I especially associate July 4th with Woods Hole, the tiny Cape Cod town where my parents met back in 1964 while doing research at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL). A few years of bicoastal courting later, they married and built a vacation home about a mile from the village center, where our family flew from our SoCal home nearly every summer for the first two decades of my life.

I’ll never forget making the annual drive down from Logan Airport, stopping at Friendly’s restaurant for a burger and Fribble, and then the familiar crunching sound of the gravel as we pulled the car into the garage. After unpacking all the boxed-up toys, dishes, and sheets that had been stashed in mothballs in the attic for the previous nine months, summer break was officially in session.

Vacation

Life in Woods Hole was pure magic at every turn — three blissful months where my parents always seemed happy and rarely fought, and endless memories were made: catching the ferry to Martha’s Vineyard, sitting under the drawbridge eating sandwiches, picking fresh berries bursting from the bushes behind our back deck, bringing home frogs in buckets from the pond down the road, taking a path through the woods to a small tennis court to hit balls against the backboards.

Most weekday mornings were spent at the Children’s School of Science, where I learned about marine life and took regular field trips to salt marshes and tidepools with my brother and friends from around the country, with whom we reunited each year, all of them scientists’ kids and summer people like us.

Afterwards, we’d go to Stony or Nobska Beach, refusing to leave the ocean unless the ice cream truck pulled up, prompting us to rush over for a Creamsicle, lemon Italian ice or Chocolate Éclair (the latter two were my mom’s favorites).

At night, after we had dinner — often lobsters we played with on the kitchen floor until my mom dropped them in the pot — we’d head back into town for movie night in the big auditorium, or folk singing or dances at the MBL Club. If the bioluminescence was active, we’d go back to the beach in the dark to watch the water light up, picking up glowing jellyfish when they washed ashore.

I still smile any time I think about all our old haunts. The Landfall was the fancy restaurant where my parents met, and where I always ordered the swordfish and grabbed handfuls of the pink and green mints from the crystal dish at the hostess stand. The corner drugstore was where my friends and I would buy Charleston Chews, Bazooka bubblegum, and the latest Archie comic. And The Captain Kidd was a bar and restaurant where unaccompanied kids were only allowed in the front area, which housed the Ms. Pac-Man table that we’d feed with quarters, desperate to get the high score.

The highlight of every summer was the July 4th parade, led by a flute-playing, folk-singing local fixture named Phyllis. Kids and adults would get all dressed up in red, white, and blue, carrying patriotic signs or riding bikes or unicycles, winding from one side of town to the other. I insisted on wearing my long pink nightgown at least once or twice, certain I had captured the very essence of Betsy Ross as I used a needle and thread from my mom’s sewing kit, pretending to embroider a tiny American flag.

Those were the good old days, when my energy levels abounded and everything in life felt full of wonder and possibility. But lately, celebrating this country — or much of anything, really — has felt almost impossible. This past Independence Day was particularly painful. Zero stars. Cannot recommend.

Bullet The Blue Sky

First, there were the fireworks, which started the night before, and had me publicly declaring how much I fucking hate them for like the 10th time in as many years. I guess a lot of people still love to watch the rockets’ red glare and bombs bursting in air, but especially at this point in the American experiment, I’m not one of them. Especially when they start shaking the foundation of my house, polluting the air, and terrifying people, pets, and veterans with PTSD, all I can think about is a war-zone, or a mass shooting, or the government-sponsored assassinations of immigrants and the people trying to protect them. I equate each explosion with the obliteration of women’s rights, voters’ rights, equal rights, civil rights, freedom of speech and the press, criminal accountability, our nation’s credibility on the world stage, common decency and humanity — destroy, destroy, and keep fucking destroying.

It breaks my heart and blackens my soul.

Honestly, I’m at my wit’s end with this country. I’ve spent the past ten years marching in protests, calling my representatives, sending postcards to voters, donating to candidates and causes, and showing up at the polls to vote. I even got my British passport last year, and looked into the possibility of relocating

I appreciate that there are folks out there fighting continuing to fight for justice and hold out hope for a better tomorrow, but I’m not sure I have it in me anymore. I’m exhausted in a way I’ve never felt before, largely for political reasons but also because I’m still riding a hormonal roller coaster that’s brought my perimenopausal symptoms back with a vengeance.

Don’t Stand So Close To Me

I mean, I was so exhausted, disoriented, dizzy, and depressed last weekend that I bowed out of everything, including a Dodgers game on Friday that I’d been looking forward to, parties with friends, and even dinner plans with my son and his fiancée on Sunday.

Instead, I managed to eke out a few workouts, part of a daily routine I’ve decided is non-negotiable for managing my mood, and spent the rest of the time in an antisocial cocoon — crying, reading, or watching Love Island UK. On Monday, I woke up with more energy, so we had our postponed family barbecue that evening. But three hours later, I was ready to get back in bed. The past several days have been equally hit-or-miss: one minute, I feel like I’m focused and ready for whatever comes my way, and the next I’m too depleted to think, let alone form complete sentences.

The good news, kind of: I saw a new gynecologist the other week, and the labs she ordered confirmed the hormonal piece is real. According to the results, my estradiol levels are shockingly low for someone who’s still in perimenopause and on the highest-dose patch. The day the doctor messaged me, noting a clear correlation between the labs and my symptoms, I sobbed — partly because it shed some light on why I’ve been feeling so miserable, but also because the appointment itself had been awful.

I had specifically gone to this gyno because she’s certified by The Menopause Society. So, I was shocked when she questioned why I’d been on HRT/MHT while still in perimenopause — she said she might have recommended the pill instead, never mind my family history of breast cancer — and devoted the majority of the after-visit summary to workout plans and recipes for protein pancakes. I’m grateful she made the right call in ordering the labs, but she offered outdated ideas about hormone therapy and lacked the kind of compassion I expected from someone who works with women who are hormonal AF.

I’ve since confabbed with a wonderful menopause specialist, paying out-of-pocket for her guidance, and we’re working on a path forward — starting with relocating the estradiol patch from my ass to my abdomen and, if that doesn’t work, switching to a different delivery system. But I still can’t shake the sense that the other doctor believed my symptoms were all in my head, at least until my bloodwork suggested otherwise.

It’s a feeling I know all too well, coming from a family that viewed fatigue or falling apart as character flaws rather than medical events. Even though my mother, and her mother before her, quietly battled the same things I do now, the thinking in our home was that therapy was for other people, and drugs were a copout and a crutch (but self-medicating with alcohol was A-OK). The constant refrains were Count your blessings! and Look on the bright side! When that didn’t stick, it was Snap out of it or I’ll give you something to cry about, with a side of gossip about people who use mental health diagnoses as excuses for their inadequacies.

All of this to say, even while holding lab results saying my exhaustion has a number attached to it, there’s still a voice in my head insisting that I’m being melodramatic, too sensitive, and really fucking lazy. Especially in a world where productivity culture piles on with messages to keep showing up no matter what, honor your commitments, and don’t let people down.

Hold On

The thing that helps the most is knowing I have the support of The Husband, along with a bunch of friends going through similar struggles, and — as I noted in my Cougar Puberty essay a few months ago — people on Substack who share their own stories and help me feel less alone. Like this one about The Sads from Mila at The In Between, and this one In Defense of the 5 out of 10 Life from Cara of The Forensic Optimist.

Truly. Every time I read a post, I feel like I’m being given permission to rest, to clear my calendar, and to declare, in no uncertain terms, that I’m in my hermit era and I will not be taking questions.

This doesn’t mean I’m rotting in bed 24/7, although you’d be forgiven for thinking that if you saw me last Saturday, watching a bunch of kids with British accents making questionable dating decisions while fireworks rattled my windows. It simply means I’m continuing to be even more selective about where I put my time and energy.

Eventually, I may show up for social stuff with a bit more passion and purpose — perhaps even march in a parade, if and when there’s something worth celebrating. But for now, I’m declaring my independence from performance and exhausting obligations: no flags, no fireworks, no forced festivities. Just me, my estradiol patch in its new location, and an increasing confidence that I alone get to decide how I want to manage my life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

Most recently, my personalities came to blows over whether to get Botox and fillers, for like the eighth time in eleven years. I realize this isn’t all that deep as existential conflicts go, but sometimes neither am I. Ultimately, I went through with it, even though I publicly swore I wouldn’t. (Check out my friend Rebecca Woolf’s recent essay, “surgical enhancements may be a choice but so is choosing to ignore their implications,” which includes my comment about cancelling my appointment — which got approximately one million likes — and then a follow-up confessing I might still want to do it.)

I’m sure Restylane wasn’t on Walt’s radar when he said, “The past and present wilt — I have fill’d them, emptied them / And proceed to fill my next fold of the future,” but I guess it kind of applies? Still, that’s cold comfort, especially when it comes to my latest tryst with the neurotoxins, and not just because of the bruising and botched botulinum (which resulted in drooping eyelids).

What frustrates me most is not the disappointing results, but the eternal struggle over who I’m doing this for, and why I keep going back for more. I mean, I’ve been doing the inner work. I’ve been tuning out the anti-aging ads and perpetual pushing of beauty products. I’ve been scrutinizing my reflection less. I’ve even started to like the lines in my forehead, the wrinkles around my eyes, the angles of my face. (My neck is taking a bit longer to embrace but hey, baby steps.)

My point is: I’ve been making so much progress on the radical self-acceptance front. So what was I thinking when I re-booked that appointment? I guess I was thinking a lot of things. Like, multitudes.

Vanity Kills

First up, let’s talk vanity, which, at least in my case, is one hundred percent tied to insecurity. I could trace this back to being teased about the size of my nose as a kid, or the awkward developments that accompany puberty, or the inescapable messages from a looks-obsessed society constantly shoved in my supposedly imperfect face. Whatever the reasons, much like the battle with my body, which I wrote about here, the battle to be beautiful (whatever the hell that even means) also kicked in around the time I turned thirteen.

I specifically recall how, as the minutes until the first day of middle school ticked down, my social anxiety ticked up. Like a lot of girls at the time, I wanted to be pretty and popular, and my wicked sense of humor and book-smarts would obviously only get me so far. To really fit in with the in-crowd, I would at least need the right clothes, the right hair, and the right makeup.

After shopping for the raddest styles I could find at Contempo Casuals, I convinced my mom to take me to the downtown salon where she had a fabulous hairdresser (remember calling them that?). When we walked in, he boogied over looking like a Bee Gee — right down to the shaggy hair, open satin shirt, and gold chains — and said he knew exactly what to do with me. I emerged from that appointment with a freshly-feathered mini mullet, not unlike that of Julie in Valley Girl.

Next, we went to a weird drugstore that smelled like mothballs, where the lady behind the counter gave me a makeup tutorial. I left with a tube of liquid purple eyeshadow and a few other essentials, along with instructions on applying them.

Over time, trying to alter my appearance became even more of a thing. From slathering on baby oil and lying out in the backyard, to drenching my hair with Sun-In, my mission — especially as a suburban SoCal white girl — was to get as tan and blonde as humanly possible. And don’t even get me started on all the endless drawers and bathroom cabinets full of skincare, makeup kits, and hair products (St. Ives Apricot Scrub! Pupa! Estee Lauder! Bonne Bell! Aqua Net! Salon Selectives! Crimping Irons!).

The Sun-In was like a gateway drug, and by high school I had progressed to saturating my hair with brown-bottle peroxide, dousing it before bed and letting it soak in and dry overnight. And oh, how it dried. After a decade of that abuse, combined with the heat from crimping and waving irons, my platinum hair fell out in clumps and I chopped most of it off (yet inexplicably continued using the peroxide, only more sparingly).

By some miracle, as I approached my thirties, I finally stopped worrying quite so much about how I looked — not completely, but some progress had been made. Maybe I was realizing there were more important things to be concerned about? Maybe I was feeling slightly more comfortable in my own skin? Maybe, just maybe, age and life experience were doing their thing?

But then they started doing their thing on my face.

Here I Go Again

In 2015, shortly after I turned 45, a few people I knew were getting Botox, and one of them referred me to a fancy place in Brentwood. She was still in her thirties, but I wanted a smoother complexion like hers and figured I’d give it a go. Besides, everybody seemed to be doing it, if social media was any indicator. (Thank goodness we become immune to peer pressure after high school, right?) Plus, this aesthetician specialized in super subtle results (because why spend thousands on something detectable?) — just a little refresh!

The appointment was nice, kind of like going to a spa with a side of pain and blood. But within a day or two, I had serious buyer’s remorse — mostly because the Botox had frozen the muscles above my brows so much that my eyelids were drooping, especially on the right side. I sent the aesthetician photos of my Frankenstein-like results, and she said to give it a few days — that it would settle and wear off, and that next time they’d use less in those areas.

As if there would be a next time!

Eventually it did wear off, but apparently so did my resolve to never again visit Cosmetic Neurotoxin Nation. Yes, I repeated the entire experience in 2017, complete with the disappointing results. A few years after that, I gave it another go, this time with my dermatologist, thinking he’s a doctor, so maybe it will be different. It wasn’t. And yet! I tried another doctor around my 50th birthday.

What’s the definition of insanity, again?

To my (or perhaps the pandemic’s?) credit, I waited another few years before trying a local aesthetician. That time, I didn’t hate the results, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep going. Until a couple of years later. And then again last month when, after making and then cancelling my appointment, I caved.

Why???

Devil Inside

Here’s another fun fact about me: whenever someone (including one of my own personalities) tells me I shouldn’t do something, that’s precisely when I decide I should do it, and vice-versa. It’s a heady cocktail: one part devil’s advocate, one part black sheep, and two parts rebellious Gen-Xer.

In this case, on some level, I think I was rebelling against the rebellion — as if the voices telling me to stop getting injections were throwing down a gauntlet and I needed to rise to the challenge. I convinced myself I was resisting binary thinking. I would do it because I don’t like extremes. Nuance is essential. I can’t do black-and-white. I exist in the gray areas.

I do generally believe those things, which is why I concluded that never doing anything to my face would be as extreme as blindly buying into whatever the beauty biz was selling. Meaning I would only get a little bit. It would be a happy medium! As I said to a few people: It’s not like I’m going MAGA-Barbie on anyone … at our age, there’s only so much these injections can accomplish anyway.

Everybody’s Selling Something

There was one other thing tugging at me: I had a huge credit in my account at the med spa after agreeing to a membership the last time I’d gone in (before I learned about boundaries), and I didn’t want all those precious units of poison and plumper to go to waste. Could I have used those credits for a different treatment, one without needles? Sure! In fact, I did switch my initial appointment to a facial when I was feeling all anti-Botox.

But then I noticed the lines between my eyebrows again, and pondered the power of existing in the gray areas, and ultimately listened to my louder (but maybe not entirely wiser?) inner voice.

When I got to my appointment, the staff tried to talk me into doing five times as much as I’d planned. As the aesthetician and her assistant tag-teamed, showing me images of other women’s before-and-afters and handing me brochures for Sculptra (only $3,900, including your follow-up appointments!), I proudly told them I was on a path to radical self-acceptance, and that I almost didn’t go in at all because I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep getting injections.

They exchanged amused glances, and then the aesthetician looked at my neck, noting that Botox could help with that too. I told her it hadn’t worked before. She said it was about consistency. I insisted I was done worrying about it. “Of course! Only what you’re comfortable with. No pressure,” she said, moving on.

When she traced her finger over the lines in my forehead, I said I knew she couldn’t get rid of those because otherwise my brows would droop and I definitely didn’t want that. She replied that at some point I could do a blepharoplasty, and I said I’d researched and decided against any kind of surgery. “I’m trying to embrace the aging process more,” I told her and her assistant. “I am 56 and women are allowed to look their age!”

At least the assistant seemed to consider that for a moment, and I’m telling you, I was so proud of how I resisted all the upsells.

And yet.

The next day, after getting the agreed-upon injections, I looked like I’d been punched in the face. Then, the eyebrows began their descent, but on separate schedules. I texted the aesthetician and she said to come in immediately so she could try to undo some of the damage. But when I went in, she added another drop, to try and speed up the droop on the other brow.

This Time

I know all the crap they shot into my face will eventually wear off, and I’m counting the days until that happens. I’m not lying when I say I miss the wrinkles around my eyes, the lines in my forehead, the sharper cheekbones. I miss looking like me, which, ironically, is what most people say before they sign up for these things, not after.

Truly, I can’t wait to be able to smile again without looking like a psycho-killer. I’m excited to laugh and look like I’m laughing. I’m desperate to raise my eyebrows, to open my eyes, big and wide, to have my face and expressions match my multiple emotions (and personalities).

And even though I’ve said never again, I have a feeling that when the effects completely wear off, the temptation will rear its ugly head once more. I’ll scrutinize the elevens between my brows. Weigh the pros and cons. Try to talk myself out of it and then hear that little voice, begging for just one more hit and insisting things will be better this time … you will be better this time … just look in that mirror … don’t you want to be the fairest of them all?

Then I’ll think about the things I could do with the money instead — important, meaningful things — and how much I’ve already wasted through the years. I’ll consider why I’m doing it, for whom I’m doing it, and especially how much is too much. Because this wasn’t only about regretting my decision, it was about the aesthetician not listening to me and going too far even when I told her not to.

After all that, maybe I’ll even make another public declaration: I’m done and I really mean it this time.

But will I stick to it? I guess we’ll have to wait and see what my multiple personalities decide.

Tale as old as time…

Every time I look at this concert ticket, memories come flooding back.

With winter exams officially over, I was flying high on the fumes of a second quarter of college completed — and so was my friend and roommate, April. We couldn’t wait to get back to Riverside for spring break. (That’s a phrase I’ve never uttered in the 37 years since … but it was our hometown, we’d been missing our friends and families, and we were merely freshmen.)

After tossing our bags in the wood-paneled station wagon I’d inherited from my mom, affectionately named “Bertha,” we got in the car and I turned up the radio. As per usual, it was tuned to 91X, which alerted us to the fact that R.E.M. would be playing the San Diego Sports Arena that night.

A few wide-eyed glances later, April and I pondered the possibility of going to the show, and decided to head south instead of north on the freeway.

“Do you really think we’ll be able to get tickets?” I asked, and April assured me we would.

Her enthusiasm was like a freaking virus, and soon we were both even more amped than we’d been about getting through finals.

Bear in mind, this was the 80s, when securing concert tickets required lining up at The Wherehouse or another outlet. So we were relying on the possibility that there would still be something available at the box office, or that a scalper might be willing to cut us a deal since we were poor college kids without much cash.

I can’t remember the exact details or negotiation tactics involved — only that we could not believe our luck when we found a guy out front selling a pair for 30 bucks each, in the 10th mother-effing row.

Stand

Robyn Hitchcock opened — and I’ve loved him ever since — but I could barely contain my excitement when “Pop Song 89” kicked in. April and I began dancing like maniacs, with me jumping as high as humanly possible to every beat. A few songs in, I did suffer a fleeting moment of imposter syndrome. After all, I’d inherited my love for R.E.M. from my older brother so … was I a legit fan?

Then, Michael Stipe declared the San Diego audience to be infinitely better than L.A. the previous night, disintegrating any doubts. April and I were obviously the best fans ever — especially considering my stellar pogo-dance moves, and the way we were screaming out every lyric with perfect pitch. (Okay, maybe not every lyric, but I got a lot of them right … from “The One I Love” to “Cuyahoga” to “Finest Worksong” to “Swan Swan H,” my brother’s record collection served me well.)

It was also tough to feel like a fraud with April around. Not only was she a major music fanatic, she was quite possibly the most genuine person I’d ever met. I realize that word and all its synonyms — real, authentic, natural, organic, legit — mean next to nothing these days. But it’s the truth (oof … another empty word, especially when it comes to certain social media platforms).

Okay, I guess I’ll show instead of tell, as all dutiful writers are trained to do.

Begin the Begin

I’d known April since at least seventh grade, but we didn’t become close friends until the summer before our senior year of high school, when we went on a trip to Yosemite. Our mutual friend Hillel, who I’d known since preschool, had always been an outdoorsy little fucker, and he somehow convinced us and several others to join the expedition. (To this day, Hillel leads treks all over the world, and I’m eternally amazed by his adventurous spirit. But I digress…)

During the trip, our feet and muscles aching under the weight of our massive backpacks, April and I were easily the top two groaners, begging Hillel to let us stop every twenty minutes or so. At one point, April — who was tall, lanky, and a bit clumsy — tripped and took a serious tumble. Hearing her scream, I turned around and busted out the first aid kit, making her laugh through her tears as I cleaned and bandaged the wound.

A few days later, I found myself inexplicably climbing the back of Half Dome with the rest of the group until my nerves kicked in. About halfway up, clinging to the cables, I stopped and said, “I can’t keep going.”

But April, a few steps behind me, insisted, “Alexa! You can!”

By the time we reached the top, I felt invincible — although not quite enough to venture out on the infamous diving board with a few of the others.

At least the trek back down felt infinitely easier after that.

Senior year did too, thanks in large part to the deeper bonds I’d formed with April and the rest of the crew. We spent a ton of time together, on-campus and off, including epic parties and lunchtime excursions, riding in the back of Hillel’s Suzuki Samurai to Taco Bell … the Sub Station … anywhere we could escape the absurdity of high school for more than five minutes.

As graduation and college admissions loomed large and acceptance letters came through, April and I both decided to attend Revelle at U.C.S.D., and I asked if she might want to be roommates.

“Yeah, that would be fun,” she said.

I was elated, and a lot less anxious about starting the next chapter of our lives, knowing we’d have each other to lean on if we ever got homesick or stressed out — which we did on the regular.

I Believe

Being roommates was mostly a blast. We wrote papers together. We partied together. We pulled all-nighters in the cafeteria and commiserated over classes together. April had an especially easy time making friends, who she would bring back to the dorm like stray pets.

One time, when I returned from a lecture, she announced, “Alexa, I met a skinhead! He liked my shoes. He thought they were Doc Martens. You would hate him. He saw your Dukakis poster and started ragging on you.”

She was right — I didn’t like him at first. But April had a way of bringing out everybody’s softer, kinder, more accepting side. Eventually, the skinhead and I discovered we had things in common and even came to appreciate our differences.

April also inspired my love of music in a huge way. She taught me to play guitar, beginning with “Stand By Me” on her acoustic. When I got the chord changes wrong, she laughed and said my name in the most frustratedly amused voice.

Next, she taught me “Scarborough Fair” and then “Down in the Valley,” which I sang so relentlessly it drove her crazy — until I took it a step further and changed the lyrics in honor of our skinhead friend, who was always bragging about the size of his penis:

“Aaron’s penis, is not very big / It is as tiny, as a skin-colored twig / Where is your penis? Oh where can it be? / Sometimes I wonder, how Aaron can pee.”

April couldn’t get enough of the new song. Aaron was not as amused, but I think he appreciated it on some level.

Another thing that blew me away: We’d barely started school when April landed an underground music show on KSDT, the college radio station. Yes, it was at two in the morning, but she was killing it, playing Bauhaus; Downy Mildew; The Cocteau Twins; Early RHCP; The Primitives; and so many others. She also championed the cheesiest albums of our youth, including the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack.

One night, I was listening to April on KSDT and decided to call in. She proceeded to do “The Alexa Show” for the rest of her set, playing some of the songs we loved at the time, including “Walk on the Wild Side,” “Take the Skinheads Bowling,” “Yertle the Turtle,” and “Blister in the Sun.”

So. Central Rain (I’m Sorry)

After seeing R.E.M. that March 16 night in San Diego, we headed for Riverside, talking the whole time about our plans for spring break — including the possibility of joining another trip organized by Hillel, this time to the Grand Canyon. When I dropped April at her house, I told her to call me if she decided to go and she promised she would.

This was the era of landlines. No answering machines, no texts, no way to reach a person unless they picked up. After a few days passed and I hadn’t heard from anyone, I got annoyed, assuming they’d gone without me.

Then our friend Lisa — April’s BFF — called, and I immediately sensed something was off. “April went on the road trip,” she said. “They got into an accident … April didn’t make it.”

I collapsed in tears, begging Lisa to tell me it was a prank. I even wondered if April was on the other line, three-way-caller-style, listening in. But Lisa insisted it was true, and said I should talk to my parents.

I kept waiting for her to call back and tell me it was a project for her Psych class or something. Instead, more details trickled in: the weather had been bad … terrible rain … the car hydroplaned and flipped … April was asleep in the back … no seatbelt … ejected from the vehicle.

The rest of spring break was spent over at Lisa’s house with a small group of people who knew and loved April, all of us trying to comprehend the incomprehensible.

When I returned to our dorm room in San Diego a few days after the funeral, all of April’s things had been cleared out. Eerie, empty, devastating … there really aren’t any words to adequately capture what it was like to be back there. But our suite-mates rallied around me, and we bonded in ways none of us could have ever predicted, nor wanted.

Get Up

In the months and years that followed, two words became a sort of mantra in my journals: carpe diem. It probably sounds cliched, but that was the only way I could think to keep April’s memory alive. As in life, her death gave me the courage and confidence I sometimes lacked to pursue things I’d only ever dreamed about, beginning with a trip to Dublin that summer to study at Trinity College, where I was certain I would run into Bono, busking on a street corner. (As it turned out, there was so much more to Ireland than U2 — and so many more bands — and I kept going back, year after year.)

During sophomore year, living in the same suite with most of the same Argo Hall friends, I volunteered at KSDT. Later, I got a job at Assorted Vinyl, just as April had. I also interviewed bands for The UCSD Guardian, and went to as many live shows as I could squeeze into my schedule.

All of these things inspired me to move to Hollywood after graduation, where I scored a gig at Capitol Records, and then HITS Magazine. I’m not sure I would have done most of it without April perched somewhere in the back of my mind. Just like on that trek up Half Dome, any time I thought I can’t keep going, she popped in to say, Alexa! You can!

As time went on, the monumental task of adulting took over and I didn’t hear April’s voice nearly as often. But then I found my old journals and school assignments — the ones that inspired me to start this Substack in the first place — including a chapter in a memoir I wrote junior year, titled “Friends.”

That chapter is entirely about April, and reading it again today has been exactly the medicine I’ve needed.

Truth told, over the past week or two, I’ve been fighting a nasty virus, and my depleted energy levels have had me feeling pretty damn depressed. I even broke down in tears from the exhaustion and confessed to The Husband that I’m struggling and regressing to the point of feeling like a failure — as a wife, as a mom, as a friend, as a writer, as a human.

Of course he tried to console me. But it wasn’t until I sat down to write about R.E.M. and April that I started to feel a bit better, which I guess makes total sense. I mean, about four pages into that “Friends” chapter, I literally wrote: “Whenever I was depressed, it was April who would bring me up again.”

And now, here she is, still doing exactly that.

I may not be up for pogo dancing anytime soon, but if/when that day arrives, I’ll be thinking about April with every jump.

Until then, it’s going to be a whole lot of “Everybody Hurts” on repeat.

Before I get to the reasons I was unwittingly moved to tears, let’s take a quick look at a few of the highlights that prompted me to declare right here on Substack: “If this is Gen-Z’s answer to John Hughes I am so here for it.”

(I’ve Had) The Time Of My Life

First, there were the nods to classic movies like Dirty Dancing (“I carried a watermelon,” the lift stance) and Sixteen Candles — both of which I have watched at least two million times through the years. (Also, in case anyone needs to hear this today: “Nobody puts Baby in a corner.”)

Then, there was the striking resemblance between Ella Bright (who plays Hannah) and Brooke Shields — so much that I asked Google if she’s Brooke’s daughter. She’s not, and she’s British, which somehow made it better. Meanwhile, The Husband and I had a lengthy debate about the Gavin Rossdale-meets-Michael Hutchence situation happening on Belmont Cameli’s face.

The music was an obvious draw, as well, and included such Gen-X gems as “Dancing With Myself” … “Nothin’ But a Good Time” … “Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap” … “The Bitch Is Back” … “Lovefool” … “Fade Into You” … and a spectacular rendition of “Cherry Pie:”

I will say, the nods to Gen-X culture weren’t nearly as present in the book, but Hannah and Garrett binge-watching Breaking Bad made up for it.

All The Young Dudes

But the reason I kept sobbing had nothing to do with the Gen-X references or Walter White, and everything to do with how it all transported me right back to my own college days. Or, rather, my college nights — which were a lot less focused on getting a degree in Writing, and a lot more focused on getting together with dudes (as documented in my journals, in writing).

More specifically: I was floored by the ways the show and book tackled themes of love and longing, of wanting sex but also fearing it — the kind of stuff that made up a solid 90 percent of my college-era journals. I especially appreciated the ultimate message that deep, meaningful relationships — romantic or otherwise — aren’t entirely possible if the people involved can’t stomach the terrifying prospect of being fully seen. Truly, there were so many examples of all the ways that kind of fear gets in the way of authentic connection, whether it’s with a parent, a child, a friend, a romantic partner … a mutual masturbator (IYKYK).

Most of the things I wrote in my journals are as cringe as you might imagine. On one page, I declare I’m in love with a guy named Chris. A few entries later, I’m fixated on someone named Dave. Then, there’s Greg. And Robert. And Jim. And another Dave. Rinse, wash, repeat?

Did I get to know or even talk to any of these guys? The evidence on that is sparse, and my menopausal brain obviously can’t fill in the details. Most of them were simply described as “beautiful” — especially the ones who had long hair (what can I say? It was the late-80s/early-90s). It’s all very reminiscent of OC’s Hannah crushing on Justin.

The number of guys I wrote about increased significantly during my year abroad in Ireland. Every few nights, I would return from the pub or a nightclub (where, without fail, the DJ would play James’ “Sit Down” and always end the night with The Monkees’ “Daydream Believer”), open my journal — which was green because Ireland — and unleash my feelings about Fergil or Finn or Declan or Dermot or Niall or Noel or, oh what’s this? Another Fergil. Yet again, there wasn’t much about who they were beyond their physical attributes.

I can picture it all so clearly: me, seated at my tiny desk in my cubicle of a dorm room, furiously writing in perfect cursive with only the little desk lamp shining a light on my ramblings, waxing poetic about some boy I’d seen or kissed or invited back to the flat. One minute, I’m pondering the spectre of sex, the next I’m contemplating the meaning of love, what it might look like, whether it’s necessary before doing the deed.

Then, staring down the possibility that I might have found the right person, I would talk myself out of it, and then back into it, and then back out again. Because this guy’s a jerk or that one’s too shy or he’s really not that interested in me or interesting to me anyway. Especially at the very moment a connection seemed to be leading towards anything even remotely real or vulnerable — physically, emotionally, or both — I was out.

Like A Virgin

Several months of my Ireland writings were devoted to one guy I really did love — or, at least, it was the closest I’d come to what I thought love might be. On the night we admitted our feelings, I journaled about how we’d bonded over the recent deaths of loved ones. I mentioned the hurt and anger we were both processing. And I worried about how getting involved might make things weird for our mutual friends, one of whom I believed might also like him.

Two weeks into the relationship, I was already sabotaging the whole thing, and one of the key reasons, at least in my journals, seemed to be about one issue in particular: I was still a virgin (gasp) and figured he would expect me to put out soon, especially as an older and seemingly more experienced American girl.

And while I definitely wanted to do it, I also wasn’t sure I wanted to do it. Or maybe I just didn’t want to do it with him. But maybe I did. And then again, no — especially if that was the only reason he wanted to be with me which, let’s be honest, is obviously the only thing college boys want from college girls. Right? Right? Right???

My concerns about these kinds of expectations were informed by a few bad experiences and messaging from friends, family, and society at large, not to mention the lingering impact of coming of age when the HIV/AIDS pandemic hit. But, yeah, sex was something I thought I wanted, or should want, and was also scared to have. (Kind of like OC’s Hannah, though in a slightly different register.)

About two months into the on-again, off-again relationship with the guy I thought I might love, he showed up with his friend beneath my dorm room window, throwing stones. He wanted to tell me something, but his friend was the one doing the talking — “he’s having girl trouble,” he said. My flatmates were furious at the racket, and one yelled at them to leave because we had lectures the next morning. A few weeks after that, we shared a kiss — on New Year’s Eve — and then went back and forth for another month before my confusion had exhausted us both. All the while, in my journals, I was declaring I love him … no I don’t … I miss him … but do I really? There were even unsent love letters. And poems.

Eventually, he started seeing another girl and, at least on the page, I expressed relief and happiness that he’d found someone saner.

Who’s That Girl?

What I know now, that I didn’t fully realize then: That college girl wasn’t just scared to have sex. She was afraid to let someone in. To be fully seen. And not just physically. She had grief and anger and insecurities and so much confusion, and who could possibly love such a mad creature? It was bound to end poorly, with at least one broken heart.

That’s why I kept setting my sights on beautiful strangers, or sabotaging things as soon as they took a more serious turn. Because wanting someone you don’t really know, and running away from someone you might, is so much safer than being known yourself.

Until you find the person who makes you feel so safe that you’re willing to be seen. Which did happen eventually.

But before that, I moved from sexophobia to slutting around Hollywood, making up for lost time with enough casual hookups that I coauthored a book about it. And then, after one or two short-lived relationships where I got spooked and found ways to ruin whatever was building, I took everything I’d learned and poured it into this new thing called online dating.

Which is how I met The Husband.

I called my friends after our first date to tell them he was “the one.” We’d been emailing and talking on the phone for endless hours before that fateful dinner at The California Canteen (RIP), and the connection was clear to both of us. Of course, after a few dates, I tried to bail. But somehow, he convinced me to stay. And I’m so glad I did.

While rereading my journals, I found one page where I’d written — at 1:55 in the morning, at that little desk in Galway — a bit about the kind of guy I might want to marry one day: a man who would move me not just physically but intellectually, emotionally, spiritually. Someone sensitive and smart enough to give me the love and respect I would give in return, well beyond the sexual.

I guess maybe I was writing him into existence. I just had to stop running long enough to let him catch up. And it all came true thanks to a crazy little dial-up dating site, a mere 10 years later, and much farther off campus than any of the places where I went to get an education.

To quote the song Hannah sings in the final episode of OC (because I’m a complete and total cheese-bag): “I am the girl that I am, because of the girl I used to be.”

But I think I’m finally done — or at least I’m actively working on radical self-acceptance instead of attempting yet another weight-loss plan. Not that the combined multi-trillion-dollar health, wellness, diet, and beauty industrial complex makes it easy to embrace my bigger body.

One thing that does help, at least a bit: My mother is no longer alive to add to the calorie-counting, fat-phobic chorus.

That said, I can still hear her in my head, coaxing me to finish the job. Because striving to make our 5-foot-8-inch frames sleeker and smaller was one of the main Mommy-and-Me activities we regularly did together. And although she never got to our mutually agreed upon “goal” weight (again, that would be the number neither of us hit more than once as grown-ass women with grown asses), I still have time.

I’m just not sure that’s how I want to spend it. Or my money, for that matter.

The Replacements

It all started with Jazzercise in the early 80s. I can still remember how we would pet our imaginary horses in the local dance studio before pretending to mount them and start galloping to the heart-pumping sounds of the theme song from “Dallas” and the way we would do bouncy lunges to “Another One Bites the Dust.”

Honestly, I loved going to those classes and moving my body — until it started to feel more like a means to a weight-loss end, alongside the 40-plus years of restrictive eating that followed.

First came Shaklee. My mom was super excited to show me how it worked, and how skinny it would make us. She stacked the boxes in one of the kitchen cupboards, replacing the Oreos and other snack foods she’d banished like butt-dimpling demons from hell, then whipped up a chocolate shake in the blender.

Thus began the meal replacement era, which also included OptiFast, SlimFast, The Cambridge Diet, The Grapefruit Diet, and The Cabbage Soup Diet.

When I was in high school, my mom returned to Weight Watchers, which she had previously done shortly after I was born (because we all know baby weight is evil and must be removed immediately). After signing us both up, she slapped a “Nothing Tastes as Good as Skinny Feels” magnet on our refrigerator and we began measuring everything we consumed on a little plastic food scale. Later, after my first year of college, she encouraged me to drop my “Freshman 15” by accompanying her to the gym … and Jenny Craig.

Then the 90s arrived and, with them, Fen-Phen. I wasn’t even overweight at that point but any time I visited my mom, she would look me over and ask if I’d put on a few pounds. Plus, heroin chic was the aesthetic du jour, and a bunch of my friends and coworkers were morphing into emaciated versions of their former selves thanks to the drugs. So, my mom and I both started taking them — or, in my case, I just took the one that sped me up, using it as a party drug as well as my ticket to Tiny Town.

Culture Club

No matter how much weight I lost, it was never enough. Because diet culture — and all its prey, my otherwise intelligent mother included — kept insisting we still had work to do. As explained in this article and plenty of other analyses, it’s a culture with a long history of racism and misogyny. One that worships thinness and equates smaller bodies with health and moral virtue, intent upon shrinking women and keeping us in our place.

And it started working on my mom way back in 1951.

Here’s one story she wrote in a memoir class she took a few years before she died, about a shopping trip she took with her mother: “Mum and I had to go to Oxford Street in London, to a big shop to alter my school uniform. I stood obediently while I was measured. ‘Large for her age, isn’t she?’ the saleswoman said, as if I was an inanimate object.”

She was 10 years old.

At that point, my mother was simply taller than her peers, with bigger feet. But, as she wrote — and often mentioned throughout her life — she became known at her all-girls boarding school as “The Whopper.” She carried that with her for the rest of her life, desperately trying to fit into a world that told her she was too much, and never enough.

One thing that really sucks is that when I was a kid, I never thought of her as anything but beautiful. I have vivid memories of sitting next to her at the vanity mirror while she tied back her thick brown hair with a scarf before heading out in her little white tennis outfit, or a strappy 70s dress she sewed herself. Watching her “put on her face,” I thought she was the most glamorous person I’d ever seen. I wanted to be just like her.

Which is, I suppose, one of her lasting legacies — because being like her also meant, at some point, despising my body. And while it seemed to have started at a young age for us both, I really began noticing it when my mom was in her forties. Which would have been around the time she was approaching menopause, and I was nearing menstruation.

It makes me wonder: Is this what happens with most mothers and daughters? Are we eternally going through parallel coming-of-ages, passing the self-loathing down from one generation to the next?

Because it wasn’t just me and my mom hating our bodies back then. I mean, I totally remember the conversations friends and I had while sitting around the lunch tables at school, nibbling on air-popped popcorn or skipping meals altogether while despairing over the size of this body part or that. For many of us, disordered eating and body-shaming — ourselves and others — just became a natural part of our personalities.

And, unfortunately, a lot of us have carried those conversations right into adulthood, insisting that we’re not judging anybody; we’re simply expressing “concern” for the health and wellbeing of our kids, or celebrities (who are always either too fat or too thin), or each other.

I’m sorry but I’m not buying it — especially because I spent most of my career fucking peddling it.

Talking Heads

Yup. Here’s where it gets even uglier (mea culpa times a million): I spent decades professionally pushing the weight-loss narrative, mostly in magazines — from Fitness to Shape to American Baby. I sat in the editorial meetings and wrote the articles and cover lines, from Brand New Year, Hot New Bod! to Bikini Ready in 8 Weeks! to Is Your Baby Too Big? (Uh huh, that was the headline.)

On several occasions, I even took enthusiastic readers to health spas for makeover stories. One poor woman was noticeably distressed when she didn’t fit into some of the clothes the fashion editor brought. Another was traumatized and barely pictured in an article because she couldn’t hold the workout poses our fitness editor demanded for the photo shoot. Meanwhile, the headlines read “Real Women! Real Results!” — and I was the one who wrote their profiles, making them seem thrilled with the experience and how much we had changed their lives (which I suppose was true? Just not for the better).

Back then, we convinced ourselves we were promoting health and wellbeing while simultaneously selling ads for diet supplements and airbrushing the hell out of every image, not to mention Frankensteining the models together so their heads looked as good as their bodies in the final shot.

The most insidious part? We cited the studies, quoted the experts, reported the science (“backed by research!”). Like, yes, a large waist circumference does correlate with cardiovascular risk. Visceral fat is a health concern. But there is a world of difference between a doctor discussing those things with a patient and a magazine plastering the numbers next to a genetically blessed model.

I’m not telling you this to perform guilt. I’m telling you because the messaging does real damage, and I went along with it.

There were times when I tried to push back, and almost convinced myself we really were putting the service in service journalism — especially when I successfully slipped in articles like Too Much of a Good Thing (yes, too much exercise can hurt you) or Scrap the Scale. But the truth was that a little “actually, ease up on yourself” content was great for the brand. It meant we were balanced. It meant we cared about our readers’ wellbeing.

It didn’t slow the conveyor belt down at all. If anything, it only served to speed it up. And today it’s in absolute overdrive.

Rage Against The Machine

Which is why I’m begging, especially my fellow Gen-Xers, to please help me stop the insanity. I mean, we are supposed to be the IDGAF generation — the ones who say, “Fuck you, I won’t do what you tell me!” And I’m not sure it’s the best look to scream that while swimming around in the #SkinnyTok sewer and pretending it’s anything other than shit-water.

To be clear: I’m not saying we need to stop encouraging healthy — and I mean truly healthy — behaviors, like moving and fueling our bodies in ways that help us feel and function our best.

But when are we going to disrupt the dangerous messaging that runs alongside the good stuff? And when are we going to stop disparaging our own bodies, and the bodies of other people (including celebrities), especially in the presence of our children? Because they’re absorbing the negativity and repeating the talking points, primed and ready to keep on keeping on until the end of time.

Which brings me back to a lasting image I have of my own mother, on the day she died from metastatic breast cancer at the age of 68, bald and bloated. There, a few feet from her lifeless body, was a weight chart, which she kept next to a scale in the bedroom for health reasons this time — mostly to track fluid retention related to ascites.

I keep thinking about the final number on that chart and can’t help but wonder, after a full 58 years of hating her body and trying to make it smaller, how she would have felt about it.

Then I think about the day I picked up her ashes from the funeral home a few weeks later. Scrutinizing the slim cardboard cylinder — oh so sleek — I couldn’t help but laugh when I imagined her somewhere off in the great beyond, bragging to the other matching urns about how she finally fit into that tiny container.

Every Gen-Xer has an archive. Not just published books or bylines. I’m talking about the old diaries and photo albums gathering dust in a storage space, the unsent letters (or the ones we wish we’d never sent), the mix tapes that somehow survived three moves and multiple breakups … all the things that make us want to give our younger selves a hug, or a high-five, or both.

We kept everything, and that doesn’t make us hoarders — it makes us Gen-X!

That’s why I’m introducing Deep Cuts, a Q&A series where we dive into what’s gloriously over, what’s just beginning, and what — against all odds — still holds.

With each installment, I’ll sit down with a writer, artist, or other creative (which, honestly, includes all of us … yes, I’m talking to YOU!) from our generation and ask them to pull up something from the archive. A yearbook photo. A diary entry. An excerpt from a book or article or poem or song they wrote. A piece of art. A version of themselves they haven’t introduced in a while.

Then, we’ll talk about things like who they were back in the day, which versions of themselves they miss (and don’t miss), what they love(d) most about being Gen-X, and so much more!

It’s a chance for us to say: “Take a look at me then…” and: “Take a look at me now.”

Subscribe now

If you’re a Gen-Xer and would like to participate, please don’t be shy! Just message me and/or comment below with a bit about you and what you’re currently working on or where readers can find you, and I’ll send you the questionnaire!*

That’s it! That’s the post.

Can’t wait for you to join the party — and feel free to forward this to others who might be interested.

xx

* For now, I will be running these Q&As as regular written posts, but I may turn it into something more life-like and podcast-y down the road…

It got me thinking about all the stories that inspired my love of reading and writing, and how I wound up becoming an author myself. So, now I wanna share a bit about all that here, because I’m pretty sure plenty of you will be raising up your reading lights in solidarity (this one’s about incest — let’s rock!).

Oh Very Young

Early on, thanks to my British mum, I got hooked on the English fantasy novels she read to me and my brother while we snuggled up next to her in bed. Those included the entire Chronicles of Narnia series (I used to imagine myself as Lucy and my brother as Edmund), and several by Susan Cooper which, even though I still have the hardcover originals, I recently snagged from a little free library while walking in a friend’s neighborhood (an entire paperback box set!). I immediately texted a picture of them to my brother:

As soon as I started picking out books of my own (Scholastic Book Club in the house), I became obsessed with Judy Blume. I think I read Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret, Blubber, and Deenie at least a dozen times each. They were just the salve I needed whenever I was feeling awkward, unattractive, or otherwise inadequate (especially when it came to being a late-bloomer — thanks, Margaret).

Then there were the gothic sagas from V.C. Andrews. Flowers in the Attic. Petals on the Wind. If There Be Thorns. The Mother-effing Seeds of Yesterday!? I can still picture Chris, Cathy, and those towheaded twins delighting over a plate of powdered-sugar donuts (ahhhh! Don’t eat them!), and obviously cackle over the intimate stuff that went completely over my head when I was all of 11 years old. V.C.’s Heaven series was another favorite from that era.

But the book that’s never been far from my mind, even after all this time? Dreams Can Come True by Jane Claypool Miner.

You guys, the jacket copy is everything:

Ellynne has dreams of being popular, becoming a cheerleader, and having a great boyfriend. After losing 30 pounds and trying out for the squad, the only thing left is Kip. Should she go for him even though he has a girlfriend? Is it right for Ellynne to want to date him? How close are he and his girlfriend, Merri? All Ellynne knows is that Kip is very, very special...

I’m telling you, I read it approximately ten thousand times, lying on my Castleberry Pink Tulip Laura Ashley comforter. And then, after my debut novel came out in 2008, in a fit of obsessive nostalgia, I tracked down a used copy online for one cent! When it arrived, I held it up like it was the holy grail.

These books were my escape. A way to process my innermost insecurities and silly aspirations, and to connect with characters who were going through similar things (well, maybe not Chris and Cathy, but…!). That’s what I hoped to give readers when I became a published YA author, too. And the way I became one is, in retrospect, spectacularly insane.

Subscribe now

Every Day I Write the Book

I had recently given birth to my son when a friend’s sister, an editor at HarperTeen, reached out looking for a writer with a SoCal voice. Within minutes, I was on the phone with one of the top execs at Alloy Entertainment (the media company behind Gossip Girl, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants … no biggie), who subsequently sent me a few sentences about the project, and asked me to write a sample chapter. He told me to check out The Clique series by Lisi Harrison for inspo.

After inhaling a few books (which were ah-mazing), I knew exactly what I wanted to do with the concept and churned out a chapter. I sent it in with an incredibly casual note saying: “I have no idea if this is what you’re looking for, but I had fun writing it so all good either way.” The exec called me back to say he loved it (whaaat?). Then, after some back-and-forth revisions, discussed while driving my baby around in the backseat to keep him from crying, I decided maybe I wasn’t right for the gig. The exec said he understood but still wanted to send my chapter to HarperTeen and, before I had fully registered what was going on, I was offered a four-book deal.

Yeah. That happened.

After I developed maybe three different plot ideas with the Alloy editors, and at least one full manuscript was completed, scrapped, and re-started — which was honestly the most fun I’d ever had writing — Frenemies debuted. And tanked. (Even with the keyhole cover, which was a total nod to V.C.’s books.)

We pushed forward with the second book which was an even better experience. I was so proud of how much I’d grown as a writer, and with the end result. But just as it went to print, the series was cancelled in the U.S. Womp, womp.

All of that said, it had already been sold to a French publisher, and they still wanted all four (merci bien, Michel Lafon). Just goes to show you what different markets and promotional plans can do, oui? The translated collection did so well, they turned them into graphic novels, too. Oh, and then there was a Disney Channel movie based on the book starring Zendaya, although I don’t think they used a shred of what I’d originally written — and I’m pretty sure Z isn’t including that credit in her career highlights reel.

Don’t Dream It’s Over

Despite its mixed success, writing the Frenemies series was an absolute career highlight for me, and I was determined to keep going. Thanks to my deal with Alloy, I had scored a big-time agent, and I began pitching new ideas to her. But, truth told, I was feeling a bit like a fraud after the stateside cancellation, on top of juggling magazine deadlines and raising a small child, and the things I sent to her kind of sucked. Plus, she was busy with another client whose books about vampires seemed to be causing a stir.

So, I did what any rational, emotionally regulated professional would do: I broke up with her.

Several years later, the YA writing itch returned, and I began crafting an outline for a high-concept YA thriller, working title Learning to Die. Off the strength of the concept, I signed with a new heavy-hitter agent who was super enthusiastic and couldn’t wait to read more. Alas, it took me forever to get going, and by the time I workshopped a solid set of chapters, she had also become busy with a movie deal for some book called Gone Girl.

Once again, I felt like a pathetic imposter and, after waiting for feedback that seemed to take an eternity (it was probably a month or two), I fired off yet another breakup email. I didn’t even give her a chance to send me her notes! Which, when they arrived moments later, said the writing was great but she was having trouble connecting with the characters.

So, yeah. I fired Stephenie Meyer’s agent, followed by Gillian Flynn’s. I would like to say I’ve grown enormously as a person since then, but I guess that’s still a work in progress. Kind of like my YA thriller.

I did work on it a bit more and sent the partial to the editors at Alloy — the ones who’d taken a chance on me in the first place — wondering if they might want to do something with it. The response was super encouraging: “If anyone has a shot of selling in this space,” one editor commented, “it’s with a project like this.” Still, they said the thriller market was saturated and Alloy wasn’t in the business of developing outside projects, and suggested I pursue more agents.

That was back in 2019, and instead of pitching it further I decided Learning to Die probs needed to … learn to die. The timing was off, and so was I. Then the pandemic happened, my dad died, my kid graduated high school, and I forgot all about it.

Back to Life

But something kinda crazy has been happening since I started publishing stuff here on Substack: I’m not only rediscovering my voice, but approaching writing in a completely new way.

When I launched The Gen-X Journals last month, I wasn’t totally sure I’d stick with it. I knew I wanted to write for myself, without any publishing industry pressure, marketing plans, or monetization getting in the way of the words. And I think releasing myself from that kind of pressure and outside noise has made all the difference in my desire to keep doing it.

When Laurie and I had our conversation about our YA books that didn’t make it, I found myself thinking about Learning to Die again, no longer weighed down by disappointment or burnout, but with a new sense of hope. Maybe even a hint of swagger?

So, I guess I have 30,000 words I need (no, want) to read this weekend. To see if there’s anything still there. To see if it’s a story I still believe in. And to see if, this time, I might have a few things I didn’t quite have before: a clearer sense of who I am, what I want to say, and why I want to say it.

The books that shaped me back in the day weren’t trying to be great literary works or mass market moneymakers. They were trying to reach readers, like me, who wanted to feel seen, heard, and understood, or to escape into someone else’s world for a while.

So, here I am, 40 years later, with a Substack full of new essays and friends, a memoir in progress, and a partial YA thriller sitting in my TBR pile. I don’t know exactly how I’m going to feel about that old manuscript yet. But for the first time in a long time, I’m pretty psyched to find out.

*BTW, Laurie also runs an incredible nonprofit called Link to Libraries, boosting access to books for underprivileged kids, and that’s also got me all kinds of inspired!

BOOK CLUB! How about you? Are you a writer with a manuscript languishing somewhere in a drawer, or did you have other favorite books as a kid? You should totally lemme know below…

Leave a comment

Reading through my old diaries was part of the inspiration for creating The Gen-X Journals but that’s not the whole story. I’ve also been digging through a folder full of stuff my mom wrote during a memoir workshop she took in 2005, shortly after retiring at the age of 64, and only a few years before her breast cancer mercilessly came back and killed her.

It’s all source material for an intergenerational book I’ve been assembling — more for myself than for publication, at least at this point — and the overlap of certain aspects of our lives is becoming almost eerie.

She’s The One

A few weeks ago, I happened upon one page that stopped me cold. It was a story map assignment from my mom’s workshop where she was pondering almost all the same things I’ve been thinking through in recent years, especially with regards to change and loss (in her words, and pretty much mine: “of identity, of career, of home, of children — empty nesting”).

Whenever I’m at my desk — whether it’s to do research, write, check email, or balance the family budget (as she did) — I usually have Spotify playing in the background. Lately it’s the new Harry Styles album on repeat (lmk if you’re obsessed too and maybe we can be best friends?!), but on this particular night it was simply my 645 “liked” songs on shuffle. And, as I stared at my mother’s words, World Party’s “She’s the One” came on.

I nearly jumped out of my skin when the first verse kicked in: I was her, she was me / We were one, we were free

I’m not lying when I say I listened to the track, on repeat, for the rest of the night, the weight of all the words burrowing deeper into my heart. Maybe it was the 5mg gummy, but I became convinced my mom was transmitting a message from the great beyond directly to me, particularly when something — perhaps she — sent me searching online for the song’s origins.

Thanks in large part to Robbie Williams’ more widely known cover, I had always thought it was a love song for a romantic interest. But a few interviews with Karl Wallinger quickly set me straight. Turns out, he wrote it as a tribute to his recently deceased mother, reportedly in about 10 minutes. The opening lines are about the merging that happens between a mother and child.

Holy shit.

I sat there wondering if I too was in the midst of some great mother-daughter merge. And it terrified me. But why?

Mad Woman

Okay, fine. It’s because I hear my mother’s voice instead of mine whenever I’m being impatient or rude, and especially when I almost offer a piece of unwelcome advice to my adult child in a way that might alienate him. It’s because, on my shallowest of days, I catch my reflection in the mirror and shudder at the jowls forming around my jawline, or the way my body is becoming softer and dimpled in the ways she despised about her own.

But then I feel terrible for reducing her to the mistakes she made, and the perceived shortcomings — particularly physical ones — that made her hate herself more than she, or any human, should. My mother was flawed, as we all are. But she was so much more than her flaws.

This was a woman who rose far above her origins, suffering through boarding school and graduating with a university degree in science — the path her parents demanded of her — before leaving her strict English upbringing behind. She got on a boat, waved goodbye to her mother and sister, and headed for the states after being awarded a scholarship for graduate studies at UCLA.

Then she met my dad and converted to Judaism, became a U.S. citizen, and wrote biology textbooks — mostly for him — before becoming so enamored with community activism that she enrolled in law school and graduated at the top of her class. She went on to prosecute sex crimes and child abuse cases as a deputy district attorney, and was ultimately appointed a municipal court judge. She continued to sit on the bench while going through chemo and radiation following her first breast cancer diagnosis at the age of 60.

And those were just the professional highlights. I was born 13 months after my brother — Irish twins — and she was a mother like no other. She sewed our Halloween costumes and clothes (and her own), and planned and organized every family vacation, from Alaska to England to Australia. She oversaw the build of a house on Cape Cod (where she met my dad, and where our family summered for the first two decades of my life). She packed coolers full of fresh fruit and tuna sandwiches for every day on the beach, and cooked gourmet meals and threw marvelous parties featuring cuisine from her Cordon Bleu education. In many ways, she inspired my love of music and reading and writing and so much more.

Did she also do things that drove me crazy (kind of literally)? Hell yes. And I’ll probably be unpacking more of that in future posts.

But today, I want to focus on the fact that she did the best she could, as I believe most — not all, by any means, but most — parents do.

How Deep Is Your Love

My mother was an imperfect perfectionist. But the effort is all right there, in the photos capturing our closeness, the letters she saved (even the ones where she was awful), and especially the dreams she described in her writings — some achieved and others never fulfilled. She always said her roles in the courtroom were similar to performing onstage, which was something she loved in her youth and, I believe, wished she could have pursued. She also died before publishing the novels and memoirs she’d been quietly drafting.

In some ways I feel like I now have the chance to help her realize the latter. If only I can believe in myself, perhaps more than she believed in me … or, rather, in herself.

Because I can see things in her that she may not have — the adoration alongside the abrasiveness, the brilliance beyond the blind spots, the beauty beneath the blemishes — and I can hold all of it, without the fog of being the person living it (or at least not exactly?).

As the husband often reminds me when I focus too much on the negatives: We’re not our parents, because we’re aware enough to disrupt certain cycles. We know what not to do, based on the things that were so damaging and traumatic for us. And from my POV, we also know what to carry forward, based on the things they did right — including the moments they made us feel seen, heard, loved, complete … however rare.

So, maybe the question isn’t: Am I turning into my mother?

Maybe the question is: What parts of her do I want to keep?

And maybe, any time I cringe at becoming her, I need only remind myself that there’s as much to rescue as bury, so long as I keep digging for the good stuff.

It’s probably lurking just beneath the surface, after all.

I revealed that Shaun was, in fact, my first celebrity crush. My childhood best friend (who was also with me at my first concert) and I would blast his debut album in the downstairs rec room, way more enthusiastic than the people who got to see him on American Bandstand. (Seriously, check out that link. Can you say sleepy?)

Do You Believe in Magic

As I thought about Shaun, my mind flashed back to my first real-life crush. Le sigh.

It was the beginning of 5th grade — so, very likely a Monday — when my heart stood still. There he was, on the opposite side of the classroom, like a brown corduroy-clad demigod sent to Castle View Elementary specifically for me. The arrangement of desks in a semi-circle may have separated us in that moment, but I knew that soon enough, nothing would keep us apart.

We were MFEO, and would absolutely be together forever.

His eyes were like giant pools of Hershey’s syrup, surrounded by thick lashes, a creamy-tan complexion, and glossy dark hair undeniably shaped by the most regal of bowls. But that was just the surface-level stuff.

What really made me swoon was how he laughed at my jokes, as if I was the most entertaining enchantress on earth. Sure, other kids had been appreciating my sense of humor since I’d sort of come into my own the previous year. Not to brag or anything — I had actually been pretty shy when 4th grade started, especially as one of the younger kids in a combined 4-5-6 class. I wasn’t the prettiest nor most athletic (I dreaded the Presidential Physical Fitness Test), and marveled at how some girls knew what going out with a boy meant.

But by the middle of 4th, my emerging book smarts secured me a spot in the 5th grade reading group, which slightly inflated my fragile ego. Soon, I began raising my hand and even cracking jokes. Making people laugh — though it rarely happened at home — felt like my own personal superpower.

Admittedly, I didn’t always wield my gift as responsibly as I could have, and some of my sarcasm was at the expense of others. (Insecurities, am I right?) But I mostly tried to use it for entertainment purposes, and by 5th grade, even the boys seemed to be paying closer attention.

Including my crush.

Whenever I said something especially hilarious, I would glance over to see his eyes sparkling beneath the fluorescent overhead lights, crinkling at the edges as he laughed and laughed. We even spoke once or twice — clear evidence we would soon be betrothed.

Hey There Lonely Girl

Maybe six months into the school year, he approached me on the playground, and I braced myself for a declaration of love. Instead, he told me one of his friends had a crush on me. Like, what was I supposed to do with that? Not only was he not interested, but he also wanted to set me up with someone else?

In a heartbroken panic, I agreed to go out with the other boy, still not totally sure what that would entail. By the end of the day, a few notes had been passed, and we were officially an item, even though we’d barely exchanged more than a few anxious glances.

He was kind of cute with his red hair and freckles (I’m trying to be kind; he resembled Alfred E. Neuman), but didn’t seem to get my sense of humor — and he was definitely not as advanced a reader as I was. I wondered what he even saw in me but tried to roll with it. I let him put his sweaty hand in mine a few times but refused to join him in “the tube” — a big, silver slab of concrete on the playground, where I knew other kids went to make out.

Against my better judgment, I did agree to go to his house after school. When I got there, he opened the garage door and went straight in for a kiss. Horrified, I bolted as fast as my legs could carry me. The next day, he acted like we were still together until I dumped him, probably with an especially scathing sarcastic barb.

After that, things with my crush cooled off. Maybe he didn’t like the way I’d treated his friend, or maybe he never liked me in the first place. But something told me it might not be true love after all, and given the weirdness of my first serious relationship, perhaps it was for the best.

Still, over summer break, with extra time to daydream, I kept picturing us as the it couple of the 6th grade. For that to happen, I figured I would have to tell him how I felt. Perhaps if I presented it the right way, everything would fall into place. He’d be my prince and I’d be his princess.

On the first day back, I showed up in my sweetest Chemin De Fer pedal pusher overalls and pink button-down oxford shirt, side ponytail curled to perfection.

I raced into the classroom before anyone else and headed straight for the seating chart to see if our desks were near each other. But his name was nowhere to be found. I was aghast. Surely he wasn’t assigned to the class with the slower readers?

I casually asked around, wondering if anybody knew where my crush was. That’s when I learned the ugly truth, and it was so much worse than I’d imagined: His family had moved to another state. He was a million miles away!

My heart sank. I was certain I would never see him again, and I’m pretty sure I spent way too much of 6th grade making fun of other kids to mask my misery. It was ugly.

Reunited

In 8th grade, a friend mentioned that my long lost crush had moved back to California. I was stoked…for all of five minutes. Before we even encountered each other, I discovered he was dating one of the nicest and prettiest girls on campus, who was also known for having the best butt. I didn’t stand a chance.

On the few occasions we crossed paths, I wasn’t even sure he remembered me, and by high school, our imaginary, ill-fated affair was ancient history.

Fast-forward to 2008, when Facebook made the world small enough for all of Gen-X to reconnect. I hadn’t thought about him in decades but then there he was in my DMs, calling me his Alexa (?!) and confirming at least part of my 5th grade fantasy: You always made me crack up with your intelligent sense of humor.

It took less than an hour for me to confess my elementary school secret: Do you realize you were my first crush ever, back at Castle View? We exchanged a few more messages, laughing about times gone by and how much life had changed. How much we had changed — both of us now happily married with kids, and me completely opposed to ever attending a high school reunion.

Love Story (Alexa’s Version)

At that point, the husband and I had just celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary, our son was nearly three, and I was in the midst of writing a YA series (which drew heavily from my own childhood experiences like, say, first crushes). I was no longer daydreaming about a together forever future. I was living it.

Not that it’s all been the stuff of fairy tales.

In keeping with the expectations for all good Gen-X girls, I definitely wanted to be a wife and mother. But those roles have occasionally felt as constricting as a pair of ankle-zip jeans, and way more complicated than a 5th grade crush. Partly because I like my alone time. A lot. The husband and kid are probably the only two people on the planet I can stand for more than a few hours at a stretch. Too much togetherness makes me want to crawl out of my skin.

So, yeah, I’m confessing to my current crush, first name Solitude. It’s quite possibly the only thing I love almost as much as my family. Just call me Virginia Woolf.

There have even been times when my desire for Solitude has become so intense that I’ve literally bolted. Kind of like I did when my 24-hour boyfriend tried to kiss me. Or like I did after my first few dates with the husband, unsure I wanted to give up my single life. And also like my mother who, whenever she got into a particularly nasty argument with my dad, would pack me and my brother up in the station wagon and declare, “We’re getting a divorce!” (They never did.)

It’s only happened a few times, and I’ve always come back — and, after nearly 25 years since our first date, I think I always will.

But I do need my space. To decompress. To create. To dream…perchance to sleep. It’s something the husband and I discuss openly and fairly often. Especially because I also have misophonia, and at certain times of the year, he has very audible allergies — not exactly a winning combo. His snoring sometimes keeps me up to the point that I’ve taken refuge in the guest room.

I’m happy with this occasional arrangement, and I know plenty of other couples who sleep in separate rooms for the sake of their slumber and sanity. (It’s called a sleep divorce, and it’s totally trending. Seriously. Click the link. Click it…!) The husband, however, isn’t sold — especially since our dogs follow wherever I go, leaving him all alone.

As recently as the night of our Shaun Cassidy vineyard visit, I half-joked that I was sad we didn’t book a room with two beds, which didn’t land well. He told me it felt like I didn’t want him around. I told him he was being ridiculous. We bickered until I eventually climbed into bed next to him, neither of us able to sleep. (Isn’t it ironic?)

After tossing and turning for the rest of the night, we woke up to confess we’d had nightmares about the other one leaving. Because clearly if you don’t sleep in the same bed every night, the marriage is over, I joked, and this time he laughed.

Yet the question lingered: Are we really in this together…forever?

The honest answer: Probably.

For us, I’m not sure that concern will ever disappear completely. But it does force us to think about all the reasons to stay. And for now, those infinitely outnumber any case I could make for bolting.

I mean, I could write an entire book about how lucky we are to have each other (and one day perhaps I will). That’s not just me trying to talk myself into it or sugarcoat the tough stuff. Seriously…he finds me hilarious, and we can talk for days about the fuckery of humanity. He makes me coffee every morning, and says “I love you” every night (okay, almost every night). He puts up with my kind of crazy, and I put up with his. He’ll go toe-to-toe with me on any argument until we come out the other side, all the stronger for it.

And yes, as you can probably guess (no Hardy Boys mystery here): He is so much more than just a crush. You might even say he’s dynamite.

It’s a problem I’m still working on, even at this supposedly enlightened stage of life. Especially as time marches on and I feel the exhaustion of the roles I’ve played sucking the energy right out of me, way more than old age ever could.

As a Gen-Xer in particular, I feel like I’ve had a false concept of success shoved down my throat for decades, measured by job title, income level, social status, clothing size…productivity, productivity, productivity. AND THEN? I get the wellness industry (of which I have tragically been a part), swooping in to sell me an overpriced antidote.

Of course, the first step in recovery is admitting I have a problem, so: Hi, my name is Alexa, and I’m full of shit. This Substack, among other things, is my rehab. My attempt to detox from outside expectations, real or imagined. Even if it also qualifies as a wellness expense, I suppose...?

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Back to those diaries…

In leafing through them, I cringe at the posturing, and how I seemed to polish every word. It’s like I was writing for an audience seated in the VIP section of my mind, ready to pounce if things weren’t presented just-so. Almost as if I was terrified somebody would read every line (you know, before I posted it online all these years later) and then punish me for being bad or weird or whatever.

Born of Frustration

I guess some of that fear makes sense in the context of my childhood. I was the emotional one, frequently criticized for crying without cause and failing to be happy enough, grateful enough, ambitious enough. I was almost always doing something wrong, intentional or not, and then paying the price. (Who remembers getting smacked with belts or hairbrushes, or getting their mouth washed out with soap? Mine was clean as a fucking whistle, thanks be to Irish Spring.)

It probably didn’t help that my family often told me I was adopted. Of course they were only kidding, but I half expected some dark secret to be revealed when I took a DNA test not long ago. (Truth Hurts? I was 100 percent that bitch.)

Bottom line: I struggled to fit in.

I have such clear memories of sitting around the white tulip table at dinnertime, practicing clever quips in my head. If I appeared smart or elicited a laugh, maybe I’d feel like a true member of the tribe (so to speak). While the news played on our tiny TV, I would furrow my brow and nod in agreement as my parents discussed war in the middle east and how the president was fucking everything up (amazing how times have changed).

When Wheel of Fortune came on, we competed to solve the puzzles, and I occasionally got one right. But, my stress levels skyrocketed during Jeopardy! I was desperate to get the answer in the form of a question, and don’t think I ever did. My brother, on the other hand, was like Alex Trebek with a bowl-cut, and Mom would cheer when he proved his intellectual prowess, praising him for being “the first-born of a first-born and a first-born.”

I was the surly little sister with “second sibling syndrome” (my mother diagnosed me with it at least once a week) — especially when I was being too sensitive or jealous. On one particularly dejected occasion, I went so far as to carve my brother’s name into our piano to get him in trouble. And it worked! Decades later, when I mentioned the incident in a birthday card, he said “I knew that was you!” I think he was legit mad I hadn’t copped to it earlier (though we do laugh about it, and so many other things, now).

Since I’d already been branded a little shit, I fully embodied my black sheep identity, stealing money from my mom’s (and the cleaning lady’s) purse, shoplifting, and doing my best impression of a juvenile delinquent. I also careened from one social identity to another: Cheerleader, honors student, theater geek, and everything in between. Most groups accepted me into the fold, but that sense of belonging still proved elusive. (I was crowned Class Clown and Biggest Chauvinist in the senior yearbook, which I guess sort of sums it up?)

No wonder I was plagued with insecurities and identity crises. How could I possibly know who I was when everything I did was a performance for somebody else’s gaze?

True Colors

Moving into adulthood, I made some progress. After graduating from college with honors, I headed to Hollywood and scored my dream job working for Capitol Records as a temp. Within a few months, my boss was so impressed with my dedication to even the tiniest of tasks that he replaced his two assistants with only me.

My self-confidence soared.

On top of getting paid to see bands like Radiohead and attend parties with The Beastie Boys, I discovered a kinship with my coworkers, bonding over the thrills and spills of early adulthood and independence. Around the same time, I did a somewhat controversial self-help seminar (another story for another time), where I connected with even more likeminded friends.

It all helped me find my voice. Or at least something that sounded like it.

Even my historically rocky relationship with my mom improved. At one Thanksgiving celebration, a few glasses of wine in, I bummed a cigarette from her and we stood out on the balcony, chatting about my childhood insecurities — inhaling my newfound awesomeness, exhaling my former awfulness.

She seemed proud. Or relieved. Or both. I know I was.

From there, I did my damndest to continue meeting or exceeding the expectations on some arbitrary report card of life, pretty sure I was putting my own unique stamp on it. Eventually, I checked off all the boxes, from career to marriage to motherhood. Along the way, I discovered hints of who I was and who I wanted to be, and cobbled them into a person I almost loved.

1 step forward, 3 steps back

Of course, there were plenty of ups and downs because life. Then, last fall, I hit an immobilizing wall of self-doubt, reducing me to the little black sheep at the early-80s dinner table.

Perhaps it was inevitable. In the midst of post-pandemic perimenopause, my son graduated high school, got his private pilot’s license (totally normal for a kid to go from driver’s license to pilot’s license, right?), and moved out of state with his fiancee. Now full-blown empty-nesters, the husband and I began looking for areas to retire, or at least begin our next chapter. From Oregon to England, we came close to putting offers on houses, but ultimately opted to stay in our home of 20-plus years, at least for now.

These were mostly good things, sure, but also a bit of a midlife mindfuck. Especially when death factored into the equation. Along with my dad, several friends had recently passed away. Then, I began updating the will and trust documents, which still had my dead parents named as co-guardians of our son. As I sat there thinking through all my end-of-life wishes, the past 56 years came into focus. And it wasn’t flattering.

The scenes played out like a high-def horror movie: The crap I’d pulled as a kid, professional shortcomings, marital strife, parenting missteps, family rifts, lost friendships, roads not taken…

The list was endless, and I was convinced I was a failure in every sense of the word. I’d always been my own worst enemy, but this was some next-level self-loathing.

Come On Get Happy

At some point during this freakout, I asked my doctor to double my Prozac dose and searched for a therapist, ultimately booking a session with a millennial gay guy. Truth told, I chose him because he was the opposite of the old suburban women I’d met with before, who all seemed like mirror-images of … me.

Talking things through helped a bit. In addition to hilariously comparing my origin story to that of Wicked’s Elphaba, among other musings about musicals, my therapist offered the kind of compassion and validation I needed to stop spiraling.

Around the same time, I read a self-help book addressing “fawning” as an additional threat response alongside those other f-words (fight, flight, freeze…). I saw so much of myself in the chapters about people-pleasing, over-functioning, and playing different roles in order to feel accepted or keep the peace. Pop psychology FTW?

That’s when I began to feel like I might need a break from talk therapy. For me at least, it had started to feel like its own type of fawning. Maybe that was the reason it hadn’t helped much before? I was playing yet another role: The responsible adult who asked for help, showing up like a good student and bullshitting my way through it, just so I could get a pat on the head and return to the same old patterns.

About eight sessions in, I told my therapist all of this and tried to break up with him. After a few gentle nudges to stick with it (and the big question: “Are you sure you’re not just afraid to go deeper?”), he honored my request.

This felt like a victory. I said no to something that didn’t feel true to who I was or what I needed, and the world didn’t end!

High on my own boundaried supply, I proceeded to set more limits: I opted out of social plans if they didn’t sound appealing. I proposed smaller get-togethers, even in place of huge holiday gatherings. I wanted to actually talk with people instead of white-knuckling it through seating charts and side dishes.

Asking others to accommodate me was rough at first. I didn’t want anyone to feel like I was abandoning them or disregarding their own wants and needs. But there was very little pushback, and it continued to feel better and better. My nervous system was settling, and so was I.

Hungry for more, I asked a childhood friend about something I knew had helped her several years ago, especially with boundaries, and she referred me to an art journaling program. From the first workshop, I was hooked.

During one class, I had a major lightbulb moment. It focused on the work of Dr. Gabor Maté, who argues that when authenticity threatens attachment, attachment wins. Every time. I didn't need him to explain that to me — I'd been living it since family TV time. But something about hearing it spelled out hit me hard.

It was just one more piece of the existential puzzle I’ve been attempting to assemble, and one I probably won’t ever finish. (Does anybody?) At least, for now, I feel like I’m finally creating someone who looks a lot more like me — messy but still worthy of belonging — instead of performing a polished version of her.

On the page and off.

Of course I was into previous eras, too, thanks in large part to my parents. They had an incredible vinyl collection, and I can still remember dancing around the living room with my friends to ABBA’s Take A Chance On Me, The Carpenters’ Top of The World, and Fleetwood Mac’s Second Hand News. We would twirl until we became so dizzy we collapsed onto the green shag carpet in puddles of sweat and laughter, then retire with our TV dinners to watch The Brady Bunch or Donny & Marie.

During 4^th grade, all the kids at school were raving about the Saturday Night Fever soundtrack. I bragged to them that I totally had the album, even though I didn’t. I thought it would impress — and once I’d committed to the bit, I realized I might have to prove it. So, I convinced my parents to take me to the movie (my first R-rated one; my mom covered my eyes during the nude scenes). I felt certain this would lead to a trip to Licorice Pizza. And so it did.

I took my double-album full of street cred to school the next day and hoped the older boys with their Dorothy Hamill-meets-Hobbit haircuts would notice. Nobody seemed to care, let alone remember my brag from before. But it still felt significant to me. Like I was the disco queen of the elementary school playground, if only in my mind.

In subsequent years, I would curl up on the gold-and-orange cushions of our Danish mid-century sofa and read all the lyrics on the inner album sleeves while listening to The Beatles, Jim Croce, Neil Diamond, Billy Joel, Don McLean, James Taylor…and the list goes on.

Moving into middle school, I was all about new wave. In club meetings after school, during slumber parties, and especially at dances, my classmates and I would showcase our most tubular moves while blasting The Go Go’s, Culture Club, Spandau Ballet, and WHAM! (Unless it was a slow song, which would find me hiding in the bathroom or crying in my bedroom…longing for time to mend the careless whispers of my more experienced friends.)

Just Can’t Get Enough

The summer after my sophomore year of high school, I finally got tickets to my first concert: Depeche Mode’s Black Celebration.

I had successfully secured my driver’s license six months prior, and my parents agreed to let me be the one Behind the Wheel when my friend’s dad, who worked for the venue’s insurance company, got tickets for four of us. The car stereo didn’t work, so we put my boom-box in the backseat and played all our Depeche cassettes, singing at the top of our lungs the whole way.

When we got to Irvine Meadows, we could not have been more stoked. Preferred parking AND front row seats?! It was only slightly (okay, majorly) embarrassing when I pulled into the VIP lot in my mom’s Oldsmobile Custom Cruiser, complete with fake wood paneling. If that wasn’t bad enough, my friends and I had somehow decided to wear our preppiest attire — me, in a red- and navy-striped Ralph Lauren rugby shirt with a white collar, and my pleated-front Guess jeans. I looked like such a goody-two-shoes. Like, how did I not get the memo? This was a Black Celebration, dork!

Still, once we got to our seats and the sun finally set, we were bathed in the darkness, and the music was all that mattered. Well, that plus the dreamy sight of Andy Fletcher on keyboards. Most girls (and guys) were losing their minds over Dave Gahan or Martin Gore, but I was all about Fletch. I seriously couldn’t take my eyes off him, and was certain he was staring right back.

By the end of the show, I had all but convinced myself that Fletch loved me, and one day we would marry. I was honestly rather stunned when nobody from the band’s team came out to find and transport me backstage after the show.

Fun fact, though: My husband was there that night. I just wouldn’t realize it until almost exactly 15 years later, when we met on match.com (yes, the online dating site existed in 2001, but just barely).

Share

Blasphemous Rumours

Fast forward an additional 22 years, and the husband and I were once again at a Depeche Mode show, this time together, at Kia Forum (which, I’ll admit, my foggy brain just registered as IKEA Forum). Spoiler alert: It wasn’t the same. I mean, obviously it had been nearly 40 years, and I had the presence of mind to wear black.

But also, Fletch wasn’t there (le sigh, RIP). Beyond that, as much as the show itself was wonderful — truly, no complaints on the performance itself — the magic I remembered from an arena full of fans didn’t quite materialize. For me, at least, it all felt kind of deflating. Even depressing.

It wasn’t the first time over the past few years that seeing live music fell flat, though. And that’s been tough for me to reconcile as I get older. The thing is, going to shows has been a massive part of my life. But lately? Not so much.

Like, a lot of people I know go to multiple concerts every month. I used to get so caught up in the excitement on social media and in group chats that I’d join them in getting tickets and even initiating plans, only to wind up canceling and feeling like an unreliable asshole. When I did go out, I rarely had as much fun as I expected to (though there were several exceptions like, say, Oasis last year).

So, I began opting out altogether. It had all simply become too overwhelming, and more exhausting than exhilarating.

Get The Balance Right

It may not be the hippest thing to admit, but it’s the honest one: I can’t handle the concert circuit like I used to. Which also kinda brings to mind the DM song Sometimes, which I recently sang quite flawlessly to the husband — kitchen concert, party of two — sending us both into fits of laughter.

I do have occasional FOMO and the vague sense that I should care more than I do. But it’s all part of figuring out what works for me and what doesn’t as I move into the next phase of life. Which for now means saying no to the shows and then scrolling through stories on IG, living vicariously and mostly without regret.

It also means I have more time for other stuff I love, like growing shit in my garden, making art and jewelry, writing, and hanging out in quieter spaces doing quieter things with the people I adore, including the multi-dimensional man I married.

What a trip it is, realizing the girl who once drove a group of friends to a concert in the 80s, blasting the band’s songs on a boom box in the backseat of a station wagon, is now in her fifties and forgoing similar experiences. But also, what a trip to finally accept that it’s perfectly okay to Enjoy the Silence.

Share

I’m hoping to make Ticket Tuesday a semi-regular section in The Gen-X Journals. LMK if you’d be interested in hearing about more of my all-time favorite shows (U2, REM, Jellyfish, Radiohead...) — or, tell me a bit about your best concert memory.

I was born in 1970, and for the first half of the subsequent decade I was certain I had a giant red “A” emblazoned on my chest. Not because I’d done anything Hester Prynne-like. As if.

No, the imaginary accessory on my adolescent attire stood for ABNORMAL.

Why did I feel like such a pariah, beyond the usual adolescent insecurities? Because most of my female peers started their periods by the time they were 13, at the absolute latest. I, on the other hand, was halfway through high school before the bleeding began.

It didn’t help that my mother was deeply concerned about this developmental delay, amongst others, even as she expressed horror at the increasing size of my ass.

“Oh no,” she winced, scrutinizing my curves while sitting in the dressing room where I was trying on 8th grade back-to-school outfits. “You’ve got Granny Turner’s bottom!”

The details of that moment were instantly seared in my memory, right down to the black Calvin Klein corduroy miniskirt and top we decided would be most flattering (translation: I wouldn’t look like such a cow). Thus began a lifelong battle with my body, and an appreciation for all-black attire that persists to this day.

But the absence of a period fed my inferiority complex most of all, and I’ve self-identified as a late-bloomer ever since. I even documented it in a teen magazine article 25-plus years ago, hoping my experiences might help girls going through the same sort of thing.

Share

Bad Blood

When Aunt Flow finally showed up in 1986, I could barely contain my excitement. At last, I was a woman! (Because as we all know, nothing defines us more than the ability to conceive.) When I raced upstairs to tell my mom the good news, she was ecstatic, and went to grab some pads.

“No need!” I smiled with a toss of my bilevel bob. I was already a pro at using tampons, having practiced my insertion techniques for the previous several years.

As you can probably guess, the thrill that came with this particular rite of passage was brief as a Mormon wife’s season of The Bachelorette.

Those in the know had obviously warned me that being on the rag would be rough, but this? This was hell in a Benetton bag. The cramps. The clots. The bloating. The breakouts.

Worst of all were the mood swings, and it wasn’t long before hormonal rage became a primary part of my personality. Every four weeks, like clockwork, I transformed into the moodiest little monster known to this mortal coil.

Maybe I’m being melodramatic (of course I am…we’re talking sophomore year here), but riding the crimson wave became the absolute bane of my existence.

Lies Lies Lies

I’d love to say things settled down after high school. But when I got to college, I’m convinced most campus coeds quickly learned when to avoid me each month.

It didn’t help that I suffered from hormonal acne, made infinitely worse thanks to dermatillomania (skin-picking). One time it got so bad that I pretended to have chickenpox, just so I could isolate until my face calmed down.

Pretty sure my suite mates from back then still don’t know I was faking it. But if you’re reading this, Wendy, Stacy, Jen, et al, please know I was only trying to protect you (along with my public image).

Under Pressure

There was the odd occasion when I turned my menstrual lemons into lemonade (maybe not the best idiom but let’s just go with it?). On one especially sunny day in San Diego, I was at the mall (probably shopping for black clothes) when I felt that familiar little river starting to flow down below.

Searching for a bathroom, I couldn’t seem to escape an unrelenting parade of the perkiest people I’d ever encountered. (Today we call this toxic positivity, and it’s always been punishingly prevalent in SoCal.) I was irritated beyond belief until it hit me: This could be perfect material for an assignment I’d been struggling with in my “Writing for Performance” class.

When I got back to my apartment, I wrote down all the thoughts that had been racing through my mind, complete with a rudimentary chord structure. Later that week, I wailed those words into the darkened auditorium from a dimly-lit stage, beat-up acoustic guitar in hand. And the crowd went wild.

Smells Like Teen Spirit

Here’s the real kicker: It’s now 2026. I am 56 years old. And I’m still bleeding. It has been 40 years, people! Even my doctors gasp when I tell them the date of my last period. (It was January 28, if you’re interested, and I’m hoping against hope I’m finally done.)

Crunching the numbers further, I’ve been perimenopausal for at least 10 years. We’re talking hot flashes, night sweats, some of the heaviest and most painful periods of my life, vertigo, insomnia, and crippling brain-fog that ultimately made it tough to keep up the pace in my publishing career.

Talk Talk

In 2017, when my symptoms began escalating, I launched a Facebook support group called ALL THE RAGE: Midlife, Menopause, and More. Connecting with other women in this way offered an incredible amount of comfort, courage, and serious comic relief.

In fact, during the near-decade that has followed (with a few detours into complicated grief and depression, thanks in large part to the pandemic and my father’s death), my hormones have seemed to be handing me a bottomless glass of lemonade. No, not in the form of performance art pieces (unless this Substack counts?!).

I’m talking about deep connections with fellow sufferers, including lifelong friends from my formative years. I may sound like a pollyanna, but perimenopause has provided a legit touchpoint for raw, unfiltered conversations and the kind of female bonding I’ve been sorely missing, especially while consumed with career, marriage, parenthood, and all the adulting things.

I guess it’s similar to finding community through any kind of trauma…and my cup (of lemonade, tea, coffee, tequila?) runneth over.

Also, thanks to all the resources exchanged, I took a closer look at HRT a few years ago. I know it’s not for everyone, but after doing the research and determining the benefits would outweigh the risks — even with my family history of breast cancer —I’ve found it to be an absolute lifesaver. Literally no more night sweats or hot flashes, a bit less brain fog, lighter periods, and even a slightly improved mood (I mean, it’s not that magical).

I’m not saying life is now perfect by any means (the world is a brutal place!), but I’m feeling better than I have in a long time, and I credit my Gen-X sisterhood in particular for keeping me sane.

You might even say they’re The Wind Beneath My Wings.

Share

It’s me, Alexa Joy Sherman Young (multiple names for multiple personalities), coming at you live from Encino.

Why Am I Here?

I mean, does anybody really know? And if so, can you please share it with the class?

Okay, for these Substackian purposes: Although I’ve spent most of my career in publishing as an author, editor, and journalist, it was while digging through old boxes after both parents were dead (can we talk about adult orphanhood?) that I unearthed some of the more compelling writing in my repertoire: Diaries, handcrafted comic strips (inspired by Betty and Veronica, of course), love letters, and endless school assignments.

A lot of the material didn’t make for easy reading at first. So much angst over boys I didn’t even know, and OMG the agony of being a virgin well into my twenties! Truth told, I burned some of it in my thirties after becoming a wife and mom (go figure): Whole chapters of my life, fed to the flames in some frantic attempt to erase the shame of who I perceived myself to have been. Like, if the pages didn’t exist then neither did my most embarrassing moments, right?

I now regret cremating that shit and wish I’d saved every word. But at least some of the sex stuff was quasi-documented in my first published book (yay?):

The good news is I didn’t burn it all. And once I stopped cringing and started looking at things through more progressive lenses (don’t you love a double entendre?), something unexpected happened: I saw myself. Not the person I thought I’d become, as defined by the roles I’ve played for most of my adult life, but the person I’ve always been: Complicated and confused, sure, but also someone I could — and probably should — love.

Especially when I silenced my inner critic and stopped wearing the masks I thought were part of the upwardly mobile dress code.

And therein lies the midlife mindfuck. It’s a lot to unpack, especially as a perimenopausal empty-nester trying to figure out WTF comes next.

How About You?

Perhaps you’re grappling with similar existential conundrums (not to be confused with crises … we shall not call them crises!) — especially if you’re Gen-X. Maybe you, too, were raised to believe you could have it all, and you damn well better pursue it all, even if it meant losing yourself in the process.

I’m also guessing hoping you have a few bodies buried in your proverbial basement. Yes, I know it’s easy to be #grateful that social media and reality TV didn’t exist way back when to enable your mass public humiliation. But are you really that relieved?

Or are you maybe, just maybe, looking back and appreciating who you once were? Perhaps you’re even starting to realize that the more you’ve changed, the more you’ve stayed the same — and so long as you’ve evolved in the ways that matter, that’s not such a bad thing.

Could it be that you were always enough, and now it’s time to embrace that person, once and for all? To dismantle the bullshit you built around yourself in order to survive in a world that demands way too many of the wrong things?

What’s The Plan?

The Gen-X Journals is a space where we can take an unflinching look at who we used to be and who we’re becoming … or perhaps unbecoming. Expect personal essays, cultural reckoning, and the kind of honesty that comes from having nothing left to prove. No shame, tons of support for my fellow Midstackers in particular, and the occasional deep dive into a song you forgot you knew all the lyrics to. (I worked in the music business for the better part of the 90s, so there’ll be lots of fun stuff from that era.)

If you’re game, consider this an invitation to share some memories of your own. (Like, here’s one idea for future posts: What was your first concert? Have you seen them since? Compare/contrast!)

My inbox is always open and I read every message. So, please K.I.T. and let’s get this party started.