Sugarland’s “Little Miss” Inspires Fans

Remember the ’60s song “I’m a Woman”? (You know, the “I can bring home the bacon / fry it up in a pan / and never let you forget you’re a man” business?) Well, the song “Little Miss” is the realistic, modern-day answer to that song. It is the very raw, honest, beautiful shadow side to that archetype of the Everywoman.

While that unforgettable hit (heck, it was even in a perfume commercial back in the ’70s, for goodness sake!) celebrated the American Woman’s uncanny knack for multitasking — as well as her chosen juggling of a bajillion different roles within her life, work, and family — “Little Miss” explores the realistic underbelly of the challenge of trying to “be everything for everybody.” She is a woman coming to terms with the fact that “just because you CAN do everything doesn’t mean you SHOULD do everything.” She is a woman who often forgets herself in her attempts to try and do for everyone else. She is a woman who has learned the hard way that often when we try to do everything for everybody all the time, we can wind up losing ourselves. And when that happens, everybody loses.

But all is not lost in “Little Miss”! Oh no!

“Little Miss” has a spark of hope. She has had enough life experience and loss to know that anything forgotten can just as well be remembered. That anything she has tossed aside in a fog of perfectionist martyr bullshit can be reclaimed, including her sense of self, her body, her passion, her inspiration, and her desire to savor the marrow of life.

And, just to be clear, “Little Miss” isn’t just for the ladies. While “Little Miss” was written in the voice of a woman, the disappointments of being underappreciated and the pressure to be perfect are struggles that are often felt by men as well. The character, as a man, would clearly be defined, shaped, described and voiced differently. However, the emotion we each feel within these struggles is the same. Whether male or female, our tears all taste of salt, my dear ones.

I hope this song holds up a mirror. If you happen to catch a glimpse of yourself there, I hope you are reminded that you are enough, that you are worthy, that perfect is completely boring and, most of all, that it’ll be all right again.

- Jennifer