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Writer & Columnist | Santa Barbara, CA
Starshine Roshell Posts
My husband doesn’t dance. Doesn’t know how, doesn’t try, and doesn’t even stop to watch dancers unless they are, say, female and nearly naked.
Which is why it was so weird when he ordered an instructional DVD last year and dragged the whole family into the living room one rainy Saturday to learn the five-minute dance made famous in the “Thriller” music video.
Um. We’re going to do what?
Like everyone our age, he’d been dazzled by Michael Jackson’s creepy, campy, and undeniably boogielicious 1983 mini-movie and its dancing undead. After seeing Jennifer Garner and Andy Serkis (Gollum moonwalks?!) bust the routine in 13 Going on 30 — and watching 1,500 inmates at a Philippines prison nail it on YouTube — he decided no Gen X-er should be without the skill.
Plus he figured if the whole family could whip it out at parties, maybe we’d get invited places. “We just have to have those spooky, kooky Roshells!”
It turns out the instinct isn’t so weird. Okay, it’s weird, but it’s weirdly common.
For four years, people around the world have gathered annually, and at the same exact time, to set world records for the Largest Simultaneous Dance — while doing the “Thriller” routine.
It’s the sort of news that’ll have Grandma pining for the good old days: More unwed couples are living together than ever before, according to a new Census study. The number of shacked-up couples jumped 13 percent in the last year to an all-time high of 7.5 million, and experts say it’s not a decline in morals that’s driving the trend — it’s a drop in income.
The economy, they claim, is spurring unmarried sweethearts to pool their resources in the form of shared rent and utilities.
Which makes sense. It is cheaper to live with your lover. And while I’m technically a love child and thus a terribly unreliable source for conventional relationship advice, I have to tell you that living in sin is also jolly good fun.
When my fella and I first moved in together, I was so utterly enchanted with having him constantly nearby that I followed him from room to room in our tiny apartment.
“Whatcha doin’?” I’d ask.
“Watching the game.”
“Whatcha doin’ now?”
“Untangling these extension cords.”
“How ’bout now?”
“I’m reading, babe, and on a completely unrelated topic, is it going to be like this forever?”
It wasn’t. Adorable quirks (and also mine) have a way of tempering with time. But there’s one aspect of living together that I still haven’t gotten used to, still haven’t learned to love.
She’s informed. She’s omnipresent. And she once called Ann Coulter a “horse-faced tranny” on MSNBC.
“Now I kind of wish I’d said something worse,” jokes Ana Marie Cox, the Washington journalist who serves up politics with liberal seasoning and a side of snark.
The founding editor of political satire blog Wonkette, Cox now waxes wonky as a correspondent for GQ, a frequent guest on The Rachel Maddow Show, and a hardcore tweeter. A self-described nerd, Cox entertains her million-plus Twitter followers with confessions of bad ’80s hair, shout-outs to beloved indie rock bands, and links to cool politi-stuff — like her recent interview with Gov. Schwarzenegger (Ahnuld Sez Gerrymandering Is for Girly Men).
On October 15, Cox comes to town to speak at Politics, Sex & Cocktails, a benefit for the Planned Parenthood Action Fund of Santa Barbara, Ventura, and San Luis Obispo Counties (tickets and information).
But first, she spoke to slightly starstruck me…
Santa Barbara Magazine.
Shhh. Listen … There! Did you hear that? That snarky mumbling? They’re doing it again. Taunting me. Shaming me. Making judgmental “tsk, tsk” sounds in my direction.
Yes, I know they’re only books. Just glossy hardcover journals. Just pretty pastel diaries with a soft-focus cover photo of some baby’s delicious feet. The books look so tidy and innocuous, with their sweet ribbon embellishments.
But we know better, don’t we?
We moms know that baby books — those keepsake compendiums where we’re supposed to inventory our kids’ cute sayings and developmental milestones for posterity — do not exist to bring joy to families. They exist to bring revenue to the gift industry. And to drive me self-loathingly, inferiority-complexedly deranged. (Ooh, there’s a nice line for the baby book. Lemme jot that one down.)
Sure, there was a time — when my babies napped often and I was too exhausted to stand up and go make a sandwich — when I wrote diligently, dutifully in those pretty books: “Why we chose your name … ,” “Our first days together … ,” “Your first smile … .”
Smacking your head on a low-hanging beam. Ordering an expensive dinner and forgetting your wallet. Neglecting to notice the gaping hole in the crotch of your pants.
Some things just aren’t funny until they’re over. Looong over. And then they’re hilarious.
Bad dates and god-awful ex-boyfriends are like that. They make us curse, cringe, cry … and ultimately leave us no choice but to cackle like maniacs.
That’s how I feel now about the guy I once dated who was hot for my mom. And also the one who compulsively stole pens from drugstores.
And it’s how friends Jessica Hill and Krishna Devine felt after enduring ugly breakups a few years back.
“We were sitting around having cocktails, dissecting our dating experiences, and comparing notes,” Devine recalls. “And we said, ‘We’re ready to get over this. It happened, but we’re going to find the funny part of it and move on.'”
So the gals coauthored a book, Why He’s My Ex, a snappy and acerbic new picture book cataloging the heinous-cum-hilarious things men do that make them Mr. Wrong. They’ll sign the book at 3 p.m. on Sunday, September 26 at Chaucer’s bookstore.
It was like a meeting of Irresponsible Parents Anonymous. Shuffling anxiously into the sterile office, we were strangers to one another, with two shared attributes: shame that we hadn’t taken care of this sooner, and relief that we were finally doing something about it.
We are the laggard parents (perhaps you’re one of us?) who haven’t yet named a legal guardian for our children — haven’t debated the relative merits of various friends and family members to raise our children in the event of our untimely deaths, haven’t had the touchy conversation with said individuals wherein we ask them to accept the onerous responsibility of ushering our spawn gracefully into adulthood, haven’t filled out the legal paperwork making the decision official … But as you see, the process is complex.
It’s one of those parenting chores that fall into the category of “prudence” — and that I stink at. Saving for their college. Having them fingerprinted. Even getting them flu shots. So if I’m an unfit mother for not planning for their potential orphanhood, well, add it to the list.