Meg’s Thoughts

Mar 2013

For me, one of the best parts about this week has been the way so much of our public conversation has turned around discussing the nature of marriage, thanks to the two marriage equality cases in front of the Supreme Court this week. Yes, sometimes I listened to the “debates” (I’m not even going to dignify them by not quoting that) about marriage on NPR made me feel like I’d fallen down a rabbit hole and landed in 1995, when one of my debate topics was marriage equality (really? We’re still talking about this shit?) But the fact that we were talking about what marriage means, and how it’s changing, was so encouraging. And now, on to the links.

Wedding-y

In light of Liz shaving her head for children’s cancer and hair donation, a kick-ass bald bride with alopecia areata.

Disposable AND compostable plates and things… in colors? Yeah, you’re welcome.

Our own Emily (also of Emily Takes Photos) explains Raw photos vs. Jpegs. This was a big controversy when I got hitched, and it turns out photographers not wanting to give you raw files is not some big scam. It’s because they’re not that pretty, and they’re pretty much worthless to the laywoman (hey large chunks of data). This is why I shoot on my fancy camera in Jpeg, even though Maddie scolds me when she has to edit those photos.

Buying a cancelled wedding. I can’t decide if this is brilliant, or logistically almost impossible. But hey, go shopping.

This article on this history of queer African American women and marriage is fascinating.

Reclaiming Wife

The Atlantic, with a not terrible case for young marriage. Obviously not for everyone, but for those looking to justify a decision already made (thats from the married at 21 Maddie, who submitted this link), this one isn’t terrible. And this line: “Marriage actually works best as a formative institution, not an institution you enter once you think you’re fully formed. We learn marriage, just as we learn language.”

My friend Jordan of Oh Happy Day lives in a 500 square foot apartment with her husband and two kids (Seriously, it’s really small in real life. Way smaller than it looks in these pictures.) She’s one of the worlds most visually talented ladies, and she makes to WORRRKKKK, which I find so empowering. No, you don’t need to have it all to have kids. (Her kids used to sleep in a closet, and not like Harry Potter).

A writer with a baby. Or pregnant, and not ready to join the cult of motherhood. I could have written this when I was pregnant. Thank god, being a mother IS just being a writer with a baby.

General Interest

We’ve been getting emails lately asking if APW can delve into the structural underpinnings of feminism, ie, what feminism is to the APW staff, and how it works on this site (because, really, we can’t tackle what feminism is for every feminist everywhere, so we’re gonna limit this). It’s such a good request (What? They’re not teaching feminism in school these days?) and we’ll get on it. In the meantime however, reading If I Admit That ‘Hating Men’ Is a Thing, Will You Stop Turning It Into a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy? is a damn good place to start. Seriously. Read it. All of it. And then send it to some men in your life.

There’s no such thing as a “perfect” feminist. One brillant bit is here, “I blame this Capital F Feminism concept that there is a code a “public feminist” is supposed to follow that doesn’t allow us to be fucking people with insecurities and desires and mental illnesses and a list of mistakes like any other human.” (Said as a public feminist). Because divided we fall, indeed.

This story about woman owned indie retailer Nasty Gal in the New York Times pretty much made my day. It explores the difference between bootstrapping and Venture Capital (and why VC doesn’t always get us), and reminded me of my abiding love for women small business owners (and how tough as nails they always are). Continue reading Saturday Link Roundup

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 21 Comments »

Mar 2013

Saturday Link Roundup

I’m sorry Saturday Link roundups are late, but since I often wait to read things I subscribe to on paper (I’m old school like that), I had to do an angry reading of most of New York Magazine’s The Feminist Housewife out loud to David over the breakfast table. Sadly, I can’t just provide you with a video of the reading, with David’s commentary included, so I’ll just have to sum it up below. Let’s do this thing!

Wedding-y

A United Methodist church in North Carolina has stopped performing marriages of all kinds in part to protest the passing of Amendment 1, which outlaws same sex marriage. In a statement, the church said, “This is being adopted as a sign of our commitment to love and justice for all people.”

If you live in the East Bay and are planning a wedding, stop by and say hello to some of the staff at Mad For Love tomorrow! There is free cake! Champagne! I’ve been told a Photo Booth! And I’ll be there signing books from 12-2 (though the party gets going at 11).

A fascinating read on the history of the diamond industry and how the illusion of scarcity was created. Thanks for sending us the link, Mira!

Reclaiming Wife

The buzz(not)worthy article of the week, The Feminist Housewife, has, on the plus side created some great conversations about feminism. While I’m in favor of both big-tent feminism, and feminist (women and men) choosing to stay home with their kids, you can’t just slap a feminist label on anything and call it good. This article is equal opportunity offensive, including such gems as, “Why can’t we just be girls? Why do we have to be boys and girls at the same time?” and “All [men] agree that no matter what the gender revolution prescribes, it is still paramount for men to earn a living and support their families, which also implies taking a backseat as caregiver.” Plus! Quotes from ‘researchers’ that lead off with, “My sense, is that younger women are more open to the idea that…” Awesome.

But wait! The article, is no surprise, mostly misrepresentations. I almost punched a hole in the wall when I got to the bit where she tried to call the amazing Rebecca Woolf unemployed, and then anti-feminist. I might or might not have YELLED the whole paragraph about Rebecca to David, followed by, “WHAT TOTAL BULLSHIT.” Turns out Rebecca, and most of the women quoted in the article, were pretty livid too.

But the commentary on the article is great. I don’t tend to link to Jezebel, but nailed it. The Forbes article on why women are vital to the American economy is an important conversation I’m glad we’re having. And Christina M. Kelly’s (Sassy Hat tip) article on ACTUALLY being a feminist housewife is phenomenal.

Now! On to other things! NPR’s Linda Holmes weighs in with her take on Amazon Mom, the new program geared to parents with young children. Her argument against gendered marketing is pretty spot-on, but this remains my favorite part: “Moms are dads! Dads are moms! Cats are dogs! Chairs are tables! Words have meanings, you see.” You also should have seen my face when David told me he signed up for Amazon Mom. Hint: it went from confused to rageful right quick. Continue reading Saturday Link Roundup

Posted in: Life, Marriage, Meg's Thoughts | 58 Comments »

Mar 2013

Open Thread: What You Want From How We Did It

Since my early days of reading wedding blogs (which were, in fact, the very early days of wedding blogs), I’ve spent a lot of time wondering: but… how did you do it? And I don’t mean this in an, “Oh, I see that you have listed links to your vendors, which totally does not help me since none of those vendors list prices and/or explanations of services on their websites,” but in a nitty-gritty, logistical, “How did you really put it all together?” kind of way. This question hits me the hardest when I’m looking at non-traditional weddings. Like, okay. The amazing wedding from which the photo above comes. I know they: rented SF city hall on the weekend, had a food truck reception at an art gallery, had a custom wedding dress made. But… how? How did they go about finding the art gallery? How did they go about find the person who made the dress? What did it cost, and were there other major trade offs or decisions they could have made to make it a significantly different cost? What was worth it? What really wasn’t?

I know I’m not the only person with these questions, because every time one of my friends gets engaged, they end up asking me questions like, “But. How do you even go about throwing a beach wedding?” or “What steps do you have to go through to make a city hall wedding happen?” And the problem is I don’t even have a place I can point them for resources. Ninety-nine percent of blogs out there are focused on giving you a glut of pretty pictures, with no real way to replicate them except hire the (expensive?) staff that worked on said weddings. And ninety-nine percent of wedding websites just want to sell you crap/make you crazy (hey The Kn*t’s to-do lists). Since APW has historically been focused on the emotions of the thing, aka getting you through wedding planning in one sane piece… I don’t have anywhere to point people. I mean, the book. You should really read the book. But that’s still not going to tell you how to find an art gallery in your city that you can afford to rent.

So, last week we introduced a new series: How We Did It. The idea is that, like Wedding Graduates and Wordless Weddings, it’s a way of sharing your wedding with APWers. Maybe you don’t want to talk about what you learned emotionally (Wedding Graduates), or show us lots of pretty pictures (Wordless Weddings), but instead you just want to tell us how you put it all together. Well guess what? You’re in luck, because we totally want to hear about that.

As we develop this series, we want to know what questions you want us to ask. This is our starting list, but let’s break it down. When you look at a wedding, what do you want to know? Continue reading Open Thread: What You Want From How We Did It

Posted in: Meg's Thoughts, Weddings | 203 Comments »

Mar 2013

Introducing APW’s Business Interns

Two weeks ago, Maddie got to introduce the APW writing interns for 2013. Today I’m super excited to get to introduce the 2013 business interns. Reading APW intern applications is both the best and the worst thing I do all year. It’s the worst thing, because I get overwhelmingly sad that APW isn’t some huge organization where we can hire all of you. And it’s the best thing, because it kind of restores my faith in humanity. You guys are the smartest, funniest, most driven group of women I’ve ever had the pleasure of hanging out with. And did I mention hilarious in a smart and political way? Reader who listed “Stay At Home Mother” on her resume, with a list of skills including “taught tiny human the English language,” I salute you. You are a bad ass.

But. Because life is not a bowl of cherries, I had to narrow it down to just two writing interns (whose awesomeness is beginning to show) and two business interns. Applying to the APW business internship program was a particularly difficult task, because the job description was so open ended. We didn’t have any specific needs, so we just asked you to tell us why you wanted to come be part of the team, and why we should bring you on. And boy, did you guys deliver. I guess in this case, life is actually a box of chocolates, because you never know what you’re going to get. But what we got was:

Lucy Bennett! Lucy’s application last year is what gave me the idea for the business internship program this year. (Surprise, Lucy! She doesn’t know that.) I kept looking at it thinking, “I want to hire her, but I don’t have a slot for her.” Turns out she applied again this year (phew) and her application was a standout. You know Lucy from all over the comment section (her web persona is You Love Lucy), and her recent wedding grad post. Lucy’s going to be bringing some serious graphic design skills to APW (you can see some of her killer portfolio here). Lucy’s resume says that she’s looking for “a work environment where I can make nice things for people, where I can wear as many (literal or metaphorical) hats as I like, and where work and silliness can coexist peacefully.” Lucy, we raise our top hats to you! Exactly.

Joanna Kirtley! Joanna studied Project Design at Stanford (which is basically ~~king~~ queen of strange and fascinating majors), which means she’s trained how to “understand people deeply and uncover their unmet needs,” and then meet them. So watch out for your secret APW yearnings to be met. She’s also a project manager and is going to be organizing us up. Oh, and also-also? She does graphic design, and has a penchant for infographics. I know, right? I know.

So without further ado, the ladies themselves. Please give them a big cheer, and feel free to throw out ideas about your unmet needs… if you know what they are. If not, watch for Joanna figuring them out…

—Meg

Continue reading Introducing APW’s Business Interns

Posted in: Entrepreneurship, Meg's Thoughts, Uncategorized | 17 Comments »

Mar 2013

Saturday Link Roundup

Wedding-y

East Side Bride has always has done Groom Style better than anyone else.

This video proves two things. One, that it’s generally dubious to wear a fancy suit near a body of water. And two, nature obviously thinks that your proposals should be even grander.

Because you guys are the coolest, APW-er Sasha put together a Spotify List of all of your first dance songs, compiled from this open thread. That’s dedication, y’all.

Let’s face it. The big news of the week (particularly if you’re religious, as I am, or Catholic, as other APW staffers are) is the new Pope. So on that note, did you know Catholics can get their weddings blessed by the Pope in a mass ceremony in St. Peters Square? And everyone wears their wedding attire. While I do have disagreements with the church on the definition of marriage, this is still awesome.

Also awesome? The story about the two guys whose Jet Blue flight attendant signed up to be their New York State witness will restore your faith in humanity. Plus, she brought cupcakes.

For those of you doing your own wedding flowers (respect!), long time APW sponsor Blooms By The Box just launched a DIY Flowers 101 project. Helpful.

Reclaiming Wife

Reader Jen sent us this link as a follow up to the kids/no kids conversation. NPR: Is having kids a rational decision?

Amy Christensen, from Thursday’s post on risk and learning to ride a motorcycle, has a great article on her blog in response to a video that went viral this week about a guy pushing his girlfriend off a cliff (literally) and about why taking risks needs to be a choice you make on your own terms.

This reader submitted link, Marriage Is For Losers is written by a therapist, and it’s as smart as it is emotional. He talks about letting our marriage be a radical rebellion to the way the world tells us to live. “Maybe we need to be formed in such a way that winning loses its glamour, that we can sacrifice the competition in favor of people.” Read it, then do some thinking (I’m going to be pondering it for awhile).

General Interest

This post, I‘m Tired Of Having To Be A Feminist, nails the way I’ve been feeling about the Marissa Mayer / Sheryl Sandberg news cycle. “Women are still being treated as a discrete group, a special interest lobby and an unpopular one at that.” I’d like to live in a world where we can agree or disagree with Marissa Mayer’s decisions as a CEO (or decide we don’t know near enough about the situation, and it actually might not be our business), not as a woman. The fact that we’re not there yet makes me tired.

A Jessica Valenti link a week seems to be the standard around here, eh? She Who Dies With The Most Likes Wins is a few months old (hey, I was having a baby), but it’s a must read. This bit is solid gold, “I had to choose between being likable or being successful, I’d choose the latter every time. Yes, the more successful you are—or the stronger, the more opinionated—the less you will be generally liked. All of a sudden people will think you’re too “braggy,” too loud, too something. But the trade off is undoubtedly worth it. Power and authenticity are worth it. And in a world where women are told to be anxious about everything—that we can’t “have it all” but will forever be searching for it—saying that ambition and success are actually pretty great can be a radical message.” For women, success is a life liability (particularly among other women, oddly). And we’ve got to stop this nonsense, for all our sakes.

A debate popped up a few weeks ago on APW about body image and dress forms, and for me, the real issue was much broader: we live in a culture where super small bodies are treated as the norm. The issue is so prevalent, that it can be hard for people with the best intentions to work around it. So this article on ‘realistic’ mannequins at an H&M in Sweden is awesome. Also, if you ask me, those mannequins look hotter than the normal terrifying variety.

This NPR story about a father who hacked Donkey Kong for his daughter so she could play Pauline and rescue Mario, made feminist Meg cheer. It also made parent Meg (it still sounds like a lie when I call myself a parent) cry. Listen to it in full, it’s a good one.

And speaking of NPR, I found this New York Times article about how NPR wants younger listeners, aka, “People that Tweet,” really interesting. I think every blogger I know is an NPR listener, as are most APW readers. So what gives? Are we not vocal enough about it? I’m not sure, but I’d like NPR to invite me to their next “Weekend in Washington” to blog about it. I mean, RIGHT?

And closing out the week with awesome, you guys helped Liz raise 211% of her goal of money for children’s cancer research. She’s also now bald! Updates on that to come…

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 40 Comments »

Mar 2013

Liz Shaves Her Head for Children’s Cancer

This is Liz. You know Liz. Liz that writes Ask Team Practical every Thursday. Liz who just gave you advice on engagement rings this morning. Liz who writes at Happy Sighs. Awesome APW staffer Liz. Amazing feminist Liz.

Looking at this picture of Liz, I bet you’re saying to yourself, “Hot damn, Liz is beautiful.” And she is. But how much of your reaction to Liz’s beauty has to do with the fact that her face is framed by super long and wavy hair? If I were to be honest, I’d tell you that Liz’s hair plays into the way I react when I see a picture of her. Why? Because I’ve been socialized to think of long hair as feminine and beautiful. Hell. Other than a few ill-advised bobs in the late 80s (I have thick wavy hair, why did anyone let me do that to myself?), I’ve always had long hair. I insisted on growing out my hair around the time I learned to talk, and that was that. It’s easy for us to associate hair with women’s beauty, because our whole culture does it.

Tomorrow, Liz is going to find out how much value the world gives to a woman’s hair. Tomorrow Liz shaves her head.

Liz is shaving her head to raise money for St. Baldrick’s, which funds childhood cancer research. Kids with cancer have forever altered the course of some APW staffers lives, and there is a huge funding gap when it comes to cancer research. As a new mother who’s had health scares, this St. Baldrick’s page made my breath catch and tears well up in my eyes. The average age of diagnosis for adult cancer: sixty-seven. The average age of diagnosis for children’s cancer: six. Children who die of cancer loose an average of seventy-one years of their lives. But all types of childhood cancer combined receive only four percent of federal funding for cancer research.

So tomorrow, Liz shaves her head in an effort to raise $2,000 for cancer research, and then she’s donating her hair to make wigs for women with cancer. She said in her original blog post about it, “Cancer is such a big word, I don’t know that I ever allow myself to fully think about the dark enormity of it. But, not having control over the way you look and feel about yourself is something I can grasp. These small ones who are undergoing treatments have a whole range of giant concerns that I can’t fathom, and having no control over the way they look and feel about themselves is just the smallest tip of the iceberg.”

When I heard that Liz was doing this, my first reaction was, “Liz is such a bad ass. I could never do something like that.” Which is such an easy way out, right? But it turns out, Liz is terrified. Well, she’s terrified but thought that sounded too negative, so suggested maybe she was “excitriffied” or “overwhelmed.” Liz isn’t doing this because she’s braver than the rest of us, Liz is doing this because she’s scared. She told me yesterday, “Two years ago, when I first went to support a friend at a St. Baldrick’s event, I noticed that while there were dozens of people going up, one after the other, to shave heads and beards and mustaches, there were hardly any women. And I grew indignant! And then, I realized that it made sense, because I completely would not be willing to shave my head, charity or no. That’s… well, no. Don’t they hold walks for that sort of thing? I’m terrified of shaving my head. I’m afraid of how I’ll feel about myself, how people will look at me and treat me, and yeah, it all makes me feel sort of shallow and self-interested to admit that. But, I guess that’s sort of the point of helping one another. If I only gave what didn’t hurt, it wouldn’t be very giving at all, would it? Facing this one small kind of fear helps children who are also facing it, but in addition to a whole ton of other scarier, darker fears. When I think of it that way, it’s not very hard, after all.”

Because Liz is doing something scary and brave, the APW staff and APW readers close to Liz have stepped up to try to support her as best as they can. Maddie pointed out that Liz’s donation page reads like a who’s who of the APW community. I can count about fifteen donors who have written wedding graduate posts, and that’s just people whose first and last names I know.

So this is where you come in. Liz hasn’t made her $2,000 goal yet, and we’d really like her to surpass it. If you have something you can donate (and yes, $1, or $5, or $10 totally counts), please consider giving it here. But regardless of if you can donate finanically or not, please consider supporting Liz with some words of encouragement in the comments. I’d love if she felt the support of this community as she does this scary thing tomorrow.

Here is to you Liz! You are continually an inspiration to all of us at APW (not to mention being one of the funniest, gustiest, and kindest people we know).

—Meg

Posted in: Life, Meg's Thoughts | 56 Comments »