okay, after reading pretty much everything you’ve ever written 🥺, i think i’ve decided that teen-trash!nottgrass is my favorite sub genre of yours. you just write it so effortlessly and realistically that it makes me want to completely restart my teenage years, absolutely iconic
HELLO MY LOVE god I know right. what was I even doing as a teen? my homework? so disappointing. granted it’s probably best for our safety that we did not get involved in any arms dealing or drug rings, or… okay no I would really like to have been with a motorcycle boy who fights. I guess I will have to be my own motorcycle boy who fights
I will ALSO say for a totally unrelated rant that as much as I love teen trash because I don’t have to concern myself with morality or health insurance or anything other than being young and obsessed with each other while I write it, there’s no reason to glorify youth. I’m finding that not enough women talk about how nice it is to age. I recently read a great quote from Jenny Slate: “As the image of myself becomes sharper in my brain and more precious, I feel less afraid that someone else will erase me by denying me love.” I can’t tell you what a relief it is to find that as you age, doors open. You start to see opportunity you wouldn’t have known how to see before. And you learn to love yourself in a way that makes it easier and more fulfilling to love others.
I’m saying this because last week I watched Jennifer Lopez talk about how she turned 50 this year and when she triumphantly said “the best is yet to come,” I broke down in tears, because I often think I’m falling behind. I mean, what woman do you still hear about that’s over 40? basically no one. sometimes my own obscurity feels like it’s racing towards me like a bullet I can’t escape because I didn’t come across what I wanted to do in life soon enough. youth and beauty have a tendency to be synonymous; we only celebrate the success of the prodigies, not people who find their way over time by choosing their path carefully and working relentlessly for something. I always thought I would be the sort of person who got lucky, who found success early, but now I understand that as I approach my thirties, my story will have to be the story of the woman who fought hard, and who had to fail many, many times before she succeeded. I want that story to have value, too.
CLEARLY you’re catching me on a very philosophical morning and I know you are still in the throes of your beautiful springtide so I just want to tell you all this because I wish someone had said it to me while I was clinging to my youth like I might become less valuable without it
but the point is I adore this and you and I’m so happy to have you here, because I will probably not stop writing trash teens and it’s nice to know I have an audience
