"I'll Get you My Pretty" Beauty is ....

   


          Do you love me because I'm beautiful, or am I beautiful because you love me?" (Quote from the movie, Cinderella). Have you ever wondered what makes a woman beautiful and is being pretty enough? Now according to Webster's Dictionary, pretty is artful or clever, pleasing by delicacy or grace; having conventional elements of beauty. Basically, just an adjective used to describe: an example might include pretty red flower or pretty necklace, or the worst, she has a pretty face but... ect. Webster's definition of beauty is a quality giving pleasure to the senses. Here it seems to be suggesting, beauty gives pleasure to our senses, and it appears to be the 'mother' of pretty.

         I find no true answers in those definitions, however. Why is it so elusive? I know what beauty is to me: family, hope, truth, a gentle rain, a sunrise, really good food with a good wine sharing it with good friends. It's timeless, intangible things, or a spirit. Well you get the point. I could go on and on to infinity.  Pretty? Well it just stands back in the shadows of its more maternal and popular companion wishing it could be beautiful; pretty might be suffering from the envy of its more alluring summation.

         If given the choice most would rather be considered beautiful over pretty. Why? Because being beautiful inspires the arousal of all the senses and pretty is only pleasing with elements of beauty. Yes, they're seeds of the same family but cannot be symmetrically equal. The difference could be as simple as a rose just budding which is sweeter and more fragrant, and elicits responses such as wow! It's so beautiful! Whereas, a rose losing its petals and aromatic essence arouses a less hearty applause: well, it's still pretty even if it's dying. I wonder, is it because beauty has possessed all its myrrh?

         My efforts appear to be futile here. Let me take it a step further by suggesting, beauty is like a triad: the spiritual, the physical and the psychological aspects of a living organism; pretty is just a reflection of what one sees on the outside. Let's take a look at what Tracy Hallam has to say about beauty in her poem, Warm Obstacle,"Mine is no ordinary face. Mine is a face that has stood near beauty, just shy of pretty, bearing a strength undefined." In her profound and poignant words, I hear beauty cannot be defined by an outward glance. On the lighter side, there is always the famed line from the wicked witch in the Wizard of Oz who hurled" I'll get you my pretty." I know, I'm stretching it, but I guess what it really comes down to is beautiful and pretty are subjective.

         To test this declaration, I decided to ask my five-year-old grandson what pretty and beautiful means to him. It went something like this.

"Isaiah, do you know what pretty is?" He nods his head yeah. He's playing with rubber farm animals on the floor. Then he looks at me with a playful light in his big hazel eyes.

"The sun is pretty when it shines. It rains a lot grandma." I shake my head in wonderment. A true Pacific North-westerner already! Isaiah's bright innocence is beauty in my eyes.

"Do you know what beautiful is Isaiah?"  Once again he nods his head.

"Yeah, mommy's beautiful and you're beautiful but older. And I think Jasmine's beautiful too. She's my girlfriend at day-school."  Ha! This brings a smile to my face. I had to hug him for his sweetness. At least the boy has good taste and it suggests, perhaps beauty is ageless. 

         Beauty and pretty are not only subjective, but also, what they mean to us, comes very early in life. So I suppose, they are just a 'state of being'...it's how one is perceived and the perception others have of you. I think collectively those preconceived notions are superficial. The 'superficial' of course, lies on the physical level.

         In the end, beautiful and pretty are different because beauty comes from within. As discerning as it may be, it is the spirit of oneself radiating from inside. Pretty is just a mere reflection of beauty. I began this little quest with a quote from Cinderella which in essence suggests love has the power to create beauty. John Keat's suggests "A thing of beauty is a joy forever, its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness. William Shakespeare wrote, But love is blind and love cannot see the pretty follies that themselves commit. Both of these quotes are fine examples of the elusiveness of beauty; both are equally strong in their themes. I think its fair to surmise, there is an element of ambivalence.

         I'd like to finish this with two of my favorites. One from Ralph Waldo Emerson; It is true that genius takes its rise out of the mountains of rectitude; that all beauty and power which men covet are somehow born out of that Alpine district; that any extraordinary degree of beauty in man or woman involves a moral charm and finally from Hilda Doolittle who really epitomizes the true meaning of beauty with her words:

He was very beautiful,
the old man. 
and I knew wisdom,
I found measureless truth
in his words.