I love you Caitlin Moran

Dear Caitlin Moran (sorry, Mum, I’ll write next week),

Would you please be my best friend? Pretty please?

I ask because last night I closed the back cover of your book debut ‘How to be a Woman’ and I wanted to stand on the table of my train carriage and shout ‘I am a feminist’.  

What really held me back were my heels. Which, as you eloquently point out, are impractical footwear and are not ideal for scrambling into a jolting train surface.

I would, however, disagree with you, dear Caitlin, that women wear heels to make their legs look thinner. The reason that I choose the tottering footwear is twofold.

Firstly, being 5”2”, any extra height is gloriously welcomed (almost as warmly embraced if you were to step through my office door).

Secondly, I am the youngest in my office and so (combined with the 5”2” thing) I feel I require a little more authority.  Because, let’s be honest, an adult giraffe wields more power than a young meerkat.

Which brings me, Caitlin, to the mission statement of your manifesto. Your Bible to women’s position within society concludes that what feminism boils down to is being pleasant and polite to one another – men being nice to women, women being nice to men, women being nice to women.

If this is what feminism is, by and large, I once again declare myself a strident feminist. In my short life, I have already experienced chauvinism, oppression and straightforward rudeness and I’m ready for a positive change.

I begin with ‘The Patriarchy.’

As previously established, I am petite. I am also blessed with a fast metabolism, meaning I can pack three slices of cheesecake away without great physical effect. Lucky bitch, I know.

(On a more negative not, however, I look younger than I am and purchasing clothes can be a genuine practical issue, everything hanging off me like a toddler wearing it’s father’s suit jacket. My friends, for example, joke that my wardrobe is purchased in Mothercare while supermarket staff say, “Sorry love, you just look fifteen” as they pass a bottle of wine and my driving license back to me).

Plus my 5”2” frame means I am insubstantial. A vigorous gust of wind causes me to lose balance and a standing journey on the Underground throws me from side to side and in to other passengers, like a shuttlecock.

As a result of my petite frame taller male friends see it as their privilege and right to pick me up and spin me around like a living and breathing rag doll.

You yourself point out, Caitlin, that our bodily forms are the scientifically weaker of the sexes. As a result, all I can do is use my female wit and charm to disarm them.

But this does not work. Despite screaming “‘The Patriarchy’ will not control me!” at the top of my lungs, as I’m hurled around in a fireman’s lift, I can’t seem to get through.

I thus find heels to be excellent weaponry. Already being the ideal height for kneeing men in the Frankie Cocozza’s, pointed footwear is a wonderful resource because heels can be utilized as a scratching devise.

I don’t get any of this trouble from gay men. Like you say, Caitlin, gay men are excellent advocates for feminism. One of my best friends is gay and he is the most polite, most supportive and sweetest bloke – he makes me feel like a woman, despite me looking like a seventeen year old. Even when I appear distinctly ‘unfeminine’ he is all charm.

When I learned an ex-boyfriend played away, I didn’t do the “Oh no he didn’t!” finger snap while Aretha Franklin’s ‘Respect’ played. I rang Tim, who held me in bed as I blubbered over him all night, held my hand whenever we left the house for fresh air, cooked for me, got me drunk on red wine and changed my bedsheets when I drunkardly sloshed red wine over the bed. A true hero and feminist to boot. (He calls Sylvia Plath and Virginia Woolf his ‘homegirls.’ Whole-heartedly feminist.)

But I digress. Heels and women are the topic. And I find heels do also give me a bit more authority with women. When I clip-clop into the office in my pair of leopard print heels (which are only comfortable having been broken in) I can’t deny that I feel like Erin Brockovich, despite being just 21.  

I once worked in an office with a particular woman who had the incredible ability to be both sickeningly sweet and grateful and yet terribly bitchy and insulting. I’m not sure which was worse – the patronising arse-kissing or the blunt rudeness. She hardly promoted the female cause.

As I sat at my desk, ignoring her whispering and backhanded comments, I envisaged channelling Ness from Gavin and Stacey – a real feminist, wearing boots on her wedding day because they’re comfortable.

I dreamed of shouting across the packed office “Oh! ... Oh! ... OH! Sinead! Shut it, alright? You're being a wench and I don't like it. So Just. Pipe. Down."

But I did get my own back. I quickly realised the way to colleagues’ hearts is to offer a cup of tea or coffee. Besides which, if you’re making one for yourself it’s only polite to ask if anyone else wants one.

I used the fact that she patronised me to my advantage by always getting her drink order wrong. If she asked for a coffee with one sugar, I’d put three in; if she asked for green tea, I’d make peppermint; if she asked for a glass of still water, I’d pour sparkling, each time plonking it down on her desk and saying “No?! I got it wrong again?! What’s wrong with me, eh?!”

I might be just 21 (yes, for the final time, with the appearance of a teenager) without much life experience, with an appreciation for heels and a hatred of oppression, and I might not be quite what you had in mind when writing your book, but I would like to join your sisterhood.

Together we can instruct all vulgar repressive men and women to go swivel. And go for a drink afterwards, perhaps?

All of my sisterly love, Lucy.