It's COOL To Be YOURSELF
Cool vegetarians, cool girls, cool moms, and why they all hurt my feelings.
Years ago, a friend had a shirt made for me that read “I’M A COOL VEGETARIAN.” I’d said this once when my friend and I were dining at a hip restaurant in Nashville, to convey to a waiter that while I didn’t eat meat, I wasn’t there to cause trouble. I was not going to have a (plant-based) cow (alternative) if a ham hock found its way into my baked beans, or if the okra was fried in duck fat, or if the chicken fried steak included chicken and/or steak. Basically, I had firmly held beliefs about how I wanted to be in the world, unless they inconvenienced anyone else whatsoever. If my beliefs were going to piss off the chef, fuck ‘em!
Looking back now, it’s hard to believe I was a vegetarian for as long as I was. Although it does help explain why yer girl was nodding off at work like a fentanyl junkie. MAMA NEEDED IRON! On the other hand, the idea that I would amend my identity to make others comfortable is not a stretch, because I still do. We all do, right? No? Fine. Good for you and your pathologically unflappable sense of self. I’m sure lots of people hate you for it. Me, they just forget! But I bring this up because I think the latest iteration of my shape-shifting speaks to a broader phenomenon worth reflection.
If you’re unfamiliar with Gillian Flynn’s diatribe on The Cool Girl, what are you even doing with your life?! Go read a good book or at the very least, go marvel at Emily Ratajkowski’s lovely, impossibly generous rack! But do it later. For now, just browse this snippet:
Men actually think this girl exists. Maybe they’re fooled because so many women are willing to pretend to be this girl. For a long time Cool Girl offended me. I used to see men – friends, coworkers, strangers – giddy over these awful pretender women, and I’d want to sit these men down and calmly say: You are not dating a woman, you are dating a woman who has watched too many movies written by socially awkward men who’d like to believe that this kind of woman exists and might kiss them… And the Cool Girls are even more pathetic: They’re not even pretending to be the woman they want to be, they’re pretending to be the woman a man wants them to be. — Gillian Flynn, Gone Girl
I was thinking about Cool Girl the other night when I met up with some friends at a local watering hole with a big sign on the door that read “No one under 21 allowed.” Was this a personal attack on parents like me who drag their children to bars then ignore them while they ruin the ambiance for others? Impossible to say. I was coming off a three hour stint in the pool with four children under six. The friends I was meeting, currently childless, were coming off probably like, I dunno, an afternoon of buying things for themselves, running errands alone and watching Master Class? After ordering a round, I began to blab on about my day, but stopped short before the part where my son got stung by a bee when I perceived (perhaps unfairly) mild disinterest. Quickly, before losing complete control of the situation, I switched gears by asking them questions about their work and sharing random shit I’ve been paid for recently and making it sound like a career. This is just one of the many tactics I employ as I hone my new identity as Cool Mom.
Cool Mom isn’t quite Cool Girl. Cool Mom is Cool Girl’s friend who still meets up for drinks and never brings up what she did about child care because she DOES NOT MENTION HER CHILDREN. PERIOD. Or if she does, she manages to do it apologetically, somehow conveying that present childless company is under no obligation to be interested in, or even listen to, what takes up 99% of her brain power even though present childless company is presumably made up of friends who care about her. On the rare occasion she mentions her children, she does it jokingly, sharing anecdotes about her children that leave the listener wondering, does this person hate her kids? It’s a fine line between relinquishing all status to present childless company (GOOD) and seemingly asking for their pity (BAD). Cool Mom tries to walk it.
At work (and Cool Mom must work) Cool Mom is unburdened by the fact that most schools get out between 2pm and 3pm while most work ends several hours later. When it comes to finishing a big project, Cool Mom is happy to burn the midnight oil with the rest of her team (men) who also happen to be parents (dads) so why should she get special treatment? She doesn’t tell cute stories about her kids, because cute stories about kids are only cute to parents and maybe grandparents of said kids. Yet despite never mentioning her home life, people know she’s a mother. To be so low profile about your kids that people don’t even know you have them is a trait assigned only to soulless ambition ghouls who deserve what they get, like Carolyn on Apple TV’s Presumed Innocent.
Cool Mom is effortlessly hot, obviously. When she tells you she had a baby three months ago, you ask: “With that body? Where did you put it?!”
Cool Mom has definitely read Miranda July’s new book. Cool Mom is always reading. Where does she find the time? Nobody knows, because nobody asks.
Like Cool Girl, Cool Mom is a fantasy, but whose? That’s the question I’ve been turning over in my head since I started to feel my presentation as a mother morphing into a caricature of itself. Initially, I was reluctant to write about motherhood in this newsletter for several reasons. I didn’t want to alienate people who didn’t have children. I didn’t want to have the “mom” identity marker cast a shadow over everything else I thought about and was interested in. I didn’t want to seem old. Mostly though, I just didn’t want to be one of those grating, self-involved parents who thinks everyone wants to hear about their kids when no one actually cares. And yet, writing about myself and assuming anyone could find it compelling is already grating and self-involved, so why should writing about myself as a mother deserve additional scrutiny? Does it? Seriously, does it? Cause if so, I’ll keep doing this Cool Mom thing. I just want to be liked!
I joke about my kids to try to puncture the preciousness of parenting. I believe anyone who focuses too much on the good parts is lying, either to you or themselves. I also do it because the act of pointing out the tedium or absurd relentlessness of having children is a way for me to help survive it. From a bird’s-eye view of childhood development, my children, at 2 and 4, are fascinating. But in the day-to-day, they are so fucking boring! When was the last time you actually played Candy Land? Because if it’s been a while, I promise you, it’s worse than you remember it. There’s no strategy, no room for improvement, and only the mildest of dopamine hits when you draw a picture card. And yet, play it a parent must. And as my husband pointed out the other day, the best way to get through the base monotony is to find some way to amuse yourself within it.
But to some degree, apologizing for telling a story about my children, or focusing on the excruciating parts of spending time with them, feels like an abdication of identity. Because in the same way that I long for my body to look exactly like it did before I had kids, a part of me wants my life to look exactly how it did too. And holding motherhood at arm’s length by denying it or making fun of it sometimes helps me feel like nothing has changed. But it also hurts my feelings, for my children who deserve be accepted, boring, annoying parts and all, and for myself, who does as well.
No one needs another pharmaceutically blissed out momfluencer peddling lies like “it’s fun to cook with your kids” and “you can wear white around your kids” and just generally make the whole thing look like a fucking party furnished by Pottery Barn. But no one needs to believe that motherhood can be held constantly at an ironic distance either. What I’ve found to be true so far is that parenthood is very boring, and and yet, that’s simultaneously what makes it interesting. You rediscover everything you’ve gotten so used to it’s become invisible by watching your children marvel at it. And since even god will tell you there is nothing new under the sun, finding a way to restore wonder to all the old stuff is kind of magical.
Did anyone need to hear me say that seeing the world through the eyes of a child gives parenting meaning?! Of course not! No one but I did.
i love your newsletter so much
Oh lord, I feel this one so hard!