Raising only sons, I am endlessly fascinated by the delightful differences between males and females. For example, none of my sons -- even the most flamboyant -- would be caught dead at a hat party.
"Ooh, Tessa! I never knew you had red hair!"
[After a knock at the door]: "If you're a man -- STAY OUT!!!"
[In a lovely Cockney accent]: "Oh, not f'me. Too frum!"
I found a couple of beautiful snoods, which I still cherish to this day -- mostly because they let me hold my first experience of Israel close to me all of these years.
Now that I am privileged to live here, I attended my second hat party the other night. There were even more hats!
And the comments were just as cute.
"Miriam, it must be very hard to choose a hat, when everything looks so great on you!"
[After a knock at the door]: "If you're a man -- STAY OUT!!"
"[Sigh.] Some lucky people just have 'hat heads'."
One of the very different character traits between men and women is the competition thing. If men would hold a hat party, the comments would be more aggressive and joking -- dare I say "snide"? -- then at women's gatherings. Something like: Yankel, that hat makes your face look like a baseball. Well, thanks, Mordy. At least I don't look like I just sprouted feathers out of my ears. Oh, yeah? YEAH.
Women tend to encourage and help each other. Everyone wants to look better than she does; so she empathetically says nice things about her friend, or becomes her "personal shopper."
At the end of the experience, a girl feels like everyone is her friend, and she can't wait to get together with these lovely people again.
For more on the differences between men and women, especially applicable to this time of year, check out Jameel's Pesach cleaning post: "Mars & Venus on Erev Pesach Cleaning".
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