with intense eagerness since 2012! a channel of the los angeles review of books

Array

Essays that we, as ladies of early middle age, would like to see written*

 

“Witty Meeting Comebacks that Indicate Your Displeasure While Concealing the (Professionally Discrediting) Whirling Dervish of Your Rage”

“Throwing Money at Problems: A Justification”

“Is This Sex Position Degrading or Just Uncomfortable?”

“Age-Concealing Procedures: Talking to Someone While Pretending They Haven’t Had One, or, Injectables: Agreeing to Disagree”

“Strangely Funny Moments in The House of Mirth

“Women Who Take Care of Too Many People and the People Who Take Care of Them, i.e. Other Women”

“How to Get your Eyebrows Done Without Feeling Weird About It”

laura petrie“Rules for Wearing ‘Challenging’ Clothing Items, Ankle Boots Specifically”

“I Don’t Know Why I Asked You if You were OK a Third time, Perhaps Because I am Dissatisfied with Your Answer of [Shrug]?”

“Am I the Only One Not Enjoying Delightful, Airy Chitchat with my Hair Stylist? An Investigation”

“Ten Satisfying Ways of Letting Your Enemy Know That You are Ignoring Her, While Still Ignoring Her.”

“Loving Your Disco Bush in the New Millennium: Letters to my Earlier Self”

“10 Things We’d Like to Hear Virginia Woolf Say to Jonathan Franzen”

“Perfecting the Art of the Cocked Head “Really?” Response”

“Perfecting the Art of the ‘HUH’ Response”

“Perfecting the Art of the Inflectionless ‘what.’ Response”

“The Dubious Rag: What Did it Clean Up?”

“Publically Editorializing on Strangers’ Behavior: A How-To Guide”

“Sentimental As Fuck: Having Feelings Doesn’t Mean I Don’t Have Reasons”

“Separately Scrolling Through iPhones on the Couch with Your Partner as Erotic Practice”

“This Investment Sweater Will Probably Not Solve Your Social Anxiety Problems, But Then Again It Might”

“How To Cope With Your Colleague’s Excessive Self-Gratulating: Or, Shut Up Already About Your Productivity, I Have Laundry to Do”

“$80 Is Not Too Much to Pay for the Best of Something, Even A Bra”

“Facing Forward with a Straight Face but Communicating to Your Girlfriends Laterally with your Body: A Woman’s Best Revenge”

“Millenials: Nothing But Love But Also, Take a Minute and Read a Book or a Thousand”

“I Cannot Look Right Now, Sweetie”

“Public Wagon Circling: Not Actually a Useful Feminist Strategy”

“ ‘Split Skirts’ Versus ‘Culottes’ versus ‘Palazzo Pants;’ Also: ‘Wide-legged’ or ‘Wide Leg’: When to Wear?”

“I Have Thoughts About the Revolution, But I Have Not Slept and Can’t Find My Other Shoe”

“Why Have More People Not Read Villette?”

“Not Slouching and Not Wearing Oversized Clothes and Other Victories”

“The PRECISE Length of a Laura Petrie Crop Versus the Weird Mom Clam Digger”

“How to Have a Wedding in Which Nobody has to Wear Wedges”

“Why are There so Many Accidental Pregnancies in Movies when IT IS ACTUALLY REALLY HARD TO DO?”

“Belts: A User’s Guide with Notes on Resisting the Ribcage Cage.”

“How to Phrase Insincere Offers of Help in the Kitchen”

“Plans to Murder my Ex’s Now-Ex, or, Alternately, Take Her Out for Drinks”

“Meals I Won’t Cook for Boyfriends I Will Never Have”

“Margaret Fuller was Totally Right About How One Effect of The Patriarchy is that Women Can Be Such Bitches” [Part One of an Investigative Series]

“Another Effect of Patriarchy is Snack Escalation by Guilty Preschool Moms” [Part Two of an Investigative Series]

“Yet Another Effect of Patriarchy is Women Making Other Women Set out the Cheese and Crackers at Receptions” [Part Three of an Investigative Series]

“Women Explain Things To Me”

“Snacks as Feminist Practice”

 

*Specifically, we would like to see these essays written by Sarah Miller, voice of our generation.

 

Sarah B., Hester, Claire, Sarah M., & Kyla: Team Sarah Miller

Lead Image ©Barbara Morgan, UCLA  Archives

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12 COMMENTS

  1. The essay about sex positions is so funny. In fact, all of them are fun.
    As someone who is approaching middle age , I found it halarious and real. First time commenting and loving it .
    I would like to add:
    1-approaching middle age and never watched Game of Thrones : an easy guideline to look like you are into it-a feature story.
    2-Cannot understand the hype about pinterst and still check it ofen: an investigation series on why single women in their 30s check Pinterest.
    3- A woman’s guide to choosing the best weekend tv show for couch time: a comparative study …

  2. Sightings from solidly-middle-aged-and-can’t-convincingly-deny-it: in a few more years you won’t give a sh*t about Game of Thrones and many of the above — and it will be awesome!

    • Sure, a few are funny enough. But in truth, title should read “We as Middle to Upper Class Ladies of Early Middle Age…”. This sort of humor is based on relating, to belong to this economic rank and its emotional ranges. I don’t laugh because I don’t relate. Come on, LA Review of Books, I want to laugh about this compromised sack sith its singular puss we call a body. Be weirder, cruder, smarter. If you are going to speak to a sort of heterosexual, cisgender female, upper middle class experience (which is not my own but sometimes has its wit and perceptions) think Chris Kraus, Kathy Acker RIP, Masha Tupitsyn…the text equivalent of Lynda Benglis and Lorraine Grady and Lydia Lunch and Yoko Ono. I know you can do it.

  3. “Ten Satisfying Ways of Letting Your Enemy Know That You are Ignoring Her, While Still Ignoring Her.”

    I have been preparing my whole life to write this article.

  4. Guffawed loudly to myself. A few more to add:

    Half-hearted Help Making the Bed: Can You Just Not?
    How to Leave a Party and Take Back the Wine You Brought: A Step-by-Step Tutorial
    Betty Draper’s Not Giving a Fuck: A Complete How-to

  5. I am a white, middle-aged, lower middle class woman who teaches at a university in a poor rural area of America. I also love comedy, but this attempt at humor is pathetic. I recognize myself in a few lines here and would enjoy Virginia Woolf’s take on a lot of the detritus of our time, but this piece is targeted at such a narrow market that it feels misplaced, like it was written at the dinner table by the teenage son of a staffer and published so he could get a line on his resume. So anachronistic. BTW the disco bush is back and bigger than ever.

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