I’m a little swamped at the moment. Everyone says it takes three months to get used to a new job but I’m not sure I can handle being an investigative journalist for this Gabby Petito case for the next three months— these three days have been A LOT. Anyway, grateful I have backed up content to share to keep up with my commitment on this newsletter.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how almost all of my new followers are moms. At least the ones I’ve built relationships with. Not to mention, some of my best friends who are obsessed with this case are moms as well. I don’t think that’s a coincidence and I know it’s cheesy, but the delicate yet symbiotic shift that happens from going to daughter to mother and reflecting back on your experience as a daughter through a new lens of being a mother is maybe one of the most cosmic shifts a person goes through. How bad my bad boyfriends were and how hard that must have been for my parents and thinking over and over again about how I will usher AB through that experience with what I hope is confidence and good judgment and honesty. It’s all so precious, it’s hard to swallow.
In this memoir, Casey Wilson’s essays explore personal growth through motherhood with a heaping pile of self-deprecation and truth. It is a love letter to the incredibly complicated relationship women have with their moms and how women feel as they go from being just a woman to adding “mom” at the top of their IG profiles.
I appreciated the homage to the great Jamie Tarses, who died this year— and who I got divorced in front of and surely embarrassed myself in front of, while she was a boss-ass creative genius, rising above it all, in her chic boots and moto jackets. A true legend smashing through glass ceilings left and right, while barely even wrapping her hands up to stop the bleed.
It seems so obvious and base that we talk about Daddy Issues when I think the issues that stay with us the most are often our Mommy Issues.
I laughed, I cried. And even though I read this three months ago, I think about it and the ending and the revelation and acceptance Casey so beautifully describes almost every day.
I sincerely hope when AB becomes a Mom, she can find the love and grace to accept me and the mistakes I will have surely made, as well.
Or at least get a therapist that can help her.
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