Now, at my more advanced age, the memories and feelings from many years about relationships between men and women has led to a deeper meaning for me behind the song I wrote some time ago titled “Prettiest Girl”. This Valentine’s Day 2017 will find millions of people spending time with a special loved one or significant other, and I am sure that looks will have little to do with how people in love feel about each other.
When I was a kid growing up, I would see how the older folks around me treated their spouse or significant other. Television in the 1960’s and the 1970’s had really been pushing how a person looks to others, so there was a large segment of the population who felt that how your appearance was, how you looked to others, was the barometer to bettering the odds of finding love in life. But even at that early age, I began to see what was really going on with people through watching my elders and how they treated each other, it was different than what I saw on television. In fact, those times when people and relatives would visit our home when I was young, watched television together, the comments about what was shown on commercials that passed as beauty or attractiveness would be met with either disdain or even unbelief.
“Ain’t no women look like that in real everyday life” the women would proclaim. And for the men, when an absolutely ridiculous commercial advertisement came on the television about men’s appearance, it would be met with laughter followed by some kind of joke. I began to realize that these people were not together solely because of their looks, there were things that ran much deeper between them that kept them together as couples.
But hey, I was still a kid, and there were still some things for me to learn about a person’s looks. Being in junior high school and high school with other kids did not make this easier for me as some of the kids would often put on a fashion show with what they wore to school daily. If you didn’t “keep up appearances” by some, then you were deemed less attractive. Keep in mind that this is a school full of young students all trying to find their own way but unknowingly being heavily influenced by what they all saw on television when it came to the standards of beauty and attractiveness. And generally, most all the kids watched television back then.
I mentioned in an earlier blog about my sisters, growing up with them was very much a leading guide as how to ascertain my views and feelings about what I thought was attractive or beautiful in women. They told me that some of the most beautiful women are the ones that you don’t see on television, they are the ones that you don’t see in the fashion magazines or other media. They told me that the most beautiful women that I will meet will not be from where I might have imagined, instead they would come from a different place that I would most likely not be aware of.
I listened to what they told me, and as I grew older and went out into life on my own, I found that it is true about realizing a loved one or a significant other’s appearance. The entire person is what is attractive to us as people, the inside of the person, their spirit and love and empathy for us keep us close to one another in life.
While I was still a kid and the older relatives and friends of the family would visit our home in the late spring or during the summer, the inevitable barbecue would get to cooking and the drinks would flow. And as the drinks flowed and the comments became a bit looser coming from the adults, I loved it best when they would openly proclaim their affection to their significant other. The men would say the funniest things about how they did not care so much for their spouse’s looks versus her heart and spirit for him. The women would say the funniest things too, and they would say how they are glad to have their man just the way he is. One day, I heard one of my uncles say to his wife “you my prettiest girl of them all”, and she just adored hearing him say this to her in front of others. That moment stayed with me too, and I began to understand what that really meant, what my uncle was really saying about his wife.
Later in my life, I had the opportunity to understand this view with my own relationships with women. Those relationships were certainly influenced by what I heard and saw with my elders growing up, about looking at and experiencing the whole person. Not basing what a person looks like as a barometer for an enduring relationship. This thinking stayed with me, and while I was living in Los Angeles in the early 1990’s I wrote my song “Prettiest Girl”. And while living in Europe during the late 1990’s I recorded “Prettiest Girl” based on my own life experiences as well as what I experienced with my elders growing up.
And while I have not yet married in my own lifetime, I always wonder if I will find my own “Prettiest Girl” someday. But I do wish the most loving Valentine’s Day 2017 to all of you out there who loves your spouse or your significant other wholly, no matter their looks.
Much Love.