Smile Like You Don’t Mean It

“Do you always look this serious, Katrina?”

Only when I’m breathing.

If I had a dollar for every time a man said some variation of “smile, pretty!” to me, I could quit teaching right now, retire and build a mansion in Toorak.

And it is men who say this. My uncles say it to me all the time at family get-togethers. They compliment me on what a beautiful smile I have, but you’d better believe they’re quick to comment on its absence. Remarks like, “Hey, what’s the matter, sweetie?”; “Cheer up—it can’t be that bad!”, and “Oi, what’s a girl your age got to frown about?” can all be expected if I fail to exhibit anything less than the standard Sugar-And-Spice feminine friendliness.

Male strangers say it too. During the summer holidays when I was at the Hillarys boat harbour, a drunk guy approached me. He came up close to me and said aggressively, “Do you know what your problem is? You’re not smiling! A young chick like you wouldn’t be here alone if you smiled! You’d look more approachable.” He said it less coherently than that, being drunk, but the sentiment expressed was no different than if he’d been stone-cold sober. And it didn’t make me want to tell him to take his unsolicited opinion, wrap it in barbed wire, and shove it up his rectum any less.

A hippie dude I knew through a friend when we lived in Dunsborough used to frequently stop and chat with me whenever we bumped into each other in town (since this “town” was the two-horse variety, and we were both bicycle-dependent, this happened often). He was a pretty nice guy though, and I felt less anxious around him than I did around many other people. But I’ll never forget one particular conversation we had. I won’t go into it here, as its content was less important than how it made me feel afterwards; which, initially, was pretty elated. It seemed (to my teenage self) that I had so few people who really gave a crap about the minutiae of my school life, that it was a rarity to find someone who actually cared enough to listen to what I was saying. But just as I’d thanked this dude for being so understanding and was bidding him goodbye, he turned around and said: “Hey, no worries...but Katrina? I’ve been meaning to ask you—why do you frown so much? Someone do something to you or what?”

He hadn’t heard a word I’d said.

The most recent one happened yesterday. I was at a Professional Development seminar for graduate teachers, and a guy at my table—a maths teacher in his 30’s—decided to play armchair psych. Apparently I wasn’t participating as enthusiastically and energetically in the conversation as he’d have liked, because when it came to a lull, he chose that moment to loudly ask, “Do you always look this serious, Katrina?” The whole table turned to stare at me. I was slightly mortified; I’d had this daydream-omelette frying in my brain, part song chorus playing in a continuous loop, part sexual fantasy, part monkey scratching its head. I had no idea what they’d been talking about. And now, all eyes were on me. I think I said, “Huh?”

The maths teacher guy repeated the question, and added, “You seem sort of sad.” (Great—I’ve been downgraded from “angry” to the more acceptably feminine “sad.”) I protested, “I’m not sad—I was just thinking.” Instead of asking what I’d been thinking about, the genius persisted: “Sure you’re ok? There’s nothing you want to say...about your school or anything?” (Fair call—I do work at Clarkson). “No, I’m fine. It’s cool—really! I was just daydreaming.” “Oh. I just thought you looked a bit unhappy.” “I’m not. This is how my face looks when I’m thinking.” “Hey, don’t get defensive. I was just asking.” “And I was just telling. I don’t tend to be all smiles when I’m deeply engaged in thought. Thankyou.” Uneasy silence around the table. Luckily, a female teacher intervened: “Oh, leave the poor girl alone, Russ! Can’t you see you’ve embarrassed her?” “Sorry, love,” Russ apologised, grinning. “That’s ok,” I said. But it really wasn’t.

I’m really sick of people inferring from my poker-face that I must be either pissed off or miserable or both. In most of the examples I’ve given and many, many other times, I was neither. When people, typically men, ask me if I’m angry, their tone has an almost accusatory ring to it—how dare I be angry! Don’t I know that violent feelings are for males only? Don’t I know that swearing and talking about how I’d like to punch someone’s face in isn’t cute and little-ladylike? Haven’t I heard that aggression in females is reserved exclusively for “that time of the month?” When they ask me if I’m sad, the tone is a paternal one of faux-concern: “Are you alright, sweetie? You can cry—tears are feminine, after all! Just don’t cry so much that you look like a crazy wailing banshee or Morticia Addams put through the rinse cycle—you have an image to uphold, you know!”

And this is the crux of the matter: whether the “smile, pretty!” remark is made in an aggressive tone or a gentle one, its function is always the same: To keep you in your role. In this case, it’s the role of the always-smiling, always-accommodating, pliant fembot who never develops any frown lines on her pretty little forehead and never expresses any aggressive, anti-social or otherwise less-than-saintly thoughts or feelings—ever. No matter how many roles you play, comments like this are designed to make sure you don’t deviate too much from the script. And men are absolutely afforded wider latitude than women with regard to their roles. My dad constantly voices his dissatisfaction over having a daughter who swears often, shaves seldom, likes really gory horror movies and medical shows and reads mens’ mags. I don’t fit the “ideal daughter” stereotype according to his criteria, and am reminded daily of it. I have a friend, my age and also female, who is offended by coarse language, likes chick flicks, and listens to her boyfriend talk about football and cricket. She wants to start a family with him one day. My dad sometimes compares me to her, and bemoans my inability to play the role of the uncomplicated Aussie chick as well as she does. My brother, on the other hand, may swear, fart and play Grand Theft Auto with impunity.

Likewise, a man can be a husband and a father and still be able to laugh at a raunchy ad on the telly. No-one will batt an eye. But if a woman who’s a mother laughs at the ad—that’s heresy. Mothers aren’t supposed to do that! Hasn’t she heard that mums are supposed to be prudish and uptight? It’s always, “Don’t let your MOTHER catch you using bad language/competitive farting/watching porn.” Fathers aren’t mentioned—presumably because they like all of those things. But what if you’re a dad who’s offended by them? Or a mum who really digs them? Of course that’s perfectly normal. But whole television series depend on these stereotypes for their humour (The Simpsons, Family Guy, Everybody Loves Raymond), and a pierced-and-tattooed Mum who fingers herself to images of two men kissing could certainly be excused for feeling like an anomalous freak.

Please understand—I have no problem with roles. At all. I recognise that as people, we need to maintain a sense of separateness from our primordial muck if society is to function at all, and our roles may help us do that. I like that my students know I’m still human, but I don’t like it so much if they see me paying a visit to the liquor store. To buy vodka. On a Tuesday night (I kid! I at least wait ‘til Friday). And roles are certainly useful for providing us with a sense of security and identity. Roles help create boundaries; they define what we do, who we are, our purpose in life. That’s all fine. What I don’t like is when people attempt to strait-jacket me in the feminine role of sweetness and false happiness so tightly that there’s no breathing room for authentic human response.

And that brings me back to the smile remark. It’s stupid and sexist. Women don’t tell a scowling man to smile, and men sure as hell don’t tell other men to smile. But both sexes are all over a frowning woman like flies on shit, trying to gauge her mood and pontificating at length on her psychological state if her Virgin Mary Inner Goodness fails to radiate through her face. This is neither realistic nor particularly kind. Essentially, by telling someone that all they need to do is smile, you are in effect saying you care more about a person’s ability to play a role and live up to a superficial image than you do about the person—their thoughts, their feelings, their life circumstances and wellbeing—behind the facade. Not very humanising, huh?

To be fair, my face is typically expressionless. It’s one of those inscrutable types that never reveals what I’m thinking or feeling. In terms of readability, it’s the epidermal equivalent of Morse Code. There could be a storm of emotions and passions raging inside me, but you won’t see any of it. What you might see, however, is one angry-looking vertical frown line that runs between my eyebrows like an exclamation mark—even when my facial features are relaxed. In this exclamation mark are the infinite stresses accumulated through five years of high school and four years of uni, and it’s here to stay. In fact, it’s present even when I am smiling! So I guess I can forgive some people for thinking I’m always angry, sad or stressed.

What I will not forgive are the people who for some reason see fit to voice these thoughts to my face—then have the arrogance to insist they know what I’m feeling better than I know myself. It’s like when my brother, who’s built like a small tank, steps on my foot and insists that it doesn’t hurt: “You’ve stepped on my toe before, and it didn’t hurt me,” he claimed. “Dumbass,” I’d said, “You’re bigger than me! But more importantly—it’s my toe! I’m the authority. I’ll say whether it hurts or not. How I feel is not for you to decide.” And that’s exactly how it ought to be for me and the guys who tell me to smile: If the reason I’m not smiling is because I’m upset about something, don’t try to minimise the pain you think “isn’t all that bad!”—when it’s yours, you may judge. Likewise, if I’m not smiling but am secretly overjoyed inside, don’t insist otherwise when I correct you and say that I truly am really, really happy. ‘Kay?

To any guys who may be reading this, a handy hint: If you wouldn’t say it to another man, please don’t say it to me.

The maths teacher I met at the P.D. said something stupid later on that revealed his true colours. When one of the female teachers at our table started to clear our plates away for us after we’d had lunch, he jokingly remarked, “See? This is why it’s so great to be at a table full of women. They all immediately start to do what comes naturally!” He’d commented earlier in the session on the alleged nastiness of bullying and bitchiness among girls compared with the “more benign” fist-fighting of boys. When a female teacher countered with a situation in which a boy had bullied a girl in a way that was quite elaborate and under-handed, he replied, “Well, that settles it: Boys are smarter!” Wanker. Why do women sleep with men like this? The next time I meet a guy I’d like to get horizontal with, I’ll be sure to ask him three equality-centred questions first. That way, if he gets the questions right, I won’t have to worry about contributing to the dumbing-down of the human race if the condom breaks. Gets them wrong? I forget about him and spend the night with my trusty detachable shower nozzle.

It’s sad that people—men and women—feel so shackled by their roles that they often don’t feel free to be themselves. Or worse, that they force others to play by their repressive rules. People like my dad and that maths teacher are so enamoured of the idea of 50’s wives and docile daughters that when they encounter real females whose behaviours and attitudes and appearances run counter to those images, they try to force them into those roles anyway—and the result is either unhappy submission or a furious two fingers up, because the woman’s individuality is being denied.

That’s why it was so gratifying to me when another teacher revealed how she honestly felt about some of her students. When I first started working at Clarkson, another female teacher came in and sat in the desk opposite me. She looked lovely—nice make-up, immaculate hair, manicured fingernails—both professional and attractive. I noticed she’d placed a pile of folders on her desk—she’d obviously just had a class. Sympathetically, I asked: “So—how were they?” “Right shitbags,”she replied.

She smiled broadly when she said it.

“Look, Miss! No Brain!”

Like, WHOA.

Ok. So. Here's what's happening in my life so far:

• I teach high school students.
• I'm teaching lower-school English.
• One of my classes consists entirely of psychos, sociopaths and slow-learners.
  AND
• Every day thus far has been VERY entertaining.
  

Take Thursday. I have an all-boy class of Year 10s, about twenty of them (though generally no more than fourteen actually make an appearance; out tending to their crops I’d imagine). Said class has been quarantined from the rest of the herd to prevent behaviour contamination (Apparently, furniture destruction and Superbad-style penis graffiti are highly contagious). These are the type of kids that we address very slowly and very politely (“So, have you ever considered, you know, leaving school early and going into paid employment? It would really suit you!”) They aren’t academic, don’t see the point of school, and use each lesson as an excuse to piss around. Basically, I’m tasked with keeping them amused for an hour so they don’t run riot.

Lucky me, right?

Anyway, on Thursday, there was chaos as usual: Lots of calling each other “poofter” and “pussy”, and no work being done. Which was fine by me (I kept myself amused by wondering if their sexism and homophobia were the result of a latent same-sex attraction, or maybe a secret desire to cross-dress. Not that I’d ever say that to them; I don’t believe in using prejudice to get kids to behave. Plus, they’re toolheads and would respond as such.) So anyway, there I was trying to get them to behave like human beings, as opposed to, you know, crazed apes on crack, when a water bottle comes flying across the room and hits James*, this fight-prone British kid, square in the face. The owner of the water bottle was B.J.*, a cheeky little Indigenous kid with ADD (who’s perfectly sweet on the days he remembers to take his meds. Unfortunately, this wasn’t one of them).

“B.J.!” I yelled. “Outside! NOW!”

He gave me a mildly contrite look. “Aw, geeze Miss. That boy knows I’m only stuffing around. He can handle it—he’s used to it. See?”

Then he walked over and emptied the entire bottle over James’s head.

“That does it! B.J., APOLOGISE NOW. How would you feel if someone tipped a water bottle over your head?”

“I’d like it, Miss! This weather’s too bloody hot anyway.” (I really should’ve seen that one coming).

“OUTSIDE. NOW.”

He kicked a few desks and swore under his breath as he walked out, but I didn’t care—hey, he complied, right?

When I went outside to sort B.J. out (making sure I took my keys with me, so the little bastards wouldn’t lock me out), I heard James yell: “You f*#king c*#t! Come here and say that! I’ll F*#KING KILL YOU!” I raced back in. James had Ray, Shit-Stirrer Extraordinaire, by the collar and was slamming him up against the wall. “GET BACK IN YOUR SEATS RIGHT NOW!” I yelled. Of course, the other idiots were egging them on. Luckily, Ray was able to break loose from James and ran off to the other side of the room, which meant I was able to get between them. I’m not allowed to touch students (no teacher is), but I thought that at least positioning myself between them might break up the fight. It did. Initially.

So once I’d screamed them back into their seats (at opposite ends of the room), I tried to explain to everyone why these fights weren’t acceptable and how they’d be sent to the deputy if they tried to pull this shit in class again and so forth (all the while having to contend with Ray calling James “douchebag”, “fudgepacker”, etc.), and meanwhile, I could see that James had this brooding, intense look on his face. He looked about ready to burst a blood vessel. I wondered what it would take to tip this kid over the edge. So, to prevent another Who’s Got The Most Testosterone Competition, I sent Ray outside. As Ray was leaving the room, he turned to James. I heard the words, “Your mother”, and “c*#t.”

That did it.

“I’LL F*#KING KILL YOU, YOU BASTARD!”

James punched Ray fair in this face. Ray went down, and then James sat on top of him and grabbed at his throat.

Meanwhile, B.J., who had come back inside to see the first fight, was now outside again, running down the hall and banging on all the other class windows: “OI! EVERYONE! THERE’S A FIGHT GOING ON INSIDE MISS P’S CLASS! QUICK--COME SEE!”

And so, during the fight I had two-and-a-half other classes spectating from outside. Three teachers, one deputy and one security guard later, the fight ceased. The kids were a mess, the classroom looked like ground zero and I was in tears.

So, my dear private school teacher-friends: NEVER tell me how bad your class was because they talk too much, or because you caught a kid chewing gum, or because you had ONE rude tosspot who answered you back. Because, really:

YOU AIN’T SEEN NUTHIN.'

On the plus side: I think teaching has well and truly cured me of my social phobia. See, for a while there I was mildly terrified of interacting with people. I’m not now; I can communicate normally without wondering how the person I’m speaking to perceives me and freezing up. And that’s really liberating—I can focus on listening to the other person without fretting over how I’m coming across. At high school, and certainly at uni, I never would’ve been able to communicate in front of a class—I was simply too shy. Logically, I knew that the people I spoke to weren’t always scrutinising me or judging me; but emotionally, I still felt as though they were (kinda like how my vegetarianism hasn’t eradicated my desire to savour the taste of meat; it’s reduced it, but it’s still there.) Funny how logic can fail to change your feelings about something one iota. Anyway—I’m less awkward now, so yay.

Ok. Enough emotional exhibitionism. I’ll leave you with the words of a year ten student of one of my colleagues. When she told him that he wouldn’t think jail was so cool once he was getting it up the you-know-where, he replied indignantly:

“Miss, I’ll be the one giving it up the you-know-where!”

God, it’s hard not to laugh sometimes.