Lynn Peril - Authors in August

Lynn Peril is the author of three books, most recently Swimming in the Steno Pool: A Retro Guide to Making it in the Office, a history of women office professionals. Her column, The Museum of Femoribilia, appears in Bust magazine, and she is a regular contributor to HiLobrow.com. Her writing has also appeared in London’s Guardian newspaper, The New York Times, and on NPR’s “All Things Considered." She lives in Oakland, California, with her husband and three cats.

From the moment she’s wrapped in a pink blanket, long past the traumatic birthday when she realizes her age is greater than her bust measurement, the human female is bombarded with advice on how to wield [her] feminine wiles. This advice ranges from rather vague proscriptions along the lines of “nice girls don’t chew gum/swear/wear pants/fill-in-the-blank,” to obsessively elaborate instructions for daily living. How many women’s lives, for example, were enriched by former Miss America Jacque Mercer’s positively baroque description of the proper way to put on a bathing suit, as it appeared in her guide, How to Win A Beauty Contest (1960)?

[F]irst, roll it as you would a girdle. Pull the suit over the hips to the waist, then, holding the top away from your body, bend over from the waist. Ease the suit up to the bustline and with one hand, lift one breast up and in and ease the suit bra over it. Repeat on the other side. Stand up and fasten the straps.

Instructions like these made me bristle. I formed an early aversion to all things pink and girly. It didn’t take me long to figure out that many things young girls were supposed to enjoy, not to mention ways they were supposed to behave, left me feeling funny—as if I was expected to pound my square peg self into the round hole of designated girliness. I didn’t know it at the time, but the butterflies in my tummy meant I had crested the first of many hills on the roller coaster ride of femininity—or as I soon referred to it, the other F-word. Before I knew what was happening, I was hurtling down its track, seemingly out of control, and screaming at the top of my lungs.

--from Pink Think: Becoming a Woman in Many Uneasy Lessons (2002)

I am proud of all three of my books and could have chosen a selection from any of them. In the end, though, I chose the above from the introduction to Pink Think. If you’re unfamiliar with my work, this excerpt pretty much encapsulates my obsession with prescriptive literature, pop culture, and the dictates of “femininity.” But on a personal note, they also bring back a memory of the unfettered excitement I felt while writing that first draft of my first book. So much has changed in the publishing industry, let alone my life, since I wrote those paragraphs back in 1999. I wonder if I’ll ever feel that free again sitting at the keyboard.

Lynn Peril
August 2015