pinstriped pants and pearls

today i am wearing pants that make me feel like a man. they are pinstriped and a little too short.

i've tried to feminize them with lipstick, and hair that has a little bit of swagger and sway. i made sure my pocketbook was a matching shade of camel, and that my vintage belt hung low enough on my hips as to say, yes i am a woman.

but that's just it. i am a woman. i contain multitudes, to paraphrase. i can be sharp-edged and slick, and i can be crumbly and so soft its devastating. in my closet hang dress slacks and evening gowns. i'll blast backstreet boys in my car then quote rilke. it's the contradiction of it all that makes it so very beautiful.

just yesterday, i developed a powerpoint, wrote proposals. calmed frantic salesmen. and in my little office, the one right next to the highway, with the window beside the parking lot that catches the late afternoon sun, i was at home in my corporate corner. then, i came home to a dog stricken with allergies, and spent twenty minutes bandaging him up and cooing into his wet nose. and again, i felt at home.

so today my pants flap a little in the breeze and would look more appropriate on the legs of the man sitting in front of me. it's nothing new and nothing a fresh swipe of lipstick won't fix. and compared to the girls wearing teensy shorts, ushering the summer out in a special style, i like to think the modesty of them makes me a little mysterious.

and what is a woman if not mysterious, no?