The Merits of Knowing When to Quit

Our society sends a pervasive message of never-say-die. Quitting is widely considered a bad thing. From horrible jobs to toxic relationships to our workout regimen, the message is that quitters never win and winners never quit. Stick with it. Keep going. Push yourself and you’ll be successful. It’s all fine and good sometimes. It’s certainly not healthy to constantly be quitting things, or writing people off without really trying. But where is the line between perseverance and self-destruction??

I see my friends staying in bad relationships because if they leave they’re considered a quitter, abandoning someone they’re supposed to care about. Shoot, I’ve done it myself. Thankfully I put my proverbial bitch hat on and left before I married the guy I’d been actively allowing to destroy me from the inside out for three-and-a-half years. And why did I stay?? Because my friends told me that I write people off too easily, that I should give this guy a chance. And I thought they were right. So I stayed, and when I left I was so angry with myself for ignoring my needs for so long. That’s not healthy, either.

Who of us hasn’t had a soul-deadening job that was killing us?? Of course, people need a livelihood, and sometimes that’s enough to make us stay in bad situations for longer than we may want to. But eventually we leave. We quit. And we feel better for it.

The idea that giving up and moving on is bad is especially disturbing for me because now I see this with my daughter. She’s stuck with her sport through all manner of difficult times and obstacles that would have crushed the dreams of a lot of people, and I have endless respect for her for doing so. But now she’s applying that persistence to her pursuit of a school that her father and I can ill afford the tuition to, and the lesson being learned is a harsh one.

My daughter has always done well in school. From preschool through 8th grade she had the opportunity to attend an exclusive school for gifted kids in Seattle's independent school system. It was a tremendous gift since her dad and I don’t make the kind of money necessary to pay for tuition ourselves. Her 7th and 8th grade years she got a full ride: $20,000 a year plus a month-long study abroad in Turkey, paid for. This past year, like so many other 8th grade families in the independent school system, we did the whole high school application thing. It’s a lot like college, only with more expensive schools. I went to the meetings and open houses, drove to the study sessions, made phone calls, sent emails, filled out paperwork, and paperwork, and paperwork. But none of the kids who applied for financial aid got into the schools they’d applied at, and my daughter was one of them. She was waitlisted at three of the schools, and the one she got into outright she did not get financial aid for. They needed a $30,000 commitment in order for her to be able to attend.

She cried. A lot. And I don’t blame her. We heard all the rumors and the stories about the slacker kids who got into the good schools because their parents have big bank accounts. I hearken back to the fact that none of the kids in her 8th grade class who applied for financial aid got into the schools. I understand that times are tough, and the schools need to make money to stay open and in the kind of high-end service that’s expected of them, but ultimately the message these kids learned is that fancy schools are for rich kids. It doesn’t matter how hard you work; getting good grades and having terrific recommendations is all fine and dandy until your parents can’t waltz in with a $30,000 check and a $20,000 donation. It was a difficult lesson for a kid whose hard work has been duly rewarded her entire life. For it to not matter all of a sudden was a tough pill to swallow, and I felt terrible for her.

So she wound up in public school, which she still gripes and bitches about. Now we’re three weeks into her freshman year; her first year in a public school, where the teachers and administrators give a big song and dance about how they don’t want kids to fall through the cracks and then lose her registration paperwork the day before school started. On the first day of school, the bus skipped her stop and she had to be driven. And away she goes, sliding right through the cracks.

This is what all her hard work has led up to. This is what she gets for trying hard and doing a good job. Because her parents aren’t rich.

Now, the process of applying to schools is arduous. You fill out all the paperwork, get your references, transcripts, grades, recommendations in order and then pay an application fee for each school applied to. Last year it was $90 at each of the 4 schools. Then there’s test prep for the Independent School Entrance Exam (ISEE), which runs a cool $525, not including the diagnostic test or any of the $15 practice tests. Then the test costs $125 to take. Then the parents are charged $36 for one school’s financial aid application, and $40 for the remaining three. And then there’s the price of gas, driving to and from the schools on open house nights and for meetings with the admissions people. Expensive, and exhausting.

And now she wants to do it all again. After the tears and disappointment, she seems convinced that she didn’t get into any of these schools because she didn’t do a good enough job, and that kills me. Part of me really admires her persistence, but in this case I think it’s a desperate and destructive Hail Mary.

Maybe I’m wrong?? Maybe things will be different this time?? Maybe I’m too cynical?? Frankly, after watching her break down as many times as I did as she learned what the world is really all about, I don’t know how I could be anything other than pissed off. I don’t want to jump through all these flaming hoops again, and I sure as shit don’t want to stand back and watch my kid get her hopes smashed by some mean old rich people who only reward kids from moneyed families.

I can’t help but wish that the kid just knew when to throw in the towel and figure something else out. What would be so disgraceful about that??

Them That Can't, Cheer.

Okay, so before I launch into my diatribe about how silly and degrading cheer is, I feel I must clarify something off the top. Cheer in this geographic area is not what it is in other parts of the country, at least not for the most part. There are talented tumblers and stunters and whatnot, but it’s usually just what it is: girls who wear short skirts and yell for attention. I know enough about competitive cheer, which is pretty dang-ola athletic, and that’s not really what I’m talking about here.

In any case, I don’t understand cheer. I guess part of that comes from being a gymnast my whole life, where them that can do and them that can’t, cheer. Maybe part of my attitude is tied to that idea. But, really. I have a young daughter who is a talented athlete. She’s been so all her life. Now she’s talking about wanting to cheer. Dude, I sat through a performance of the cheerleaders at her new high school. They’re cute and fun and peppy and all, but they’re just a bunch of girls in short skirts with pom poms. They’re not dancers, tumblers, acrobats, or gymnasts. Their moves are so rudimentary that I’ve seen recreational cheer classes for nine-year-olds that have more proverbial meat and potatoes to them. So, what’s the deal with this?? Why are we still encouraging girls to do this?? I was unfortunate enough to be sitting in the front row of the gymnasium, so I got an eyeful of each girl’s “spankies.”

And, really, folks. Let’s just call these what they is: panties. Underwear. Teenage girls flashing their underwear in a socially sanctioned environment. Usually we wear our underwear underneath our clothes, and when we don’t someone calls us trashy. Not cheerleaders. It’s not only encouraged but required for their underwear to be out. Where else in polite society can we say this??

There is this pervasive idea that I’m some kind of pedo for noticing when there’s a crotch in my face, but the fact of the matter is that so has everyone else: they just don’t say it out loud because they’re afraid someone will call them a pedo. But it’s a crotch. In. My. Face. A child crotch. And underage crotch. A crotch I did not invite into my field of vision, but there it is. It’s weird and fucked up, but people love it!! They act like it’s nothing. Go, team. Rah-rah-whatrever. Every dude in the place has his eyes glued to an underage girl’s cha-cha-cha whether we wish to talk about it or not. These sensible suburban moms don’t appear to want to discuss it. That’s for damn sure. They’ll tell you you’re disgusting if you say that their daughter’s pussy is out. But there it is. Like Matthew Perry in Three to Tango, “butt, crotch, butt, crotch, butt, crotch.” Apparently the audience is supposed to be so wowed by the girls’ mad skills that we’re not supposed to notice her parts on parade?? Or we’re supposed to notice but not say we notice?? I don’t know. These girls are perfectly capable of doing something substantial with their lives, and yet they’re encouraged to go out into public and bend at the waist to show support for their school. Boys play football, and football is important. Girls stand back and tell the boys how great they are by kicking high and placing their naughty bits on display.

What’s so meritorious about that?? What skill other than the most primitive hip flexibility and a fake smile does that take?? And why does society still support this garbage??

Gymnastics Shelters You

I was just reading an article by Helena Andrews in The Root where she talks about how Gabrielle Douglas has retained so much of her innocence at a time when many young black women do not. I don’t feel like I have any license to comment on the lives of black people in America, but what I can do is shed light on the subject of innocence and being young from a gymnast’s perspective.

Gymnastics shelters you. That discipline that you have that makes you show up to the gym every day can keep you out of the kinds of trouble a lot of young people get into sometimes. When I was a kid, a guy I was friends with shot out a neighbor’s car window, and all my friends who were there were placed on probation. I wasn’t there; I was at the gym. That sort of thing started happening more and more as I got to be closer to the age that Gabby is now. My friends had abortions, smoked a lot of pot, started doing meth and skipping school. I was at the gym. You usually can’t get into trouble when you’re not around when the shit goes down. I loved my friends, but I loved being in the gym, so every day I went because I wanted to be there and had an intrinsic passion for what I did there. And I had friends there, too. Not that we never did anything wrong or got in trouble at the gym, but it was different there; if we effed off too much we would not be welcome back, and being on the team was important. I don’t think that many people know what it’s like to discover that kind of dedication, delight, and enthusiasm for something at such a young age, but it happens, and from that fervor comes the kind of discipline that belies a young person’s age. But being in the gym, toiling away like that can stave off the outside world, at least for a little while.

Some people say that young gymnasts are robbed of their adolescence by working as hard as they do. I never did make it to the Olympics, but as someone who found something I was very passionate about very young I feel like I understand why that kind of thing doesn’t matter. Perhaps some of us do stay innocent a little bit longer because of it?? In some ways we are, or were, very driven and mature, but still children, and still playing at something that is, at its base, extremely fun.

The Art of Sport (and Loving your Body)

I’ve been reading a lot lately about women athletes being objectified as sex objects, and I’d like to take a moment to address the subject. While I certainly don’t think that objectifying anyone is a good thing to do, I’d be lying if I said I never had a screensaver of a gorgeous athlete whose bones I’d totally jump. Tell me Apolo Anton Ohno is not pretty to look at. But we can pretty much all agree that he is what and who he is because his sport is so much of his identity: he’s in great shape, so we like to look at him, and he’s successful because he’s in great shape and is massively talented. That being said, I don’t know if you noticed but he’s HOTT. Danell Leyva, Usain Bolt, shoot, even Tim Tebow’s not hard on the eyes, and I don’t like him. But what about the ladies?? Yeah, we have an entire culture of douchebags who only see women, athletes or otherwise, in terms of what we can do for their cocks. I, however, would like to offer an alternate way of thinking about young female athletes baring all.

The incomparable comedian Elayne Boosler said that the new rules of society shall be “you can’t get famous by being naked or sleeping with a celebrity: you have to make a contribution to society first.” Frankly, I think these women have. They are brave and hard-working and talented, and if they want to show us the side effects of all that training time, i.e. their amazing bodies, then more power to them. They’ve worked hard and they look great, and they should enjoy every moment of living in their hard-won human forms. It sure as shit beats beauty pageant culture.

It was only just outside my mom’s generation that women were not encouraged to be athletes at all, let alone thought of as attractive for being athletic. Of course, naked culture was much more under wraps than it is now, but really. The athletic female form is still kind of new in the grand scheme of mainstream attractiveness.

Just like their male counterparts, these women work tremendously hard and are passionate about what they do, and in my opinion that is something that makes them beautiful inside and out. Sometimes boys see better than they think, so they see only hotness where there is so much more, but fuck ‘em!! They’re not smart enough to understand that for Alicia Sacramone, Gretchen Bleiler, Lolo Jones, and on and on, hot and sexy is just the beginning. These women are badasses, and if they want to celebrate their stunning, enviable bodies by getting naked in front of the camera, then I say you go, girls. So many women don’t like their bodies, but yours are a monument to what hard work will get you.

You are living!!

Anyway, it’s just a thought, and I know that there is more to the argument than just this one idea, but I wanted to put this thought out there. I feel like we should all feel comfortable as we are, with or without clothing, or in the clothing our sports gave us to work with. (A shout-out to some of the ill-fitting leotards I’ve had to wear in public in order to compete in gymnastics!!)

"The Horrible Tyranny of Cheerfulness"

Today I read a quote today by an author and activist that I have a great deal of respect for. If I’m not mistaken, in context it has to do with something that may be a bit off the topic I’m about to align it with; but not entirely. Barbara Ehrenreich speaks openly about her experience with breast cancer, and the “tyranny of cheerfulness” (Google it). The idea that happy thoughts and reframing will make a situation less difficult, even manageable. A spoonful of sugar, and all that.

I’ve touched on this before, and I’m sure I will again.

The idea of a “tyranny of cheerfulness” is something I’ve put a lot of thought into myself. During an especially difficult bout in my life I was told by a counselor that I was being too negative, too sad. Long story short, I’d lost my job, my driver’s license, and my long-term relationship was over. Given that information, is it somehow unnatural for a person to be especially and overwhelmingly sad in such a situation?? Just recently I’ve been told that I should “try really, really hard” to pass a class that I failed more than once (but less than ten times), as though my problem is not a lack of understanding or a struggle with the material, but a lack of trying. A very good friend of mine received some scary, life-changing news about her health right around the time her beloved grandmother died, and friends told her to “put on a happy face,” and to love life and such things. I understand that some people like and need inspirational quotes and platitudes to get them through hard times, but I also understand that some people have to feel sad and pissed off in order to grieve their loss before they can find that ever-so-popular silver lining.

I have friends I don’t know very well tell me they’re divorcing before they tell the people closest to them. I don’t always know what to say. In fact, I rarely know what to say to someone I don’t know well. But there’s a part of me that feels honored that someone can come to me with their feelings of negativity, because they know I won’t try to invalidate them. People feel these ways for a reason, and not everyone who gets pissed off, who gets upset, who feels inadequate, or feels deep sadness is a constant Debbie Downer or Negative Nancy, and it’s total bullshit for people to make them feel like they are. It seems pretty well established that holding in negative feelings can lead to much deeper depression. So what is the big deal with letting people just feel shitty sometimes??

And that’s what it is about these inspirational quotes that pisses me right off. If you have the unmitigated gall to preface your sentence to a person who is suffering with “if you think about it,” you are only presuming that they have not. And obviously you have. So you must know something they don’t. It’s rude. It’s like prefacing your sentence with “Uuuuumm, no offense but.” You’re coming across to a friend in mortal pain like an insensitive asshole.

It seems to me that people who are going through something will get to the other side with or without their friends. The ones who make it to the other side are, in my experience, rarely the ones who tell their wounded comrades to “create your own reality.”

A Comedy of Influence.

Rush Limbaugh has been in the news again as of late. I try to ignore it and hope it’ll go away, but it doesn’t. Rush said some pretty grotesque things on air a minute ago (surprise!!) that pissed a lot of people off (surprise, again!!), and he's been losing sponsors, largely via demand from people who don't enjoy hatespeech. From the right, some folks are pulling at #StopRush-style protest on Jon Stewart, and suggesting that Bill Maher was being inappropriate when he called what’s her face from Alaska a cunt. I’d just like to put this out there as food for thought: Jon Stewart and Bill Maher are comedians. Jon Stewart is an actor. While I enjoy their programs very much, they are political comedy programs. The key word being comedy.

Let us Google the definition of “comedy,” shall we??


com•e•dy/ˈkämədē/
Noun: Professional entertainment consisting of jokes and satirical sketches, intended to make an audience laugh.
A movie, play, or broadcast program intended to make an audience laugh.


I picked the first available listing, but most of us can probably agree that the above is a reasonable overview of what comedy means. Now that we have that established, that Jon Stewart and Bill Maher are the hosts of comedy shows, meant to entertain an audience and make people laugh.

Let us now Google Jon Stewart, Bill Maher, and Rush Limbaugh to see what their job descriptions are. I’m using Wikipedia. Deal with it.

*a-hem*

Jon Stewart: “American political satirist, writer, television host, actor, media critic and stand-up comedian.”

Bill Maher: “American stand-up comedian, television host, political commentator, author, and actor. Before his current role as the host of HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher hosted a similar late-night talk show called Politically Incorrect originally on Comedy Central and later on ABC.”

Rush Limbaugh: “American radio talk show host, political commentator, an opinion leader of American conservatives particularly influential in matters affecting the Republican Party.”

Okay, so as defined by popular culture, Stewart and Maher are funny whereas Limbaugh is influential and an opinion leader. Am I really the only one who sees a difference between a stand-up comedian, even one that I think is hilarious, and someone who is supposed to be in a position of power, influencing people’s opinions?? I mean, come on. I quote George Carlin, Lewis Black and Margaret Cho a lot, but I rarely hear them being lauded as leaders of influence. Do you??

I don’t always agree with Bill Maher, but to the best of my knowledge he called that Plain woman a cunt in a stand-up comedy show. Rush Limbaugh went on his show, as an influential opinion leader and went off on Sandra Fluke. And there’s call from the right that liberals hate free speech because we didn’t like that and said so, loudly. We could get into the whole “hate speech is not free speech” debate, but then we’d be here all day. I suggest that before anyone else stands up and demands the boycott of Stewart and Maher, learn the difference between “influence” and satire.

But that’s just one woman’s opinion.

Boobfeeding as Controversy.

I’m going to come out on a subject that’s been around for a long time but seems to be making (yet another) resurgence in the news right now: breastfeeding. If you do it in public, you’re disgusting, and if you don’t do it at all, you’re irresponsible. Or at least that’s what I’m gathering. When I chose not to breastfeed my daughter, a lot of people criticized me, and they weren’t very nice about it. I stand here today to say that I made the right decision. I lost my pregnancy weight in 2 weeks (I shit you not) and went on to lose another 20 lbs in the following six months. It sounds like a pregnant woman’s dream, but it was another year before I found out why: I had PPD, and when some women get that depressed, they don’t eat. I wasn’t getting enough nutrition for myself, let alone another person. Imagine that. A young mother making a choice for her damn self that was good and things worked out okay. And if you do choose to breastfeed your child, which society seems to have joined some militant chapter of the La Leche League, you’d better do it in the privacy of your own home.

What.

The.

HELL??

A gal can’t win no matter what choice she makes.

So, ladies, I say FUCK ‘EM. I’m tired of hearing everyone else’s opinion on the subject. They’ve come for our vaginas AND our boobs. It’s time to either punch some throats or just say that: FUCK ‘EM.