The Beautiful Polish Girl Meme

First, I live in the United Kingdom, specifically Scotland. The United Kingdom has higher wages and better maternity leave than Poland, and so adventurous young Poles have come in their thousands to work and play and, in many cases, escape the social expectations of Polish life. If Babcia is still afraid of long-distance telephone calls, she can't call you to say she wants to die but won't until you get married.

The United Kingdom also has a good reputation for university education, and so the brightest and most impatient young Poles come here to study. (Poles need visas for the USA, even as tourists.) As non-English members of the EU, they don't have to pay high tuition fees in Scotland. But they do have to speak excellent English, which means that their less quick-witted (or less hardworking) countrymen are left snoozing off their hangovers in the lecture theatres of Wrocław U or wherever.

These two points of view, of the worker Pole and of the student Pole, are not mine but were transmitted to me by Poles themselves. As a poor little foreigner far from home, I naturally gravitate towards other foreigners and, lo, since Canadians in Edinburgh mostly hide from each other, I have just latched onto the Poles. It helps that many (although certainly not all) Poles continue to go to Holy Mass when they get to Scotland, and that a number get involved in Polish cultural events. Oh, and of course there is the nearby polski sklep (Polish grocery store), where I go for the curd cheese, sour cream and dried forest mushrooms necessary for feeding such Polish guests as Polish Pretend Son.

Polish Pretend Son was is my primary source of information about Poland, which might be considered problematic, especially if you are a member of the Polish Left. Edinburgh has many members of the Polish Left, e.g. Polish hipsters at the university. Polish Pretend Son is not a member of the Polish Left and is super-patriotic, originally choosing to study in Scotland because "we don't have anything against Scotland." Sweden, for example, invaded Poland in 1626, so forget about Sweden, rat pit of hell.

Anyway, it was Polish Pretend Son, either out of patriotism or homesickness or horror at the legions of plump, orange-faced Scottish and English girls wearing denim shorts over black leggings, who impressed on me that Polish Girls are Beautiful. And his claims were backed up by another patriotic/homesick/horrified Polish friend who declared (I never forgot this) that all the English girls around him (for he moved to an English city) looked like "retarded whales."

As a matter of fact, the "OUR women are the most beautiful" meme used to be very widespread. C.S. Lewis refers to it in, I think, The Four Loves. The Germans allude to the perfection of theirs in a verse of the national anthem. The Beach Boys extol California girls. However, this kind of patriotism seems to have gone out of style for English-speaking men who, on the internet, extol foreign women, the miserable traitors, in a weird kind of racism of high expectations.

But, as a matter of another fact, many young women in Britain dress unusually badly, even for the English-speaking world, which is staggering when you ponder that Miley Cyrus is an American. My favourite American-in-Britain story is of a lost young American student who called up friends in a panic because he was lost and all he knew was that he must be in a red light district because he was surrounded by prostitutes.

"Sam," said his pal patiently. "Are those really prostitutes or are they regular girls?"

There was a pause as Sam took another look.

"Oh," said Sam. "I guess they are regular girls."

And I totally believe this story because when I first arrived in Edinburgh, it was very cold and yet there were bosoms on display everywhere. Many girls would wear scarves around their necks while being careful that their cleavages still showed. It was ridiculous. Meanwhile, in the department stories, there were BEAUTIFUL clothes, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful. But I have no idea who is wearing them because I never see them on the street.

Also, since the 1960s and the end of proper meal times and the rise of snacking, there are a disproportionate number of obese young women in the UK. And the grannies of obese young women do not say, as do Polish grannies, "You'll never get a man if you look like that.", possibly because the grannies are also obese or because modern-day British grannies are wimps or because modern-day British grannies know perfectly well you can get any man into bed (even a Polish one with a wife and three kids in Szczęsin) if he is drunk enough and you have zero expectations.

Oh, and female public drunkenness is a thing here. In Poland, being drunk in public is a disgrace for a woman, but this isn't Poland, is it, and if ye dinnae like it you can go back to the ***** ye came fae and ah'm no' racist ken ah'm no' ah'm jest ah'm jest ah'm jest whaurs mah drink?*

So there is a reason why young Polish men in Britain might be exaggerating in their own minds about the objectively fantastic beauty of Polish women. As for American men, the Central/Eastern European women they see--real ones, born in Central/Eastern Europe--tend to be fashion models or tennis players, the visa difficulty having channeled the majority of the young, adventurous ones to the UK or Germany, and the older, plumper ones staying home.

Anyway, I totally bought everything Polish Pretend Son said about Poles because surely nobody that handsome (Jealous B.A.: "Not THAT handsome.") and charming (Jealous B.A.: "Not THAT charming") would make stuff up. Being disqualified from the eternal struggle for male attention, I was very excited when I bought my first ticket for Supermodel Land. It was only when I enthused about going to a land free of crime and pollution, etc., etc., that Polish Pretend Son began to backtrack and admit that sometimes a car or two might be stolen, and occasionally someone threw a cigarette butt on the chaste Polish pavement. Still, he didn't backtrack on the Beautiful Polish Women Issue.

Thus I was highly amused in the RyanAir queue at Edinburgh Airport to see that very few of the women waiting for the Krakow flight were beautiful. Indeed, some were downright squashy and plain. So as soon as I was in my Krakow room, I texted Polish Pretend Son to tell him.

PPP: If women are ugly you have mainly (chiefly?) seen tourists from the UK and Germany. Enjoy Poland!


The truth is that most Polish women in Western Poland just look like ordinary women, only always white (so far) and never obese. Oh, and lots and lots of them are young because Poles my age bothered to have children, and so there they are, now in their 20s. The young ones tend to be thin, and then they get plumper as they get older, which is normal for human women. They wear modest shirts, if tight jeans or short skirts, and their tans, if they have them, look natural. The middle-aged women wear a lot of make-up or none. Lots of Polish women have their hair short. They do not cover their heads in church, although the odd granny here and there (and me) wears a beret. I have never seen one drunk or eating greasy chips on the street.

On my first trip to Poland I saw exactly two women of the supermodel class. One was a blonde waitress in the Wedel chocolate shop in the Main Market, and my first thought was that she was not going to be a waitress for long because she was THAT drop dead gorgeous. And then I saw a breathtaking woman on the train to Warsaw.

Since then I have not been looking out for supermodel-type women, so others may have passed me by while I admired the architecture or decoded Polish signs or looked at paintings or prayed at church. I am much more likely to notice how many Polish men can be found in churches at any time of day or evening, e.g. many, especially compared to the English-speaking world.

And being blue-eyed and fair-skinned, and wearing little make-up, a beret, a chignon, a sensible shoes, a trench coat and a neutral expression, I blended in pretty well with the general population of Krakow, looking like what I am, which is a moharowy beret (conservative-minded religious old lady) in training. When people addressed me it was always in Polish, and as a matter of fact, my accent is now so good, I have to stop saying "Good evening" to customs officials in Polish because they do a double-take, stare at my Canadian passport and my foreign name and take a very long time looking at whatever it is they are looking at on their scary computer screen.

In fact, even the chap in the Młoda Polska art gallery who fell in love with my hair, or with me looking at Młoda Polska portraits under my Młoda Polska hair, asked first in Polish if he could take my photograph.

And this reminds me that I get more sultry looks from men in Poland than I ever (EVER) do in Scotland, and as my own Edinburgh-Canadian grandmother informed me that I was not pretty, this is a mystery. It may have something to do with Polish men. Oh! Maybe Polish men, like Frenchmen, are just more interested in women! Oooh!

I wonder what the air fare is from New York to Warsaw, do you? Incidentally I will be appearing in Rzeszów this autumn.

Update: I have a young Polish male reader, whom I have never met, but reads this blog, who is going home to Poland and would like to meet marriage-positive Polish girls. I realize it is a long-shot, but if any reader in Poland thinks it would be fun to meet one of my few Polish male readers, do let me know. I commend him on his sense in asking my aid.

*Full disclosure. In fairness, I should mention that it can be hard not to get drunk in British social life, in part because the British men pouring the stuff forget that British women cannot knock it back the way they do. Also, alcohol tolerance goes up and down. When I was in Poland, I think I had one glass of wine in ten days. Therefore, when I turned up at my Fifth Wedding Anniversary party, I got instantly tipsy on one little glass of sparkling wine.

"Don't top it up," I protested at whoever topped it up, and he or she topped it up.

Then there was red wine at supper.

"Just a little!" I protested at whoever filled my glass. "Just a little!"

And then when I began to cut the cake, I realized that I was too intoxicated to properly cut the cake, and I gave up.

So although it is the woman drinker who is to blame when she gets drunk, I am ready to admit that her social and biological circumstances may have a lot to do with it.

Meaning

I have a lot of email to answer, but I am still feeling very tired in the wake of my cold. I feel very tempted to nap. I think this may because of the Polish cookies I had for breakfast, though. Sugar is bad. Very, very bad.

The central point of my lectures, I now realize, is that women are called to love of God and of service to neighbour, not to being found sexually attractive. If women think the point of our existence is to be found sexually attractive, by men or women, then the older we get, the more meaningless our lives will seem and the more frightened we will be of growing old. And we will also buy into a hierarchy in which the most worthwhile women in the world are models, actresses and high-class hookers. Wouldn't it be amazing if there were glossy magazines that outlined not how to get Beyonce's "look" but Mother Teresa's active compassion, or Saint Edith Stein's intellect, or Blessed Natalia Tułasiewicz's courage?

I mention Mother T, Saint E and Blessed N because none of them relied on, or used, any merely human male to give their lives meaning. They were all deeply committed to the Lord Jesus Christ, a commitment that inspired them and helped them to serve others, under even the most atrocious and dangerous conditions. Mother T was never a pretty little thing. Saint Edith, who grew up wealthy, was handsome, but never glam. Blessed Natalia, like the great majority of Poles of her generation, got engaged in her early 20s, but never married the man because, as much as she loved him, he was a Commie and and atheist. She never looked back, and she never wanted to do anything else but love and serve God as a woman in the world. Was she pretty? I can just see a Polish female pal shrugging and saying, "Average for Poland. Maybe below." And why should we care anyway? Saints should be above all that--thank heavens.

Thank heavens for our wonderful woman saints! They are never canonized because they were pretty, or because legions of men found them attractive. They are a glorious army of women of all sizes, ages, conditions, compared to whom top models and screen icons are a pitiful gang.

A woman who is deeply convinced of her worth as a child of God and a soldier of Christ is less likely to be tempted to seek and use men for validation. When I was a child and teen, girls sought to charm boys for whom they had no real affection. It made them feel powerful, perhaps, and pretty. Nineteenth century novels featured women about whom legions of men flocked, and these young heroines collected marriage proposals like trophies. When I was in high school I honestly believed multiple boys calling a girl up on the phone to make dates, all rivals for her smiles, was the status quo because books I read about high school life hinted that it was. What nonsense. And the garden party scene in Gone with the Wind was probably worse for American and Canadian girls than "Some Day My Prince Will Come."

Aaaaactually, no. Snow White's trilling has got to be The Worst. The only Prince any of us can expect with all our hearts is the Prince of Peace. Husbands are usually just nice, ordinary chaps you fall in love with and then you're stuck, and he's stuck with you, and if you're both lucky, grown-ups and good, it's all great fun. Otherwise, it's a slog. Look at old photos of poor young Diana, Princess of Wales, and compare her sad, sulky face with that of wrinkled, satisfied old Duchess Camilla, who, I was reliably told by an ancient (and usually uncharitable) fellow deb, was once the most glamorous creature. Obviously poor Di was not really cut out to be Princess Charles, whereas glammy Camilla actually was. And Diana Spenser might have made a splendid kindergarten teacher and done many good works had she stayed unmarried or waited until she was grown up before she got married. And now poor Di is entirely defined by the fact she got married. I mean, she wasn't assigned the title "Princess of Wales" at birth. Her future career was not determined by anything stemming from her education or resume. Her status was entirely based on her marriage, her looks, her PR and the uniquely British obsession with their Royal Family. And by 1996, her love affairs were turning her into a kind of tabloid joke. Only sudden death could save her, and it did.

Mother Teresa died a few days after Diana, and so the most famous women in the world suddenly departed the world. And when you get down to it, they shared something more than fame. Mother Teresa was a spiritual mother, and Diana, Princess of Wales was a physical mother. The legacy Diana left to the world, besides a deplorable new tendency of emotional diarrhea among the English, was two little boys who believed that, no matter how crazy or unhappy Mummy was, she loved them. That's nice. That's good. She would have made a great kindergarten teacher.

We Are All Mothers of One Kind or Another

I am sick & in bed very tired but have just remembered that so many of you are going to have your spiritual motherhood completely ignored at Holy Mass tomorrow. If you discover yourself having to sit when the ladies with (living) children stand, please remember married mom and fellow reader Sheila stubbornly sitting in solidarity with you.

Then please pray for each other and the ladies whose children have died, abuse them, neglect them or are in prison.

I will pray especially for all my readers who, like me, have never given birth. God bless you,and may our priests eventually stop dividing us women from each other at Holy Mass on Mother's Day. We are all called to be mothers, physical or spiritual, and sometimes both.

Five Years of Marriage

He snores, which wakes me up. I toss and turn, which wakes him up. Housework bores me, and I resent that it eats into my writing time; he hates an untidy house and tidies noisily, slamming cupboard doors.

He loves to chat his way through problems; I need silence. He is used to being the leader of expeditions; I spend the first three days of our Continental holidays in a very bad, irrationally nasty, mood.

He does most of the cooking. I do most of the laundry. He puts off taking out the garbage. I put off washing the kitchen floor. Oh, Lord. I really must wash the kitchen floor.

We both gained weight. (That said, I have recently lost it all.) He clears his throat one thousand times a day. I have a mood disorder. ("Did you take your pill?" "Arrrghhhhhh! I forgot.") He almost never finds stuff I lose, and I lose stuff all the time. (I even lost my wallet on the way to the airport to Poland.) He is nice to books; I am... improving!

He is a much-valued member of my parish, and when he can't get to the 11:30 Mass, his tenor is much missed. I still survey my ruined theological career and wonder what is the earthly use of a Roman Catholic M.Div. degree to a laywoman--a trad laywoman at that--in Scotland. He complains if I spend too much time studying Polish; I dream of finishing my theology PhD at the Jagiellonian.

He has got a good job right here with fantastic benefits, which I share. I return from trips to Canada and Poland, having enjoyed speaking engagements or interviews or book launches, and marvel, "Here I am a total unknown." But it feels so good to hand B.A. a royalty cheque or an honorarium. He gives me so much, it's fantastic when I can give him something I earned myself.

God decided not to bless us with children. B.A. is sorry that I am sad about it, but he seems very sanguine. What the head doesn't know, the heart doesn't sigh for, I think. He thinks I feel the way I do because I am a woman and women are like this. I wonder if he would think that if he hadn't been an only child or had been brought up Catholic. This, of course, can lead to a convert vs cradle debate; at dinner parties I am usually outnumbered by protesting ex-Anglican converts and appeal to any Poles, my natural fellow cradle Catholic allies.

But as God has decided to bless us with a lot of friends instead, we have agreed to blur the lines between home and church. Domestic Church means that if young parishioners or friends are in trouble, they can stay with us. Domestic Church means Sunday Lunches for the choir, servers and their principal fans. Domestic Church means a rather stringent Lent but a blow-out Christmas Eve (Wigilia) supper. Domestic Church means B.A. saying he will go to bed at midnight whether or not the rest of the Schola has left, and me shutting the door behind the Schola after 1 AM, bless their little hearts.

And it is all great fun. I never thought I would describe marriage as fun, but I must say that the past five years have been fun. I think this may be because we had already grown up and learned from our faults and failings and had done a lot of hard work to become the people God wanted us to become. We already knew, when we met, aged 36 and 37, that a person is responsible for his or her own happiness. We already knew that we can't have all the great material things in life--we have to choose what is most important to us, and stick with that. Like my Scottish-Canadian grandparents, we choose travel. Unique to ourselves, we also choose dinner parties. Our money goes on dinner parties and travel. And my Polish classes. Must...have...Polish...classes.

Travel may sound trivial, but it means seeing my family in Canada, my work in Poland, and B.A. getting away from the Historical House--which is his work as well as his home--at least once, but preferably twice, a year. Although, inexplicably, I am an utter witch for the first three days of our Italian holidays, I am adamant: Whatever it takes, B.A. must go to the beach.

I will never be a fashion queen. B.A. is unlikely ever to have a state-of-the-art entertainment system. Pedigree pets will be out, even if we do ever buy a home we could put one in. As Catholics, we didn't even have to decide to forgo expensive, immoral, dangerous and over-hyped IVF. Our current circumstances make fostering and adoption out of the question.

We don't run a car. We ride buses with the poor and the "socially excluded", which is PC jargon for demoralized ethnic Scots and Irish-Scots crushed by the collapse of Scottish industry, the erosion of both Scottish Christianity and, its alternative, the Scottish Communist Party, and the rise of heroin and drunken grrrl power. Trainspotting makes for a great read, but for a really lousy bus ride. Cars are the tanks of the so-called upper- and middle-classes, protecting us from Begbie. And we don't have one.

That said, I'd rather take the Rough Bus with B.A. than a limousine with anyone else, and I imagine that only great love of and loyalty to her husband gets Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge through her day. Personally, I could not imagine being married to young balding William, but Her Royal Highness could probably not imagine being married to middle-aged bearded B.A. And, really, marriage comes down to a concrete relationship a concrete person and all the people and circumstances he or she comes with. Of all my friends' husbands, there's only one that I might have had a crush on: the super-cute lawyer. Can I say that? No, but seriously. And his wife is my very best married friend, so I can say that. They are both extremely good-looking, by the way. If I were a guy, I would have had a crush on her. Okay, I'm going to stop taking about this now.

Anyway, what I am trying to say, keeping in mind that this is a blog for Singles, is that marriage is about two concrete people in concrete circumstances, in a world still suffering from the effects of Original Sin and yet blessed with the Incarnation and the sacraments that stem from the Incarnation. Marriage can be a terrible, fiery experience, especially between immature or foolish people who are not rooted in reality. But it can be a wonderful way of life, especially for older people who are delighted to have found such an amazing spouse despite years of flailing about in a social or spiritual wilderness.

Again, I am sorry we have not had children, and the top of our wedding cake--saved for the baptism of our firstborn--will never be eaten. But I am comforted that this is not because of any personal sin, even neglect of health, but merely because God willed it so. Some women are able to conceive at 37, 39, 40, 42; I was not. But we are given other opportunities to fulfill the fatherhood and motherhood to which every adult is called.

So I can say with all my heart that this is a very happy fifth wedding anniversary for me, and I wish B.A. a very happy fifth wedding anniversary, too. I am sorry for all the tossing and turning this morning, and maybe the next time we go to Italy, I should go a day or two before you.

Update: Thanks to the Aged Ps for the walnut shoe rack! They are terribly good about wedding anniversaries, following the traditional list (although substituting crystal for leather) with enthusiasm.

Update 2: And I am remembering in a special way A., a young (to me) divorced Polish woman who spoke to me at the Brave Women conference, and her son L. The burden of a chaste divorced woman who at least sometimes misses her husband is a heavy one. Saint Monica, mother of Saint Augustine and wife of abusive Patricius, pray for them and for us all.

The Brave Women Retreat, Krakow (Part 2)

The retreat was from Friday, May 2 until Sunday, May 4, and I gave my own talks on Saturday and Sunday. These were (mostly) in English, and the rest of the retreat was, of course, in Polish.

Being prone to worldly distractions, my mind was often occupied with the thought of where my next coffee was going to come from. Polish instant coffee, the kind found in the guest dining room, is charming and evokes memories of other visits to Poland, but in order to think, e.g. understand any Polish, I must drink real, fresh, brewed coffee.

Saturday morning began with prayers and meditation in the chapel. I rushed out beforehand to see if the coffee shop on ulica Kalwaryjska (Calvary Street) was open. Alas, as it was Constitution Day, it was not. So I returned to the the Redemptorist klasztor and went to prayers.

At breakfast I asked Father Paweł for some real coffee, and I was truly grateful when he brought me some. Somewhere in the secret corridors of the Redemptorist house, there was a proper coffee machine. Invigorated and brainy, I joined the throng in the parish hall for Praise and Worship hymns before giving my first talk.

Incidentally, you know that I go to the FSSP Usus Antiquor on Sundays, but you probably don't know that I have a soft spot for "Praise and Worship" music. It makes a cheerful change from solemn plainchant and male-dominated polyphony. I can see the argument that P & W is not appropriate for Holy Mass, which is one reason why I enjoy it so much outside of Mass. Guilt-free enjoyment, and when it is in Polish, there is the educational aspect, too. Singing is fun, and what could be more fun than belting out the following, eh?

Duchu Święty, przyjdź! (Come, Holy Spirit!)
Duchu Święty, przydź!
Duchu Święty, przydź!
Duchu Święty, przydż!

Niech wiara zagości, (Let faith find a home)
Niech nadzieja zagości, (Let hope find a home)
Niech miłość zagości w nas. (Let love find a home in us).
Niech wiara zagości,
Niech nadzieja zagości,
Niech miłość zagości w nas.

Duchu Święty, przydż!, etc.

Of course, there is the difficulty of pronouncing przyjdź, which is something like p-shh-eay-je. But never mind.

My first lecture was on "Catholic Heroines of the 20th Century", and I had chosen Servant of God Dorothy Day of New York, Blessed Natalia Tułasiewicz of Pozńan and Heretical Simone Weil of Paris, who I admitted was an unusual choice. However, she was Single, and I deliberately chose Singles with super-strong principles. My young translator, who chose not to bring the text with him, stumbled over "Servant of God". Simultaneous translation was not his forte, and we painfully gave my speech clause by clause. When I got to direct quotes by Blessed Natalia, I just read them in Polish. The kindly ladies applauded a particularly long one.

Afterwards, the translator dropped a hint that the awkwardness was all my fault for reading directly from the text instead of ex tempore, whereupon Father Paweł and Alicja beat him to death began to remonstrate with him in English and Polish.

When we reappeared after the break for my second lecture, I was relieved to see that my translator now had a copy of the text. This lecture was on "The Dignity of the Unmarried Woman," and it went much more smoothly and--very important--rapidly. Then there were some questions, the first asking why B.A. and I don't adopt, and another asking how to cope with feelings of failure. Then Father Paweł talked a bit about the importance of not being angry at men (I believe) and having good friendships with them.

Then there was lunch and the cake episode. Cake (ciasto) and cooky (ciastko) are, as you see, very similar in Polish, and when I asked my translator what Father Paweł was announcing, he mentioned that there would be coffee and cake set up at three o'clock. He meant "ciastki" but unfortunately I took him at his word. A huge desire for cake overwhelmed me. Cake! Cake! Cake! I ducked out of Adoration rather early in search of it. Cake! Cake! Cake!

There was no cake in the darkened guest dining room, so I peeked into the Redemptorists' dining room. No cake. I looked in the guests' little kitchenette on the second floor. No cake. So I went to the parish hall. No cake. There was another lady there already, so I asked about the cake, and she pointed to the two plates of cookies. She smiled sadly when I protested that the translator had said cake.

I began to ponder how I might sneak out and get some cake. Surely some cake shop must be open, even on Constitution Day. After all, Kraków has a booming tourist trade. Tourists don't care about Constitution Day. Tourists care about cake. And shouldn't there be Constitution Day cake? Or is cake for every occasion sort of a North American thing?

But first I took my seat in the parish hall for Alicja's talk. This was delayed, however, by the sudden entrance of a bishop. The bishop! Father Paweł, naturally very time-conscious, cheerfully gave up any attachment to the schedule. Bishop! Bishop!

The bishop was officially visiting the Redemptorists and joked that he had found their cloister full of us women. (In Canada, everyone would have got very defensive, but in the Krakowian parish hall, everyone thought this was hilarious.) He gave a good ex tempore talk on Women in the Bible, particularly Our Lady and the Annunciation, and then took questions. Boldly, one of the women asked him about the vocation to the Single Life. I was rapt. The bishop said that vocation was an event, and that although you may have an inclination to be married or to the priesthood, you do not have a vocation to it until you actually take your vows. True enough; I agreed with him completely. But this leads to the questions: What event determines that you have a Single vocation? If vocation is determined by an "event", why does the post-Vatican II church list Single Life, a state into which everyone is born, as a "vocation? I wish someone had asked these questions; I didn't have the Polish and it didn't occur to me to ask Father Paweł, helpfully translating, to ask the bishop. I was a bit in awe of the bishop, to tell you the truth. He left us a stack of holy cards.

Alicja's talk was on "To Be Pearls", a meditation on biblical texts that talk about pearls, especially in the context of good women. She had very kindly given me a copy of her notes, so I could follow along. Polish is hard. Have I mentioned this?

Then there was supper, and an hour or so before Holy Mass in the beautiful Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. I put on my rain boots and went in search of cake. My plan was to walk towards the touristy "Jewish Quarter" for half an hour, and then walk back. And lo, after 25 minutes I found an open cake shop. Victory! I carefully explained in Polish which cake and how big a piece, opened my handbag and discovered that I did not have any money with me. I walked 25 minutes back to the Redemptorists' house, offering up my disappointment in reparation for my sins, etc. I still longed for cake. Alas, I never got any cake. I went to sleep thinking "Cake!" It was really very sad. Okay, it was really very pathetic. I was sad.

On Sunday I woke up no longer obsessed with cake. However, there was still the coffee problem. Instead of going to morning prayer, I went to the Calvary Street coffee shop, but lo, it was closed for Sunday. However, thoughtful Father Paweł made me a proper coffee, and it was waiting for me in the guest dining room. I was delighted.

My first lecture was "On the Theology of Women", and it was all about St Edith Stein (Teresa Benedicta of the Cross) and her theology of women, and then about St. John Paul II and his additions to her theology. (I have promised to translate this one into Polish for Alicja, which will take me a few weeks.) My final lecture was called "Warnings from the West" and was very bitter about hip-hop culture, the sexual revolution, how much North American men and women distrust each other and what the Poles call "gender theory."

My lecture, which I thought rather depressing, ended with a lot of suggestions, which unfortunately I had couched as commands, i.e. "You must... You must..." I heard my translator inexorably repeating the bossy "musicie", and I felt that I had made a grave rhetorical error. Nobody, least of all the Poles, likes bossy foreigners telling them what to do. So I added to the end an explanation of what I admire so much in Poland, aspects that have been lost in my own country and, to my horror, I began to cry.

But this actually was very lucky and appropriate for a Polish audience, perhaps especially one of women. Poles are rather less afraid of expressing tender emotions than Canadians, especially British Canadians, are. (Sudden memory of myself weeping in a crowd before a library television, live broadcasting on 9/11 and a fellow Canadian lady with an artificial smile asking me if I was all right. Of course not, you silly cow. I've just seen a tower containing perhaps thousands of people collapse before my very eyes.) In Poland, it's alright to cry. In fact, if a woman doesn't cry, other women might think that there is something wrong with her.

Father Pawel made a speech thanking me and presented me with a copy of his latest book and a pillar candle commemorating the commemoration of St. John Paul 2. And then there was lunch.

After lunch, Alicja gathered together some women from the "Brave Women" society, and we all went to a meeting room to chat with a journalist. Eventually Father Paweł sat beside me and began muttering an English translation in my ear, for which I was very grateful. In short, the women meet one Saturday a month for prayer, testimony and workshops of different kinds. There was one on personal style, and what colours look good on you. They talked about the importance of women from different states and stages of life coming together in fellowship and about spiritual motherhood. Afterwards, the journalist interviewed me, and with Alicja's help we muddled along happily in English and Polish.

Then I went for a proper walk in "the Jewish Quarter" before going to a pizza supper with Fr. Paweł, Alicja and Katarzyna, the flamenco teacher. And then we all walked, in the unseasonably bitter cold, across a bridge over the Vistula to "the Jewish Quarter" where at last I had some cake. It was chocolate with raspberry puree and whipped cream. When the others chatted in Polish I listened very hard. There is so much vocabulary I don't know.

And that was the retreat! The next day I made a beeline for the French cafe near the beautifully baroque Main Market, but as it was packed with students, I went next to "Tribeca u Szołayskich", which is in the same building as the principal collection of "Młoda Polska" art. (I visited the latter on Friday morning and loved it.) There I had a beautiful cup of coffee with milk and a chocolate croissant, which is to say, kawa z mlekiem i czekoladowy croissant.

I am very grateful to all the women who bought books and asked me to sign them, and who asked me questions, and for my prayers, and those who promised to pray for me, too. I am especially grateful to Alicja, who as always was very supportive and kind to me, and of course to Father Paweł, who was an excellent and generous host. And I must also mention the delightful counter service of Kraków, the waiters, waitresses and cashiers, all of whom listened to my Polish, spoke to me in Polish, and switched to English only as a last resort. Nothing is more helpful to my acquisition of Polish than being forced to speak it.

Update: Alicja's report, with more photos! Alicja mentions that I am going to send her two of my talks translated into Polish--one fully, and one just notes. I am just going to my dictionary and, like the heroic Oates, may be some time.

The Brave Women Retreat, Krakow, May 2-4 (Part 1)

Poppets! I have returned to dear Scotland from beautiful Poland with cherry vodka, rogaliki z różą (rose jam cookies) and 81 pages of notes. Upon arrival, I discovered my big new-to-me desk set up with a huge monitor and ergonomic keyboard (set up thanks to B.A., equipment thanks to my brother Nulli), so this will take longer to write. My neck hurts already. I have to look at the keys. Argh!

I was in Kraków for the canonisations of SS. John Paul II and John XXIII. If you subscribe to it, see my report in the Toronto Catholic Register. Otherwise, see another in the Catholic World Report blog. The CWR report includes descriptions of Wrocław, where consciousness of the OTHER papal saint was more obvious.

Meanwhile, in Wrocław I went to the house that was the family home of Saint Edith Stein from c. 1910 until the Nazis confiscated it in 1939. The address is now 38 ulica (street) Nowowiejska, and although the interior was much messed with before a Saint Edith Stein society saved it, you can get a good idea of what it was once like. And I think St. Edith and her family must have known and loved the big chestnut tree in the back garden. Seeing the salon in which St. Edith wrote her doctoral thesis and met with friends was a moving experience. The handsomely patterned floor is the original. For some reason, it hadn't really dawned on me that the Steins were not just comfortable, but rich.

I returned to Kraków in good time for the retreat. There were a maximum of 65 ladies, at least two of whom I recognized from the first Brave Women retreat two years ago. The retreat was led by Father Paweł Drobot, helped by Alicja Jewula, who writes the Brave Women blog and co-ordinates the Brave Women society, which was founded at the first retreat and now meets every month in three cities: Kraków, Wrocław and Warsaw. Alicja says I am the mother of the Brave Women society, which is very satisfying, even if I understand only 20% of what they say!

Friday's events began with supper, Holy Mass in our hosts' (the Redemptorists') chapel, and then prayers and songs of praise before the first lecture, "Do you recall that you were created for joy?" This was by Katarzyna Dziurdzik, who owns a flamenco dance academy. The lecture was in part about her adventures in flamenco, and afterwards she and a few of her students put on a performance.

To be continued tomorrow as I get used to this keyboard!

Dating the Way of the Dinosaurs?

I had a poignant email from a reader who just wants to go on a date. She doesn't want a marriage proposal (from a relative stranger, anyway) or a declaration of love. She just wants to go on a "I'll pick you up at seven" dinner date. And I sooo understand this. And I know what she's thinking. She's thinking she'll get all gussied up, and a handsome man will ring the doorbell. She will appear, and his eyes will widen, and he'll say, "Hey! You look great!" And then he'll whisk her off to supper in his vehicle and open the door for her when she gets out and open the restaurant door and help her with her coat and pull out her chair, if the waiter doesn't get to it first. He'll order a bottle of wine, and then they'll have such an interesting chat, the waiter will start hovering so he can finally take their order. Et cetera. Et cetera.

That sounds very nice, but the fact is that this is no longer the societal norm. To get that level of male attention and care, you usually have to be in a romantic relationship with the guy already, or maybe in France. (I prefer to believe that France is still this legendary place of deeply attentive, if utterly unfaithful, woman-loving men.) I advised my reader to ask around and find a really nice hairdresser. If you want to feel taken care of, but you are not actually ill, to the beauty industry you go! Very nice men with no designs whatsoever on your purity will make you feel like a million pounds/dollars.

I still remember getting a massage at an Aveda salon in Toronto; I was expecting a lady named Ashley. My masseur was a handsome, muscled man named Slavko. How can this be legal, I wondered. Oh well. La, la, la! (Slavko, I am quick to mention was a complete professional, and it was all very registered, as in RMT.)

Speaking of hairdressers, it is my habit always to get my hair ironed out before I go to Poland. I look foreign as it is; I cannot imagine what sort of impression I would make if I appeared before my retreatants/publishers/journalists with my hair in its natural state. And I love hairdressers and beauticians in Edinburgh because they are natural students of human nature, having heard more than your average priest. So yesterday, when two young ladies, one slim and one curvy, were ironing my hair--one girl on each side of my head--I asked them if the date stil existed.

"I've never been on a date," said the curvy one.

"Nobody goes on dates," said the slim one.

"How do people have relationships, then?" I asked.

"We just go to clubs and meet people," said the slim one cheerfully.

The curvy one shot her a quizzical look.

"Well, you do," she said.

Between them they had two approaches. The slim one goes to clubs and bars and, naturally vivacious, has conversations with anyone and everyone. The curvy one has never had a relationship with someone she didn't know from school. She and her friends go out together, and she ends up in "relationships" with male friends.

They both thought the idea of internet dating was scary. The idea of meeting a complete stranger they met online alarmed them, although the slim one chats with complete strangers all the time.

"How can you tell which ones are nice and which ones are jerks?" I asked her.

"I can just tell," she said. Then she elaborated, "From the way they act."

Women do not come to the salon to get their hair done because they are going on a date. That doesn't happen. Women come to the salon to get their roots done, or to keep their cuts fresh, or, more rarely, to get an up-do for a wedding or some other glamorous event.

It would seem that, to these young Edinburghers anyway, there is no formal structure to romance and courtship. It happens naturally within the course of their friendships--either going with friends to clubs and bars, or just being with people at school, or hanging around with friends.

Thus, if you've never been asked out on a date, it may be because dating--except between complete strangers who meet online (and maybe in France and the American South)--is going the way of the dinosaurs. Not only is it not something the urban young seem to do these days (and my hairdressers aren't the sum total of my research, incidentally), it speaks to the changing roles of men and women.

First of all, women have the same work opportunities as men, if not better, and we certainly get paid the same amount for the same work. Thus, many men don't see why they should pay all that money on a date. (If they are already in love with the girl, they will, but if this is more of a "job interview"-style date, then they don't get it.) Personally I think that women spend so much more on their appearance that it actually evens things up when the man pays, but a man might not see it that way.

Second, many men are paranoid about being seen as breadwinners. Possibly I should stop thinking about the manosphere (or Taki magazine--not for the sensitive!), but many young American men seem to be terrified that all women want is their money, and if we get their hooks into their paychecks via marriage, we will divorce them, take them to the cleaners, get their paychecks garnishéed, and no other woman will want them, etc.

Third, many men don't know how to date. If their friends date, then they date. If their friends don't date, they don't date. They don't read books about dating. There are no dates in the Hornblower series. Is there dating in Star Trek? No. And look at Han Solo and Princess Leia. No dating.

Thus it does not surprise me that instead of asking women out on dates, men hover around making Han Solo-like jibes and never get on with it, instead stammering things like "Hey, if you and Luke... I don't want to get in the way." They may actually blurt out how they feel before they're encased in carbonite, but actually, Han Solo didn't, did he? I belong to a generation of men who grew up thinking Han Solo was the ultimate guy, and probably so do you.

And that's it from me for a week. If you want to hear my words of wisdom, come to Krakow for the Redemptorists' Majówka retreat for women. My lectures will be in English, simultaneously translated into Polish, and Polish girls will be happy to translate other stuff for you because Polish girls are very kind, actually.

The contrast between kindly, sympathetic young Polish women and Polish-men-in-general is very striking. Polish girls are like gazelles, and Polish men are like bears. No wonder that Wojtek the Bear was accepted as a soldier in the Free Polish army. Other than the fact that he eats the cigarettes rather than smokes them, he seems very Polish in the Scottish play about him. I can't remember if Wojtek went to Mass, but he probably did. I used to make exceptions to this rule, but then I discovered that even really sweet, mild-mannered Polish priests have bear-like wills.

Hmm. Maybe I should not make such personal remarks about Polish men just before I go to Poland, eh? Otherwise, I may be in for some growling and roaring tomorrow.

But if you don't come to Krakow, I will be posting again on May 7. Until then, have a happy Easter season!