by Freida Marie Crump
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Greetin’s from the Ridge.
She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. Mrs. Lindsay would walk into class each morning and I’d think to myself, "Yea, that’s what a classy woman ought to look like."
Mrs. Lindsay nearly always wore simple floral prints, high heels, and her hair seemed to be sculpted into place. I sat in the second seat, first row of my elementary school classroom and marveled at how a lady could put herself together so perfectly every morning.
And I can remember her fingernails…long and fire engine red, and just the right length to flip open a jar of paste or comb a 6-year-old’s unruly hair. Her lipstick matched her polish, and there was always a hint of rouge on each cheek. The tall, thin teacher would walk up and down the rows, carefully pronouncing each word on our spelling test, and except for the one day she caught me with the answers tucked between my knees, she treated me like something too special for words.
The big event of the year was the bean planting. We each poked a bean into a small plastic cup, placed it on the windowsill with our name attached, then watched to see whose bean would be the first to sprout. Mine never came up. Every time Mrs. Lindsay would leave the classroom I’d water it within an inch of its leguminous life and I think I eventually drowned the thing. Once all the other beans had sprouted and mine had turned into a soggy glob, Mrs. Lindsay secretly switched the nametags on her bean plant and mine. I had the tallest bean plant on the windowsill and only she and I knew what had occurred. Mrs. Lindsay was one gorgeous woman.
An old classmate recently brought me a picture of our little crew from grade school. We were lined up on the gymnasium bleachers, spit-polished and ramrod straight for the yearbook picture. I always took goofy pictures and this old photograph was no exception. There was Gary who would shoot mustard across the table at me during lunch hour, Margaret who was the best softball player in Coonridge Elementary and was always chosen first, Darrin who we knew would be in jail before he graduated and now has three boys of his own and can’t figure out why they cause him so much grief. And then there was…Whoa. Wait a minute. That couldn’t be Mrs. Lindsay.
The lady sitting on the top row with a teacher’s weary smile and a hand on spastic Janet’s shoulder couldn’t be the same Mrs. Lindsay who once gave me her lunch when mine got crushed under Burt Scranton’s foot. This woman was old! She was more than old, she was …well…wrinkled and sort of tiny. Something was wrong with the photograph. She had lines in her face and even the faded black and white photo, I could see that her hands were arthritic and curled. What had happened to the most beautiful lady in the world?
The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis did an analysis of looks and job promotion and found that if you want to get ahead it helps to be good looking, slender and tall. If you’re gorgeous, it increases your chances of being paid more for what you do.
Frumpily built women seemed to fare the worst in the study, and smaller men seemed to come out on the short end of the stick.
Of course this comes as a terrible blow to most of us, and it flies in the face of logic for anyone who’s known a gorgeous airhead. I’m trying to think of a single acquaintance of mine who would truly label herself gorgeous, so the researchers in charge of the study, Kristie Engemann and Michael Owyang have done nothing but managed to depress most of us. (I wonder Engemann and Owyang have considered a study on the effect of strange-sounding last names and corporate promotion?)
The fact is, Mrs. Lindsay was beautiful, and my young eyes apparently weren’t paying a bit of attention to how she looked. Make a quick mental list of the most influential and loving people in your life and I’ll bet you my Mary Kay Time Wise Age-Fighting Eye Cream that your choices have nothing to do with their height, weight, or complexion. Perhaps the corporate world has different standards, and their criteria for promotion is as honest as their retirement fund accounts.
All the research makes about as much sense as the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis becoming the authority on such things. If they want to know beautiful, they should study bean plants.
You ever in Coonridge, stop by. We may not answer the door but you’ll enjoy the trip.