Inside and out and all the way through

It is lovely to be a beautiful woman, but today's definition is so much different than it was sixty years ago when I was four.

Back then little girls wore curls, long ones, lots of them.  Mothers dressed their daughters in white pinafores and smocked dresses.  Looks were almost everything. 

I was raised to be polite, accomplished.  I learned to do crossstitch at four and was "finished" as a teenager.

I was also counseled to make people feel comfortable, especially men, or boys.  I was supposed to  reflect the best of everyone back at them.

It was good to be a good student, well-read, informed, but the only people I could out-shine were other girls.

My education was wound over, around and through whatever it took to make myself a good wife and mother.  There was a standard joke back then.  Men went to college to get their BS, women to get their MRS.

I have found my place in this world and I am truly happy, but I want so much more for my granddaughters.  I want them to know they are beautiful inside and out and all the way through.