You'll Grow Out of It

I was a woman sobbing in a hotel corridor, which is kind of incredible, because when I was little I thought I was going to be a senator.

Women have problem areas in a way that men don't. We have big hips and muffin tops. Men just have the thing where they create wars and wreak havoc all over the globe.

This was when I learned one of the biggest secrets of being a woman, which is that much of the time, we don't feel like we're women at all.

I wanted to structure a day where a hypothetical random snapshot of me looked like Carrie Bradshaw in her kimono, totally relaxed, not Brittany Murphy in Girl, Interrupted, diddling an old chicken under her bed. The

Ma'am is yet another horrible-sounding word in the lexicon of words that women are stuck with to describe various aspects of their body/life/mental state/hair. Vagina. Moist. Fallopian tubes. Yeast infection. Clitoris. Frizz. These are all terrible words, and yet they are our assigned descriptors. Who made up these words? Women certainly didn't. If, at the beginning of time, right after making vaginas, God had asked me, 'What would you like your most intimate and enjoyable part of yourself to be called?',' I most certainly wouldn't have said, 'Vagina.' No woman would, because vagina sounds like a First World War term that was invented to describe a trench that has been mostly blown apart but is still in use. Even off the very top of my head I feel like I could have come up with something better, like for instance the word papoose, which actually as I'm typing it feels like an incredibly brilliant word for vagina.

As a wolf, I’m a diamond in the rough. I crack jokes. My whole life is about trying, about speaking up in order to be seen, about howling with laughter or howling out how I see the world.

This is the lament of older women, and ultimately of all old people—that you become invisible. It is especially hard for women, though, whose entire lives have been spent spinning around the idea that if no one is staring at you, you’ve somehow failed.

When you have a baby, there will be plenty more pain. The pain of recovery, no matter how you give birth. The pain of nursing. The pain of not fitting into any of your old clothes. The pain of not even fitting into your maternity jeans. The pain of hearing your baby cry and not knowing how to fix it. The pain of wondering whether your partner still finds you attractive. The pain of arguing with your husband while your child is in the other room. The pain of knowing that you witnessed the very first moment of this beautiful person’s life, and that one day, hopefully at least a hundred years from now, there will inevitably be a last moment.

My parents spent countless hours teaching me to read and write. My mother was an English teacher who patiently taught me where to put my periods and commas, and my father, who loves books more than anyone I know, taught me from an early age that books are precious and should be handled gently , "like butterflies.

I was worried that I was already a failure. At which point my friend said, “What are you trying to win?” What was I trying to win? I thought about it and realized—nothing. There’s nothing to win. There is so much pressure on women around birth and labor and mothering to do it one way or another. It’s so easy to believe the notion that having a baby demands complete and total sacrifice, and anything short of that is not enough. That if you’re not in pain, you’re selfish.

Not responding to the texts of a man who has wronged you is truly one of the sweetest pleasures in life..

If you’re worried that skipping the pain of childbirth means you’re somehow cheating your baby, or yourself, you’re not. Because the truth is, life offers more than enough pain that you will not be able to skip.

You know what? You had a rough weekend, but people are basically good. They really are. We’re all just on this crazy blue marble together.

A sockless man is not to be trusted.

What gets in the way of living with vitality," Tejpal asked. Everything, I thought to myself. "Wounds," Tejpal said. She talked about the importance of forgiveness, and how the most important step in forgiveness is to allow yourself to feel the pain of the hurt you received. Only then would the pain begin to heal. Suddenly, Dracula leaned forward and spoke up. Even though this wasn't really a situation where you were supposed to speak without being called on. "That's not true," she blurted out angrily, her Long Island accent pulling all her vowels downward. "There are some things people do that hurt you forever and that cause scars that will never heal. Just 'cause you think about them doesn't mean they're going away." All the women in the room turned around to stare at this angry person. This was supposed to be a touchy-feely, self-discovery happy place where Tejpal was in charge. You are not supposed to attack Tejpal. I sensed that people thought she was crazy and normally I would find her as annoying for not getting it as everyone else was, but instead I felt a wave of deep compassion. It was the first time during my visit to Miraval that I felt attuned to how deeply, painfully exposed people can allow themselves to be when there's even a sliver of permission to be honest.

Are you having a natural birth?” I’m just trying to buy a sandwich. Is this complete stranger really asking about my plans re: my vagina?

I remember going to the Hayden Planetarium a few years ago and finding an area where you could stand on different scales to see what you would weigh on other planets. One woman was getting on a scale to weigh herself on the moon and she handed her purse to her friend. SHE HANDED HER PURSE TO HER FRIEND so that she wouldn’t THROW OFF HER WEIGHT ON THE MOON.)

It’s interesting that no one cares very much about women doing anything “naturally” until it involves them being in excruciating pain. No one ever asks a man if he’s having a “natural root canal.” No one ever asks if a man is having a “natural vasectomy.” GET THE EPIDURAL.

Well, isn’t this all part of life. Birth and sex and porn. Exciting and horrible and great and disgusting and joyful.

Always, always, always - more heart is the way to go.

There are so many debates in this life in which there is some evidence of one thing, and also some evidence of the other. At such point, you just have to decide what to believe. So here's a radical idea: Why not believe the thing that makes you happy?

The number one symptom of being old is caring whether someone thinks you're old.

Why do we have to be a nation divided between misses and ma'ams?

We all enjoy the little moments when we can quietly announce to the world how special and unique we are.

The journey by which two people find each other and decide to make a life together must involve an accumulation of so many twists and turns for both. It's a mystery as to how it all gets done.

Lingerie is really never worth the agita.

I do not remotely look like Audrey Hepburn. Nobody does. That's the whole point of Audrey Hepburn.

Men rise to the standards you hold them up to.

Texting is like kryptonite to women's standards.