a real feminist, eh? Haw, haw, haw! 

Suzie Junior. Oh, please don't say that, Mr. Campbell. I'm sure you'll find somebody someday. 

If I'm sounding unusually acid *, it is because I know something traditionalist Catholic girls don't necessarily know, and it is that they are deeply, supremely and ontologically valuable. If they continue to be themselves--kind, modest, brave, hardworking, churchgoing--they will very probably become mothers of infants as well as life companions to good men who recognize their worth. (That is excepting, of course, those girls who choose--I don't want to hear any of this future-freezing "discernment" nonsense--who CHOOSE to become Brides of Christ.) But even if these splendid girls don't eventually marry and have children, they are, in their very persons, the preservation of the civility of Western Civilization. It was to protect girls like them that past generations of young men were willing to wage war and older ladies like me waded into embarrassing scenes gripping umbrellas. 

This is, by the way, what older people really mean when they say, "Don't lower yourself." (It sounds like they're saying you're low already, but they mean the exact opposite: you're supremely valuable and as a valuable being, you should act and dress accordingly, with modesty and grace.) It is also why I absolutely advise against young women asking young men to dance or on dates or any of those other things old people once called "running after men." It is wrong for young women to chase after young men because they run the very real risk of choosing the wrong men. 

Choosing the wrong man can be fatal to one of your most valuable possessions as a young woman--time--for if you are very unlucky, he will accept your advances and lap up your flattering attention without ever doing anything much to deserve it. He won't ask to marry you, for why should he? He probably hasn't grown up yet and, when he does grow up, he may break up with you (or flee in relief when you break up with him) and pursue a girl who embodies his unconscious idea of female perfection, e.g. his Primary 2 teacher, Mrs O'Connor, when she was 24. 

The right men are men who have thoroughly grown up (and not all men do grow up, sadly) and recognize the right women's worth. They will find excuses and opportunities to spend time with the women they admire. These men are friendly and funny; they do not try to make the women they admire angry or want to cry. They don't realize it yet, but you are the spitting images of their favourite primary teachers/babysitters/Blue Peter hostess when they were your age. These are the only men worth bestowing your affections on. 

This brings me to the subject of crushes. Crushes are as common as the common cold. They are just emotional flu. They happen to everybody: four-year-olds, fourteen-year-olds, priests, old married ladies. The objects of these crushes are often inappropriate, and the reasons for the crush are often irrational. My first crush object was a cartoon character, and I got the most terrible crush on an older girl when I was 13. (I shudder to think what ideological straitjackets adults today would have forced me into.) In between, I had a crush on a small English immigrant because of his long eyelashes and on various other boys, not because they paid any kindly attention to me whatsoever, but because of what they looked like or how well they played ice hockey.

Treated correctly, crushes go away. Encouraged, however, they can turn into a form of emotional pneumonia. There is no shame in a woman getting a quiet crush, which nobody can really help, but indulging one is as imprudent as going out with wet hair when you have a fever or a runny nose. When you have the flu or cold and a wet head and now want to sleep in the asparagus trench in your soggy garden, it is time to go to confession. 

In short, when you get a crush on someone inappropriate, you must take care that it goes away ASAP. (The older you get, the quicker you will go about this.) You do not seek the person out. You do not search the internet for his photo. You do not discuss him with your friends. You do not contemplate whether his indifference to you is just evidence that he is shy and just needs a little encouragement.  (No.) You force yourself to be rooted in reality and admit that you would prefer a man who boldly asks you out for coffee and brings you flowers on Valentine's Day. 

If your radar is tuned so that you can hear your crush's name at 40 paces, feel free to listen (silently) to gossip about him that will dash your hopes for good. It could be sublime, e.g. that he told Mary Catherine O'Houlahan that, because the genocide of 1915-1916 almost wiped out his people, he feels he could only ever marry a fellow Armenian. It could be unpleasant, e.g. that he told Suzie McCoy that she was a feminist for wanting to work in a lab until she marries and has children. Either way, it will be medicinal.

Many years ago I knew a girl--age 13, so this is impressive--who cured a crush on a boy by concentrating on his shoes. He wore battered trainers that she very much disliked. By disliking his trainers even more intensely, she got over him. If all else fails, give that a try. 

 

*It's also because I read my blogpost about men whose Traditional Catholic Singles ads consist of their theological interests and reproductive demands instead of important information like the professions they will pursue so that their future wives and children have food to eat. 

UPDATE Concerning discernment: if the idea of becoming a cloistered nun, religious, priest or permanent unvowed single person makes you burst into tears of grief and disappointment, congratulations! Your discernment is over.