Working Girl

I recently received an email from a wonderful new acquaintance of mine, an email sent to a group of women that are working together to coordinate the teaching of a women's religious studies and support group. The email was addressed to "Girls!..." which, I am assuming, includes myself.

Girls. Girls?!?

I understand that many women nowadays use such terms to address one another, and even Dictionary.com acknowledges this more playful and/or offensive form of casual address:

Usage note 
Just as many mature men, even young men, resent being referred to as boys,  many adult women today are offended if referred to as girls,  or the less formal gals.  In business and professional offices, the practice of referring to one's secretary as the girl  or my girl,  as in I'll have my girl look it up and call you back,  has decreased but not disappeared entirely. Such terms as the girls  in reference to a group of women, girl or gal Friday  in reference to a female secretary or assistant, and bachelor girl  in reference to an unmarried woman are increasingly regarded as offensive, and working girl  in the sense “a woman who works” is declining in use.


I guess I now get to count myself as one of the offended ones, having been referred to as a "girl" and being really irritated by it. As usual, I couldn't just leave it there, though. Why would being called a "girl," as part of a group and by a very kind person, cause me so much disgruntlement? It was not meant as an insult. I would guess that there is really little intent behind it at all, except perhaps giving us a clue into the way that this particular person sees herself and others around her. Does she think of herself as a "girl," then? A young person, a child, "a young, immature woman, especially formerly, an unmarried one"? I don't see myself this way, except maybe the unmarried part, but somehow "divorcee" and "unmarried" don't quite fit the exact same social categories as implied by the dictionary definition. At least in my head.

So at what age do I get to stop being a "girl" and become a "woman"? I thought I had already achieved the rights to this status by virtue of passing thirty years of living, but perhaps I have erred. Perhaps I must wait until the gray hair has taken over, until the youthful face has sagged and wrinkled, before I will no longer be seen as a "girl."

It has been an odd and strangely poignant moment of conflict, struggling momentarily with the discord of exterior definitions and/or labels and my own, preferred, self-definition. Maybe I should insist upon a less troubling form of address. And probably lose a potential friend, in the process. I don't know: is "ladies" any better?