Crumbs Made Her Unhappy
Speaking of ladies who write for The Atlantic, here’s senior editor Honor Jones a-gush with expression in the Family section:
I loved my husband; it’s not that I didn’t. But I felt that he was standing between me and the world, between me and myself… I had caused so much upheaval, so much suffering, and for what? He asked me that, at first, again and again: For what? So I could put my face in the wind. So I could see the sun’s glare.
It’s a tale of divorce, you see, and rather sad, and just a little confusing. For instance, exactly why the divorce came about is not immediately obvious. There’s no mention of affairs, or hardship, or emotional cruelty. In fact, and despite 3,000 words, the husband is barely mentioned, except as an unwitting hindrance to some nebulous fantasy of self-exploration, or at least self-dramatization. Indeed, we’re presented with a loving husband and comfortable middle-class life, in which one chats with architects and browses the Instagram accounts of cabinet makers, while weighing the merits of soapstone kitchen counters.
Slowly, I realised, I didn’t want this life. I didn’t want to renovate. I wanted to get divorced… I started imagining other lives. Other homes.
Here, I should point out that Ms Jones also has three small children. Though their wellbeing doesn’t appear to figure too heavily, or much at all, in the extended ramble of the article. However, we do hear a lot about other, more important matters:
the crumbs got me down.
Crumbs are a recurring topic, mentioned seven times, along with a dislike of vacuuming. Truly, a life of unrelenting hell. Albeit with a cleaner to do much of the heavy lifting:
I hired a woman named Luba to clean… I loved talking with her. She was full of sensible advice, like how I should really stop washing the cleaning rags along with the children’s clothes, because the chemicals could irritate their skin.
Not the worst opinion we’ll hear today.
We’re then informed that a comfortable middle-class life, in which time can be spent choosing new kitchens and chatting with the cleaner, is actually an oppressive experience:
I wanted to be thinking about art and sex and politics and the patriarchy. How much of my life—I mean the architecture of my life, but also its essence, my soul, my mind—had I built around my husband? Who could I be if I wasn’t his wife? Maybe I would microdose. Maybe I would have sex with women. Maybe I would write a book.
At which point, I’m tempted to suggest that a more adventurous adolescence and some teenage experimentation might have saved a lot of later heartache. But it seems we’re expected to share Ms Jones’ belief that the only thing preventing her from being exciting and fabulous – from blossoming as a fully switched-on and progressive woman who drops acid and dabbles with lesbianism, which can then be mentioned for effect – is her family and her obligations to them. And obviously, it’s physically impossible for women who are mothers and wives to think about art and sex and politics.
Hence the betrayal, the breaking of vows. And hey, divorce is such an adventure.
The subject of remorse does crop up, briefly:
There were days when the magnitude of what I’d done bore down on me. I kept wondering if I’d feel regret, or remorse. It is hard to admit this—it makes me cold, as cold a woman as my ex-husband sometimes suspects I am—but I didn’t. I felt raw, and I liked it. There was nothing between me and the world.
Oh lucky world.
And then the rewards for this feat of selflessness and bravery:
On my nights alone, I caught up with old friends, frantically made new friends, said way too much about my personal life over drinks with colleagues. Out in the city, I felt solid: a capable woman taking care of her family.
Today’s words are unintended irony.
Update:
In the comments, Jacob asks,
Is her first name ironic?
Well, there’s quite a bit of irony, albeit unintentional. Such that we’re expected to believe that Ms Jones is somehow being robbed of self-expression, presumably by “the patriarchy,” despite her life of minimal drudgery, and despite being a contributor and senior editor at the New York Times and a senior editor at The Atlantic. Resulting in the self-indulgent ramble quoted above.
Needless to say, Ms Jones has dozens of blue-tick Twitter followers, many of whom are her peers in ‘progressive’ institutions of one kind or another, merrily gushing about her “courage” and capacity for introspection, her glorious humanity, her “brilliant soul.” Her tale, we’re told, is “beautiful and moving.” And none of those applauding apparently raised an eyebrow at a self-involved woman shattering the lives of her three small children, and her husband, in order to concentrate on herself even more than before.
Reading Ms Jones’ outpourings, I was reminded of a conversation in which someone was telling me about how a number of her female friends had spent years and large sums of money on a series of activities and retreats in order to “find themselves.” I suggested that if someone is in their fifties, having spent half a century on this Earth, and still can’t find themselves, then maybe, just maybe, there isn’t much there to be found.
It didn’t go down terribly well.
Update 2:
Regarding the gushing mentioned above, Rafi notes,
It’s like a parallel universe.
It is a little odd. And it does, I think, reveal the psychological gulf – and moral gulf – that can exist between we, the unremarkable, and our glorious betters. But then, like so much else, The Atlantic seems increasingly geared to the preoccupations of neurotic middle-class lefties. Which is why you’ll find self-satisfied articles on how we should prioritise the feelings and wellbeing of brazen and habitual thieves over those of the people they prey upon. And on how insufficiently woke crossword puzzles are one of “the systemic forces that threaten women.”
Things of that kind.
Who could I be if I wasn’t his wife? Maybe I would microdose. Maybe I would have sex with women. Maybe I would write a book.
‘Sex and the City’ isn’t real.
Is her first name ironic?
Is her first name ironic?
Well, there’s quite a bit of irony, albeit unwitting. Such that we’re told she’s being robbed of self-expression, despite being a contributor and senior editor at the New York Times and a senior editor at The Atlantic. Resulting in the self-indulgent ramble quoted above.
Needless to say, Ms Jones has dozens of blue-tick Twitter followers, many of whom are her peers in ‘progressive’ institutions of one kind or another, merrily gushing about her “courage” and capacity for introspection. Her tale, we’re told, is “beautiful and moving.” And none of those applauding apparently raised an eyebrow at a self-involved woman shattering the lives of her three small children, and her husband, in order to concentrate on herself even more than before.
It reminded me of a conversation I had a while ago, in which someone was telling me about how a number of her friends had spent many years and large amounts of money on a long series of activities and retreats in order to “find themselves.” I suggested that if someone is in their fifties, having spent half a century on this Earth, and still can’t find themselves, then maybe, just maybe, there isn’t much there to be found.
It didn’t go down terribly well.
You seem to be mocking a woman who was suffering torture at the hands of four filthy beasts who were producing soul-crushing volumes of crumbs in her home. What good are soapstone counters if they are covered with crumbs? You’re obviously failing to grasp that she was married to a fiend who would rather have toast than a wife and children who appreciated crackers more than their mom. Can’t any of you imagine the Nirvana that is a crumb-free life?
I admit that I am a tad confused about her contemplating some casual girl-on-girl action though. Is the pendulum back in the “lifestyle choice” position? Seems like yesterday I was assured that this was a genetic imperative. Ooooooooooooooo, maybe it’s a latent imperative triggered by crumb toxicity! Government-funded grant opportunity detected!
Crumb-free life, limitless pronoun possibilities, “frantic” attempts to make new friends…c’mon people! Why aren’t we celebrating this hero? …and don’t tell me it’s because she’s already celebrating herself way too much.
Is her first name ironic?
“The Carter parents were a quiet and respectable Lancre family who got into a bit of a mix-up when it came to naming their children. First, they had four daughters, who were christened Hope, Chastity, Prudence, and Charity, because naming girls after virtues is an ancient and unremarkable tradition. Then their first son was born and out of some misplaced idea about how this naming business was done he was called Anger Carter, followed later by Jealousy Carter, Bestiality Carter, and Covetousness Carter. Life being what it is, Hope turned out to be a depressive, Chastity was enjoying life as a lady of negotiable affection in Ankh-Morpork, Prudence had thirteen children, and Charity expected to get a dollar’s change out of seventy-five pence—whereas the boys had grown into amiable, well-tempered men, and Bestiality Carter was, for example, very kind to animals.”
–Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett
I loved my husband; it’s not that I didn’t. But I felt that he was standing between me and the world, between me and myself
I wonder if it has ever occurred to her that her husband’s job stands between him and many things that he would like to do? I also wonder if she will ever realize that being an adult involves accepting responsibility and that life is not endless play.
I want the husband’s side of the story.
It’s a tale of divorce, you see, and rather sad, and just a little confusing.
I wonder how her husband and children feel about her broadcasting their troubles to the world.
Very old advice: Do not marry a writer. (At least not unless you are very sure of said writer’s discretion and respect for the privacy of friends and family.)
I suggested that if someone is in their fifties, having spent half a century on this Earth, and still can’t find themselves, then maybe, just maybe, there isn’t much there to be found.
Yes.
I admit that I am a tad confused about her contemplating some casual girl-on-girl action though.
On the contrary: I have been assured by a few lesbians that even the most brief and casual sexual encounter between two lesbians who will never see each other again is immeasurably profound. [rolls eyes]
She is just a chronic kvetcher, here we see her ululating about yoga pants, here she finds vacations problematic.
Just one of those miserable people who enjoy being miserable.
I wonder how her husband and children feel about her broadcasting their troubles to the world.
It is a strange way of fishing for praise, as seems to be the intent (and indeed effect). I mean, it’s basically, “I broke my marriage vows and betrayed my family, including three small children, possibly doing them serious, life-denting harm, because I got a bit bored with myself and the comfortable life my husband had provided.”
Very old advice: Do not marry a writer.
Bloggers exempt, obviously.
Bloggers exempt, obviously.
I recall enjoying James Lileks’ blog posts about his very young daughter Natalie (who he called Gnat and who he obviously doted upon) but wondering how she would feel once she was old enough to be truly aware of them. (Some kids don’t care at all, while others are mortified.) She did eventually ask him to stop calling her Gnat and he no longer writes nearly as much about her. (Caveat: I do not know how much or how little he wrote about her in his actual newspaper columns.)
Ironically, she is a pretty crummy person.
I’ve run across a few people like this. They uproot their life, including divorce, in order to strike off in a different direction. There’s nothing particularly wrong with their old life or marriage that I could tell — they just apparently wanted something different.
And I can’t criticize it much. It often seems like a poor choice, but it’s their choice.
What’s striking about this example is the children. With children comes responsibility whether you like it or not. Self actualization takes a back seat to their care. Basically everything takes a back seat.
She found another person. 100%. Even if she wasn’t dating this person already, she has another in mind. Guarantee it.
I wonder how much in alimony she will be getting to finance her adventures ?
I wonder how much in alimony she will be getting to finance her adventures?
Well, microdosing is fairly cheap, as drug-related activities go. As for experimental lesbianism, I couldn’t say.
How long before she’s writing about the challenges of dating when you’re a narcissistic, divorced harpy with three children? I think she’ll find even lesbians will find that unattractive.
Yes, it’s her son who has things mixed up.
“…sensible advice, like how I should really stop washing the cleaning rags along with the children’s clothes, because the chemicals…”
I knew a woman who lived such a protected married life that when she got divorced she didn’t even know how to put gas in her car or know that her car tires/tyres were inflated with air.
She learned the latter fact when a driver waved to her and called out “Your tires are flat!”. “Which one?” she answered. “All of them!”
…spent many years and large amounts of money on a long series of activities and retreats in order to “find themselves.”…
A poster in my grandson’s school hallway: “Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.” (Attributed to George Bernard Shaw.)
A poster in my grandson’s school hallway: “Life is not about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.”
A psychologist–I cannot remember who–once said something to the effect that growing up is, in a way, becoming a person.
I recall reading the name of a job applicant and wondering how a mother could name her daughter “Uwanna F”
What’s striking about this example is the children. With children comes responsibility whether you like it or not.
Emphatically agree. Heavy responsibility. Kids need their parents, and not just for occasional drop-in visits.
There is also, of course, responsibility towards the other spouse. After all, a lot of divorced men and women never again find someone to marry and so alone for the rest of their lives, a bad fate.
She learned the latter fact when a driver waved to her and called out “Your tires are flat!”.
I do often see cars with under-inflated tires. Both male and female drivers. Possibly more often female but I cannot honestly testify to that.
‘Sex and the City’ isn’t real.
Most SatC nerds have never read the book, which is the point. In the book the author-insert “Carrie Bradshaw” routinely wakes up alone curled up around her toilet with vomit and semen in her hair. The book is a fairly accurate, starkly honest portrayal of what that lifestyle is actually like. Candice Bushnell has since disavowed the lifestyle and has been quite vocal about how self-destructive it is.
When Darren Star saw the book that HBO had just optioned, he knew there was no way in hell he could sell that to women. So he retooled the show into a ridiculous Cinderella fantasy – one that women have been patterning their life after ever since.
I have been assured by a few lesbians that even the most brief and casual sexual encounter between two lesbians who will never see each other again is immeasurably profound.
Why, it’s almost like deeply dysfunctional people with deep-rooted trauma unsuccessfully using casual sex to plaster over their need for intimacy and security.
I want the husband’s side of the story.
It’s worth keeping in mind that the author’s side of the story is still just a story. We’ve seen here in the past articles in a similar Eat, Pray, Love vein that were entirely fictional. Assuming anything in this article is true, there’s more than a faint whiff of the author mostly trying to convince herself.
Monogamy in humans isn’t natural the way it is for swans and wolves. It had to evolve as a social construct independently, in every human society, because it produces better results than harem-based tribes. What we’re seeing is the midgame of throwing out all of the social enforcement of that idea forty years ago.
When Darren Star saw the book that HBO had just optioned, he knew there was no way in hell he could sell that to women. So he retooled the show into a ridiculous Cinderella fantasy – one that women have been patterning their life after ever since.
A horrible thing to do. Dare I say evil?
The stuff suicides are made of.
She did eventually ask him to stop calling her Gnat and he no longer writes nearly as much about her.
He still writes a bit, even though she’s off to Boston College to be indoctrinated.
What he does not do is write about his wife, who seems to be a high-level lawyer in state government. Which is for the best, really.
And obviously, it’s physically impossible for women who are mothers and wives to think about art and sex and politics.
Anais Nin has entered the chat.
experimental lesbianism
Band name.
To “feel regret or remorse” she’d have to “imagine other lives,” starting with her husband’s and children’s. Pardon me for stating the obvious.
I was rather more partial to the “Soul Crushing Crumbs” as a band name until I realized that, yes obviously, it would have to be a soul band.
A horrible thing to do. Dare I say evil?
We abhor and condemn those who, for profit, get vulnerable people hooked on harmful addictive drugs. We should do the same with people who sell harmful lies.
My goodness. ‘Tis a degree of self-absorption so concentrated that I fear she might turn into a black hole. Which I suppose would be appropriate, as a singularity is known primarily for warping and destroying everything in its vicinity.
Now I’m imagining her oldest son delivering the eulogy at her funeral someday. He just reads excerpts from this article, and concludes with a Gallic shrug.
But isn’t this sort of female navel gazing crap that has kept at least two cable TV stations (Oxygen & WTF the other one is), Oprah, an un-heavenly host of psychologist, half the book/poetry publishing industry, etc. in business for the last 30, 40, 50 years? Just think of the enormous damage that it would do to the economies of western civilization were it not for soooo many of these women.
I have a cousin, well 2nd cousin once removed, who just had a baby. In addition to her being the first woman ever, ever, ever to experience such a thing, she stumbled upon a “safeguards for your baby in this hospital” instruction sheet from 1968 (her mother was born in 1967) and the rules…well, they gave her anxiety. Rules. From 1968. It’s constant drama. She never knew her great grandfather, a WWI artillery veteran, a strong firm first generation American from Germany. That man, and his wife, have got to be spinning in their graves. I have watched this family degenerate across three generations now and it’s mostly female-ish BS, well post WWII quasi-feminist (yet “oddly” conservative…”conservative”) BS, that has driven it. Stunning.
A horrible thing to do. Dare I say evil?
No, not at all. I enjoy watching Smallville (shut up, David); I don’t run around the neighbourhood in brightly coloured tights trying to stop street crime.
There’s nothing wrong with escapist fantasy. There is something wrong with people incapable of distinguishing between escapist fantasy and reality. I don’t know about the relative rates, but my gut check is that there’s a lot more women running around thinking they’re Samantha or Carrie than there are teenaged boys running around thinking they’re katana-wielding vampire hunters.
We should do the same with people who sell harmful lies
Displaces the responsibility. What you’re advocating for is the bowdlerization of all media, in the same fashion children’s cartoons were bowdlerized in the 1980s. Cobra Commander, Megatron, Starscream, Skeletor, the Misfits, the Gorgs, Tweeg and the Peculiar Purple Pieman of Porcupine Peak were all useless putzes because they had to be: Broadcast Standards and practices said the villains couldn’t be effective or admirable lest the children emulate the wrong character.
What we need to abhor and condemn are adults who live their life as if they’re in a TV show.
Reading this reminded me of a song, The Stone, by Josh Ritter. Some of the lyrics:
Change your face
Change your name
Rip the roots that you laid down
Rip the roots that you laid down
You’ll keep your hurt
You’ll keep your pain
Close company now
Close company now
Lying wide awake
In a different house
With different arms around you now
On a different street
In a different town
On the same old road
That the night comes down
That the night comes down
I enjoy watching Smallville (shut up, David)
[ Muttering from cellar. ]
I wonder how much in alimony she will be getting to finance her adventures ?
Yes, when she said “There was nothing between me and the world”, I ctrl-F’d for alimony and child support. If you’re going to be so raw and brutal, why not talk about the money? They can afford to move from a cozy Pennsylvania farmhouse to two apartments in an area of Brooklyn where she believes it to be safe for their kids to walk between the parental habitation units, play in the public playgrounds, and attend the local public schools – a good school district, as they say. It seems that the “transitional” 3 bedroom apartment became hers, and it doesn’t say what sort of apartment the husband has. What sort of money are we talking about here? Is it Atlantic editor money, or is the boring unsatisfactory ex-husband still paying some of her bills?
… articles in a similar Eat, Pray, Love vein …
A relative of mine self-published a book a few years ago with all of the attributes of the genre – the formless angst among the high-end kitchen fixtures, the affectless “so we’re finished, are we?” conversations, the charming foreign gentleman who just turns up. At a family get-together (thankfully without the author being present), my cousin re-introduced the wholesome pastime of reading aloud from books, or at least from her book. Cruel, but a lot of us were being pestered by the author for our “feedback”, and we had no idea what to say.
https://dalrock.wordpress.com/2017/06/28/listen-to-the-whispers/
https://dalrock.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/a-god-we-must-obey/
There’s nothing wrong with escapist fantasy. There is something wrong with people incapable of distinguishing between escapist fantasy and reality.
Except that the impression I have is that this is not merely escapist fantasy but a lie about what is and what can be, and in fact a lie that has been peddled for decades.
this is not merely escapist fantasy but a lie about what is and what can be, and in fact a lie that has been peddled for decades
I think you’d be hard pressed to note any particular difference in the distance between presentation and reality among Sex and the City, Friends[1], Dallas, and Have Gun, Will Travel. Anyone who mistakes any television for an accurate depiction of anything is committing a category error. That’s the fault of the viewer, not the producer.
Don’t forget, Pratchett’s Discworld novels depict a society ruled with an iron fist by an absolute tyrant who is portrayed as wise, benevolent and all-knowing; and the subtext of all the novels is that it is best that the government be in charge of all important institutions. We’ve seen where that particular lie leads, repeatedly throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. Shall we lock his works away, then, For the Greater Good of Society?
[1] Wildly popular among millenials and Gen Z for obvious reasons
Indeed, we’re presented with a loving husband and comfortable middle-class life,
Wow, a Millennial Betty Friedan.
But hasn’t the wonderfulness of the “sexually liberated, perpetually unmarried” life been a staple of feminist propaganda since the sixties?
But hasn’t the wonderfulness of the “sexually liberated, perpetually unmarried” life been a staple of feminist propaganda since the sixties?
Well yes. Let’s not forget that feminist ideology is largely Marxist in nature and the end game of marxism is disruption and revolution. They’re not exactly trying to make people happy. So many “educated” people have never grasped this about most leftist ideologies.
Bragging about being a piece of sh*t is the new progress
They’re not exactly trying to make people happy. So many “educated” people have never grasped this about most leftist ideologies.
Oh, they’ve grasped it. They just believe they will be among the whip-wielders, not among the whipped.
They also believe that most Other People are the equivalent of herd animals who must be controlled in order to be content – not happy, just content.
So many “educated” people have never grasped this about most leftist ideologies.
I have noticed that. Virtually impossible to get through to most “educated” people.