I saw this meme on Facebook. It's a few years old, and I've seen it before. However, I honestly don't like it. The lady on the left is Ernestine Shepherd. She's 77 now, so this meme is a few years old. She didn't start working out until she was 56 years old. Obviously, she looks great, and I'm very impressed to hear you can start at a such late age. That's awesome. Perhaps there is hope for me yet. {{snort}} I'll start tomorrow ... {{double snort}}
But anyway ... I don't like the meme because it seems unfair to the lady on the right. I don't know her name, but she looks like a wonderful woman. She's my idea of the ideal grandma, if there is one. She looks like the type of grandma who'd have homemade cookies—still hot from the oven—waiting for you when you came to visit. The image, I think, seems cruel. It shows her looking out a window longingly, almost as if she's waiting for someone to show up, or wondering why no one ever does. The one on the left looks like keeping her body in shape takes up all of her time. She's probably not into baking cookies, but then again, I could be wrong. Even so, it takes hours each day to keep your body in that kind of shape. If I were to guess, I would say working out consumes much of her day. That's not a bad thing. Neither is sitting by a window and watching the world go by. Both women are beautiful.
The meme says, "The choice is yours to make." Perhaps that's true, or perhaps it's not true. Ironically, it also says, "Both of these women are 74 years old." What it doesn't say is their story, or their background, or what they've been dealt with in their lives. That's what I don't like about it. It's obvious that both are alive, regardless of who is in better shape. It's impossible to say who will live longer. It really doesn't matter. And this goes back to my last blog post about simply loving who you are. Perhaps both of these ladies are completely content in their lives. I hope they are. I just couldn't help feeling sad for the lady on the right. What do you think?
I agree. I wonder what the reaction would be is the one on the right was smiling at the camera while holding a cookie sheet full of freshly baked cookies. The choice would the be "slave to you body or contentment."
ReplyDeleteExactly! Odd how they used a photo of a woman looking out a window, almost like she's sad for the way she's turned out.
DeleteI hate BS posts like this--as if everything is a CHOICE. And as if one is better than the other. Maybe the woman on the right chose to dedicate herself to serving others instead of some social construct of beauty with hours in a gym! Maybe the woman on the right writes or teaches or bakes or loves better. Furthermore, who cares? I've gotten pretty sassy on FB, calling bull to the sh*t on that kind of "choice." You are my people.
ReplyDeleteI'm so happy to hear others agree on this. I got a lot of the same replies on Facebook.
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