He Said/She Said

A version of this appeared in The Virginian-Pilot on September 24, 1995.

KERRY SAYS:

Hang on ladies, they've found another way for us to feel inadequate.

Is your waistline smaller than your head?

It's not? Shame on you. Quick, reach for the SlimFast or the Dexatrim.

In a magazine profile of Carolina Herrara, her husband gushes about the fashion designer's great beauty.

”Her older sister was supposed to be the most beautiful in the family, but I thought Carolina was,” raves Herrara's husband, Reinaldo. “She had a waist smaller than her head. Do you know that is the perfect proportion?”

No, Reinaldo, I didn't.

A waist smaller than her head? Did he say her waist was smaller than her HEAD? Is this man insane?

Give me a break.

If that's the new yardstick of beauty, I'd have to sprout a head the size of a beach ball to be in proportion.

Besides, who says it's the perfect proportion? A man, of course.

Men have always had peculiar ideas about what looks good on a woman. Most of us try to please - within reason.

Long hair, for instance. Men supposedly love it, but most women I know - busy women with more to do than stand there fussing with a curling iron every morning - would rather have short tresses.

Lingerie. Don't get me started. Men seem to love the stuff. Most women I know would rather sleep in an oversized T-shirt and crew socks than a skimpy red teddy with scratchy lace.

Then there are high heels. Face it, you guys love 'em because the strain of teetering around all day on our tippy toes leaves our calf muscles well-defined. Forget what's happening meantime to our poor toes and arches.

I could go on with things like garter belts, spaghetti straps, string bikinis.

But I have a sobering thought for all you guys who seem to be thinking with heads far smaller than your waistlines: Ever wonder why so many older women, once they're widowed - seem so happy, so content?

It's because they're wearing sensible shoes.

DAVE SAYS:

You really have to lay off reading those grocery-store magazines, Kerry. You're becoming a walking billboard of misinformation about what men like in women.

Never, in a lifetime of conversations in pool halls and locker rooms, have I heard a man mention a woman's head size and her waist size in the same sentence. Do you really think you'd hear this conversation in one of those places:

”Hey, Bob, how's it goin'? Still going out with Cheryl?”

”No, I had to break it off.”

”How's come?”

”Well, you know how it is. I found out her hatband was longer than her belt.”

”Oh, yeah, I know what ya mean. Bummer. But there's no way out when that happens. Ya gotta let 'em go.”

Get real, Kerry. Men may be shallow when it comes to appearances - no more so than women, I'll bet - but no guy I know would turn his back on a good woman because she's wearing a size 8 hat and size 9 jeans.

The difficulty with women and their appearance is that they're more likely to listen to some fashion guru from SoHo - or, in this case, a dress-designer's husband, of all things - than they are to the guy who's closest to them.

Think for a minute what you said about women wearing their hair long just to please men. You immediately mentioned that medieval torture device, the curling iron. Where did you get the idea that men prefer long hair that has been fried, nuked, twisted, teased, steamed and sauteed until it has the look and feel of baked seaweed?

Look around you, Kerry, at the women who have destroyed their hair, for life, by trying to make it look like something they saw in a grocery-store magazine. Do you think the guys they were trying to impress really wanted them to do that? Men tend to have two preferences in women's hair: soft and clean. The size of the head it's hiding is irrelevant.

And, as for that little red teddy you complained about, here's a clue: your husband doesn't expect you to sleep in the darned thing. Wear it occasionally, but after things quiet down a bit, ditch it for that comfortable T-shirt. He won't care. Like any of the rest of us, he'd be asleep by then anyway.