"The Operative" by Lisa Kable

When I was younger, I used to play this game called "No One Lives Forever." It was a first person shooter set in the 1960s that followed the missions of a British spy named Cate Archer. 1960s? FPS? Spies? Main character is female? I was all about it when I was 11-years-old. My dad had me try it out when it came as a sample in PC Gamer (Remember when it was semi-safe to trust the samplers?) and I ended up begging him to buy me and my sister the full version. Well, the full version also came with the soundtrack as a bonus. Score! OMG - I loved that soundtrack and it was featured very heavily in my workout music throughout my teens. I also really loved that game and remember it fondly. "The Operative" is Cate Archer's theme song. It's my favorite song on the OST, for various reasons: 1) It sounds sexy, 2) it's one of the only songs on the OST that has lyrics (and I connect better to songs with words....), and 3) during a time when I was seriously considering "intelligence officer" as a future career choice, it idealized the romantic vision of spycraft that I ate up as a little girl. In reality, spycraft is incredibly tedious and expert research skills are essential. If you're lucky (and smart), there shouldn't be many instances where you're running for your life, gun in hand - if there are, those are mostly training scenarios. If you're interested, a few "spy" books I recommend reading are "See No Evil" by Robert Baer and "The Company" by Robert Littell.

For today, I wanted to talk about a couple of dames (one fictional, one historical) who, to me, epitomize this idea of being beautiful, brilliant, and perhaps a tad dangerous - in a good way.

Agent Margaret "Peggy" Carter

Hopefully by now, everyone is familiar with Agent Carter, who I've decided is not just my favorite Marvel character, but also who I would like to be when I grow up. As you can imagine, I was disappointed when they stopped the show after two seasons. In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Agent Carter is Captain America's first love, but after it is assumed he's lost forever, she has to carry on with her life. So what does she do? She joins the Strategic Scientific Reserve (SSR) in New York and proceeds to own the place. Being the only female operative at the SSR (the other women who work there have a more secretarial role), she feels the need to prove herself. I think this is natural for some people. I know it is for me - if someone says I can't do something or tries to tell me who I am, I'll probably try to prove them wrong out of spite. That's the goal - never be what someone expects (I like to think I meet that goal most days). At the end of the first season, she saves the day with her cunning and determination, which results in her being seen as a valued member of the SSR. In the MCU, it's also implied that Agent Carter was a founding member of S.H.I.E.L.D. and was crucial to its success as an organization. I'd have to give props to Hayley Atwell's performance of this complex character, both in the movies and in the TV show. Yes, Agent Carter was beautiful but that was not at all where it stopped. The first vibe you got from Atwell's Peggy was that this woman was a) Really fucking smart, and b) the classiest broad you will ever meet. Classy has nothing to do with being feminine or high maintenance, it has everything to do with treating yourself and others with respect. Agent Carter was there to do a job so she didn't hold back and she expected others to at least match her intensity, and continually push her to do better. And that is why she is one of my fictional role models.

Hayley Atwell as "Agent Carter"

Hedy Lamarr

Lamarr was described as "the most beautiful woman in the world" at one point in her career and that has to be the understatement of the century. You look at old publicity stills of Hedy Lamarr and it's almost hard to believe she was that gorgeous. And it's almost unfair that she was also graced with a brilliant mind. She was a natural inventor and, throughout her life, she spent much of her time on various hobbies, which included "tinkering" with everyday objects. Even though she enjoyed being an actress, she quickly became bored - especially since the roles she was given didn't exactly have depth. This feeling of disconnectedness only increased with the start of World War II. Not content with simply being a "morale booster" for the war effort, she wanted to contribute something of tangible value. She co-invented the frequency-hopping spread spectrum technology, which is the underlying tech that allows Bluetooth and Wi-Fi to work. Lamarr and composer George Antheil patented the technology in 1942. It was provided to the Navy for use in guided torpedoes but, at least during the war, a working device was never created. The patent was uncovered for commercial use later and eventually evolved into the wireless technologies we know today. However, Lamarr wasn't acknowledged for her role in its creation until 1997, when she received the Electronic Frontier Foundation Pioneer award. The rest of Lamarr's life is kind of tragic. She stopped making movies in 1958 and, even before then, most of her films were box office flops. As her looks declined with age, she became more reclusive, until she basically had no contact with the outside world. Even so, she is still one of the most beautiful women to ever grace the silver screen. And her invention allows me to compose this blog from the comfort of a wi-fi enabled laptop. For that, I will be eternally grateful.

Hedy Lamarr

That concludes our month on the Divine Feminine. Hopefully, you learned a little bit - I know I did. I'll be taking a short break tomorrow, will announce April's theme on Monday, and then I'll be resuming regular posts next week. Thanks for reading!

"The Operative" Video