2014 will be the first time any married gay couple has ever filed federal taxes together in the United States. It’s been a decade since Massachusetts became the first state to start granting marriage licenses, and some states have previously accepted joint returns for state taxes. But until the Supreme Court struck down the federal prohibition against gay marriage in The United States v. Windsor last summer, the Internal Revenue Service didn’t recognize joint returns for married same-sex couples.
For some, this April’s tax season will be a time to celebrate the progress of the gay-rights movement. But for most couples, it will be also be a huge headache.
In gay-marriage recognition states, “thanks to the Windsor decision, doing tax returns for same-sex married couples is much easier now,” said Joan Zawaski, an accountant in California who is also in a same-sex marriage. “Married is married, we just file joint returns just like other folks. But in non-recognition states, it’s back like the battle days.”
This is because many states are refusing to accept joint returns from married gay couples, even if they were legally married in another state. Usually, states piggyback off of the IRS on tax returns—people fill out their federal returns and then use that information to fill out state returns. But since many non-recognition states aren’t following the IRS’s decision to accept joint returns from same-sex couples, their revenue departments have had to devise new ways to figure out how to collect the right amount of money from married same-sex couples. In some places, this means gay men and women have to fill out multiple forms, sometimes saying they’re married, sometimes saying they’re single. Other states have created brand new forms, just for gay couples.
But many have simply issued tax bulletins describing the ways same-sex couples will have to divide their incomes, benefits, and even claims on their children for state-tax purposes. Virginia’s five-page memo mentions that the Commonwealth does not recognize same-sex marriage or agree with the federal government’s decision to accept joint filings at least seven times.
“There were no statutory provisions in the Virginia tax code for doing that,” said Marc Purintun, a tax attorney who lives in the state. He and his husband got married in California in 2008. “On the receiving end in Virginia of the memo from the tax department, it felt pretty hostile.”
A few non-recognition states have made a very different choice: Colorado, Missouri, Oregon, and Utah will all accept married same-sex couples’ joint tax returns, even though all four have constitutional amendments against gay marriage. This is particularly interesting in Utah, where same-sex marriage was legal for 17 days in 2013 and 2014. After a federal judge ruled the state’s ban on gay marriage unconstitutional, the Supreme Court put a hold on same-sex marriage licenses until the justices decide whether they want to review the ruling. That left the 1,300 gay couples who got married during that time in something of a legal limbo, since Utah’s governor said the state would not recognize their unions. Now, at least one issue has been resolved: For tax purposes, the state considers these couples to be married.
All of this has created an interesting mix of tax policies among the states. Here’s a basic map of what married gay couples have to do to file their taxes in different states:
State requirements for married same-sex couples filing taxes in 2014, based on information provided by the Human Rights Campaign (The Atlantic)
But of course, it’s not quite that simple. “The fun part is where you have one of the same-sex spouses inheriting some oil royalties from Oklahoma,” for example, said Zawaski. Oklahoma is a non-recognition state, so even if a California couple filed their taxes jointly at the federal and state levels, they would have to file separately to pay taxes on any investment income they owe to Oklahoma.
Employers have also had to figure out how to deal with their gay employees' tax status. Some benefits, like health insurance, tuition breaks, and transportation subsidies, are not taxable income under federal law. Many companies had previously extended these kinds of benefits to same-sex couples and families if employees could prove they were part of a domestic partnership or marriage, but those couples had to pay taxes on this money. Now that federal guidelines have changed and states are issuing their own tax policies, companies have had to adjust how they handle benefits for same-sex couples. “National corporations that have employees all over the country are having a hard time keeping up,” said Purintun, who has worked with clients who have received inaccurate W-2s from their employers.
Kate Fletcher, a private-practice attorney and full-time pilot at American Airlines, said it took four months of persistent pestering to get the company to adjust her W-2. “They get to keep my money—American Airlines has given the state of Virginia money that belongs to me,” she said. Eventually, that money will be refunded, because she isn’t legally required to pay federal taxes on her benefits, but in the meantime, she could have been investing the money or using it to buy groceries or pay her mortgage.
Even though the IRS issued guidelines for same-sex couples following the Windsor case, some think the agency may be partly at fault for the confusion. For example, the agency has said that married gay couples can re-file past returns in the hopes of getting a refund, but that hasn’t been made clear to tax preparers across the country. “The IRS is telling them things like, sorry, the Windsor case is not retroactive. There’s been lots of miscommunication between taxpayers and IRS agents in the field,” said Pat Cain, a tax-law professor at Santa Clara University, who is also in a same-sex marriage.
“I would not say the IRS writ large has been trying to reach out to community organizations and make sure people are informed as possible,” said Brian Moulton, the legal director at the Human Rights Campaign. “They put out guidance, put out publications; that’s their approach.”
All of this means one thing: Even for married gay couples who live in states that recognize same-sex marriages, this filing season may involve unexpected complications. “I do think this is going to be a surprise to some people,” said Cain.
Couples in civil unions may also have issues. Even in recognition states, they have to file individually at the federal level and jointly at the state level, because the IRS does not recognize joint returns from people who aren't technically married. This creates an interesting situation for couples living in Hawaii, for example, which just started recognizing gay marriages in December: Even though they have the option to get married, they might get better benefits and pay less tax money if they don’t.
But for many people, taxes are symbolic of the broader question of equality. While gay-rights advocates have cheered the Windsor decision and the IRS’s tax ruling, this filing season shows that gay marriages still aren’t equal to heterosexual marriages in America, no matter where you live.
"My husband says not one damned dime to them: If they’re not going to recognize our marriage, we’re going to file in the cheapest way possible."
“There’s certainly anger that the state wants to disregard my family and our value,” said Purintun. “The form asks are you married, and … you sign under penalties of law that what you put on the form is true.” If Purintun and his husband follow Virginia’s guidelines, they will have to file their state taxes as single, “unmarried” individuals. “I wonder how many members of the legislature or general citizens of Virginia would be willing to sign that that’s true because a tax bulletin says this is true,” he said.
Purintun and his husband haven’t decided what they’re going to do about their taxes yet; they’re hoping that Virginia may revise its guidelines before the state's filing deadline at the end of April. “My husband says not one damned dime to them: If they’re not going to recognize our marriage, we’re going to file in the cheapest way possible,” he said. “But as a tax attorney, I think you should follow the law.”
Gay couples who live in non-recognition states have a few other options, he said, including filing their taxes with an attached letter of protest. Or, they could cross their fingers and try to file jointly—since the IRS and state revenue agencies don’t ask people to indicate their gender on filing forms, he thinks couples would probably get away with it.
“There are penalties that apply if you falsify your tax return, but would it be false if you say that you’re married in Virginia even though Virginia didn’t recognize it?” he asked. “If you’re married and likely to pay more by filing married, where’s the foul?”
It is true that most married couples who will now file jointly at the federal level will likely owe more money to the government—with a higher combined income, more of their money will be taxed at a higher bracket. But for many, this seems to be worth it.
“I’m going to pay a huge marriage tax penalty myself and I hate that, but I’m probably not going to curse as much when I’m preparing my form as I have in past years,” said Cain.
“What we’ve said as we try to convince ourselves that we have to pay more taxes is that equality is the benefit that we wanted,” Purintun said. “Equality is not necessarily free, but it is what we want.”
I've been with my current boyfriend for three years. We're really great together—similar interests, senses of humor, great sex. I love him so much—the only issue is that of our respective backgrounds. He grew up in a tony suburb, went to prep school, then to a very prestigious college, and finally the very prestigious graduate school where we met. I went to public school in a bad neighborhood, put myself through a not-so-prestigious college, made a name for myself in my field, then got into that same prestigious grad school. Our families could not be more different. I didn't think it would matter so much, but something happened recently that I can't shake.
My little brother, who has been a fuck up his entire life, has finally gotten it together and joined the Air Force. I'm not super pro-military or anything, but he was on a bad, bad path and now he has a job and structure and it's been really good for him. When he finished basic training, we (me, my mom, and my boyfriend—our father has long been out of the picture) went to his graduation. I'd never been to one of these things before but it's a really big deal for the airmen. A lot of them, my brother included, had never really accomplished anything worth celebrating before. My mom basically cried the entire time.
Unfortunately, throughout the day-long graduation, whenever we were alone, my boyfriend would bring the subject back to him. He looked around anxiously when we got there because most of the young men were in uniform. He kept asking me if he thought people knew that he hadn't served. Then he would go on these weird defensive rants about why he hadn't served, one of which included some pretty fucked-up ideas about people who don't go to college. I got pretty annoyed at him for being so self-involved on a day that should have been about celebrating my brother. I didn't say anything, though, because it was so out of character for him to behave like that.
In the couple of months since this incident, I get so angry whenever I think about it. I brought it up with him once, but he sort of dismissed me, saying that he wasn't trying to draw attention from my brother. I actually totally believe him about that. I guess the thing that drives me nuts is that this person who has been given every opportunity and celebrated at every turn can't stand one day when others are being honored and he isn't. I'm probably being too harsh, but this is the narrative in my head.
This whole incident is bringing up some stuff from earlier in our relationship that I think I'd just brushed aside. When we first met, I honestly resented how easy his life had been compared to mine. I used to tease him for being a prep school kid and eventually he told me that hurt his feelings so I stopped. Since I stopped, we basically never talk about class-related stuff, so I think it appeared that we'd resolved that conflict. In reality, we just stopped talking about anything that would trigger any tension related to class. We also spend way more time with his family. It's partially because we live closer to them, but also because I'm comfortable in his family's world of affluent professionals while my boyfriend is just not comfortable spending a lot of time with my family in my old neighborhood. We do have pretty decent communication about other issues—this one just seems to be off limits for some reason.
I do love this man, and we're starting to talk marriage (we're both around 30). Can I be with someone long-term who I resent in this one way? Is it possible to love someone without wholly respecting them? Or am I being too hard on him? Ultimately it's not really his fault that his parents have been able to give him so much. I just really can't tell if this is something that will blow over in time or an indicator that this relationship isn't built to last.
Help me Polly!
Confused About Class
Dear CAC,
Honestly, I think you misread your boyfriend's reaction to your brother's graduation. I don't think he was envious of the attention. I think he felt unexpectedly droopy and emasculated in the company of all of those guys in uniform, looking sharp, accompanied by a lot of pomp and circumstance and talk about the incomparable honor of giving your life for your country. No matter how you might feel about the military or our country or the whole notion of having to give up your life at the whim of a potentially misguided leader, as a young man this experience would probably be unexpectedly intense. Your boyfriend is roughly the same age as all of these perceived heroes proudly proclaiming their willingness to die. It was understandably unsettling for him. He didn't want you to see him as less heroic than those dudes. He didn't want to see himself that way. He wanted to explain why he thinks those guys aren't necessarily doing something that's so honorable. He did this away from the rest of your family. He was trying to get you on his side, looking for your support and understanding. He probably said some dumb things along the way.
Not that I don't understand why you weren't aware of the particular folds of his emotional experience. You had your own concerns. This was your brother's big day. And if your boyfriend blathered on and on about himself the whole time, in front of your family, that would be concerning. But I don't get that sense. I get the sense that he made a series of discombobulated, defensive comments when you two were alone, and they stuck in your craw and made you wonder if he has any idea at all how totally pampered he's been, how easy he's had it, how hard other people have to work just to fucking exist.
I do understand your anger about that. Personally, I would want to explain the big gap between rich and poor, between sailing along and struggling tooth and nail, between floating through college and working really fucking hard in school while holding down two jobs, between sailing into grad school and working a real job first. And I think you should explain those things to him.
But I also think that you have to empathize with him, not only about his feelings around this military graduation but also about his life in general. He was standing there feeling a little bit useless, in spite of his faith in himself and his beliefs about the world. He was feeling like a wilty little grad student among macho men. Men are really fucking sensitive to this kind of thing. Even the kinds of smart, sensitive late-bloomers that most of us favor have these moments of self-doubt where they wonder, "Christ, should I feel embarrassed that I'm not uniformed and heroic like these macho guys? Am I supposed to feel like they're making good choices and I'm the wimpy dude back home they're out there protecting?" It's easy for women to forget how often men compare themselves to each other, and how sensitive they are to feeling somehow less studly in the company of overt machismo.
I know saying that makes me sound like a deluded Camille Paglia type. Throw in a little Greek mythology here and there and voila, six figure book deal. But I do think you're not opening yourself up to your boyfriend's experience enough, and you're not going to have a healthy relationship with him if you can't stop seeing the first 30 years of his life as a relaxing and leisurely stroll down Easy Street.
Imagine for a second going to your boyfriend's little sister's debutante ball. It's her big night! She struggled with eating disorders in the past, but now she's doing fine and she just got into a very expensive private college, and she looks just beautiful! Her dad is so proud of her, and her mom is crying big salty tears! What you're thinking, though, is that these fucks would never ask YOU to wear a white dress, thanks to your zip code of origin. And in spite of the token people of color here and there, these people are obviously racists. Imagine that you stayed up late grading papers the night before, and your tuition fees are overdue, and there you are, surrounded by gorgeous little rich girls who never do anything more taxing than sitting still to get their nails done? And everyone can't stop talking about how impressive and gorgeous and special they all are?
I know it's not the same thing. And I know you would keep your mouth shut. But imagine the feelings you might feel. Imagine the things you'd like to say to your boyfriend, in private, after watching him admire the pretty spoiled girls from afar.
Listen to me: Your boyfriend was feeling feelings about that graduation ceremony. That's all that was about. If you start discounting his feelings routinely just because he's been a little pampered, your relationship will suffer. Your guy had his own hardships, trust me. You can say to yourself, "What a spoiled little fucker, and he doesn't even realize it!" But that's not fair to him. You love this guy. You need to find out more about the things that did challenge him, the situations that did unnerve him and make him feel bad about himself.
I grew up in a perfectly comfortable home in a perfectly nice middle-class urban neighborhood, first as a professor's kid and then with a divorced working mom. We were usually in debt and I was always expected to scrub toilets, trim bushes, rake leaves, paint doors, empty gutters, pull weeds, whatever. I always had a summer job, starting at age 15. I never had a car. I was definitely jealous of my friends, with their fucking Clinique cosmetics and Esprit sweatshirts and Polo shorts, with their dermatologists and their expensive ballet lessons and their pretty redecorated bedrooms with walls and ceilings they didn't paint themselves. I loved my friends but I was a real asshole about how spoiled they were. I used my resentment of their wealth as an excuse not to empathize with them. I discounted any suffering they told me they were going through. And some of them had real problems—deeply dysfunctional families, eating disorders, financial support that kept them semi-infantilized until their early 30s. I thought my own problems were somehow more real than theirs, just because they had a lot more money and didn't have to work as hard as I did.
The truth is, we were ALL privileged. And I was particularly privileged, because I learned the satisfaction of hard work early on in life. I do mean satisfaction. I can't count the times that setting my feelings aside and doing some really fucking hard work has pulled me out of a funk. Most of what's good in my life found its way to me because I knew how to work hard without giving up, to work hard at something until I was better and better at it. I'm not a workaholic, not by a long shot. I am a lazy motherfucker. But I do understand and appreciate a concerted, strenuous effort. I don't mind looking at my work and saying, "That could be better." It doesn't scare me that it'll take MORE HARD WORK to take something from mediocre to great.
People who don't understand hard work, who don't appreciate and enjoy it, end up suffering a lot. That is a fact. Your boyfriend has nothing to do with this point I'm making; he's in grad school, he knows how to work hard. I'm just telling you that there are many, many aspects of struggling that are a real privilege, that put you at an advantage, once you realize your full potential.
I want to challenge you to take more pride in your background. Not angry fuck-you resentment, but real pride. I know you think you have real pride, and you also think I am a fucking pampered piece of shit who doesn't get it. You're probably right about that. I still want you to listen to me: Real pride can be angry, sure. But real pride can also allow for difference. Real pride invites the privileged in, warmly, to witness with clear eyes, to share some of the many gorgeous aspects of growing up with nothing. There is ugliness there, but there's beauty there, too. There are things about your family that might make you feel ashamed, but that should make you feel proud. My grandparents chainsmoked hand-rolled cigarettes and watched "The Family Feud" every fucking night on a couch covered in plastic. At the end of the show, my Carpatho-Rusyn grandfather would shout to my Carpatho-Rusyn grandmother cleaning up in the kitchen, "Dem Greeks, dey won, Ma!"
When I brought my boyfriend to visit my grandparents, was it uncomfortable for him? Of course. He couldn't mask his emotions, as he spotted the plastic grapes in the little urn on the wall. People who grow up with lots of money often don't have access to working class people, don't have access to immigrants. But everyone is provincial in their own way. People who grow up in Manhattan can be hopelessly provincial, hopelessly unaware of the rest of the country, the rest of the world. If your boyfriend isn't that comfortable around your family, that's not necessarily snobbery, and if you cast it in that light, you're being unfair to him and yourself. Some people out there watch "Judge Judy" and speak in double negatives. Shocker. Some people live in neighborhoods that seem scrappy and dangerous to outsiders. He just needs some time to get used to it. You need to insist that he get used to it. If you protect him from it while resenting him for that, if you avoid taking him home, you'll injure your relationship. Give him the benefit of the doubt. I hate the phrase "It is what it is," but when it comes to showing people where you came from, it comes in handy. This is how I grew up. It is what it fucking is. Did I choose this? Would I choose it again? Do I hate this? Do I love this? All of the above. It is what it is.
Also? Being a guy is not a walk in the park. The separation from your own feelings you have to achieve just to get by is crazy. Prep school, while it sounds absolutely luxurious to a poor kid, can be an insanely cut-throat, unfriendly place. Kids I know who went away to prep school often came back with completely different personalities, personalities that, quite frankly seemed a little defensive and overly cool, like they'd been traumatized by their exposure to a whole new level of uber cool, pushy rich kids and had emerged far worse for the wear.
That's my casual observation, nothing more. But you really do need to open your mind and allow that your guy has had a very different experience than you, and not all of it boiled down to him getting his ass wiped by servants armed with extra-soft toilet tissue.
I don't think you'd feel as angry at him if you'd chosen a time when you WEREN'T mad and explained the very particular folds of your background to him. I think this needs to happen, and you need to do it in a way that doesn't make him feel defensive about the way he grew up. After you feel like you've been heard—and look, you've got to warn him, "I need for you to listen very closely to this. I need you to understand all the shit I had to do to get here"—then you've got to hear HIM out. You've got to ask him all about his upbringing, and you've got to be nice about it, really fucking nice, not dismissive and eye-rolly. You've got to appreciate the little bits and pieces of his past that feel crumpled or messy, that don't fit together well, that made him feel sad as a kid.
He sounds like a sensitive person, just like you. Sensitive people don't have an easy ride, no matter where they are. We will make mountains out of molehills wherever you plant us. And even though it's easy to be unsympathetic and skeptical of that—and believe me, I can be—it's still important, if you love him dearly, that you empathize with the challenges he faced and still faces, no matter how small they might seem to you.
It's probably time to have some tough conversations. Don't wait until you're mad. Sit him down when you're feeling good and look him in the eye and tell him you need to talk about your differences. Be gentle. There is no moral high ground in this conversation. You are simply two different people, with two different stories. He needs to understand that your family is important to you. Remember that it's never easy to accept and embrace someone's family, no matter what they're like. Be respectful of that, but make it clear you feel sensitive about them and protective of them and you don't really want him making negative comments to you about them moving forward. Just as he didn't want to be teased about prep school, you don't want to be teased about your background, and you don't want him casting aspersions on your family's choices. You should ask him to rethink the way he talks about people's life choices when he talks to you and to them, with some acceptance that he may not have all the information he needs to draw conclusions about people from completely different circumstances from his. You should tell him that you're going to try to do the same thing for him: Not assume that someone is lazy or spoiled, for example, or doesn't know the meaning of hardship. There are all kinds of hardship out there.
It's a big challenge, for two people from totally different classes to come together and smoothly navigate the world. It's also really romantic and interesting and if you approach it with care and sensitivity, you'll both grow into richer, wiser, more mature people together. You both have a great opportunity to learn a lot. Try to embrace it rather than avoiding it. Try to open your heart and be vulnerable and allow him the same safe space that you need.
It will be a challenge. Lean into the challenge and talk about it a lot, with a generous, accepting spirit, and your love for each other and trust in each other will grow in leaps and bounds.
This isn't about your boyfriend wanting to be the center of attention. He's grappling with something bigger than that. He has prejudices, sure, and also fears and insecurities. Let him show you the full scope of who he really is, flaws and all, and dare to show yourself to him. We are not ONLY safe among our own kind, in our own comfort zones. When we believe that, we make our worlds smaller and smaller. Take pride in your path here, and let him have his pride in his path, too. Dare to do this without anger and preemptive, self-protective resentment. Dare to do this with an open heart.
Polly
Are you ashamed of your money? Do you suspect that buying a million copies of Polly's book might make you feel better? Because you're right about that. Also? Write to Polly and cry her a river.
Heather Havrilesky (aka Polly Esther) is The Awl's existential advice columnist. She's also a regular contributor to The New York Times Magazine, and is the author of the memoir Disaster Preparedness (Riverhead 2011). She blogs here about scratchy pants, personality disorders, and aged cheeses. Photograph by Teruyoshi Hayashida, from, of course, the incomparable Take Ivy.
A lot of folks probably would say Pauline Kael or David Bordwell or Manny Farber; some might argue for more academic writers like Linda Williams, Stanley Cavell, or Carol Clover. For me, though, it's an easy question. The greatest film critic ever is James Baldwin.
Baldwin is generally celebrated for his novels and (as Ta-Nehisi Coates wrote recently) his personal essays. But he wrote criticism as well. Mostly this was in the form of short reviews. There is, though, a major exception: his book-length essay, The Devil Finds Work, one of the most powerful examples ever of how writing about art can, itself, be art.
Published in 1976, the piece can’t be categorized. It's a memoir of Baldwin's life watching, or influenced by, or next to cinema. It's a critique of the racial politics of American (and European) film. And it's a work of film theory, with Baldwin illuminating issues of gaze and identification in brief, lucid bursts. The dangerous appeal of cinema, he writes, can be to escape—"surrendering to the corroboration of one's fantasies as they are thrown back from the screen" And "no one,” he acidly adds, “makes his escape personality black."
The themes of race, film, and truth circle around one another throughout the essay's hundred pages, as Baldwin attempts to reconcile the cinema he loves, which represents the country he loves, with its duplicity and faithlessness. In one memorable description of the McCarthy era midway through the essay, he marvels at "the slimy depths to which the bulk of white Americans allowed themselves to sink: noisily, gracelessly, flatulent and foul with patriotism." It's clear Baldwin believes that description can often be applied to American cinema as well—whether it's the false self-congratulatory liberal Hollywood pap of The Heat of the Night or Guess Who's Coming to Dinner or the travesty made of Billie Holiday's life in Lady Sings the Blues, the script of which, Baldwin says, "Is as empty as a banana peel, and as treacherous."
Yet, for all its pessimism, The Devil Finds Work doesn't feel despairing or bleak. On the contrary, it's one of the most inspirational pieces of writing I've read. In part, that's because of the moments of value or meaning that Baldwin finds amid the dross—an image of Sidney Poitier's face in the Defiant Ones, which in its dignity and beauty shatters the rest of the film, or "Joan Crawford's straight, narrow, and lonely back," in the first film Baldwin remembers, and how he is "fascinated by the movement on, and of, the screen, that movement which is something like the heaving and the swelling of the sea … and which is also something like the light which moves on, and especially beneath, the water."
But more even than such isolated images, what makes the essay sing, and not sadly or in bitterness, is its sheer power of description, and its audacity in treating self, society, and art as a whole, to be argued with and lived with and loved all at once. You can see that perhaps most vividly in the concluding discussion, in which Baldwin talks about the racial subtext of The Exorcist.
For, I have seen the devil, by day and by night, and have seen him in you and in me: in the eyes of the cop and the sheriff and the deputy, the landlord, the housewife, the football player: in the eyes of some governors, presidents, wardens, in the eyes of some orphans, and in the eyes of my father, and in my mirror. It is that moment when no other human being is real for you, nor are you real for yourself. The devil has no need of any dogma—though he can use them all—nor does he need any historical justification, history being so largely his invention. He does not levitate beds, or fool around with little girls: we do.
The mindless and hysterical banality of evil presented in The Exorcist is the most terrifying thing about the film. The Americans should certainly know more about evil than that; if they pretend otherwise, they are lying, and any black man, and not only blacks—many, many others, including white children— can call them on this lie, he who has been treated as the devil recognizes the devil when they meet.
I like The Exorcist considerably more than Baldwin does, but even so, I think it's indisputable that he transforms the film. A pulp horror shocker becomes a meditation on how evil is displaced and denied—and on how denial of sin, personal and social, is central to evil. Baldwin's scorn doesn't destroy the movie, but turns it into something wiser, more moving, and more beautiful. As the blues that Baldwin loves changes sorrow into art, Baldwin takes American cinema and makes it look in the mirror to see, not the devil, but the face it could have if it were able to acknowledge its own history and violence. It's a face that would be, yes, blacker, but also more honest and more free.
In her first post at her blog at The Washington Post, Alyssa Rosenberg explained that she writes about pop culture because "art and culture are deeply engaged with big, important ideas about the way we live our lives, the conditions we’re willing to let others live in and our most important priorities." I don't disagree with that, and I doubt Baldwin would either. But I think The Devil Finds Work also makes a different case for writing about pop culture. That case is the case that Shakespeare makes for writing drama, or that Jane Austen makes for writing novels, or that Wallace Stevens makes for writing poetry, or Tarkovsky for making films. Baldwin shows that criticism is art, which means that it doesn't need a purpose or a rationale other than truth, or beauty, or keeping faith, or doing whatever it is we think art is trying to do. When I write about pop culture, I'm trying, and failing, to make art as great as The Devil Finds Work. That seems like reason enough.
Yesterday morning at the office we all got an email in our inbox that our co-worker Chuck had brought in a special dessert to share. Not one to miss out on a treat I skittered out of my cubicle to check it out. This pan of "kitty litter" is what I found.
Isn't is GRRRROOOSSSS?! Ha ha we dug into anyhow! What craftsmanship with the kitty poo! It was very tasty! We all got a big kick out of Chuck's April Fool's Kitty Litter Dessert. It's made from cake crumbles, pudding and vanilla cookies. I found the recipe online for anyone that wants to yuck out their friends and family too.
“Their mouths, which mere minutes before had been employed in the process of demolishing and ingesting various foodstuffs, were now jammed up damply against one another while still being used for breathing, which must have been more than a little uncomfortable.”
“Bits of one jammed into bits of the other, dangerously close to some of the weakest and most important internal organs.”
“With absolutely no regard for personal space, the two of them created an unnecessary amount of friction, generating sweat in the process.”
“Some sort of gel emerged.”
“One sat upon the other, like furniture that sneaks inside of your body.”
Here’s the thing. One-piece bathing suits, when wet, are very annoying to take off. And when you’re swimming three hours a day, as I did for practice on my high school swim team, climbing out of the pool, taking it off, and putting it back on every time you have to use the bathroom starts to feel burdensome. So maybe you just… go…somewhere in between the one millionth and one millionth and first lap you’ve swum that day.
Urine is sterile, and chlorine is sterilizing, right? This is the justification we offered ourselves, to counter our shame. Plus, decorated Olympic swimmers Michael Phelps and Ryan Lochte do it.
Turns out that was a pretty bad idea, for more reasons than just the ick factor. A new study published in the American Chemical Society’s journal Environmental Science & Technology, looked at the chemistry of what happens when urine meets chlorine, and it isn’t pretty.
The researchers mixed uric acid, found in both urine and sweat, with chlorine. Within an hour, they found that both trichloramine and cyanogen chloride had formed. These two chemicals are frequently found in chlorinated swimming pools—Ernest Blatchley III, one of the study’s authors, says that in the nearly 10 years he and his team have been studying swimming pool chemistry, they have found those two chemicals in every sample they’ve taken from a pool.
“We know that there are associations between some of these chemicals and adverse human health outcomes, so we’re motivated to understand the chemistry behind their formation and decay,” says Blatchley, a professor at the School of Civil Engineering and Division of Environmental and Ecological Engineering at Purdue University.
Exposure to trichloramine has been linked to respiratory problems, and cyanogen chloride can adversely affect the lungs, central nervous system, and cardiovascular system, according to the CDC.
Both of these chemicals contain nitrogen, Blatchley says, and uric acid also contains nitrogen, in a form the study’s authors suspected would be reactive with chlorine. They were right.
Though there is uric acid in sweat, it’s a pretty small amount, and it’s really urine we should be worried about, Blatchley says. Which is comforting, since if you’re swimming hard, there’s not much you can do about sweating, but you can always, you know, not pee in the pool. Some people do and some people don’t, but on average, a person leaves about 30 to 80 milliliters of urine behind each time they visit the pool.
A major concern, according to Blatchley, is times when there are a lot of people in one pool, such as at a swimming competition. In the presence of chlorine, cyanogen chloride in particular not only forms quickly, as shown in this study, but decays quickly as well. This means that if a lot of people are peeing in the pool, there’s the potential for a lot of cyanogen chloride to form, depleting the chlorine in the pool. While the cyanogen chloride would normally decay quickly, less chlorine means it might stick around longer, and that could be a real problem.
All of this is to say that peeing in the pool is not harmless, despite Phelps’ and Lochte’s claims that it’s normal and everybody does it.
“There’s a lot of people in the swimming community who look up to these people and listen to what they have to say,” he says. “[Phelps and Lochte] are not chemists and shouldn’t be making statements that are that false.”
Yesterday, as a five-alarm fire engulfed a new apartment complex in Houston, a construction worker found himself in pretty much the last place he'd want to: trapped on a ledge, feet from the flames. As he waited, helplessly, to be rescued, others waited with him. The construction site was across the street from an office building, and workers flocked to the windows to see the drama unfold. One of them filmed it. You can see some of their images reflected in the video that resulted, above.
Things ended as well as they could have for the trapped man; he escaped, and no injuries were reported as a result of the fire. In the video, the scene playing out on that ledge vaguely foreshadows this outcome: The person whose life is in danger—who is standing, trapped, as flames lick at the walls next to him—seems relatively calm.
What we hear, instead, is the commentary—the exchanges of people who are watching the scene unfold from a safe distance. And that commentary is … banal. Deeply (and almost profoundly) so. In the same way that your commentary, or mine, might well be were we watching the same scene. Here are some of the sentiments expressed by the onlookers of this terrifyingly unfolding drama:
"OMG."
"Oh, Jesus."
"This guy is on the frickin' ledge."
"He can't get out, 'cuz he can't get out the door."
"You can feel the heat."
"Look at this, oh my God."
"Unbelievable."
"Oh God, oh God, oh God—oh, my God."
"Look at the glass melting up there."
"They need to get him!"
"Get closer to him!"
"Hell, he can jump from there—I mean, good grief."
"I think that we probably should be going."
"Hey, what about the guy? What about this guy?" "They got him."
"Damn, I was gonna get an apartment over there, too." "Not now."
"They're cheaper now."
This is not to criticize the people watching the scene unfold—the people whose commentary, almost literally, upstages the drama of the burning building and the man trapped on its ledge. Again, my own comments, on witnessing the same scene, would probably sound similar. (Though I do like to flatter myself that I'd save the "cheap apartment" hilarity until after the threat of a man being burned alive had officially ended.)
It's worth noting, though, what the real estate humor here hints at: the chaos of tragedy as it's experienced by real people, in real time. The confusion that is so aptly captured by a video like this, shot on a smartphone and posted to YouTube. The same kind of caught chaos we saw with that fertilizer plant in Texas. And with that asteroid exploding in the skies above Russia. And with, for that matter, the Hindenburg disaster.
Compare those ad hoc representations of tragedy to our more traditional ways of knowing tragedy as an aesthetic, and video-taped, reality: through moving images provided by TV news, by Hollywood, by professionals who are trained to keep their mouths shut. On YouTube, as shot by amateurs on the scene, our experience of disaster instead features a Greek chorus of "OMGs" and "Unbelievables." More and more of our portrays of catastrophe—and of the dramas that prevent catastrophe—are now mediated in this way: by other people. People who are shocked and scared and empathetic and, in the best and worst of ways, unthinking. People who, even if they tried, couldn't keep quiet.
It isn't usually spelled out quite so bluntly, but an awful lot of parenting practices are based on the belief that the best way to get kids ready for the painful things that may happen to them later is to make sure they experience plenty of pain while they're young.
I call this BGUTI (rhymes with duty), which is the acronym of Better Get Used To It.
If adults allow—or perhaps even require—children to play a game in which the point is to slam a ball at someone before he or she can get out of the way, or hand out zeroes to underscore a child's academic failure, or demand that most young athletes go home without even a consolation prize (in order to impress upon them the difference between them and the winners), well, sure, the kids might feel lousy—about themselves, about the people around them, and about life itself—but that's the point. It’s a dog-eat-dog world out there, and the sooner they learn that, the better they’ll be at dealing with it.
The corollary claim is that if we intervene to relieve the pain, if we celebrate all the players for their effort, then we'd just be coddling them and giving them false hopes. A little thanks-for-playing trophy might allow them to forget, or avoid truly absorbing, the fact that they lost. Then they might overestimate their own competence and fall apart later in life when they learn the truth about themselves (or about the harshness of life).
The case for BGUTI is, to a large extent, a case for failure. The argument is that when kids don’t get a hoped-for reward, or when they lose a contest, they’ll not only be prepared for more of the same but will be motivated to try harder next time. An essay on this very blog last year, titled “Why Parents Need to Let Their Children Fail,” cued an enormous on-line amen chorus. The journalist Paul Tough informed us, “If you want to develop [kids’] character, you let them fail and don’t hide their failures from them or from anybody else.” A casual Web search produces tens of thousands of similar declarations.
Unlike the charge that children are spoiled, which has been around forever, there was a time when it would have seemed surprising to make a case for failure because it up-ends the expected order. It’s logical to think that success is good and failure is bad; we want to help kids succeed and reassure them about their capabilities. But listen to this: Failure can actually be helpful! It’s possible to feel too good about yourself! Parents may be hurting their children by helping them!
These messages presumably raised eyebrows at first because they were unexpected and counterintuitive. Except now they aren’t. People are still telling this story as if it represents a bold challenge to the conventional wisdom, but the fact is that almost everyone else has been saying the same thing for some time now. It has become the conventional wisdom. Indeed, the notion that failure is beneficial, or that kids today are overprotected or suffer from inflated self-esteem, is virtually the only message on these subjects that we’re likely to hear.
The corresponding advice—let them stumble!—is offered in response to our alleged failure to let children fail. So let’s begin by asking whether this assumption is really true. The idea that kids lack experience with failure and frustration is really just another way of saying that things are too easy for them. But have you ever met a child who doesn’t regularly experience failure and frustration? I haven’t. One need only watch a child carefully—or, if the occasion presents itself, ask her directly—to get a sense of how often she tends to fall short of her own or others’ expectations, how often she’s disappointed with how things worked out, how often she doesn’t get what she wants, how often she finds herself on the receiving end of critical judgments from her peers or adults, how desperately she wishes she could perform as well as __________ (that kid she knows who seems to do things effortlessly). And her frustrations are doubtless compounded if all these feelings aren’t taken seriously by adults. Which they often aren’t.
The key question, though, is how likely it is that failure will be constructive, and whether our chief concern should be to make sure children have more opportunities to screw up. Undoubtedly many very successful people have encountered setbacks and deprivation on the way to triumph. But that doesn’t mean that most people who encounter setbacks and deprivation go on to become successful. We rarely hear about all those folks who displayed awesome grit and gumption but never made a go of their business, never sold their app, were never discovered by a talent scout, never had a chance to smugly recount their earlier setbacks and deprivation to an interviewer—for the simple reason that they're still having them.
Here’s what we learn from psychology: What’s most reliably associated with success are prior experiences with success, not with failure. Although there are exceptions, the most likely consequence of having failed at something is that a child will come to see himself as lacking competence. And the result of that belief is apt to be more failure. All else being equal, a student who gets a zero is far more likely to give up (and perhaps act up) than to try harder.
We may wish that a child who can’t seem to get on base, or spit out a list of facts from memory during a test, or coax anything more than a hideous shriek from his violin will react by squaring his shoulders, reciting the mantra of The Little Engine That Could, and redoubling his efforts until, gosh darn it, he turns things around. But wishing doesn’t make it true. That turn of events remains the exception rather than the rule. It’s true that kids learn from failure, but what they’re likely to learn is that they’re failures.
In a typical experiment, children are asked to solve problems that are rigged to ensure failure. After that, they’re asked to solve problems that are clearly within their capabilities. What happens? Even the latter problems now tend to paralyze them because a spiral of failure has been set into motion. This doesn’t happen in every case, of course, but for at least half a century researchers have been documenting the same basic effect with children of various ages.
Failure often proves damaging in part, as Deborah Stipek of Stanford University explains, because it changes children’s understanding of why they succeed and why they fail. Specifically, those who have learned to see themselves as failures are “more likely to attribute success [when it does happen] to external causes, and [to attribute] failure to a lack of ability” as compared to “children who have a history of good performance.” A kid who doesn’t do well assumes that if he does succeed, he must have just gotten lucky—or that the task was easy. And he assumes that if he fails again, which he regards as more likely, it’s because he doesn’t have what it takes: intelligence, athletic ability, musical talent, whatever.
This quickly turns into a vicious circle because attributing results to causes outside of one’s control makes people feel even more helpless, even less likely to do well in the future. The more they fail, the more they construct an image of themselves—and a theory about the results—that leads to still more failure.
And it’s not just achievement that suffers. Those who fail also tend to lose interest in whatever they’re doing (say, learning), and they come to prefer easier tasks. Both of these outcomes make perfect sense: It’s hard for a child to stay excited about something she has reason to think she can’t do well, and it’s even harder for her to welcome a more difficult version of whatever she was doing. In fact, failure often leads kids to engage in something that psychologists call “self-handicapping”: They deliberately make less of an effort in order to create an excuse for not succeeding. This lets them preserve the idea that they have high aptitude. They’re able to tell themselves that if they had tried, they might have done much better.
And the news is even worse if we’re concerned about kids’ psychological health. Even someone who really does buckle down and try harder when he fails may be doing so out of an anxious, compulsive pressure to feel better about himself rather than because he takes pleasure from what he’s doing. Even if it does occur, is success really worth that price?
What all this means is that when kids’ performance slides, when they lose enthusiasm for what they’re doing, or when they try to cut corners, much more is going on than laziness or lack of motivation. What's relevant is what their experiences have been. And the experience of having failed is a uniquely poor bet for anyone who wants to maximize the probability of future success.
This Alice Bradley was, among other things, principal of the Fannie Farmer School of Cookery from 1915-1944. The cookbook pictured above (actually more of an advertorial pamphlet, Other Bradley) promised salads both alluring AND new, and it delivered, but today I’m going to a highlight an even more glorious example of Ms. Bradley’s expertise: The Alice Bradley Menu Cook-Book.
Now, I’m no expert on semi-aspirational Depression-era cuisine, but if I had to imagine what it was like, it would guess this. The meats are boiled; the sauces are white. Many of the foods are mock-foods. There’s always one extra step that tips a relatively inoffensive side dish into pure horror. Take, for instance, “Date Salad.”
1. Wash and remove pits, stones, whatever you want to call them, sure. 2. Fill with peanut butter: so far I’m on board. 3. Oh, wait, the peanut butter should be mixed with some WHAT THE NO NO NO— 4. Curl up into a tight ball and shriek with your mouth closed until you stop imagining peanut butter and mayonnaise together. P.S.: Why isn’t she saying what the shredded lettuce is dressed with? I’ll tell you why: it’s French dressing. It’s always French dressing. Back when Alice Bradley was in charge, only the French did dressing.
Next up: this.
I’m sure Alice Bradley was a nice person, but only a monster would think to cream celery.
Let’s cleanse our mental palate with some Jellied Cabbage Salad, shall we? This one, at least, sounds…adventurous? I don’t know, I’m broken. Hey, what can we serve this with OH GOD NO.
Okay, Chili con Carne is, well. Huh. There’s no French dressing in it, and that’s something. But isn’t this a little more…boiled than the kind of chili we’re used to? Is that…enough seasoning? I mean, I’m not the Principal of any School of Cookery, so who am I to say?
Finally, an alarmingly simple breakfast suggestion. I looked really closely at this one, and I’m pretty sure there’s no boiling or surprise mayo anywhere in here. I’m not sure, though. I don’t know that I can trust my own eyes.
Next week: we look at some of those alluring (and new!) salads. They have a spicy secret. (Hint: it's not mayonnaise. Usually.)
Oh, Louise Gluck is so good, and intimacy is so funny and cruel and singular and wonderful and awful, and I was rereading this poem ("Anniversary") yesterday:
I said you could snuggle. That doesn’t mean
your cold feet all over my dick.
Someone should teach you how to act in bed.
What I think is you should
keep your extremities to yourself.
Look what you did—
you made the cat move.
The short rest of it ("There's a lot more where those feet came from") at the Poetry Foundation.
Here is a perfect object. It is sold out, which is understandable: I would pay $20, easily, for such a vivrant thing.
Here is a conundrum: I cannot find anything else quite like it to buy in its stead?! There are lots of wine-themedshower curtains, even ones that say I'd rather be drinking wine, which is a formal construction I find reprehensible: one must truly be about something before one talks about it, we must continue to value action over asininely expressed intent.
There are also plenty of wine traysfor the bath, but they look pretty high-gloss for my blood. Wherefore the bath wine accessories for the person who sometimes accidentally squirts pet shampoo into her hand when she's sleepy? Where are the party-for-uno tools that aesthetically insinuate a deep understanding of the fact that comfort is not always fancy but often quite the opposite and that everything is better when it just directly addresses the point?
What I'm saying is, someone please go on Shark Tank with a nice, simple dishwasher-safe suction cup for bath wine and I suspect that at least some portion of the Hairpin readership will immediately be on hand with a bulk order so we can live, collectively, our best lives now.
So we did it. We concrete’d our kitchen’s laminate counters. Sherry shared this quick peek at our first coat in Friday’s post, and we’re back with the final results, the details of how we got there, and an in-action video to hopefully help explain the process.
We’re really happy with how they turned out. Pictures don’t do it justice, but the whole room feels a lot more updated and less laminate-y. It’s giving off kind of a stark/cold vibe in these photos, but after we add some colorful window treatments, stuff on the shelves/counters, and remedy that bad faux brick flooring (and that almond stove) we think it’ll feel like a whole new room. I’m not going to sugar coat it, though. It was a lot of work. And a lot of dust.
Here’s a reminder of what the counters looked like before. We had creamy-yellow laminate (with the occasional burn mark or scratch). In addition to the main kitchen area, we also gave the concrete treatment to the nearby nook by the eat-in part of the kitchen. We haven’t sealed the counters yet (we haven’t been able to track down either of the two products that our research points to using), so the color will probably get a bit deeper after that step.
We did this using Ardex Feather Finish, which we’ve been really interested in trying since seeing a few other attempts like these from Kara Paslay, Little Green Notebook, Sarah’s Big Idea, and A Beautiful Mess. Somewhere between all of their pretty pictures and the low price tag for Ardex ($19 per bag) I had assumed this would be a quick and easy task. Oh silly me…
Maybe it was because we’re first timers, or maybe it was because our work area was especially large (we were dealing with 45 square feet of counters thanks to the U-shaped area in the cooking zone and the nook area by the table), but it turned out to be a tiring and messy job that spanned across five days. It wasn’t very complicated or difficult, just more labor and time intensive than we realized we were getting ourselves into. So let’s dive into the process. Forgive our photos for not being chronological. We took a bunch throughout our four rounds of applying/sanding the Ardex and I’m just using the ones that are most helpful. Let’s begin with supplies!
Ardex Feather Finish, obviously. It’s not easy to come by, but you can hunt for a local distributor on their site or just Amazon it. Richmonders, we found ours at Fishman Flooring Solutions. We ended up using 2.5 bags, though I think we applied it a bit thicker than necessary.
Mixing buckets: We used one of these small red buckets for mixing our Ardex (it mixes with water). We made pretty small batches, so this was a great size.
Measuring buckets: We used these (one for water, one for Ardex powder) to make sure we were mixing the right ratio in our red bucket.
Sandpaper: A variety of grits – both high and low, as well as a sanding block for easy gripping. We used mostly 60, 120, and 220 grit.
Spreading tools: We used the flat trowel (on right) for mixing in the bucket, then used the other three for spreading. The big 10″ drywall knife was good for big flat areas, the 4″ putty knife was great for backsplash and edges, while the small guy helped us get into tight spots, like around the sink.
Stuff for keeping walls clean: We kept a sponge and paper towels on hand to clean up any drips or splatters on the wall. We also taped off some areas too (more on that later).
Protective gear: During the sanding process the glasses and dust mask helped keep stuff out of our faces (Sherry preferred our heavy duty respirator) while the gloves were great for keeping our fingers from getting crazy raw.
*None of the links in this post are affiliate links
Speaking of sanding… the first step was to rough up the existing counters with some high grit sandpaper. This was before we realized our fingers would be taking a beating from all of the sandpaper gripping. We wised up and added gloves and used nice big sanding blocks wrapped in high grit paper about ten minutes into it. It went much easier after that.
The Ardex bag suggests a mixture of 2-parts powder to 1-part water, but we found that balance to be a little bit on the thick side – making it hard to spread and what we believe led to our first layer being, well, on the thick side too. So we erred on the side of a bit more water from that point on.
Like grout or thinset, the goal seems to be a toothpaste-like consistency. Thick enough that it doesn’t run or drip off your blade, but thin enough to spread easily. If you’re mixing larger batches it suggests a paddle mixer, but we did just fine by hand (Sherry took a turn mixing things too and didn’t have any issues doing it by hand). Since it starts to harden within about 15-20 minutes, we never wanted to mix up too much at once anyway.
Spreading it on the flat surfaces was kinda fun, in a weird way. It was like icing a giant cake and using a big 10″ blade made it pretty fast to get the big areas covered. The backsplash was another story, but we’ll get to that in a second.
Here’s a quick video Sherry took of me applying the third coat, since we thought it’d helpful for you to see the stuff in action. I’m not claiming my technique to be great or anything, but we did find we got a bit better each round (Sherry also thought we got better at sanding/smoothing each layer as we went). Which is good news because your first couple of layers will get covered up anyways – so they’re kind of like low-risk practice rounds.
When it came to doing the sides, we switched to a smaller putty knife. We usually did these after we had applied most of our mixture to the top, that way what was left in the bucket had set a bit more and was less likely to slide off the vertical surface.
At first we found the edges to be challenging since it was easy for stuff to build up there. What we realized a couple of rounds in was that after about 20 minutes the Ardex had hardened to an almost clay-like consistency, and Sherry or I could come back and smooth the edges with a damp finger. My favorite part was sneaking up behind Sherry all Ghost-style to smooth them from behind her back. Who says there’s no romance in DIY?
Here’s our first round after it dried. You can see Sherry taped off the wall to protect it when I lamented how much was getting on them as I went. In hindsight we’re still unsure whether that ended up being a smart decision. It certainly made us less paranoid about being messy as we went, but removal was a bit of a pain and not perfect since we were essentially concrete-ing the tape to the wall in a few spots.
We decided to ditch the tape after our second round of counter smoothing, so we slowly worked our way around the room peeling it off (we feared that too much concrete build-up would trap the tape in place forever). One thing that we found during this process was that pulling it down from the top (rather than ripping it to the side like we do after painting) did a better job of getting a clean edge and not just tearing the tape. But we did have to chisel it free in a few areas… so I’m not sure if it was a time saver in the end.
Things looked pretty rough after our first round (well, after every round actually). But that’s where the fun mess begins: the sanding step. Here’s where you smooth out any rough spots or ridges so that the next layer can go on evenly and ultimately get you to a flat, smooth finish.
After letting the surface dry overnight, first Sherry would go across the top with a putty knife and scrape off any obvious ridges that were left by the drywall knife during the Ardex application. Even though it had hardened, it wasn’t tough to do. Blobs and ridges just popped right off as she scraped back and forth over them.
The most satisfying thing was cleaning off the bottom edge. Sherry realized we could just run our smaller putty knife along those and sheer off any irregularities, which left us with an awesomely crisp line on the bottom. Best part of this project by far. Could’ve done it all day.
That step was quickly followed by our least favorite part: sanding, sanding, and more sanding. We chose to do it all by hand, since we feared that our power sander would just sand everything down to the laminate again (or leave rough ridges or marks as it traveled around the counter). Plus, with all of the tight spots like the backsplash and around the sink, we figured it would be easier to maneuver by hand.
We used a sanding block (for easy grip) wrapped in fresh sandpaper each time. For sanding every layer except for the last one we used a really rough 60-grit paper to make smoothing ridges and rough spots easy, but after the last coat of Ardex (we did four coats) was all smoothed on and dry, we switched to 220-grit paper to make sure we didn’t leave big/rough scratches in that top coat of concrete.
Sherry also realized that it was helpful for us to pause while sanding each section to vacuum off the excess dust as we went (thanks shop vac!). This was especially helpful because sometimes the dust would disguise an area that needed a bit more sanding. Plus, it just helped for sanity reasons, since we felt like we were keeping the mess more contained that way.
Speaking of which, the mess was the biggest surprise to us. Despite reading other people’s experiences with it (and obviously, we knew sanding was involved), I don’t think either of us had mentally prepared for the fact that there’d be a fine gray build-up of powder EVERYWHERE. And since the kitchen is such a central and highly traffic area of our house, keeping it clean ended up being a big time suck (after each round we would sweep, then vacuum, and then mop the floors to be sure nobody tracked anything throughout the house when they passed through over the five days that we worked on it).
After our first coat, we noticed the laminate was peeking through in a few spots after our initial sanding step – mostly on edges where it’s really easy to scrape everything off if you’re not careful. But that’s one reason you do multiple coats, so we weren’t too panicked.
Here you can see a second coat beginning to get applied over the first. Note the difference in color between the wet Ardex vs. the lighter stuff (that’s how it dries). We actually think once we seal it, it’ll get closer to the wet color though, so that should be interesting to see.
Here’s a shot of our final counters (well, pre-sealing). You can see it’s still not perfect, which everyone notes is one of the charms of this Ardex technique. You definitely get that sort of imperfect, industrial look. But it definitely feels more solid & stone-like, as opposed to plastic-y like laminate.
I’ll admit that I had to come around to the idea of appreciating the flaws of the finish. Sherry was immediately charmed by it, but the perfectionist in me resented the fact that this type of project doesn’t yield perfectly uniform results. I think once we seal it I’ll appreciate it even more (that will darken it a little and remove the chalky finish in favor of a more polished look) so I’m really looking forward to that.
By far the hardest area to get smooth was the backsplash, just because it was a small area that was difficult to reach and seemingly made up entirely of edges and corners. So both applying the Ardex and sanding it was challenging and required a bit of body contorting on my part (lucky Sherry was too pregnant to reach it in most areas thanks to her belly being in the way, which had me slightly envious by the end of this process).
Another tough spot was around the sink. If this were our “forever” counter, I would’ve gone through the trouble of removing the sink, but we’ve got some old copper pipes that are pretty much corroded together down there (which would mean bringing in a plumber to switch this out). So we opted to save that for Phase 2 of our kitchen update and just taped / sanded around it. The results were actually better than I expected.
Challenges and flaws aside, we’re happy with the overall improvement to the space. It feels good to rid the kitchen of another old yellowed surface and make the room feel a bit more 2014. Just cover the floor with your hand and squint – ok?
And although the time that we spent on this update was longer than we envisioned (probably around 15 hours spread across five days, including prep and clean-up) the cost was still pretty fantastic. The three bags of Ardex (again, we only needed 2.5 to do four coats) cost $57 in total – and we probably spent another $20 in buckets and sandpaper. So for 45 square feet of countertops, we paid just $1.71 per square foot to update it – which is pretty hard to beat.
That doesn’t include the sealer though, which is next on our list. We’ve read a ton of sealer reviews since it seems that the wrong sealer can cause more scratches, stains, and even issues like bubbling down the line – so we want to get it right. The two most highly recommended products seem to be Ardex Clear Concrete Guard High Performance Sealer and GST International Satin Seal Water Based Acrylic Sealer. Does anyone out there have a preference between the two? We can’t find either of them locally so we’re going to have to order one of them online and wait for it to come, but we’ll definitely share what we end up going with, how it goes on, and what it does to change this finish – as well as updating you guys on how these counters end up wearing for us over time.
Have any of you tried Ardex? What’s your take? As tired as we are from all of that sanding, we’re kinda excited to take it for a spin again… just on something much, much smaller.
Nearly every time Tris Prior is given a new set of clothes, they’re too loose. The protagonist of the enormously popular Divergent trilogy—which sees its first film adaptation Friday—is so short and thin that she has to roll up her jeans three times just to make them fit, and her shirts come close to slipping off her narrow shoulders. Tris may be one of the toughest teens in all of dystopian Chicago, but she still refers to herself as “birdlike, made narrow and small … built straight-waisted and fragile.”
When it comes to recent young adult sci-fi and fantasy literature, this is typical. Divergent is just one in a spate of recent young adult novels—three of which saw big-budget film adaptations in 2013—to emphasize the diminutive stature of its main character.
In Mortal Instruments, for example, Clary Frayis “delicate” and “slender,” with a small chest and “narrow hips.” Lena Duchannes, the most powerful “caster” (i.e., witch) in the Beautiful Creatures series, earned her nickname “Lena Beana” because her grandmother thought she was “skinny as a string bean.” We learn that the tenacious heroine of Blood Red Road (a best-selling “Mad Max for girls”) is “scrawny” before we even learn her name. And, of course, there’s The Hunger Games, which makes it clear that Katniss Everdeen is “smaller naturally,” even in comparison with the other members of her starving district. Some readers became so attached to the image of a short, emaciated girl claiming victory in the battle-royal arena that when Jennifer Lawrence was cast as Katniss, multiple critics complained that she was too “big-boned” for the part.
Today’s strong female protagonists are overwhelmingly described as “small,” “skinny,” and “slender.” It seems literature only goes so far in its message of female empowerment, routinely granting its most kickass heroines classically masculine-levels of strength (physical or otherwise) only when cloaked within the trappings of a more delicate—and recognizable—femininity.
Since these characters are nearly always underestimated based on their size, it’s safe to assume readers are meant to see their triumphs as all the more impressive. Having a tiny heroine is an easy way to create a satisfying David and Goliath narrative—the stuff on which young-adult fiction is built. But so many stories about powerful young women employ this trope that it can’t just be written off as lazy characterization. Besides, would their arcs be any less compelling if their thighs touched, or they occasionally had to invest in a sports bra?
None of these books fawn over their leading ladies’ size, but, by default, they link being undersized with being exceptional—each of these characters is singled out as special for having more grit, skill, and/or magical prowess than most everyone around them. Divergent goes so far as to associate flab with low moral character: When Tris first meets her nemesis Jeanine, she wears a tight dress that reveals “a layer of pudge around her middle” and knees “crossed with stretch marks.” Of course the virtuous heroine is delicate and birdlike, while the unsympathetic villain has stretch marks.
There’s clearly something intriguing about strength in small packages, but only when it comes to female characters. Male leads, by contrast, are more often described using language that would typically indicate power; Tris is the “skinny girl from Abnegation,” but Four, her love interest and training instructor, has a deep voice that “rumbles” and muscles that are “taut, defined.”
Being skinny isn’t a bad thing, but it becomes an issue when so many of the strongest female characters around conform to a single body type—especially one long associated with a narrow definition of what it means to be feminine. And in more adult fare, this archetype of the delicate-looking action hero often gets twisted into a fetish disguised as girl power. (Just look at the ultra-violent Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Sucker Punch, and virtually everything Joss Whedon has ever written.)
But this is the same double standard that we’ve been subjected to again and again; just as women are expected to be sexual but not slutty, pure but not prudish, heroines should be strong but not buff. Powerful, yet still delicate enough to be cradled by their male love interests. Mature enough to lead those around them, yet so small that people confuse them with innocent little girls.
Characters like Katniss, Tris, and Clary are rightly praised for being self-sufficient role models, and proving that female-driven stories sell books. I just hope that someday, strong female characters will actually reflect and affirm the diversity of the young readers who idolize them.
I rarely have visceral reactions to movie previews, let alone previews for Tyler Perry movies that I am never, ever going to see, but I gaped through a two-minute trailer for The Single Moms Club. Gathered on a broad porch, drinking rosé and sharing laughs, are five single moms, none exhibiting a single dark eye-circle or a frenzied need to get somewhere they’ve forgotten. They look like they smell nice and eat well. They’re laughing. They’re talking about men, ho ho, how can we lock them down?
My mother, who divorced my father in England in 1995 when I was eight and my brother was nine, and moved us across the ocean to America, never looked like those women. She did her best to hide it, but she was often harried and panicked, shuttling us from school to activities while pursuing her master’s degree, then her doctorate, all with a lower middle-class income and mounting debt. She moved us to a new country with little to nothing and continued to support us through years of fighting, ungratefulness, and trial. When I was home last week, she and I reclined on my bed and talked about her experience as a single mother operating under precarious and challenging circumstances.
When you were living in England and you wanted to get a divorce, did you have apprehension because you knew you were going to have to raise us by yourself?
Yeah, just like anybody would. Previously, before things started to go badly in our marriage, I wasn’t worrying about things like money and security and your future. It wasn’t a concern of mine until I knew I was going to be on my own.
Again, the situation is unique because once I decided I wanted to get a divorce, I knew that I wanted to go back to America. So that was the driving impetus. I didn’t want to stay in England, and your dad wanted me to stay there. At one point I even suggested that we go back together, and he didn’t want to do that.
Would you have been happy doing that, though?
How could I know?
If you’re going to divorce someone, it’s about the person. It wouldn’t matter where you were living with them.
I was going to give it a shot, you know. I was torn because I didn’t want to be the bad guy taking you two away from your dad.
Why do you think it was so important to not take us away from our dad?
I think it’s a sad thing for any child. Not that I felt that you were particularly close to your father. You were only eight and your brother was nine. And my parents were divorced when I was nine. You don’t want to replicate the same mistakes your parents had made.
Why did you see their divorce as a mistake?
At the time, I didn’t know enough about their relationship. Now I know that if my parents had stayed together, it would have been a disaster. And with your father and I, it just became more and more apparent as the years went on that we were so different. I just couldn’t see it working.
Why did you want to come to America?
I felt very lonely, coming from a large, extended Italian family as I do. I was missing so many things—you know, people’s marriages, people died and I didn’t get to pay my respects. England is a different place, it’s a whole different culture. Your father’s family weren’t exactly the warmest, touchy-feely kind of people. There wasn’t that closeness.
What was it like when you first divorced Dad?
Our divorce went through in around July of ‘95, and it took 9 days because I wanted to take you back with me. The way the law works in England is that if you’re a citizen of another country, you can divorce and go back at any time, but if there are children involved, then the court decides whether or not the children leave.
How did you convince the court?
The judge ruled that he was going to let me decide. He said these words: “I know that you will make the right decision. I’m not going to decide for you.” Barristers on both sides had never heard of this happening before. But we had witnesses. Grandmom flew over from America. Your aunt was there. A few people wrote letters that were read out in court.
What was dad’s testimony like?
He painted us like this family from Sicily. He didn’t really have a whole lot to say about his forthright behavior as a father because one of the things that he and I always used to argue about was when he would take you guys out on a Sunday or whatever, he’d always end up at the rugby club. I don’t know if you remember those days. At the pub and at the rugby club, and there’d be nothing for you to do, you’d go kicking and screaming.
Why do you think a person like that would have kids if he wasn’t really interested in it?
He didn’t really want kids.
Then why did he have kids?
I wanted kids. I didn’t trap him, it just happened. To me, it was a natural part of being married and being with someone.
Do you think that you were better off once you were a single mother?
If I had to choose, I wouldn’t do it on my own. Why not have support from another person? Who would say that you’d want to do this job on your own? It’s the hardest thing that I’ve ever done in my life.
Specifically?
Obviously the money side of it. Basic security things. Raising you and having to buy things and find a place to live. Once we got divorced and we were settled and I put the house up for sale, he was told he had to pay so much money a week for each of you, no more, no less, and he did it begrudgingly.
What about spending time with us?
I said he could come whenever he wanted. I wasn’t going to prevent him from seeing you. I would even invite him over for dinner but he would never come. He was just like, “Nope nope nope, that’s it, it’s done.”
How did you manage with your own time? Were you working?
While this whole thing was going on, I got my associate’s degree in teaching at a community college level, only in England it’s a more substantial program. I did that and during the day, I was trying to work for this insurance company, although it didn’t work out. So I got a job at Southfield’s College as an English Lit teacher and a Communications teacher.
Bri, my friend Bri, we would take turns. I’d babysit for her, she’d babysit for me. Both of you were in daycare, that’s how I managed.
Were you ever in a pickle in those years?
I’m sure I was, Dayna, but I honestly can’t remember. I do remember when you got your cut on your elbow. That was the one time I asked your father to babysit, the first time, and you had to go to the emergency room. I’m sure there were times when I had to cancel plans.
What did you feel like in the early days, when you first separated?
I felt isolated. I missed my family. They wanted us to come home so badly. My sister came over another time. I just felt like I was out on an island, it was just really difficult to do it. I wanted a normal family life, it felt so strange. I didn’t feel like I belonged there anymore.
Who did you talk to?
Bri. Grandmom. My sisters. They were my support system.
What got you through the day?
I had to work. I didn’t have a choice. I just knew that I had to provide. I never really thought about it. I just did what I had to do.
You didn’t ever have moments of despair?
I did with your father because it was never easy. He never made any of it easy. And I’m sure there were many times that I just didn’t know. He wasn’t paying a lot of support and I wasn’t earning a great deal of money, and it’s expensive over there, so I just felt like if anything happened, I didn’t know what I was going to do.
Did you ever feel like we ever wanted things that we couldn’t have?
I know that I tried to give you everything that you wanted, if I knew what it was. Your brother told me that he felt a time that he couldn’t have what he wanted. Did you feel that way?
I don’t think so. I knew that we didn’t have a lot but I never felt like there were things that I wanted that I couldn’t have.
Under the circumstances, you always had your house, you always had clothes. We had Christmas. We did everything that was important.
What was it like when we first moved to America?
Well, we first moved in with my sister and my brother-in-law.
Did you come with a plan? How were you going to make money?
Not exactly. I had my bachelor’s degree, and I was banking on this teaching certificate to help me, and I was probably formulating the idea then that I needed to get my master’s degree because in the States, a bachelor’s is just nothing, even then. We moved back in August of ‘95 and I started looking at courses. I broke my foot in December and I started January of ‘96 on my graduate program on crutches. I started teaching SAT prep. I found two part-time jobs.
Did you feel a struggle at that point or a relief?
I felt a relief in some ways because I was with my family and everyone was so happy that we were there, and were part of things, but I was worried about the two of you because I wanted you to start off on the right foot. Your brother had that kid bullying him for a while, remember? We had a little bit of a rough start, I guess.
Did you ever regret your decision?
No. In terms of prosperity and advancement and opportunity, I just didn’t see it for us in England.
Who were you doing it for?
You!
You were still young. Didn’t you want to have your life?
I made friends again. I met people. I had some disastrous relationships, just guys that were not worth two cents. I felt like I was fulfilling my desire, going to school, advancing my career at the time. I felt like that was important, too.
Did you feel personally satisfied?
In what way?
There’s always that debate—can women have it all? Can they be a mother and a career person?
I wasn’t really a career person, per se. I liked helping people. There’s not a lot of money in helping people. I wasn’t looking to be the president or the CEO of a company and drive a big old shiny car. I was satisfied if I felt fulfilled in my job, and I loved work, I really did. I guess I felt guilty sometimes because I didn’t know for sure. I was always worried about you two being happy.
How did you know that you were going to secure our happiness?
I knew I couldn’t. It was up to you to do that. Only you could be happy in yourself. I’m not talking about happiness like having material things and all that. I wanted you to feel like that you belonged where you were and that you were starting to thrive in your own direction.
Did you get a sense that that was starting to happen?
Well, there was a sense that it wasn’t happening, like I said with all that bullying that went on with your brother and you had a little bit of a patch there. But yeah, things started to get better. I saw that happening.
But you never regretted it?
I thought about it. I analyzed it. I wondered. But I would do it all over again. I realized it even more when we went back the first time. I was so glad that I left there. You wouldn’t have been able to grow the way you’ve grown.
Is that a mother’s instinct?
My instinct. My experiences. Just looking at you and your brother. I really don’t think you would have survived there. I felt like England was going to suffocate you. You’d probably end up living in America on your own anyway.
What were some of the best parts about being a single mom?
I don’t know that there are really any best parts. You get to make all the decisions, but having said that, you don’t always know if you’ve made the right decision. It’s good to bounce that off of someone else. You just have to make decisions and stick by it.
Have you ever made the wrong decision?
Oh I’m sure. I’m sure you two could tell me a few things I did wrong. But I’m pretty strong-willed anyway, and even if I had a partner, husband, whatever, you know when I feel something’s right, I just go with my gut. Hopefully, if I had had a partner at the time, they would have felt the same way. It would have been a lot easier to have somebody else just standing there, even if you’re making the decision yourself, just somebody next to you, supporting you. It was worth it when your brother graduated and when you graduated. That was a real accomplishment.
Did you ever feel like it wasn’t going to happen?
No. I got a little scared about the money with school. That was probably one place where I would have been better about decision-making if I’d had support.
What about relationships you were in? How did you know to introduce us to who you were dating?
I felt if they were a kind soul and it seemed like we could make a life together, or it seemed that way, then it made sense. I wasn’t a very good judge of character sometimes.
Do you regret that?
Yeah. Well, no, I don’t really regret it. I don’t think it was detrimental. It’s all part of the experience. It’s hard when you’re a young, single mom. You don’t know if it’s best to be alone and just stay alone until you’re too old to have a relationship. But that never made sense to me. Suppose I never met anyone until I was 60 or 65, you know?
How do you balance your attention?
I would always make sure that you guys were doing something. It wasn’t ever taking time away from you, in other words. If anything, I spent more time alone because you guys would go do your thing, and I was by myself. I always had something to do, like study, and I had my family. But I spent a lot of time alone alone while you guys were growing up, doing your thing.
What if we didn’t like the people you were dating?
Did that happen?
I never liked anybody you dated!
Well, you never made a big deal out of it!
It wasn’t my life. Do you feel like you were getting in relationships as a way to fill a role that wasn’t there?
I think that’s the basis for any relationship, whether you have kids or not.
You’re more eager, though, as a single parent. It takes some of the burden off.
I’m sure it’s nice when you meet someone that you think you’ll like and that your kids will like, but you don’t go into it thinking they’re going to take your responsibilities. I don’t remember anybody having any say in anything that I did, ever, as far as you guys were concerned.
It was only until your stepdad whom I married when you were 20 that I relinquished some of my power. But only then.
What was rewarding about being a single parent?
Having two kids like you and your brother. I’m so grateful that you turned out the way you did.
Do you think that we’re crazy?
No, I don’t think that you’re crazy, but I do think that you’re both very individual souls with your own humor and personalities. I see part of me in both of you.
What about part of dad?
I see part of him in your brother, more than you. But that’s another topic.
Would you consider being a single parent a hardship in your life?
It is the hardest thing that I’ve ever had to do and it still is, even with my husband now, even with you being older. Being a parent is not for the faint-hearted. It’s tough. I think it’s easy to fall into a pity party where you look to friends with partners or husbands to share in some of the burden, but I saw a lot of relationships where it was actually more detrimental than helpful to have a partner. I saw many husbands who did nothing. It was almost like the wife had three kids instead of two. He was another liability. I don’t necessarily think that a two-parent family is always the best.
It takes a village, right?
I think it’s easier when you have a lot of good role models. They don’t necessarily have to be your biological father or mother. You have people in your life who make a difference in your life, and I think you learn from that. You could have the crappiest parents in the world and just because they’re together, what are you learning? That’s what annoys me about people who have an attitude about single parents, having this holistic system that you’re supposed to have two parents and all that business. Because that could be a toxic environment, too. It’s not necessarily stable. Nothing is.
IKEA is helping my Tennis withrawals with this Solur Tennis Trainer. I can hit the ball alone, one some big open space, no wall or partner needed. Yes!
This bottle looking device by Bin Akebono combines eight (!) kitchen essentials in one clever kit. An ideal gift for anyone living in tight spaces. The set includes a funnel, a lemon juicer, a spice grater, an egg masher, a cheese grater, a lid grip for loosening stubborn jar tops, an egg separator, and a 1 1/4 measuring cup. Seriously cool.
W.E.B. Du Bois was a man of many achievements. In 1895, he became the first African American to earn a Ph.D at Harvard; he co-founded, in 1909, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; his influential 1903 book on race, The Souls of Black Folk, is considered a classic in its field. He was also a tireless civil rights activist. In 1914, his soon-to-be 14-year-old daughter, Yolande, left the family home to study at Bedales School in England. He wrote her the following letter of advice soon after her arrival.
I have waited for you to get well settled before writing. By this time I hope some of the strangeness has worn off and that my little girl is working hard and regularly.
Of course, everything is new and unusual. You miss the newness and smartness of America. Gradually, however, you are going to sense the beauty of the old world: its calm and eternity and you will grow to love it.
Above all remember, dear, that you have a great opportunity. You are in one of the world’s best schools, in one of the world’s greatest modern empires. Millions of boys and girls all over this world would give almost anything they possess to be where you are. You are there by no desert or merit of yours, but only by lucky chance.
Deserve it, then. Study, do your work. Be honest, frank and fearless and get some grasp of the real values of life. You will meet, of course, curious little annoyances. People will wonder at your dear brown and the sweet crinkley hair. But that simply is of no importance and will soon be forgotten. Remember that most folk laugh at anything unusual, whether it is beautiful, fine or not. You, however, must not laugh at yourself. You must know that brown is as pretty as white or prettier and crinkley hair as straight even though it is harder to comb. The main thing is the YOU beneath the clothes and skin—the ability to do, the will to conquer, the determination to understand and know this great, wonderful, curious world. Don’t shrink from new experiences and custom. Take the cold bath bravely. Enter into the spirit of your big bed-room. Enjoy what is and not pine for what is not. Read some good, heavy, serious books just for discipline: Take yourself in hand and master yourself. Make yourself do unpleasant things, so as to gain the upper hand of your soul.
Above all remember: your father loves you and believes in you and expects you to be a wonderful woman.
I shall write each week and expect a weekly letter from you.
Lovingly yours,
Papa
RSS Feed proudly sponsored by TinyLetter, a simple newsletter service for people with something to say.
TMZ has put together this excellent highlight reel of a recent 4 1/2 hour deposition hearing where the Biebs is being sued for allegedly ordering his bodyguard to beat up a member of the paparazzi.
The mashup includes all of Bieber's antics during the hearing which are likely to make your head spin. One of my favorite "arguments" he had during the hearing: "How could I ever be aware of something, knowing something? That's physically impossible."
See all things Bieber using Cheezburger's Search feature now.
My plunge into poverty happened in an instant. I never saw it coming.
Then again, there was no reason to feel particularly vulnerable. Two years ago, I was a political reporter at Politico, and I spent my days covering the back-and-forth of presidential politics. I had access to the White House because of my reporting beat, and I was a regular commentator on MSNBC. My career had been on an upward trajectory for 30 years, and at age 50 I still anticipated a long career.
On June 21, 2012, I was invited to discuss race, Republican candidate Mitt Romney, and the 2012 presidential election on MSNBC. I said this:
“Romney is very, very comfortable, it seems, with people who are like him. That’s one of the reasons why he seems so stiff and awkward in town hall settings … But when he comes on ‘Fox and Friends,’ they’re like him. They’re white folks who are very much relaxed in their own company.”
The political Internet exploded. Because I’m an African American, enraged conservative bloggers branded me an anti-white racist. Others on the right, like Andrew Breitbart’s Big Media, mined my personal Twitter account and unearthed a crude Romney joke I’d carelessly retweeted a month before. The Romney campaign cried foul. In less than two weeks I was out of a job.
This wasn’t the end of my troubles. Five months earlier my ex-wife and I had a fight; I got a restraining order against her; she filed charges. To put it behind me, I accepted a plea agreement, was ordered to serve six months’ probation and, upon completion, the incident would be wiped from my record. But in the wake of the Politico scandal, Fishbowl DC obtained the court documents and published a piece, “Ex-Politico WH Correspondent Joe Williams Pleaded Guilty to Assaulting Ex-Wife.” Finding a new job went from hard to impossible: Some news outlets that had initially wanted my resume told me they’d changed their plans. Others simply dropped me without saying anything.
That’s how I found myself working a retail job at a sporting goods store—the only steady job I could find after six months of unemployment in a down economy and a news industry in upheaval. In a matter of months, I was broke, depressed, and living on food stamps. I had lost my apartment, and ended up living out of a suitcase in a guest bedroom of an extraordinarily generous family I barely knew. My cash flow consisted of coins from my piggybank and modest sums earned from odd jobs: freelance copy-editing, public relations, coordinating funerals, mowing lawns. So when Stretch, the laconic, 34-year-old manager of a chain store I’ll call Sporting Goods Inc.called to tell me I was hired, it was the best news I’d had in a long time. (I have chosen not to name the store or its employees here, because the story is intended as an illustration of what it is like to work in a low-paid retail environment, and not as an expose of a particular store or team.)
Of course, I had no idea what a modern retail job demanded. I didn’t realize the stamina that would be necessary, the extra, unpaid duties that would be tacked on, or the required disregard for one’s own self-esteem. I had landed in an alien environment obsessed with theft, where sitting down is all but forbidden, and loyalty is a one-sided proposition. For a paycheck that barely covered my expenses, I’d relinquish my privacy, making myself subject to constant searches.
"If you go outside or leave the store on your break, me or another manager have to look in your backpack and see the bottom,” Stretch explained. “And winter's coming—if you're wearing a hoodie or a big jacket, we'll just have to pat you down. It's pretty simple."
When he outlined that particular requirement, my civil-rights brain—the one that was outraged at New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s stop-and-frisk policy and wounded from being stopped by police because of my skin color—was furious.
Walk out immediately, it demanded. No job is worth it. Your forefathers died for these rights, and you’re selling them for $10 an hour.
But Abraham Lincoln, in the form of the lone $5 bill in my wallet, had the last word: You, sir, are unemployed and homeless. You cannot pay for food, goods, or services with your privacy.
I’m not sure why—perhaps out of middle-class disbelief or maybe a reporter’s curiosity—I pressed the issue. Seriously: I have to get searched? Even if I'm just going across the street for a soda, with no more than lint in my pockets? Even if you don't think I stole anything?
Stretch shrugged, nonplussed. Clearly he’d been living with this one for a while.
"Yeah, it's pretty simple. Just get me or one of the other managers to pat you down before you leave."
I hadn’t had a job in retail since the 1980s. Perhaps youthful nonchalance and the luxury of squandering my paycheck on clothes or beer had helped camouflage the indignities of minimum wage retail job, though I don’t ever recall being frisked at the door. Yet over the decades, employee bag checks have become standard operating procedure in the retail environment, although some workers have pushed back.
At that moment, however, I wasn’t one of them. I needed something—anything—that resembled a steady job. I had to get back on the ladder. That meant sucking it up and starting at the bottom rung. So I chose two new store logo T-shirts, size 2XL. “Better make ‘em roomy,” Stretch suggested. “They tend to shrink in the wash.”
* * *
Obtaining work in retail had changed a lot since the 1980s. What used to require a paper application and a schmooze with the manager has turned into an antiseptic online process where human interaction—and the potential for an employment-discrimination complaint—is kept to a minimum.
That put me at a distinct disadvantage.
In person, thanks to good genes, people often assume I’m younger than I am. On paper, however, I’m just another overeducated, middle-aged, middle-class refugee whose last retail experience dates to the Reagan administration.
Not to mention retail employers these days have their pick of applicants: the Great Recession added countless numbers of desperate workers like me to the annual labor-market influx of college students and high schoolers. According to an Economic Policy Institute report, “In 1968, 48 percent of low-wage workers had a high school degree, compared to 79 percent in 2012.” Likewise, the percentage of people in these jobs who have spent some time in college has skyrocketed, jumping from under 17 percent to more than 45 percent in the same time. All of us are in a race to the bottom of the wage pool.
Although older job candidates bring experience and skills to the table, their job applications typically blink like red warning lights to retail managers: overqualified, overpaid, and probably harder to manage than some high school or college kid. In a word: trouble.
“Think about it, Joey—that’s why there are online applications,” my sister, a veteran human-resources professional, told me. “If you apply online, and you never hear back, they don’t have to tell you why they rejected you and face a discrimination lawsuit.”
I soon realized the only way I’d have a shot in retail is if I dumbed down my job application, met directly with the person in charge before applying, and used my journalism story-telling skills to sell myself, stretching the truth past the breaking point.
It worked: I ambled into Sporting Goods Inc. on an inspiration one day, asked for an application, and then asked to see the manager. Luckily, Stretch bit on my fictional backstory—journalist-turned-community-college student, studying physical therapy in a mid-career change—and my real-life background as a lifelong athlete.
It was a perfect fit—at least in theory.
* * *
The first thing I noticed on my first day on the job is that in retail no one sits.
Ever.
It didn’t matter if it was at the beginning of my shift, if the store was empty, or if my knees, back, and feet ached from hours of standing. Park your behind while on the clock, went the unspoken rule, and you might find it on a park bench scanning the want-ads for a new job.
Another quick observation: Working in retail takes more skill than just selling stuff. Besides the mindless tasks one expects—folding, stacking, sorting, fetching things for customers—I frequently had to tackle a series of housekeeping chores that Stretch never mentioned in our welcome-aboard chat. Performed during the late shift, those chores usually meant I’d have to stay well past the scheduled 9 p.m. quitting time.
Mop the floors in the bathroom, replace the toilet paper and scrub the toilets if necessary. Vacuum. Empty the garbage. Wipe down the glass front doors, every night, even if they don’t really need it. It was all part of the job, done after your shift has ended but without overtime pay.
One afternoon, upon hearing that Sporting Goods Inc.’s top managers were set to fly in from out of town for their annual review of their retail troops, Stretch went on a cleaning binge, clearing junk from the sales floor and the stockroom. When he finished, and I saw the amount of garbage waiting for me to haul to the loading dock, I felt like Hercules at the Augean stables.
There were five or so 20-gallon bags stuffed with refuse along with several piles of empty containers, cardboard boxes, and shipping wrap. Two cases of expired energy drinks. Several unwieldy stacks of outdated, five-foot-long cardboard displays.
The garbage run came after I’d already pulled my six-hour shift on the sales floor, and done some of my usual closing-shift chores. At the same time, since the other employee on duty was a petite young woman, taking out the garbage was a solo operation. Forty-five minutes later, I’d finished, sweaty and slightly winded. Stretch turned off the lights, I grabbed my things and we headed to the door. Before checking my backpack to see if I’d stolen anything, he said, “Thanks for the hustle,” and tossed me my bonus.
A pair of socks.
Granted, they were nice socks—high-tech, $25 wool athletic socks, something I might have purchased on impulse in better times. To the manager, it was a meaningful gesture; he seemed to sincerely want to reward me for going above and beyond my usual duties.
But overtime pay, or some kind of financial reward, apparently was out of the question. So he gave me socks.
* * *
There’s an ongoing debate over whether Congress should hike the federal minimum wage from roughly $7 an hour, where it’s been since 2008, to at least $10 an hour.
Proponents argue that three extra dollars an hour can lift hundreds of thousands of workers out of poverty. Opponents say a raise for hourly-wage workers would keep some businesses from hiring and force others to make layoffs to stay in the black.
As a worker who earned $10 an hour, I say: Neither argument is entirely true.
Sporting Goods Inc., I came to realize, was fine with paying me a few dollars more than the minimum wage—officially $7.25 an hour in Maryland—because it had other ways to compensate itself, including disqualifying me from overtime or paid sick days. Requiring me to play Cinderella on the closing shift also saved management the money it would have had to pay a cleaning company to maintain the store. Yet even $10 an hour—about $400 a week before taxes—can barely keep a single adult afloat in a city like Washington.
A modest studio apartment in a safe neighborhood would easily consume an entire month’s pay. Meanwhile, depending on circumstance, an annual salary of roughly $20,000 might not automatically qualify a retail worker for government assistance. One of my co-workers, a young single mother I called Flygirl, lived with her mom and commuted 40 minutes, one-way, from a far-flung suburb to make ends meet. Most of my co-workers, in their early 20s or 30s, had roommates, spouses, or second jobs. None of them seemed to be making it on their retail salaries alone.
Even though I was living rent-free in a guest bedroom, my every-other-Thursday paycheck couldn’t help me climb out of my hole, particularly after the state took half my pre-tax, $300 weekly salary for child support payments. Grateful just to have a job, I didn't think twice when I noticed Stretch sometimes cut me from the daily crew and kept my hours under 30 per week—until Mike, a longtime friend and a former union shop steward, explained.
"You're part-time," he told me. "If you work 40 hours or more, they'll have to give you benefits."
Because I live across town, meanwhile, I had an hour-long commute that cost as much as $10 a day round-trip on public transportation.
"Dude," my best friend Jamie said. "After taxes, you're making just enough to get to and from work each day."
* * *
Sporting Goods Inc.’s Employee Handbook has several entries about stealing from the company and its consequences: immediate termination, prosecution, imprisonment, and possible deportation. The threats were serious: I noticed about a half-dozen ceiling-mounted surveillance cameras spread across the store.
The cameras fed into a bank of monitors in the managers' office. The video feed was usually observed by a "loss prevention officer," formerly known as a store detective. In our case it was usually a young, tattooed brother I’ll call Flex, who was built like an NFL linebacker and dressed in hip-hop style: baggy jeans, flat-brimmed baseball cap, T-shirt.
When things were slow, which was often, Flex would stroll around the sales floor, browsing the merchandise, chatting up the sales crew. I often mused that his presence in our workplace perhaps had a secondary purpose: subtly reminding Sporting Goods Inc.’s employees that the loss prevention officer could probably chase you down and pulverize you if necessary.
But loss prevention, I soon learned, was a one-way street.
In my old salaried, white-collar life, I had the luxury of setting my own schedule, taking extra personal time if I needed it. The “flexible 40” worked because, generally speaking, my employers usually got it back when I worked through a deadline, for example, or came in on weekends to finish a project. By contrast, in the retail world, employees usually have to swipe a time card just to have lunch.
One evening, I got a stern reprimand from Fratboy, the 27-year-old duty manager when I came back 10 minutes late from my 30-minute break. It seemed I’d lapsed into flexible-forty mode and inadvertently abandoned him on the shoe floor during an unexpected evening rush.
"I know it's not a big deal," he said. "Personally, I don't care. But what kind of manager would I be if I didn't mention it to you?"
So noted, I told him, won’t happen again. Case closed.
The next day, however, when I clocked in a few minutes after the start of my 3 p.m. shift, Stretch sidled up to me near the outerwear rack, arms folded.
"Do you wear a watch?" he asked.
I thought it was a joke. Of course, I answered, waiting for the punch line.
"Well, Fratboy told me you came back late from your break last night. We can't have that."
Irritated by my tardiness, Stretch lectured me on time management, including an Orwellian principle found in retail: If you arrive on time for work, you’re already 10 minutes late. Showing up early is necessary, he said, so you can "get ready to hit the floor."
In that instant, I thought of my college football days, in full gear, psyching myself up for a game by blasting rap music into my headphones. Somehow, the metaphor didn’t translate to selling Nikes and yoga pants to suburbanites.
I later realized Stretch was invoking the principle of "wage theft"—retailers expect employees to be in position ahead of time, making their life easier, even if the employees aren’t getting paid for coming in early. There’s even a website devoted to fighting the practice.
Another loss-prevention irony: trash duty.
Under Sporting Goods Inc.’s protocol, two employees, preferably male, had to take the trash to the dumpster at closing time. One handled the trash; the other stood guard at the open loading-dock door. The refuse was tossed into a dumpster protected by both a built-in deadbolt with electronic keypad and a combination padlock.
Although the dumpster was in an access-only area with security patrols and cameras on every corner, the trash team was expected to stand watch—for thieves, it was implied, or armed intruders, or perhaps crossbow-wielding Visigoths on horseback. But as one of us carried and tossed the garbage, the other had no weapon more powerful than a shoe box.
I imagine the unstated objective was to send another subtle message about employee theft: Someone is always watching, even when you take out the trash.
Perhaps the most vivid example of Sporting Goods Inc.’s obsession with internal theft was the fate of a friendly 20-something who’d worked at the store for two years. Even the managers agreed the coworker I’ll call Ike was knowledgeable, loyal, and dependable, the sort of employee who’d check out the competition on his own time and report on what he saw. As such, he was in line to become assistant manager, a promotion that would add a few dollars to his paycheck and more responsibility to his life.
One afternoon, Ike didn’t show up for his shift. At the same time, the managers held a series of closed-door meetings away from the staff. Word spread like a virus: Ike had been fired for an unknown offense. The store managers refused to discuss it.
Rumor became fact about a month later when Ike came to retrieve some of his things. He told me that, before he got keys to the store, the personnel office at the company’s headquarters did the requisite background check and—bad news—found an old larceny charge from when he was a teenager.
“They checked and said I didn’t report it on my application. That means I lied to them,” he explained, chuckling sadly at the irony. “So basically, I got fired because I got a promotion.”
* * *
I knew I had to leave Sporting Goods Inc. when I realized I was turning into the sort-of overeager employee who is way too emotionally invested in a crappy menial job that does its best to devalue him.
Having once supervised an 80-member news division of a major metropolitan newspaper, the first weeks on my new job triggered a self-esteem meltdown. Flygirl, a supervisor half my age with a high school diploma, critiqued my shirt folding. I fruitlessly searched the shoe stockroom for the right size and style for an impatient customer. I silently prayed no one who knew me would come in during my shift.
As the learning curve flattened, however, my past life faded over the horizon and I gave up looking for an on-ramp back to journalism. Starved for approval after so much rejection, I started to take a weird, internal pride in my crappy menial job, almost against my will.
I felt a thrill when Stretch gave me a high-five for taking an online order from a customer without screwing it up. I quietly exalted when I correctly diagnosed that a customer needed stability running shoes and not the neutral ones he wanted. I congratulated myself on my work ethic when, instead of taking an unpaid sick day, I pushed through a Saturday shift despite a wicked, can’t-breathe bronchial infection.
More than once, I fantasized that if I quit—if I quit?—Stretch would dangle before me the promotion that had been destined for Ike, begging me to stay.
Reality struck one afternoon, however, when a customer I’ll call Jan came in for running shoes. Silver-haired, intelligent, and charming, Jan told me she’d recently retired from the U.S. Treasury, where she’d helped oversee the 2008 financial bailout.
As I fitted her for shoes and checked her stride, we struck up a conversation about politics, finance, and the fact that not a single Wall Street banker had ended up in jail. Then, Jan hit me with a question I hadn’t considered in the months since I hustled my way into a job I didn’t want, had to have, and had come to accept.
“So, Joe,” she asked, “What is it that you really do?”
I paused, slightly taken aback. I sell shoes, I told her. That’s my job.
“Yes, I understand,” she persisted. “But what do you really do?”
By that point, it was clear what she meant: Why are you here?
Three months earlier, I would have anticipated the question, and had some vague answer handy. At that moment, though—unable to return to my chosen profession, unwilling to start thinking of an alternative—I mumbled something about being a writer, and let the subject drop.
I wish I could say that was the moment things turned around.
In a perfect world, after talking with Jan, I would have ripped off my employee T-shirt, thrown it in Stretch’s face, and strode out of the store. In reality, it took another month or so before I got the opportunity to leave Sporting Goods Inc. for a temporary job as a communications director for a Capitol Hill nonprofit, a gig that paid twice as much per week as I’d earn in a month at the store. That salary still didn’t come close to my Politico paycheck, though it was a step in the right direction.
When I called Stretch to quit, he wasn’t happy, but he didn’t try and convince me to stay, either, as I’d hoped. He did, however, manage to deliver a dig that all but summed up my time as a retail employee.
“So, your new job,” he said, his irritation coming through the phone as he realized he needed to fill my shift for the week ahead. “They’re hiring you away from here. I guess [you] don’t care about hard work or loyalty.”
Hard work, yes; I certainly did my share working for a store that didn’t seem to value it all that much. I learned, however that loyalty is a malleable concept—and incredibly difficult to find these days, even at $10 an hour.
Hi Polly.
Here's a nice use of science fiction's trick of describing cherished human behaviors and institutions through the ironic distance of an alien observer: Mallory Ortberg's short story Erotica Written By An Alien Pretending Not To Be Horrified By The Human Body: 
Here is a perfect object. It is sold out, which is understandable: I would pay $20, easily, for such a vivrant thing.
I rarely have visceral reactions to movie previews, let alone previews for Tyler Perry movies that I am never, ever going to see, but I gaped through a two-minute trailer for The Single Moms Club. Gathered on a broad porch, drinking rosé and sharing laughs, are five single moms, none exhibiting a single dark eye-circle or a frenzied need to get somewhere they’ve forgotten. They look like they smell nice and eat well. They’re laughing. They’re talking about men, ho ho, how can we lock them down?
You didn’t ever have moments of despair?
You’re more eager, though, as a single parent. It takes some of the burden off.
