Thursday, April 12, 2007

Nature or nurture?

Here are five things I can't be without:
  • Urban folk music from the late 1980s
  • Multi-ethnic variations on the 'cheese and pickle' theme
  • Big jumpers
  • Red wine
  • Hot baths
Here are five things I can't bear:
  • Anything featuring harpsichords
  • McDonalds
  • High heels
  • Alcopops
  • Cold showers
Some of it's age, some of it's class, some of it's inexplicable. As a feminist, I obviously site myself at the 'nurture' end of the continuum, but it doesn't explain everything. If I were 10 years younger, would I like drum and bass? Would I have a WKD side? If I were 400 years older, would I yearn for that plinky plonk sound and drink mead till my teeth fell out? I can't quite believe that I would, but where *are* the joellas of yesteryear?

joella

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

This is not one of your more focused entries. Have you been hitting the mead again?

I'd love to see you in heels. Would you do it for sponsorship?

Ben said...

Beatrix Potter. Emmeline Pankhurst. Madame de Pompadour. I don't know where any of them stood on harpsichords, but I think Joella would see eye to eye with any of them on a number of issues.

Jo said...

Yes, well spotted Charlie, I'd probably have made this make more sense if I hadn't had to drive to Manchester when I got up the next day. I do sort of know what I was trying to say, but I didn't make a very coherent job of it.

Nobody has seen me in heels since about 1988. I do still have them (there was only ever the one pair) but mainly to remind me never to buy any more.

If I could be in the past, I think I would be a bluestocking. I could have gone to Girton and then ridden a horse through the Hindu Kush smoking opium.

tatton said...

Personally I think Charlie's being a bit harsh - doesn't understand the dramatic ways being a woman has changed with time.

I'm a little bit younger than you and like drum and bass.

For a quick answer you just need to look back at your family tree and see what your ancestors were doing in similar situations. Going without food, especially for women - if they hadn't died in childbirth - as the man of the family would get most of the food, was a reality for most of the Irish for example, so they didn't yearn for much else. We are lucky to be the generation we are, and more to the point, lucky to be born where we were. In medical terms even for genetic diseases, environment (nurture) accounts for 40% of the difference. IE you can offset genetics/biology/science by what you do.