The first CD I ever owned was Britney Spears’ ...Baby One More Time. I was 7 years old shopping with my dad at The Wall, a now-defunct CD store, when I spotted its pink case on display, my Bayou Barbie kneeling for a historic portrait of sexualized innocence in American pop music.
...Baby One More Time, both the album and the video, imbued my young brain with prom queen feminine ambition. Britney was the saccharine fantasy of boys and men alike, too hot to be squeaky clean, too artless to rock the boat. She occupied a noncommittal space of palatability—the kind of tepid persona that yields mass adoration and hypnotized little white country girls like me into thinking that could be me someday. Big white smile. Hair just below the shoulders. Pornstar voice, both sweet and raspy. Cheerleader body.
And a miniskirt. It was the miniskirt for me.
I went to Catholic school for 1st-5th grade. Girls had two uniform options: a white polo paired with either navy blue pants, or a pleated plaid skirt. My mom wouldn’t even entertain the latter. The year ...Baby One More Time came out, though, she acquiesced for Halloween alone: I got to go as Britney Spears for dress-up day at school. I wore my hair in pigtails, knee-high socks, and a non-uniform plaid miniskirt. I was on top of the world.
I spent most of my childhood dying to be girly. My sisters were tomboys and my mom wore nothing but oversized sweatsuits, so my taste for florals and frill was a point of household contention. Seeing Britney Spears, and Fran Drescher on The Nanny, and the cast of Clueless, and countless other dream queens in miniskirts, I had something to look forward to. I was going to be a girl in a miniskirt.
For years I’ve leaned on the miniskirt as a source of sartorial empowerment. At almost 30, that sentiment has only strengthened—perhaps because I’ve been made to feel like it shouldn’t. I know too many people who believe certain clothing has age limits, and that, somehow, the transition to modesty begins at 30. I will seize every opportunity to widen the chasm between myself and those people.
What’s more youthful and irreverent than bare legs with no pelvic protection? The miniskirt shouts everything I want an outfit to say about me at full volume: a sexier, more contemporary version of “I am woman. Hear me roar.” The miniskirt rose to prominence just before the Women’s Liberation Movement of the late 1960s fought for workplace equality, an end to domestic violence, and much more. The symbolism of a raised hemline—an instrument of exposure, of body autonomy, in the context of greater liberation—remains relevant today.
I’ve always found shorts unforgiving. My thighs never fit and I’m subject to chafing and cameltoe, rendering me that fidgety person, tugging at their ill-fitting clothes. Nothing stifles my confidence like discomfort. The miniskirt is this perfectly feminine thing that allows the soft parts of my body, another perfectly feminine thing, to breathe. If only I felt that same generosity from other women… I digress.
Adulthood is grave and the world is doomed and a miniskirt reminds me to stay playful. That having fun is a moral imperative that begins in my closet. A miniskirt can take you from French film muse… to Studio 54 disco queen… to streetwear aficionado… to Britney goddamn Spears circa ...Baby One More Time. And anything with that kind of shapeshifting power is my weapon of choice.