There are compelling images of human tragedy, and then there are the depressing images of human mediocrity. I'm fortunate enough to live in a society where I am all but spared the former; it's the latter that I see daily.
The Woman Wearing Nude Pantyhose with White Sneakers:
This woman causes my heart to clinch in fear. There was a survey done which found that women, no matter how well they were doing in life, were still afraid of ending up as homeless bag ladies. And it's true, most of us are neurotic and suspicious of our own success. But women who have climbed high enough not to fear falling to bag lady status are terrified of falling to Woman Wearing Nude Pantyhose with White Sneakers status.
You see this woman at 8:45am and 5:15pm, walking briskly down the sidewalk toward the bus stop or the subway. She is forty-something now, but she let herself go at 28. Those white sneakers? She used to wear them to aerobics class in the eighties, before she turned 28 and let herself go. She wears those Reeboks because damn it, they are still in good shape even if her ass isn't.
This woman telegraphs that she hasn't had sex in decades, and that she may never have sex again; she has a cat, and houseplants, and borrows paperback romance novels from the library. She's never been married and hasn't changed her hairstyle since 1989. She'll never leave her job, where she is considered reliable and passive, and where a young crop of ambitious twenty-somethings laughs at her dated makeup behind her back.
You see this woman and you wonder if it was ever different for her; if she was ever young and beautiful and in love. You wonder if she was ever someone just like you are today, and you decide that maybe she was, and then you wonder what kind of terrible thing happened that changed all of that forever -- a broken engagement, a broken heart -- was it a slow or sudden resignation?
She is the kind of woman that Oprah loves to get her hands on for a makeover and a firm talking-to. I wonder if Oprah also looks at women like this with fear, seeing the version of herself that could have been, the frightening shadow of possibility that lurked behind the self who found love and success. It's less terrifying, less depressing, to think that it's not too late for this woman to be saved from her nude hose and her white Reeboks; if she can be convinced to cut her hair and throw out the blue eyeshadow and put on high heels again...if she can be saved from neutering herself out of lonliness, then we know that at least there is hope for that alternative self we hope never to become.