This is the Work! This is the Knowledge! This is the End of man!

As a female it’s hard for me to speak of my own sex without having an unmasked un-sexual preference for it. At times, I can be guilty of esteeming its superiorities beyond the Other Sex. And why not? I am a woman—or at least on the road to growing into one.

There is an undeniable magic in these creatures, women. Not having totally traversed into womanhood—I don’t know when this transformation actually takes place, but I have yet to feel it—I have had the fortune to observe them and witness the specialness that makes them altogether unique and beautiful. There is strangeness in their special qualities, too, for they are creations of irony, paradox, riddles and beauty. Same in their uniqueness, different in their personalities, women share the complexities and simplicities that are commonly bound to all, and yet it is these complexities and how they are formed and applied to each’s personality that sets them apart from others.

What a sense of humour God had when it created women! In men, it created solid forms, things concrete and hard, on the surface at least. In women, it created liquid, things soft, pliable yet strong, with intricacies and delicacies that would shine when rotated in the light, reflecting the glory of the Maker. I would like to think that women were the reason for smiles, laughter, and merriment. Perhaps the first woman was the first to break her lips apart and let the corners curve upward in a beguiling, ecstatic, arc. This is my bias speaking, of course.

But I digress.

The entirety of woman is a paradox. Complexly simple at times and at times infuriatingly simply complex. Different from each other, but very alike at the same time—same in their difference. Strong, yet weak. Hard, yet soft.

She may be simple in her likes and tastes, because she knows what she wants. Simple pleasures thrill her. But by the same turn, she enjoys things complicated, things that bring a challenge, things that test her, that may even bring her pain. She is the same as the next woman and yet almost entirely different. She experiences the same feelings, the same burning desires, simple passions, simple wants, the same frets, the same worries, the same doubt, yet how she acts on them, yet her reasons for them may be totally different. These simple passions and wants may be like a whelming flood, overtake her and drown her in the current. She may be ruled by her emotions, consumed like a fire, in a split second. In the next second, she has returned to composure.

She is stronger than people credit. She must experience the physical pain of pushing a sack of bone, skin, muscle, fat, organs, through a 4-inch slit between her legs, and then she must bear the emotional burden of knowing a part of her has become its own entity, see the thing make decisions that break her heart, and then ultimately leave her, sometimes never to return, never reciprocate her undying, totally consuming love. She is weakened sometimes by her resolve to love this thing and allow it room to grow apart from her. It is this love that allows her to be weak, to give when her instincts cry out to be resolute. She must at times be harder than stone, even when she wants to slacken and allow things to take their course. And many times, she must be the soft place that men and children need, even when she has no energy and inside may be hard like the bottom of an empty barrel.

These riddles of the make up of women make them magical creatures. Creatures of laughter, tears, screams and song. Living paradoxes.

Their enchanting mystery has bewitched men, writers, artists, sculptors, poets, bards and even their own kind for centuries. They bewitch me still. These beings of charm, of opposing personalities, powers that clash. These brilliant people of simple delights, complicated emotions, intricate facets that shine. How can you not love them?

I guess it is the simplicity in me that yearns to be included in their ranks. But I am just a mere girl, and I can live with that for now.