Know Your Worth

A message for childless cat ladies and any group of people they love to hate

I recently made friends with a girl from Turkey.  We were in a small town in North Macedonia, each arguing at the taxi stand with local cabbies who were quoting us triple price, and nothing makes for fast friends like a common enemy.  

After splitting a cab to the bus station, we grabbed two seats next to each other and prepared for the long drive across the border into Albania.  As we began chatting she said something (I can’t remember what) that made realize she was not aware of our age gap. She was young—mid-20s.  

“Well, I’m older than you,” I clarified.

“How old are you?” she asked, predictably.

“41”

“Whuuuuuuaaahhh,” she gasped, audibly, eyes widening.

I mean you would think I had just told this girl that I had been diagnosed with a terminal illness or was scheduled to be euthanized at the end of the week.  

She looked at me concerned and was still clearly in the bargaining phase as she processed this information.

“But you look young.”

I smiled. Yes.

And I remember being so young that 41 sounded terrifyingly old.  41 sounded like a person who did not look or act how I look and act now.  

I was too amused to be insulted.  Instead I felt curious.

I started asking her about what age means to her and we had a wonderful conversation about age, time, phases of life, the challenges of navigating friendships in your late 20s.

I was so glad to be sitting where I was, with perspective and time on my side, without all the fear and anxiety and frustration of that era of life.  And also I was feeling wistful for the simple innocence of being that young and afraid of what lay ahead.

All the fears she laid out before me were valid. I could not promise or dismiss them all away.  So instead I reassured her that alongside all the changes that time will inevitably bring her, there would also be a greater sense of freedom from external pressures and social obligations.  

I recently learned that the man I thought I was going to spend the rest of my life with is dating a 29 year old.  She is 12 years—a full generation—younger than me.

I wish I could tell you that this information meant nothing to me but it brought up every fear, every ugly thing I have been made to believe about my age and place in this world as a woman.  

I grew up between two cultures that each hate women in their own way.  Growing up in the Iranian community single, unmarried, childless women were looked down on in the worst way.  To be single and unwed as a woman was the greatest source of shame.  They would say, ‘torshideh’, which means ‘she has soured.’  And what sours? What expires after its sell date?  Milk.  Food.  Over-ripened fruit that rots.  All that we consume, what exists for our nourishment and no longer serves a purpose. 

And the US is no better in this regard. ‘Cue the obligatory single cat lady reference from the guy who loves couches.’ Not only is it a part of the national discourse at this very moment, it’s part of how the dominant culture I grew up in has always discussed and portrayed women.  Look at how even the non-extremists and mainstream media discuss Kamala (and, yes, I think it is a good thing that Biden dropped out and insiders within the Democratic Party pushed for it, as discussed in my last newsletter).  I don’t have to like or support Kamala or her policies to feel for her as a woman, a woman of color, and the daughter of immigrants.  Regardless of politics, there is an undeniable amount of energy devoted to picking women in positions of power apart—their laugh, their clothes, the way they assert themselves.  

I don’t agree with her shutting down the protesters and at the same time I feel for her.  If she had been more accommodating to the protesters then the talking heads would have spent endless news cycles analyzing whether she has the leadership ability to handle the job and whether people will respect her in a position of authority.  Women in leadership positions (and women in general) are always evaluated for their likeability. Men like Joe Biden, George W. Bush, and even Obama, are portrayed as folksy and likeable but the women are not given this same treatment.  We kind of hate them.  They’re definitely not people we want to get a beer with.  If they laugh, we mock them. If they are assertive, they’re unlikeable.  I’m not saying we should give Kamala a pass but only that I can empathize with the position she is in and understand that even when she wins she never will win.

In my work, I often have supervised younger women and one of the most painful things is watching supremely bright, hard working, and ambitious women twist themselves into knots trying to get approval and permission from the people around them.  They will come to me wondering how they can improve a relationship with a competitive or territorial coworker, they will fill out their self-evaluation with a mountain of self-criticism when they are consistently outperforming all their peers.  It is painful to watch them and see pieces of myself and how often I worked myself to death thinking I had to prove myself and get permission simply to exist.  For so long I thought I was pursuing my career out of passion and running towards something but I now realize how much I was running—from my own lack of worth and from the fear that people like me can’t make it or get into a leadership position.

I was good at my job, like really good at it.  But I always worried I wasn’t. That I needed to do it better.  To be perfect.  And if someone became competitive or territorial I always assumed it was something about me, and that if I could just be better I would figure out how to deal with it.  Yes of course it was always ‘my tone’, or ‘my approach’, or whatever euphemism for workplace microaggressions you want to insert.  And when it comes to my love life, I have always been a really good girlfriend.  Not to say I am always without fault but looking back I can see my romantic history a little more clearly.  Back when I was a freshman in college, I was pulling a 4.0, and my boyfriend at the time eventually confessed to me that he was intentionally distracting me and trying to get me not to study to sabotage me.  (Yes, I know how this sounds, but we remain friends to this day and he insists the reason we broke up was he was young and immature).  Then my boyfriend in my early 30s would constantly criticize me—my clothes, my mannerisms—but it wasn’t until only recently that he confessed he had felt insecure about his finances and career but the young girl he is seeing now is in the same boat financially and professionally as him. Suddenly, it clicked for me. Here I had wasted years of my life feeling that I had been too flawed for him when in fact he never felt good enough or on my level.

Like the young girl I had met on the bus, I used to be terrified of aging, too. But I finally now at 41 understand the reason people don’t like unmarried, single women has nothing to do with our appearance, our attractiveness, or our sexuality.  People don’t like us because we have outgrown the point of maximum utility.  We are no longer malleable.  Our sexual power is at its height but our meekness disappears.  That is what men fear.  It’s not a laugh line or a wrinkle that terrifies them but a woman who knows her worth.  This is what an employer, the media, and your boyfriend can’t touch—a woman who doesn’t believe she is worth less or has something to prove. 

I want to put my arms around each of the young women I mentor, supervise, encounter on my path—to the young Turkish girl on the bus next to me and to any young woman or person of color who is reading this—and say all this fear and terror they put into you is designed to keep you small and to doubt yourself. Because they fear you may realize your own strength and worth and want more.  Whether it’s your boss, the state, or the man in your bed. 

It’s hard that some lessons you only learn through pain. It’s hard to watch unnecessary suffering and struggle. If you’re young and femme and reading this, I hope you learn sooner than I did. I hope it takes less for you to see how much you are really worth.