In a world with cookie cutter beauty queens and glammed up reality tv starlets the idea of standing out with one’s own can seem a bit daunting. The mom’s that proudly rock there own unique look with grace are truly wonderful and give their daughters a wonderful head start in the world where image is king.

My own mom shirked a lot of tradition in the realm of beauty – not born a buxom blonde she had to work with what she had: long limbs, brown hair, freckly skin. As I was growing up I noticed her penchant for cool.  On a whim and because she could she went ahead and got a bunch of piercings. But rather than having them spread freakishly over her body she just had them all along her ears. It was quirky and weird and very unlike everyone else’s mom. She didn’t need to push her standard of beauty in everyone’s face, but was happy to show was quirky and interesting but still professional and approachable. Nowadays she’s simplified her routine a little so there isn’t as many earrings, but just the fact that she was confident enough to reclaim her own beauty in a unique way has been very inspiring to me.

My mom just doesn’t  let the rest of the world make unreasonable demands on how she looks. She cuts her hair short, dyes it red herself, and doesn’t get too fussy with the makeup. Lucky for me she hasn’t force fed her own concept of beauty down my throat – allowing for a very different expression as I take inspiration from women’s magazines and celebrity style. But her influence has definitely taken root. No matter how much I take to a mainstream trend or look I always have to shape it to my own body, infuse it with my own personality.

My mom is beautiful this way and as a result so am I.

Since Mother’s Day is coming up I’ve been wondering how much of my own personality has been influenced by my mom’s. Am I my own mothers daughter? If not how has her example affected my life and values?  What of that of my girlfriends?

So I’ve decided this month to write about the ways in which my mother and other mother’s out there have shaped their daughters lives. Feel free to share your own examples with me here in the comments or email me.

Are we our mothers daughters? From fashion to beauty, work to play, our sexuality to body image lets take a look at the lessons our mother’s have lovingly shared with us.

Mother’s do a heckuva lot for us – more than just one day of chocolates and flowers warrants!

photo credit: Mubina H

“I heard someone once say that we’re only as sick as our secrets.” -Carrie Fisher’s Wishful Drinking

I have begun reading about Carrie Fisher’s crazy up and down life with delighted interest. After watching all the youtube videos of her I could find starting with the one below, and then reading a slew of articles and interviews I boogied on over to the library for a copy of her totally candid live-and-in-wacky-first-person autobiography Wishful Drinking.

My mother, whom I currently chaperon asks innocently “do you think you are bipolar?” then,
“all the people I’ve heard about being bipolar are really hard to live with.”

She’s so wonderful and seems blithely forgetful of the often emotionally torturous years her and my father have survived in raising me. That or she took a good measure of peace in her office miles away while I raged home alone with my brother. No matter, she has always taken my intensity in stride…as best she can anyway.

Alright…gotta get back to the book. Here’s that vid I was talkin about an excerpt from the amazing documentary hosted by Stephen Fry “The Secret Life of a Manic Depressive”:

By the way, did you notice how I totally posted this out of sequence? Yeah, it’s been a weird…project.