I have thought about this theory approximately one million times since first reading this book in 2006.
I am, of course, a literal Gardener; it’s almost actual gardening season around here, and we have SO much to do, to plan, to plant. But I have always believed that, in the Carole Radziwill and JFK Jr context, I am also a figurative Gardener. I am a nurturing, mother-hen type of person who likes to make sure loved ones are special and cared for. That said, my husband is not really a Flower, so I have always thought that we are one of those double-Gardener marriages.
Except sometimes, I think I am a Flower, or, at least, I’m turning into one.
The area in which my Flower-ness becomes most apparent is in travel, or more specifically, travel planning. I love to travel, I love to see new things and have new experiences. I love it all! What I don’t love, however, is dealing with the logistical details. I am capable of dealing with logistical details – I can and have in the past booked flights and hotels and activities – but I find it boring and tedious.
Someone who does not find it boring and tedious, and, in fact, who shines at travel planning is my husband. The man can spend hours researching places to go, things to see and do, and, importantly, how to physically get there. He loves doing it and so over the course of our marriage I have just stepped back to the point where I have ceded all control.
I am completely a Flower. We are now at the point where I only barely know not only our travel itineraries, but I also barely know where we are going. If anything, this attitude of just being along for the ride increases my enjoyment of travel exponentially. I’m like Rex going for a car ride; I’m just excited to be going somewhere, it doesn’t hardly matter where.
Now that my husband is retired and the kids are grown, we have so much flexibility for travel, and to that end we have a few big trips booked for this year, plus some smaller ones, and one of those is coming up this weekend. My husband and I are going to Las Vegas.
I am a complete non-gambler – I do not enjoy it in any way – but Las Vegas is just so much fun; this will be my fourth time going and I am very excited. Needless to say, I did none of the bookings and had nothing to say about the actual itinerary, other than to enthusiastically say “That sounds fun!” every time my husband brought up an idea. My husband has booked us a few shows, and other than that, I don’t know what we will be doing. It doesn’t matter! I’m just excited to go!
So clearly, I am a Flower.
One of my earliest memories is one of complete and utter emotional devastation upon learning that flowers die in the winter. To be fair, I was an incredibly sensitive and dramatic child and I probably experienced utter emotional devastation daily, if not more bi-hourly. However, I have a very clear memory of devastation about the fate of flora during the winter, winter being a very long season in Calgary. How or why this occurred to me, I don’t know, but I would guess that there was a book about seasons involved; I clearly remember my level of hysteria that my dad tried to quell by telling me that the flowers come back again in the spring. This was small comfort indeed, because of a Very Big Idea that Very Small Nicole had, and that is that when I grew up, I wanted to be a flower.
I was probably three, and so I had no concept of symbolism or anything else, and I obviously had only the most tenuous ideas about what constituted growing up. I genuinely thought it was an interspecies free-for-all, and that becoming an adult meant that you could literally morph into any kind of animal, vegetable, or mineral.
So you can imagine my devastation when I realized just how brief my life on this mortal coil would be after achieving adulthood. I guess I believed that my life would follow this rough trajectory: I would be a child, I would go to school, I would be grown up, I would immediately change from human to flower form, and then I would die. I would die in the winter, thus missing Christmas and a visit from Santa.
I don’t know at what point I realized that my anxiety about an instantaneous winter death was unfounded, but eventually I went on with my little human life, enjoying flowers for what they were and not as a mirror of my future self.
Weekly Reading
An Elderly Lady Is Up To No Good. This was an absolutely delightful little book of connected short stories about a murderous little old lady. It is very clever and quite hilarious. It is translated from the Swedish, so there are many wonderful Swedish tidbits in here, and one made me genuinely squeal out loud, thanks to Were You Raised By Wolves. Do you listen to that podcast? If not, why not? Do you hate joy? The podcast is a beam of light in this dark world. Anyway, there is a little line in this book about Christmas Eve, and one of the characters mentions that the “children will have watched Donald Duck.” I knew EXACTLY what they were referring to, thanks to Were You Raised By Wolves, and if you don’t know, look up their Kalle Anka episode. Obviously it involves Donald Duck, but it is so much more. It is PURE delight, and so is this book.
Dual Citizens. In the past six months, I have been made aware of a conversation in the writing and publishing community about the role of prologues in novels, and the current thinking seems to be just DON’T. I didn’t really think about it too much prior to these past six months, but now I really notice when there is a prologue, and what, if any, value is added. And I will say that the prologue – and epilogue, for that matter – in this book not only does not add to the book, but they actively subtract from it, in my view. Particularly since there seems to be a strange discrepancy; in the prologue the character is going into labour at 38 weeks, but later in the book she is said to be “overdue.” So that actively took me out of what is otherwise a really wonderful story, with incredible writing and prose, about two sisters and their narcissistic, neglectful mother. There are some interesting character arcs and a message about understanding others as we gain life experience. Some of the imagery is a little heavy-handed and slightly unbelievable – sleeping with wolves, really? – but this is a really excellent character-driven novel. I guess we can excuse the prologue.
Is anyone else totally exhausted from the time change? I SURE AM. Other than “Lose A Precious Hour Of Sleep” day, it was a lovely weekend. We attended a surprise birthday party for my friend Joy (HI JOY) and, unrelated to that, I made another cake from Julie’s You Are Human And You Need Cake book, and I took Rex for a nice long Sunday morning hike. It was an attempt to change my attitude when I can’t change the circumstances, the circumstances being the ridiculous ritual of shifting the clocks hither and thither semi-annually for absolutely no reason. ANYWAY. This Flower is heading for bright lights and (relatively) late nights, and will see you on the other side. Take care, my beautiful flower friends. xo
]]>The little girl kept screaming and screaming, her shrieks and sobs echoing through the store. The old lady in front of me in line turned to me. “That kid needs attention! She’s been bawling for this whole time I’ve been here!” she said sharply, and I was actually relieved because in the millisecond before she spoke I thought she was going to say that the child needed a spanking or something, and then it would have been a whole thing. As it was, I didn’t love her tone.
I looked up to see the mother, carrying her still-screaming daughter and pushing the cart full of groceries and her son towards the really gross public washroom. I looked at the old lady and said mildly, “Wow, that mom has her hands full. I feel for her. It’s hard to be a mom.” And then I smiled, and did not break eye contact, in an only slightly-psychotic way. The woman gave a little huff and turned back to her groceries.
In my semi-recent Ask Me Anything, Suzanne (HI SUZANNE) asked Besides people who don’t put their shopping carts away, what are some of your top pet peeves? Suzanne knows me well and rogue grocery carts are definitely number one on my pet peeve list, followed by the statement of opinions as facts, particularly, or maybe even exclusively, negative opinions. Also on my list is when people judgmentally cannot empathize with the plights of other people, tied with the inability to feel joy in other’s happiness or success.
I think this last point has to do with the patriarchy in which we all reside, which dictates that there is only so much room at the table, that a limited amount of women are allowed success in the same area, that life is a zero-sum game in which to succeed, someone else must fail. And honestly, it makes me sick. It makes me even more sick to think that I have, on occasion, bought into this idea in the past, and I have had to work to overcome it.
As an example, back when I worked for YMC as a vegan food blogger, there was an independent Canadian vegan food blogger who, at the time, was achieving great success. She was publishing cookbooks to many accolades, and I will tell you now that I did not feel a glow of happiness for her success. I could appreciate the beauty of her cookbooks, I talked about them positively to my friends, yes, but secretly I harboured many negative thoughts about them. They’re too complicated! I would think. There’s too many obscure ingredients! I would also think, ominously, She’s not THAT great.
Recently I read On Our Best Behaviour, and the section about Envy really recalled those feelings. The author suggested that rather than make envy a poison that eats away at us, women could use the feeling to light the way to the things we want in the world. Instead of tearing each other down – even mentally, maybe especially mentally – we could use envy to our benefit. I’ll have what she’s having.
And the truth is, if I had really wanted that kind of success, I would have had to sacrifice a lot of time, money, and energy to get it, and those sacrifices I was not at the time willing or able to make. That woman worked really hard to get where she was and perhaps if I had channeled all my energies the way she did, I could have had a chance at a similar level of success. But I didn’t, and that’s perfectly fine.
San (HI SAN) asked what is your best personal quality, and right now I think that it is my ability to see myself clearly and make changes when necessary. I think we all are much more malleable than we think we are, and if we want to make changes in ourselves and in our lives we can. It is a fallacy to say this is just who I am, this is just my personality, because although we are all born with personalities and tendencies, and our life experiences exacerbate those personalities and tendencies, for better or worse, we CAN change things we don’t like.
I think it’s pretty common to have a who does she think she is, she’s not that great feeling towards other women. After all women – particularly, I think, of my generation and older – have been indoctrinated since infancy to instinctively dislike and discount other women who are prettier, younger, thinner, or more successful, in whatever metric “success” is measured, and honestly, it’s really distasteful to me, especially when it’s inside me. I don’t blame myself or anyone else; we were raised in a society that made us believe that life is a finite pie and we all have to compete for our slice. I have worked very hard to overcome that conditioning; now when I see a woman who is thriving I automatically think Wow! She’s incredible! rather than She’s not THAT great, and I’m proud of that, to answer Engie’s (HI ENGIE) question what is something you’re proud of?
Elisabeth (HI ELISABETH) asked what was the best and the hardest decision you made in 2023 and this question stumped me for a while. I experienced a great deal of change in 2023, but all of the decisions relating to those changes came much earlier. I realized the answer the other day, when I thought about how I dealt with the changes. There was a months-long period last year when I genuinely thought I might have a nervous breakdown. It wasn’t until I made a mental shift wherein I said to myself that this is my life, I choose how to respond to my life, and, to quote Desiderata, whether or not it is unclear to you, no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should. That decision, to choose how to respond to everything out of my control, was the best decision I could have made. It was also the hardest, at least the hardest to achieve.
Weekly Reading
Roman Stories. Right off the bat, I have to tell you that I am absolutely fascinated by and in total admiration of people who not only speak more than one language, but write in it too. Jhumpa Lahiri, an author I deeply admire, moved to Rome, learned Italian, wrote these stories in Italian, and then translated them to English. I mean, what. How. Anyway, I love short stories and these are so good, showcasing the ordinary but extraordinary lives of people living in Rome, a variety of people from a variety of backgrounds. She mainly focuses on the immigrant experience in Rome, and the daily hardships, big and small, that people face in everyday life.
My Brilliant Friend. Another Italian book, this one courtesy of Engie and the Cool Blogger’s Book Club. I voted for this book as a friend had read it and loved it; I cannot say I loved it, but I did have a pretty interesting experience with it. At first, I found it hard to read; I think that if you read this book at face value, it is a terrible slog, at least in my view. But if you read this as a symbol of post-World War II Italy, it becomes a very interesting tale of a nation’s growth. Each character I thought of as a symbol of a part of Italy: Elena, education and scholastic achievement, Lila, the fashion industry. The neighbourhood in Naples where the book takes place is dominated by the grocer’s family, symbolic of Italian food exports, and by the owners of the bar/ pastry shop, who symbolize, in my view, the mafia. There is also the gentle Antonio – the automobile industry – and the Sarratore family – arts and poetry. I found that reading this book in this way, with an eye to symbolism, was interesting, whereas when I did not read this way, it was boring and confusing. As it was, I was incredibly grateful for the list of characters at the beginning of the book, because there was no way I could keep them all straight and remember who everyone was and how they were connected. As it was, even up to the end I was thinking wait, who’s Ada? Who’s Nino again? And those were pretty main characters, the fact that I was constantly forgetting who they were and what they were doing there is telling.
The Five-Star Weekend. After her husband dies suddenly, an Internet famous woman decides to host what’s known as a five-star weekend: a girl’s weekend with four friends from different stages of her life. Pandemonium ensues, as would be expected with five women with secrets, various pasts, and current stresses. Listen, let’s not overthink this. It’s just a fun, light, fluffy beach read that will probably make you hungry with all the food descriptions. Next beach vacation I’m downloading more from this author. It’s candy in book form, in the best way.
Thank you to everyone who submitted questions to my Ask Me Anything; I am in the midst of answering them all, and I welcome anyone who still has a question to submit it. In the meantime, have a beautiful week, friends. xo
]]>Our last Leap Year was in 2020, and thinking about it now, how strange that time was, having an extra day just ahead of being locked down and going through a global pandemic. When I look at my blog from February 2020, it is all very cheerful and clearly I had no idea what was about to occur. I also, it seems, did not mark the leap day in any way at all.
Well, I shall not make that mistake this year! I have had a really lovely month filled with good things, so why not extend it a day?
Nicole’s Favourite Things: The Leap Year Edition
The E is for Environment
One of my favourite podcasts, Alison Rosen Is Your New Best Friend, has a new segment called Podcast Pals Product Picks, and as you can imagine, I am here for this kind of content. One of the guests talked about E Cloths, which to my mind means ELECTRONIC cloths, but the E in this case stands for Environment. Anyway, they are special microfibre cloths that use only water for cleaning, and by the time the podcast guest finished talking about the streak-free shines on all of his glass and stainless surfaces, I was scrambling to order them. Here, take my money. We have a lot of windows in this house, not to mention mirrors and my shiny lacquered Yamaha piano, and I am never able to get them really clean. I will THINK they are clean, and then the sunlight will come in a certain way, and I will feel the kind of despair that accompanies what one thinks is a job well done, but was actually wasted time and effort.
NO MORE!
Listen, I do not know what magic is involved here, but all I can say is that they really work. Apparently these cloths are somehow antibacterial and antimicrobial and require no extra cleaning supplies, but that is a bridge too far for me. I may use hippie cleaning products, but I still want to use cleaning products. I’m happy to shine my glass and stainless appliances with just water and E Cloths, but I’m not relying on them to, you know, wipe up food-related messes or clean the bathroom.
The Big Ass’k
I have been on a lifelong quest to be less dissatisfied with my hair, and I honestly don’t think I will ever actually love my hair. I have issues, is what I’m saying, for many reasons which I will not go into here so as to not bore and depress us all. Nora Ephron once said that not worrying about your hair anymore is the secret upside to being dead, and when I read that, I finally felt very seen in a way I never had before.
My lifelong quest means that I am always on the lookout for new hair products. I bought this Cake volumizing product on a whim, and also because it was called The Big Ass’k, and honestly, I feel that the name called to me. My anaconda don’t want none unless…
Anyway. I like this product a lot, it’s really great for non-shampoo days to add volume, and it smells fantastic.
Look at that shiny clean mirror!
Actual Cake
I think I bought Julie van Rosendaal’s cake cookbook back in January 2023, with the eventual resolution to make every recipe in the book. My younger son sternly reminded me of this resolution a couple of weeks ago, chastising me for falling down on my goals. To that end, I tried a recipe that I have been wanting to try since obtaining the book: the Jos Louis cake. I have never had a Jos Louis in my life, and neither had anyone in my family, so we could not compare this to the original. Mine was not as pretty as Julie’s, but wow, was it a delicious cake. It might be the best cake I’ve tried from that cookbook to date.
Now, I want to note that this is not a simple recipe. There are many steps and it takes a while to get assembled. Also, I have no idea how one would cover the cake in ganache without it spilling all over the sides of the platter, but no matter. As they say in Beauty and the Beast, true beauty is found within.
Let My Lust Open The Door
I have a new favourite podcast called Bad On Paper; the two lovely young hosts are authors who talk about their writing processes, as well as about books and life in general. This checks every box for me! For Valentine’s Day they had an episode about – wait for it – obscure erotica. One of the hosts talked about a book concerning a pansexual Abraham Lincoln who – again, wait for it – has a penis fight with the Emperor of Japan to see who will – wait for it – colonize the moon. I could not be less interested in such a storyline BUT the other author brought up a book called Unhinged: An Erotic Door Romance.
The host said, “If you’re wondering ‘Is this a book about a woman who fucks her door?’ well, you’d be right!” and at that moment, I knew I had to read it. After all, let’s never forget I read the Governor General Award-winning book Bear about a woman entering into a sexual relationship with a bear – and not, as my son asked, a big hairy gay guy, an actual bear. Upshot of that, for those of you who don’t remember, bears give great oral but are maybe not so good with intercourse. Or, as I like to say now, intercoursing. Anyhoo, back to the door. This little piece of door-related erotica was well worth the $1.30 on Kindle plus the 45 minutes it took to read. I mean, not to spoil anything, but this is no ordinary door. It was made from wood from a tree that – wait for it – Zeus, Greek god, fucked. You read that right! Zeus Harvey Weinsteined an oak tree and bam, we have a sentient – and, apparently sexy – door. More spoilers! The door can sometimes take on a human form! Sexiness ensues!
But wait, there’s more!
The host of the podcast mentioned that Squeak, erotica having to do with balloon animals, was her second choice in books, and, hilariously high off of the image of a doorknob wearing a condom, I bought it on Kindle for another $1.30. Sadly, this one was disappointing. I mean, it wasn’t really entertaining to read, it was just mostly confusing. There’s a three-way? And two of them are partially balloon animals? But they maybe also turned the woman into a balloon animal by having sex with her? But I’m not sure? In a different kind of universe? I really don’t know, but it only took me about 25 minutes to read so it wasn’t a huge investment or anything. Funny thing to note: the author is clearly using a pseudonym, but there is a real photo of her and a description that she lives with her husband, seven cats, and two dogs in North Carolina and you know what, I like this level of author detail. I also appreciate her level of creativity because doors and balloon animals are not items that I have ever thought of in a sexual way before, but now I’m looking at my doors for a little too long. They seem to be getting uncomfortable.
Girl, Put Your Snowshoes On
Let me tell you, the best thing about having a retired, active husband – other than afternoon delight wherein I pretend he is a door – is the willingness to do fun things any day of the week, and the best thing about having my specific retired, active husband is that he likes to buy accessories for us to do such things. In the fall he bought us snowshoes, which I frankly thought would be a waste of money. After all, we had just bought cross-country skis. This is probably why the snowfall has been so low this year, I’m sorry, everyone. Anyway, after kind of a hectic month of not doing anything winter sport related, we decided to give the snowshoes a whirl last week, and let me tell you, I am obsessed.
It’s hiking in the mountains, but with snow!
If it wasn’t a 45 minute drive to get to snow, I would snowshoe every single day, this is how much I love it.
Outfit of the Month
I had a real Ladies Who Lunch experience with my girlfriends a few weeks ago; we went for a nice lunch downtown and then poked around in various expensive boutiques in the area. When we walked into one store called, appropriately enough, The Little Boutique, I had no intention on purchasing anything. I was just along for the ride; the clothes all seemed pretty expensive and nothing seemed to call out to me. That is, of course, until I saw a soft, drapey black sweater on the sale rack.
One might argue that I needed another drapey black sweater like I needed another leg, but I felt the material and it was so incredibly soft. It was also originally priced at $509.
I mean, who would pay that? Not me, but it was marked down to $119, which is still a lot for a sweater I did not need. But then it was 25% off of that price, and you know what, I am not made of stone. $85 for a sweater that was originally $509? Who could say no to that? NOT ME.
Something has been happening to my body lately that is just out of my control. I am in great shape, I am strong and flexible and healthy, and I am also losing my waistline. It is just…disappearing. Where is it going? I don’t know. I am developing the menopausal woman’s waistline, which is to say no waistline at all. My torso is turning into a rectangle; this is a fact, and it’s one that I have come to accept, and so having a long, drapey sweater that skims that rectangle? Yes. I’ll take it.
I debuted The Expensive Sweater at my Galentine’s party, paired with my old faithful Lululemon City Sleek pants, which have been on the Favourite Things many times already; they are actual pants that feel like yoga pants. What could be better? Other than getting an expensive sweater for 16% of the original price, of course.
I hope you all had a wonderful February full of lovely things – if you’d like to tell me about them, I’m all ears. xo
]]>Life continues on its trajectory and here we are. It was university Reading Week, and my older son came home for it which was, of course, delightful. Fifteen years after that playground conversation, and my son has a life that I only vaguely know about. He makes his own appointments and does things that I have no idea he’s doing, like snowboarding and rock climbing, I only have a very cursory idea about his schedule and classes, I don’t know any of his friends, and I have seen where he lives only once, for three minutes, while he moved in. His entire life is completely separate from me.
Well, that’s the goal, isn’t it? Fly, little birdie.
A few years after the playground conversation, I was speaking with the grandmother of one of my son’s friends. She was a lively and vibrant woman who took care of her grandchildren while their parents worked. I was telling her that I was nervous to leave the kids with my parents for three nights while my husband and I went away for his birthday. I’d never left them for so long before, and I felt anxious and guilty.
She patted my arm and said it was good to do these things, after all, she said, time goes fast and one day I’d be looking across the table and it would just be my husband. She told me that she remembered exactly when that happened, she said Oh, it’s you. Hello.
That isn’t quite the case here yet, but I can see it in the distance.
Marriages and long-term partnerships are so interesting and, snowflake-like, no two are the same. I was thinking a lot about that this week while reading Carly Simon’s memoir. Now listen, I have always been a fan of James Taylor, but I think that after reading this that I kind of hate James Taylor? He sounds like an absolute nightmare to be married to; I mean, to be fair, he was an addict, addiction is a disease, but also he was one of those guys who really wants a mommy in his wife – he is Sweet Baby James, after all – and who seems to have deeply resented the time and energy Carly spent on their children, particularly their very young son who was very ill with a kidney deformity. That’s probably all I need to say to paint the picture, but of course, he was also having affairs six ways to Sunday, and whenever Carly would confront him with this, he’d say “It has nothing to do with you.” OH REALLY, JAMES TAYLOR. I mean, he had to get tested for chlamydia a number of times during their marriage, so it kind of does have something to do with her? What was incredible to me was that Carly took to heart something her father said, which was that the true meaning of being rich was being able to give, and not being concerned about receiving. If that is the case, then Carly Simon was incredibly rich in her marriage, and even in 2015, decades after it ended, she still writes about him with love.
Getting back to James Taylor and his many venereal diseases, I was really puzzled by something: how was it working? And by “it” I mean his penis. I am no expert here, but he was whacked out on heroin much of the time, and so how was he having sex with all these women? I assumed that there would be performance issues associated with so much drug use, but here he was, contracting the clap left and right.
I am loathe to imagine this, honestly. James Taylor and his skeevy 70s moustache and greasy hair is not someone I want to picture intercoursing, as Detective Mettavoy once said in NYPD Blue and I have been waiting all these years to repeat. But I guess I am loathe to imagine anyone in a sexytimes situation; recently Stephany (HI STEPHANY) commented that no one talks about long-term partnered sex, and it’s true, no one does. I’m not going to delve into my own details about intercoursing here, mostly because my mom and several members of my extended family read this blog and I would like to have our future interactions not shadowed by extreme awkwardness. But I would like to circle back to my initial thought about marriage after the kids are grown and out of the house; this is the time to shine, in that department. Hello, it’s you.
Weekly Reading
Boys In The Trees. As mentioned above, this is a VERY juicy memoir written by Carly herself, and it is beautiful and lyrical, as could be expected from such an esteemed poet and songwriter. I knew going in that she had a stutter as a child, and her mom encouraged her to sing instead, which helped immensely, but what I didn’t know is she developed a stutter after being sexually exploited as a small child by the teenage son of a family friend. This exploitation went on for years and probably explains a lot about her later life. Also something that explains a lot: she was third born after two sisters, and she was “supposed” to be a boy named Carl, disappointed, her parents added a “y.” Do not even get me started on how enraged I am at the idea of “trying for a boy/ girl,” I have to actually do some ujjayi breathing just at the thought. Anyway, her parents did have their longed-for (RAGE RAGE RAGE) son after Carly, but they didn’t want him to GROW UP GAY in a house full of females (MORE RAGE) so they hired a male companion to teach him manly things. Where was her father, you may ask? He was busy. You see, Carly grew up in incredible wealth and privilege – her father is the Simon of Simon and Schuster! She grew up in New York and summered in Connecticut, spending a few weeks a year in Martha’s Vineyard, where, as a child, she met a young James Taylor WHO WAS ALSO GROWING UP WITH IMMENSE WEALTH AND PRIVILEGE. Honestly, I had no idea. Anyway, this male companion ends up a) fucking her mother to the point that she had an adjoining room with him while her father was just on another floor of the house, and b) spying on Carly and her sisters as they use the bathroom. So perhaps all of this explains Carly’s mellow attitude towards her nightmare of a husband, later on. There are many juicy details about the many sexy notches in her belt later in life, notably Warren Beatty, who really knew what was what in the bedroom, and Mick Jagger, with whom she had EXPLOSIVE chemistry, and who also sang backup on You’re So Vain. Who knew? Here’s what she had to say about that song:
Aha! So it’s more of a compilation of vain men. God, I love that song. Long-time readers will recall that this is my go-to karaoke song.
Hagitude: Reimagining The Second Half of Life. Speaking of birdies flying and the nest becoming empty, my friend Laura (HI LAURA) said the other day that she felt like when she became a mother, something shattered in her creativity, and now, as her daughter is away at college, she is at a stage where she is picking up those shards and putting them back together, rediscovering her creativity. I thought of that image a lot, reading this book. This is an interesting time of life for a woman. “…what we should be doing during menopause is gently and consciously letting go of one period of our lives, and slowly and mindfully easing the progression into another.” So says the author of Hagitude, an uplifting book drawing on European mythology about the elder period of a woman’s life, the vitality and meaning that can come from becoming a crone, a hag, a wise old woman. This is a dense book full of imagery and reclamation.
Here we are in the last week of February! Time just keeps its forward march, and here Friday is actually March. I’m hoping for a lamblike start to the month for you all, in every way. xo
]]>Fortunately this state of affairs didn’t continue for the whole week; in fact, things improved exponentially. For one thing, we finished the puzzle!
Michelle (HI MICHELLE) had asked what I do with puzzles after I’m finished, and I disassemble them and put them back in their box, which in this case feels like an extreme case of non-attachment, like I am a monk making mandalas in the sand.
If you have been in a grocery store lately, or, indeed, alive in this world, then you will be well aware at the shocking price of literally everything. Recently at Costco I picked up a two-litre of olive oil that a mere six months ago cost $18.99; it is now selling for $32.99 which, I think we all can agree, is a startling increase in price. I do believe there is a global olive crop failure, cue the ominous climate music, but also? $32.99. My cooking just got way more expensive.
Olive oil isn’t the only item that has vastly increased in price, of course, because it seems like everything has with the strange exception of almonds and almond butter, which I am not going to question and instead will welcome with open arms. Come to me, almond products. In a non-food-related, but still very shocking topic, my favourite Maybelline mascara is now $14.99, as opposed to being well under ten dollars only a year ago. This is MAYBELLINE MASCARA. It is not by any stretch of the imagination a luxury brand. I go through at least one tube of mascara a month, so my already-unwieldly beauty budget is ever-increasing.
In my recent Ask Me Anything, Engie (HI ENGIE) asked an interesting question that I have been pondering for months now: What do you resent paying for? Because I am pedantic about semantics, I have been stuck on the word resent. I do not like paying such high prices for everyday items such as olive oil and mascara, but I cannot say I resent it.
Something I find mentally exhausting is the action of clicking on a link in a newsletter or a blog post, a link that looks interesting and exciting, only to find that it is behind a paywall. Similarly, I have in the past year subscribed to a number of Substack newsletters written by talented and interesting people, and recently I have noticed that only a paragraph or two will be available in the free subscription of the Substack, the rest reserved for paid subscriptions only.
I don’t resent this. I do believe that creators should be compensated for their work, and to that end, I do have a few subscriptions I pay for via Substack or Patreon, subscriptions that I value and that add to my life. However. I could not possibly afford to pay for every single Substack or Patreon membership for every creator that I enjoy; or, I suppose I could, but that would severely cut into my beauty budget, and I am unwilling to do that. I’m not cutting back on my mascara consumption, is what I am saying, and something has to give.
It’s frustrating, though, to get excited about reading something only to find out that one must pay to read that something, which is the point of a paid subscription, I know. I know how it works! It’s like old-school click bait, but with subscriptions. Creators have to eat too, and that olive oil isn’t going to pay for itself, but I just wanted to know what Val Monroe was going to recommend for undereye bags without having to pay $8 a month to find out.
To be honest, when it comes to undereye bags, the secret is probably to invent a time machine and to get completely new genetics, or to visit a plastic surgeon or dermatologist for some kind of injection or surgical intervention, or to quit the Friday night wine habit and get ten hours of sleep a night. None of these appeal.
Speaking of undereye bags, I made a grave mistake a few weeks ago. I was glancing at my Instagram when a sponsored reel popped up, regarding The Biggest Mistake Older Women Make When It Comes To Makeup, and dear readers, I watched the whole thing. I watched an entire reel on Instagram about the best way to deal with undereye bags and other signs of aging, and now my entire Instagram is flooded, absolutely flooded, with Makeup For Women Of A Certain Age.
It’s only a matter of time until I capitulate. This is how I ended up purchasing many pairs of my dearly beloved Mott and Bow jeans, and we all know that I am not made of stone, particularly when it comes to beauty products. I shall keep you all posted.
After a great deal of thought, I realized that although there is nothing in my life that I currently resent paying for, there is something that I resent having paid for, and that is twenty years of regular, frequent, professional hair colouring. The pandemic forced my hand, as it were, when it comes to boxed, at-home hair colour, and there might not be many things that I am grateful for, back in April 2020, but I absolutely am grateful for my foray into DIY hair colour. When I think about the massive amount of time, money, and energy I expended on getting my hair coloured when I could have been doing it myself, and what I could have been doing with that money instead, I do feel ridiculously resentful. My hair is no more damaged than when I was getting it done in a salon, and while I’m sure it’s not a perfect colour job, it is definitely more than good enough.
Before:
After:
All that wasted money! Well. I have not yet invented a time machine to go back and start colouring my hair at home at the beginning of the millennium, nor to change my DNA so as to not have undereye bags. One must leave the past in the past; we learn from history, lest it repeat itself.
Weekly Reading
Speaking of history!
The Indifferent Stars Above: The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party. This is not typically the kind of book I reach for, but Engie (HI ENGIE) mentioned it with enthusiasm and it did sound fascinating: the author is distantly related to Sarah Graves, who with her family and brand new husband leave Illinois for the promised land – initially Oregon, but, fatefully, they decide to take a “short cut” and across the Sierra Nevada to California, joining up with the Donner Party. What a decision that was. The throughline for the book is “The Harrowing Saga of the Donner Party” and “harrowing” feels like a real understatement. Something I have thought of a lot, after rereading the Little House books as an adult, is that there has to be something of hubris, plus the incredibly offensive “manifest destiny,” to just pack up your family and travel thousands of miles, destination unknown, really. Also, how bad are things at home that one must feel the need to do this? I guess it’s just the search for a better life, which is something we all want. Anyway, these people were all extremely ill-prepared for what was to come, although if they knew what was to come they’d probably have stayed home. First of all, they go against the recorded recommendation to never start their journey later than May 1, instead they left over three weeks later. They start running out of provisions as they trudge across the salt deserts of Utah, with no water and their oxen (the poor oxen, I felt for the animals in this book) just collapsing and dying. Animal lovers: there are some really difficult parts to read THE POOR OXEN, THEY DID NOT CHOOSE THIS LIFE. Truly, no one would have chosen what they did, particularly the poor children. And probably the women. Let’s face it, the men were making the decisions here.
Anyway, the party starts dropping their possessions – once considered necessities – to lighten the load for the dying oxen. Then they get stuck in the “shortcut” through the Sierra Nevada, getting snowed in, everyone starving to psychosis and, often, death. A small party – including Sarah – makes a break for it to get help, and of course they have no idea where they’re going or how to get there, and it’s honestly kind of a miracle they didn’t all die right there. They were essentially shoeless and naked, in the winter and deep snow, with no food, eating people as they died, which is also what was happening back at the base camp. Of the 87 people, 47 died, including Sarah’s husband, and most of them, um, get eaten by everyone else in order to survive.
Another thing I’ve thought of often due to my Little House consumption, and now this book, is how terrible it would be to be a widow in those times. A widow would be extremely vulnerable, with no way to earn money really, and she would be kind of a sitting duck for anyone who wanted to take a shot at her, so to speak. Anyway, this is a GRIM book but absolutely fascinating, and the story is told in a really compelling way, and despite the shockingly horrifying, one might even say HARROWING, subject matter, I really enjoyed reading it. What’s wrong with me?
The Rachel Incident. Listen, I know that a while ago I swore off books about twentysomething hot messes who drink too much and make bad choices BUT something compelled me to pick this up. The author is a podcaster who I enjoy very much and this book – about an Irish woman and her closeted best friend and housemate – is one of the most intensely satisfying books I have ever read in my life. It takes place in Cork in the height of the 2008-2010 recession, and I was emotionally invested in the characters from page one. It’s so well written and there is just so much in terms of layers and nuance, it’s fantastic.
It’s been an interesting and, ultimately, good week. I hosted a Galentine’s night on Saturday with some wonderful girlfriends; I will never cease to be grateful for the incredible women in my life, and this group has welcomed me into their circle with open arms. If you’re reading this, know that I am grateful for you too! Have a beautiful week, friends. xo
]]>It is tradition for me to bake heart-shaped items at this time of year; I will make cookies later in the week. I bake so much; along with cooking dinner, I feel like I spend a lot of time in the kitchen every day. I once tried to track my time for a week and before the first morning was over, I was so depressed I abandoned the whole thing. So much time in the kitchen.
I have been contemplating the idea of hobbies this week, thanks to an episode of my friend Stephany’s podcast, The Friendship Paradox (HI STEPHANY). The episode, talking about a variety of hobbies, had me down a semantic wormhole: if a hobby is something pleasurable to do in one’s free time, then is my whole life a hobby? If everything I do is a hobby, then is nothing a hobby?
I don’t consider baking a hobby, although I do enjoy it. Yoga and exercise might be considered hobbies, but to me they are daily life-affirming activities that are vital to my mental and emotional health, as well as to keep my physical body from crumbling and immobilizing. Are my daily walks a hobby? I do not consider them to be optional for myself or, more importantly, for Rex.
I just had A Moment, thinking of what life would be like if Rex DIDN’T get his 6 km of walking a day, lord have mercy.
Reading and writing, similarly, do not feel optional to me but I’m not making any money on either of them, so I suppose they would be considered hobbies as well.
One thing that absolutely is a hobby, and something I only do in the winter, is putting together a jigsaw puzzle. This is something my husband and I do together, except that he is very bossy and often takes over completely, which suits me if it’s a hard puzzle. I tend to like the puzzles that have a lot of little vignettes on them, which are easier to put together. We are working on one now that my older son gave me for Christmas, and friends, it is incredibly difficult.
My son knows I like easier puzzles but he also knows my deep love for QEII, so he gifted this to me. I told my husband to back off, in terms of her face and dress, and so he’s been working the boring rest of it. I did allow him to put together the scepter though.
But you guys, it is so hard! The purple cape is all slightly different shades of dark purple, and what makes it even harder is this:
Puzzle-loving friends will notice that all the pieces are the same general shape. It turns out that I look for shape a lot more than I look for colour; for a while I thought I’d have to get my husband to put the cape together, but I persisted, and finally finished it yesterday.
Weekly Reading
I have SO MUCH to say about the books I finished this week. Hold onto your reading hats!
Paperback Crush: The Totally Radical History of ’80s and ’90s Teen Fiction. Did you ever wonder if you were a Jessica or an Elizabeth? Or, god forbid, an Enid? Did you think that you would drive your blond, size-6, All-American self to school in your red Fiat Spider and date the star of the basketball team while editing the school newspaper? Did you think you’d sneak around on your boyfriend’s motorcycle, get into an accident, and switch personalities with your identical twin sister? If so, then 25% of this book is for you! In 1985 I asked for – and still have – a Sweet Valley High box set for Christmas and boy, did I love those books. I wish this whole book was a SVH recap but alas, it is not. It reads like a really long blog post, which is to say it’s a casual and easy read.
I don’t mind a blog post-like read for a topic like this; and speaking of such, I would like to take this opportunity to link to a series of Judy Blume recaps – Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, and Deenie – I wrote when I had a blog with my dear friends Hannah and Allison (HI HANNAH HI ALLISON), lo these nine years ago. Judy Blume is featured in Paperback Crush, but not a whole lot, since most of her books were written in the 70s.
Also featured in this book: the VC Andrews series. Who among us didn’t read Flowers In The Attic, horrifying ourselves with incredible tales of abuse and incest and poisoned doughnuts? What a ride those books were. I think I was probably about 11 when I read those books which, whoa. Imagine that happening these days.
Getting back to Paperback Crush: I enjoyed about half of it. I liked the nostalgia of those paperback romances geared towards tweens, written in the early 80s. I used to troll the racks at the library for them, and I remember a friend wasn’t allowed to read them because they weren’t “good books.” I thought then and I still think now that any books that kids will read are good books, and why specifically does society have a need to make girls and women feel shitty for liking things they like? Oh right, patriarchy. Anyway, as I said I only liked about half of this book because the other half was a deep dive into books I was too old to read, like the Babysitters Club and Goosebumps, basically anything written after 1987. Despite the very casual writing style – again, no shade, just facts – I enjoyed the nostalgia of this and recognized MANY covers (remember the Cheerleader series?). I am actually considering digging out my Sweet Valley collection and reading about Jessica’s tryst with a college age boy (THERE’S BEER AT THE PARTY).
Strange Sally Diamond. Within the first paragraph, I assumed that Sally Diamond was a woman with autism: she pretends she is deaf so as to not speak to people, she has no friends and lives in isolation with her father, she has trouble finding nuance and reading social cues, she pulls her hair and screams when she is upset. She is excellent when it comes to following directions, which is how she obtains sudden notoriety: her father had always jokingly said that when he died, he should just be put out with the trash, and that is exactly what Sally does. The resulting media storm brings to light her upsetting early life, and we as the reader discover that her antisocial personality was in fact the result of a horrific trauma in her early years, in addition to a lifetime of being somewhat of a psychological experiment at the hands of her father. This absolutely horrifying, sickening trauma is the subject of a secondary point of view, and we see dual lives and timelines.
As an aside, this made me think of Gabor Mate and his book about neurodivergence and traumatic or otherwise adverse childhood experiences. It brings up an interesting and unsettling idea regarding causation of neurodivergent-appearing behaviours, and I don’t know how I feel about that. If we follow the idea that early childhood experiences can imprint for a lifetime, well, that can both explain things and also put a heavy weight on parental responsibilities. Anyway. LET’S MOVE ON.
Two things can be true at the same time: first, I could not read this book fast enough. It has been a long time since I was this invested in a plot, even given the extremely disturbing subject matter. The second thing is that I found the writing style to be very clunky and lacking in nuance and subtlety, particularly the dialogue, particularly in the secondary point of view. This book really suffers from a “tell” instead of a “show” which I don’t like. However, as I said to my friend Nicole (HI NICOLE), if the book was better written, I would have had insane nightmares due to the terrifying backstory. As it was, well, it was just a book – I never forgot it was a story, I never got completely immersed – and so I slept just fine. The plot really moved, and it was a compelling read, despite the writing.
I noticed this beaver dam in progress on my walk the other day – I guess some other creatures are busy with their non-hobbies too. I hope you all have a lovely, heart-filled week of love and light and chocolate! xo
]]>