A note from a stranger on a train

Forgotten feelings were unleashed....

Last Friday, I took a seat on the district line tube, on my way to Temple station. On the empty seat next to me was a postcard, with a post-it note stuck on it saying ‘Please pick me up & turn.’ Irresistible, even though I assumed it was going to either some sort of religious lecture, or the doomsday gospel of a mad conspiracist.

But no, it was a stamped postcard waiting for a random stranger to fill out and send, to an art student, who is apparently putting together a project ‘exploring how we mask our “imperfections”’. I’ve removed the recipient’s address from the pic, for obvious reasons.

The question to answer was, ‘Is there something you keep feeling judged for?’

I thought this was a novel way to conduct research. I felt quite charmed by this analogue approach to communication. I felt almost as if, as I was ‘the one’ who found this on my morning commute, I had a duty to oblige the request to participate. In that moment though, I underestimated the complicated feelings it would unleash.

And thus, it actually took a full 24 hours before I could commit to writing on that postcard because, well: the question really made me sit with the whole notion of judgement in a way that I don’t think I’ve ever done before.

Almost immediately, I found myself wondering about the gender of the enquirer. Because that question - ‘Is there something…’ implies that there might be one, singular thing that you could write about being judged for, when I can’t think of one woman I know who doesn’t feel judged, intrinsically and relentlessly, on countless fronts.

Maybe that’s unfair of me, to think men are less inclined to feel that pressure bearing down on them. But I know from within my own four walls that my husband doesn’t come up against the same daily minefields that I do. I’m thinking in particular here about how no one has ever grilled him about why he ‘only’ has one child, or made probing enquiries - and then offered unsolicited opinions - about our childcare arrangements when she was a baby. (Witness the scenes at a press conference in The Oval Office last week. Does anyone think Donald Trump would have been beaming warmly if it was a woman, instead of Elon Musk, with a child atop her shoulders? For that matter, would a woman with 12 children with three different fathers be anywhere near that place?) I don’t think that my husband, or any other men I know, have ever had random people in the street regularly pass comment on how they look on any particular day, in the way that I and most of my female friends have.

I think that’s what made this little postcard more confronting than I was expecting. I could write my own thesis on this. Which, of the many ways in which I feel judged, day in and day out, would be THE one that was worth writing down here? How would I edit my thoughts on this just one thing down to fit into this tiny space?

For the first time I can ever remember, I really thought about the vast, ever-expanding universe of judgements that we take in, internalise and either react to and try and change ourselve or just silently endure, try to ignore and carry on. They’re so commonplace, so relentless that it takes a life time of training yourself to try to stop letting them in. They’re the white noise that are seemingly the consequence of every single life decision made. They are always accompanied by the weight of countless raised eyebrows, eye rolls, awkward silences and all those uninvited, loudly expressed opinions about how you should be living your life. You can muffle the din of that noise, to some extent, but you can never completely silence it. Or stop it gnawing somewhere in the pit of your gut.

I bet you could write a list like the following too. This is off the top of my head, some of the things I have felt judged for. Here goes:

The aforementioned only having one child. For waiting til well into my mid 30s to have a baby. For hiring a nanny. For moving away from my family in Australia. For being thin (people supplant a lot onto a woman’s entire character based on her body shape). For shopping too much. For having a face. For having short hair. Being a women’s magazine editor definitely brings out a lot of preconceived ideas, ranging from assumptions that I must be a vapid moron who writes about lipstick all day, to perhaps a ‘too cool for school’ ice maiden who looks down my nose at everyone else. Then one of my neighbours spat on the ground in front of me when I told him I had become the editor of You at the Mail on Sunday. And then when I quit that job to run a charity, the comments section on a newspaper article was dominated by people saying anyone who ran a charity is probably a scam artist. For not taking my husband’s name (yes even in this day and age there were a few pearls clutched over that one on both sides of the family). For the times I’ve had to miss important events - professional and personal - because I had a migraine. For swearing. For being ambitious. For when everyone else is happy stopping on their second glass of wine but I’d quite like a third. For having stair runners that are in dire need of replacing. For being quite bad at interiors generally. I’ll stop. My brain’s still churning up examples but my typing fingers are saying ‘enough’.

I honestly can’t bear to tell you which of these things I decided was ‘the one’ worthy of committing to a postcard and mailing it to a stranger, even though actually it’s probably fairly mundane. Maybe I should have just lied and made up something about being judged for a fictitious throuple arrangement at home. I hope someone gives serves up some scandal on their postcard.

The second question on the postcard is also interesting: ‘Do you try to hide it and if so, how?’

I don’t think I do. Do you? That would be an act of apology for the life of choices made and who wants to do that? Actually, it’s true that we don’t invite people around as much as we used to. I should probably get some new stair runners before the shame swallows me whole. But again, the question made me suddenly very aware of the nagging drip-drip effect that all of the above has on us all. I feel no reason to hide any of the traits about myself that I sometimes feel judged for. But it’s exhausting, isn’t it, to be constantly braced? To be armed with rehearsed and polite when someone is ‘just curious’ about why you wouldn’t have any more children, or telling you they couldn’t possibly sleep at night living so far away from their parents.

I wonder if I’ll ever see the results of this student’s interesting art project. All of the above is making me feel like I could be an entire study, all on my own. Please tell me I am not the only one?

I don’t have a solution to this at all. Perhaps it’s a human condition - a mindset, a necessary societal evil, call it what you will - for which there will never be a cure. Tell me your thoughts, oh Substack hive mind. I love hearing from you.

But now… some fun things.

Just for a nice change of pace, here’s a little round-up of some things have sparked joy in recent days.

1. Cabaret with Marisha Wallace and Billy Porter

My obsession with Cabaret began when I was about five and saw the Bob Fosse film and it has never waned. I’ve been lucky enough to see the West End production a few times, and I love the different flavours the revolving cast brings. Billy Porter was always going to bring Big Billy Porter Energy and it works. He’s such an undeniable, unique presence. And I don’t have enough superlatives for Marisha Wallace, who I first came across when she stepped in for Amber Riley on the night I saw Dream Girls. We really lucked out getting the understudy, she’s outrageously talented. If you haven’t been to the Kit Kat Club yet, go now.

2. The White Lotus aesthetic

I’m here for the dark, wicked and fun storylines and the thrillingly ghastly rich hotel guests in series 3. There is not one thing about this show that isn’t perfect, and that includes every single beautifully-shot frame and every beautiful thing in it. I’m already devastated not to own these lamps:

I can’t find them so far, but Rockett St George have done us a solid with a great ‘White Lotus Edit’ on their site.

And my husband is already rolling his eyes because I am in love with the outstanding retro Hawaiian shirts collection worn by Walton Goggins, playing surly-rich-bastard-with-shady-secrets, Rick Hatchett.

You can look, but you cannot buy it here

Joyously, there is an Instagram account dedicated to all our White Lotus shopping needs, and while this beauty by Georges Marciano, above, seems to be sold out, this one below, by Tombolo, is still available. Heaven.

Shop it here

3. An incredible suit from a supermarket

No way does this suit look like it comes from George at Asda. I was presenting ‘supemarket fashion’ on Lorraine today and they wanted me to wear something from a supermarket and I found and fell in love with this. From the chocolate shade, to the flattering pleat-front trousers and the elegant thin belt on the jacket, it’s a winner.

4. Makeover carnage

Who remembers The Salon?

I might be late to this particular Instagram party but just in case you haven’t seen it, the @vox.cultures account shows old clips from the makeover shows that were big in the 90s and 00s, like the BBC’s Style Challenge and C4’s Ten Years Younger. Seriously: What were we all smoking back then? Makeovers? More like hate crimes. I would love a ‘where are they now’ from survivors. If there are any.