Part 15 (2/2)

Cons: Requires constant plastic surgery; essentially glorified prost.i.tute.

4. Single-career powerhouse.

Pros: Money, professional fulfillment. When people ask, ”Why no kids?” can respond, ”Because I'll be hiring yours.”

Cons: Stock portfolios can't clean kitchen, perform oral s.e.x.

5. Single mom.

Pros: Get to have family even w/o romantic partner. p.i.s.s off Dan Quayle.

Cons: Harder than it looks on TV. Harder than anything else in world. Fast track to poverty.

6. Be countercultural.

Pros: Live on own terms, buck oppressive system, groovy & interesting clothes & friends.

Cons: How much tofu can person eat? Also, good luck getting health insurance.

7. d.i.n.kS: Dual Income No Kids.

Pros: Can dine at restaurants w/o chicken fingers on menu, travel to Zimbabwe, never have to listen to Barney video.

Cons: Perpetually on defensive. Treated like freaks. Greek chorus asking, ”So when are you going to have children?”

Really. I say we Supergirls should just be glad we have the fundamental American freedom to f.u.c.k up our lives entirely on our own terms.

Besides, new studies suggest that genetics are as responsible for a person's level of happiness as anything else. If this is in fact true, then today's miserable Baby Boomer career women would probably have been just as miserable pus.h.i.+ng a baby carriage back in the 1950s. And the June Cleaver prototypes who had o.r.g.a.s.ms over their self-cleaning ovens in 1957 would probably be just as ecstatic over cell phones and corporate careers in the year 2001.

We gals are living during a Golden Age for women right now. Sure, just like any other time in history, ours has its wars, disease, brutality, c.r.a.ppy food, boring jobs, screaming children, loneliness, heartbreak, c.o.c.kroaches, disappointments, fear, annoyances, oppression, and jerks.

Sure, we're required to be courageous and responsible in new ways. But so what? Like we really have anything better to do than grow up and take charge?

We shouldn't let anybody-be it a bunch of neoconservative nincomp.o.o.ps or our own nervous relatives-convince us to look backward through the rosy, sanitized lens of nostalgia. We mustn't live in fear that happiness will elude us if we don't follow a traditional script or play by The Rules.

A few years ago, Barbara Walters had a TV special celebrating-surprise-her TV specials. She did a retrospective of all the big stars she'd interviewed. Sucker that I am for insipid celebrity gossip, I watched the whole thing.

And watching it, I learned something about happiness from Eddie Murphy, of all people.

Walters showed two interviews with him. In the first, Murphy was newly famous; he'd just moved into a mansion and was extremely awkward and defensive.

In the second interview, conducted five years later, he seemed ebullient and joked easily with Walters. ”So, Eddie, are you happy now?” she asked him.

Eddie smiled thoughtfully. Sometimes he is and sometimes he isn't, he answered plainly. And I'm paraphrasing a little, but he said, essentially, ”Barbara, I used to think that happiness was something you achieved. But now I realize that it's not. It's just something that comes and goes, and comes and goes again, no matter who you are or what you're doing.”

This sounds, like, Du-uh. But actually, it's not something we hear very often in our culture these days. Usually, we're constantly being told that there is something terribly and fundamentally wrong with us if we don't look like Cameron Diaz. Or that happiness is a commodity: We'll achieve it if we just buy enough cool stuff. Or we're prescribed ”happy pills” like Zoloft. Talk about chemical warfare.

In writing this book, it's been my intention to offer women inspiration, wit, and tools for ”intelligent resistance” to all such whacked-out messages. And yet, in doing so, I think it's important to emphasize that there are no easy or foolproof answers. Kierkegaard once said that ”anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.” Well, with our new freedom, we gals are going to experience both dizziness and anxiety. So be it. We might as well find some way we can enjoy the h.e.l.l out of it, if we can.

Besides, five hundred years ago most women were peasants or slaves and had the status of chattel. A hundred years ago, women couldn't vote, own property, or wear pants. Forty years ago, women could be discriminated against in the workforce and raped by their husbands without recourse. Thirty years ago, we couldn't get legal abortions and got fired for being pregnant.

In comparison, I'd say we chicks today have it pretty easy.

We're in the best position ever to conquer the world, to flourish and prevail. We have the guts, the tools, the vision. We have the brains and the att.i.tude. Some of us even have the clothes. So why look backward or give in to our fears? As my grandma used to say, ”The world will be more heartbreaking than you know, and more beautiful than you'll ever imagine.”

So let's follow our own path, stand tall, and don't take any s.h.i.+t.

And while we're at it, have a good laugh.

Acknowledgments.

Many people helped shape and inspire this book, yet several were so instrumental I have to single them out for praise, public embarra.s.sment, and my undying grat.i.tude. In a proverbial champagne toast, I raise my gla.s.s to the following: First and foremost, to the Power Babes: my agent, Irene Skolnick, and my editor at Warner Books, Amy Einhorn, for having immediate faith in this project and taking me on in all my hypercaffeinated glory. Kudos, too, to editorial a.s.sistants Sandra Bark and Shannon Beatty.

To my Research G.o.ddess, Allison Kuttner. Without her resourcefulness, I probably would have just made stuff up to suit my purposes, thereby becoming the epitome of the very same stupid and expedient culture I just spent two hundred-plus pages critiquing. Thank you, Allison, for keeping me honest.

To the Nominees for Sainthood: Desa Sealy Ruffin and Bari Handelman actually read through rough drafts of this repeatedly, indulging me to a degree some might consider criminally negligent. Ditto for Stephanie Weiss, who listened to me talk about this book ad nauseam, yet still managed to offer terrific editorial advice. Ditto for Sarah Ferguson (not the d.u.c.h.ess), who literally gave me a hallowed Room of One's Own.

To my Sister-in-Arms, Ophira Edut, who continually serves as inspiration and editrix.

To the Pink Posse, a generous inner circle of smarta.s.s females who regularly laughed with me and let me turn their private lives into object lessons. Major props go to, in alphabetical order: Melinda Anderson, Karen Archia, Laurie Mintzer Edberg, Candy Fletcher, Robin Gellman, Carolyn Hunt, Sara Pines, Hannah Serota-Campbell, Amy Simon, Jennifer Sosin, Cecilie Surasky, and Suzanna Zwerling.

To the Good Guys: Mark Torok and Christopher Campbell, for their unwitting contributions.

To my Supportive Cohorts: Eddy Gattis, Ann Kurzius, Kate Mattos, Connie Morris, David Sheridan, and Jim Whitmire, who helped me clear my decks and carve out the time to write.

To the Great Dane, Pernille Chambliss, who kept me sane while I did this.

To my Fearless Family: G.o.ddess bless (and help) my parents, David and Ellen, who never dissuaded me from speaking my mind and who had the foresight to give me my brother, John Seeger Gilman, who has humored and supported me like no one else.

That is, except for the last-but-not-least person on my list: my strong and stunning partner, Bob Stefanski, who makes everything in this world seem more entertaining and possible. Thank you, Bob, for your love, patience, and endors.e.m.e.nt.

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