This is honestly the most depressing piece of self-therapy that I have ever read. I'm sorry to not post for so long and then post a rant, but honestly, i thought this book might be good, and I became more and more pissed off as I read it.
Some background. I've been thinking about having kids lately (spawning, as my sister so genteely puts it) and so I"ve been consumed by a frenzied need to research and prepare. (was I always like this, audrey? so preparing?) Anyhow, I've been reading whatever I can get my hands on about moms who combine work and kids. It seems like such a shitty balancing act, and before I read this book I was leaning heavily towards the realm of working only part time. Seems like the author made that choice, and is bitterly, resentfully, snidely, unproductively, meanly regretful.
The book follows the lives of four or five friends (I was never interested enough to count exactly how many) as they galumph around sponging off their overworked and dramatically flawed husbands. The complain nonstop. They bemoan the fact that their 10 year old kids don't need mommy anymore. They pine for the sense of meaning work gave them. And yet they DON"T GO OUT AND FUCKING WORK!!
Instead, they have boring and dreary conversations with each other about their boring and dreary lives. They become resigned to mediocre sex and mediocre marriages. They have failed and boring affairs. They are Boring. Eventually some of them go out and make halfhearted changes and get undesirable and boring jobs that they don't care about. I didn't care either. I wish I could unread this book.
The worst part was the air of inevitability that the author gave to these women and their shitty half ass lives. This is a book about a bunch of disillusioned, depressed women who don't like their lives and should have made better decisions. The message? I"m not sure. It could have been "don't have kids, they will fuck up your life and drain your soul", or maybe "middle age is the end of meaning". What crap.
News flash: if your life sucks, change it. If your husband is a jerk, dump him. Better yet, don't marry him in the first place. Life is a maddening, jungly brilliant explosion of change and growth. Ageing is not a disaster or a decay. It is a fabulous journey into the unknown, where no one has ever gone before. Disaster is opportunity. Every moment counts, and if you treat them like they don't, it's your own damn fault. I hated this book and its sad, lame characters; they were like literary entropy aimed directly at middle aged women. My life isn't like that. Yours isn't either. No one's has to be.
Some background. I've been thinking about having kids lately (spawning, as my sister so genteely puts it) and so I"ve been consumed by a frenzied need to research and prepare. (was I always like this, audrey? so preparing?) Anyhow, I've been reading whatever I can get my hands on about moms who combine work and kids. It seems like such a shitty balancing act, and before I read this book I was leaning heavily towards the realm of working only part time. Seems like the author made that choice, and is bitterly, resentfully, snidely, unproductively, meanly regretful.
The book follows the lives of four or five friends (I was never interested enough to count exactly how many) as they galumph around sponging off their overworked and dramatically flawed husbands. The complain nonstop. They bemoan the fact that their 10 year old kids don't need mommy anymore. They pine for the sense of meaning work gave them. And yet they DON"T GO OUT AND FUCKING WORK!!
Instead, they have boring and dreary conversations with each other about their boring and dreary lives. They become resigned to mediocre sex and mediocre marriages. They have failed and boring affairs. They are Boring. Eventually some of them go out and make halfhearted changes and get undesirable and boring jobs that they don't care about. I didn't care either. I wish I could unread this book.
The worst part was the air of inevitability that the author gave to these women and their shitty half ass lives. This is a book about a bunch of disillusioned, depressed women who don't like their lives and should have made better decisions. The message? I"m not sure. It could have been "don't have kids, they will fuck up your life and drain your soul", or maybe "middle age is the end of meaning". What crap.
News flash: if your life sucks, change it. If your husband is a jerk, dump him. Better yet, don't marry him in the first place. Life is a maddening, jungly brilliant explosion of change and growth. Ageing is not a disaster or a decay. It is a fabulous journey into the unknown, where no one has ever gone before. Disaster is opportunity. Every moment counts, and if you treat them like they don't, it's your own damn fault. I hated this book and its sad, lame characters; they were like literary entropy aimed directly at middle aged women. My life isn't like that. Yours isn't either. No one's has to be.
3 comments:
Sorta sounds like some of the mom's i talked with while owen was at his kindergarten orientation. I'm not worried about Owen fitting in at school. I'm worried about kicking some of the mom's over privileged lazy arses. (oops did i say that out loud?)
yes, i cut an pasted that from facebook
well, it's the North Shore. What can we say. Their kids will grow up overstimulated and unhappy.
Wow, that sounds so dismal.
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