giving up the ghost.

At least the majority of the American people don't think I'm an unqualified moron. Yet.

This morning, sleepily, after hearing extensively about my menstrual woes, my husband remarked:

"You make being a woman sound like the worst thing, ever. It seems like you're barely holding it together all the time."

He's right.

I'm quitting, you guys.

I guess you could say this is a long time coming. Since I've gotten married, my hygiene has slipped significantly. I don't wash my hair nearly as much as I used to. I cut it off for a bob, which I intend to gradually snip away at until my hair resembles Edie Sedgwick's. I only wear makeup if I'm actually going somewhere (anywhere public any time before 6 pm doesn't count as 'somewhere'). I've worn high heels two times in two months. I'm just fucking tired of being female, and I don't care anymore.

I'm tired of not being able to shit regularly. I'm tired of haranguing my breasts into a wired felt-cotton trap every morning. I'm over worrying constantly if I'm knocked up. I'm sick of concerning myself with how I look and wondering if I should censor what I say.

You see, women are in a constant pursuit of looking as attractive as possible. Always. We are told from childhood that our purpose is to decorate the earth, to light up men's faces as they leer at our chests and appreciate our delicate features. We are on display 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We're supposed to diet and keep up with trends and have huge breasts and no wrinkles and not be smarter than the men we're involved with and we should be mild and passive and motherly and cheerful and just fucking perfect. If we're not doing everything we can to impress dudes, then we're under fire for being fat, ugly, man-hating feminazi lesbian shitasses (Scott Baio's wife's words, not mine - though I wish I could take credit for such a zinger). And if we happen to be too attractive, it's our fault that we led men to rape us, because we're sluts and whores. We have to be slaves to a society and then get backhandedly fucked by said society just for doing what they tell us.

But you know what? I'm not doing it anymore. I have a nice place to live, a job that's tolerable, an awesome cat, and a man that loves me even if I have chipped nail polish and have been wearing the same bra for four days in a row. Even so - what is the point where we say enough is enough? Is that aging? Recognizing that you're not the hot chick, the ingenue, the demure doll who men bend over backwards for? Or is the recognition that you don't even care enough to try to play that game anymore?

Women deal with enough blood and shit and tears. We owe it to ourselves to be honest. And to love ourselves for that honesty alone.

reason #5,724 why I am now an old lady.

Let me tell you all about my newest hobby. It's really quite thrilling. You see, I go into grocery stores to buy butter and frozen pizza and come out with puzzle books. I am a big fan, in particular, of word searches. I spend hours on end ignoring my husband while attempting to complete word searches in which I look for words like "liege" and "whiskers." Then I go to bed, not after 11 p.m. and not before complaining about how much my feet hurt and attempting to woo my cat into sleeping on the bed beside me.

It's weird when you reach this point that you realize why adults do things, and though you're conscious of this, you don't stop yourself from doing them too. Other things on this list that I've discovered include:

1. arguing about housework
2. getting a pet and treating it like it's a child
3. having less sex
4. having a drink immediately when you get home from work
5. feeling like you should go on a diet
6. placating yourself with stupid crap you don't need (like vintage luggage and xbox games)

I mean, many of these are the consequences of... responsibility. Responsibility of keeping a house, being a good partner, being successful at work and attempting to retain your sanity without absolute exhaustion. But it's hard keeping your edge, man, and with every Dell Official Word Search booklet I buy that advertises for porcelain Yorkies sitting in teacups wearing rhinestone collars, another piece of my youthful hipness dies.

Back to the puzzles. I just completed "Mustache Bash" and had the hardest fucking time trying to find "fu manchu."

you all get older. I just get more stylish.

Some current observations on aging, marriage, spawning (gross) and being fantastic:

1. I don't get why we, as a culture, congratulate people for having babies, and, furthermore, praise the attractiveness of said babies, even when they're hideous.

I guess I should get used to this, as it's going to happen for the next 20 years or so, but it seems like everyone is getting knocked up. And they all expect congrats and GIFTS for doing so.

Call me callous, but I don't think that having a man ejaculate inside of you is something worthy of a prize. I'm forced to hearken back to Garfunkel & Oates' "Pregnant Women are Smug." I know women - my best friend Melanie among them - who have had kids, and adore them, but never acted like they were better than anyone else or more special for doing so.

I think the idea of a shower weirds me out, too. It's like being at a big Christmas morning except there are no mimosas, and you don't get shit but have to watch someone else open every pair of fucking socks they get and show them around, and everyone's supposed to feign interest when all they can think about is when they're going to GET OUT OF THERE and watch football. Oh wait, I forgot, I'm the only broad who likes football, and not just because it's impressive to dudes.

I know having a child makes you less selfish, a better person, you're a mutant if you don't want one, it's your responsibility as a woman to procreate and ensure the survival of the species, blah blah blah, but I really don't care about how much your one-month-old baby shits, or how sore your breasts are because you've been pumping them all night. You probably don't care about my obsession with Lilith Fair or how I ate an entire container of Funfetti frosting last night, but at least I'm kind of ironic. And funny.


2. I am really sick of people asking me fucking stupid questions such as, "How's married life?"

THE SAME AS BEFORE, JACKASS, except now I have idiots like you asking me questions about being married because anyone under the age of 30 who is single has no idea to talk to anyone who isn't. I signed a piece of paper and said some vows, I didn't undergo a lobotomy. I'm still myself. Our relationship is basically the same. The only difference is that older men show me more respect, and older women now think it's okay to tell Seth about their husbands' sexual fetishes. And I get the whole "STFU MARRIEDS" thing. I don't think I fall in that category - I would rather drop dead than post "I love my schmoopie!" anywhere on the goddamn internet - but maybe if you talked to us about things other than our marriages, maybe we would talk about things other than our marriages.


3. I'm not going to spend five hundred trillion dollars on products to minimize my wrinkles. I don't care.

I've got a drinking problem and I don't moisturize. I don't give a shit. I haven't exactly been skating by on my looks for these past 23 years, so why bother trying to start? My teeth are not bright white, I enjoy Wendy's chicken nuggets and I win people over with my sparkling personality. That's just me.