http://www.jennfields.com/2007/11/01/soft-girls/ writer & editor Sun, 30 May 2010 20:25:59 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3 http://www.jennfields.com/2007/11/01/soft-girls/comment-page-1/#comment-123 Verna Wilder Sun, 11 Nov 2007 18:43:52 +0000 http://www.jennfields.com/2007/11/01/soft-girls/#comment-123 It's so easy to judge others when we're young, isn't it? No one is smarter than a 20-something, except maybe a teenager. And then we get some experience and we get older and start learning to really empathize -- and then come the Karma Chickens, coming home to roost, and we really get how much we really don't know and never have. Very humbling. I love this post because I can see where it's going, and I'm nodding my head, "Uh-huh, yep," and here comes the soft self, not pretty cookie soft but wiser soft, humbled soft, humble pie soft. Yep. Maybe the pretty cookie woman looks back on those days through a glaze of her own humblling experiences. And like Rosemary, as we grow older, we come to a physical softness that forces us to use what we have as we appreciate and let go of what he had. I have always been a soft woman, and I once forced myself into a cookie mother role. I am grateful to have lived long enough to move on to something that suited me better, but I swear that there were cookie mothers back then who really did find satisfaction in the role, and that needs to be ok, too. Thanks for a thought-provoking post, Jenn. It’s so easy to judge others when we’re young, isn’t it? No one is smarter than a 20-something, except maybe a teenager. And then we get some experience and we get older and start learning to really empathize — and then come the Karma Chickens, coming home to roost, and we really get how much we really don’t know and never have. Very humbling. I love this post because I can see where it’s going, and I’m nodding my head, “Uh-huh, yep,” and here comes the soft self, not pretty cookie soft but wiser soft, humbled soft, humble pie soft. Yep. Maybe the pretty cookie woman looks back on those days through a glaze of her own humblling experiences. And like Rosemary, as we grow older, we come to a physical softness that forces us to use what we have as we appreciate and let go of what he had. I have always been a soft woman, and I once forced myself into a cookie mother role. I am grateful to have lived long enough to move on to something that suited me better, but I swear that there were cookie mothers back then who really did find satisfaction in the role, and that needs to be ok, too. Thanks for a thought-provoking post, Jenn.

]]> http://www.jennfields.com/2007/11/01/soft-girls/comment-page-1/#comment-122 Rosemary Carstens Sat, 10 Nov 2007 04:48:33 +0000 http://www.jennfields.com/2007/11/01/soft-girls/#comment-122 Jenn: I really enjoyed this post. I've found in life that just when I think I've achieved some level of superiority, my lack of it hits me smack in the face! Through my teens (still doing sit ups when 7 months pregnant), 20s, 30s, and 40s, I worked out regularly and DID have a six pack, even though I was not particularly athletic and I didn't have much sports endurance. It was all gym work. I was perhaps too proud that I was staying in shape. Then I hit the 50s--and I couldn't burn fat to save my soul. I worked harder, but my skin tone began to slip and has continued to so so. I'm a soft woman now, have some arthritis and can't keep the pace when walking with those I used to easily OUTpace. It is so humbling--I'm forced now to exercise my intellectual muscles and HOPE TO GOD they, too, don't go soft! ha - Rosemary Carstens, http://www.carstenscommunications.com/FEAST.html Jenn: I really enjoyed this post. I’ve found in life that just when I think I’ve achieved some level of superiority, my lack of it hits me smack in the face! Through my teens (still doing sit ups when 7 months pregnant), 20s, 30s, and 40s, I worked out regularly and DID have a six pack, even though I was not particularly athletic and I didn’t have much sports endurance. It was all gym work. I was perhaps too proud that I was staying in shape. Then I hit the 50s–and I couldn’t burn fat to save my soul. I worked harder, but my skin tone began to slip and has continued to so so. I’m a soft woman now, have some arthritis and can’t keep the pace when walking with those I used to easily OUTpace. It is so humbling–I’m forced now to exercise my intellectual muscles and HOPE TO GOD they, too, don’t go soft! ha – Rosemary Carstens, http://www.carstenscommunications.com/FEAST.html

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