First order of business. Thank you. For holding my virtual hand through my soggy Sunday moment and its precarious aftermath. For leaving a trail of words. For your existential echoes. It dawned on me after publishing yesterday’s post that one surefire way to feel not good enough is to set insane expectations for myself that only a robot could meet. Like, say, vowing to respond to every single comment left on this blog. Like promising to have a blog post up by 6am each morning. In an ideal world, these things would happen. But I am beginning to suspect that this world, this wonderful world, is not ideal. No, it’s real.
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A few weeks ago, Husband and I went swimming with the girls in South Carolina and Toddler said something that I can’t stop thinking about. She wore both a water ring and water wings and she said to me, her little voice stuffed with panic, “Mommy! Help! I keep floating to the deep, deep part!” And like a good mom, I threw my arms around her and hugged her and assured her that she was okay and that we were in fact in the shallow end.
The shallow end.
Lately, my pool is lacking a shallow end. And this is odd. Because I used to be plenty shallow. Embarrassingly shallow. I used to subsist on shopping trips to trendy stores and celebrity gossip. I used to obsessively sample fad diets in an effort to be skinny and hot. I used to camp out at the gym for hours a day, spinning away, going nowhere. I used to panic when I was late to get my highlights touched up.
But somewhere along the way, life got delightfully deeper. Maybe it was becoming a wife or a parent or a fatherless girl? Maybe it was becoming a writer or a blogger or a Professor of Insecurities? Maybe it was flirting with the often harsh and humorless realities of adulthood, of aging, of lingering mortality? I would wager that it was all of these things.
But it doesn’t matter. What matters is that I think I’ve swung too far in the other direction. What matters is that I miss my shallow end. I miss the superficial things I used to enjoy. I miss watching mindless reality television and searching for the most flattering jeans. I miss talking about celebrities.
I miss my goofy, silly, blondeness.
And so. I am reclaiming it. Consider yourself warned.
I came to this conclusion yesterday afternoon. We all know that I’m epiphany-prone and yesterday was no exception. I was talking with my friend (and superstar nutritionist) Lauren Slayton. I asked Lauren to meet me because I want to up the ante health-wise in my life. I want to focus on my body, on my nutrition, on the health of my young family. I want to feel more energetic and do what I can to prevent cancer and to raise good eaters. At the end of our meeting, I said to Lauren, “It’s so funny because for so many years I watched what I ate and worked out because I wanted to look hot, but now my priority is to be healthy.” And as I said this, I realized something.
I want both. I want to be healthy and hot.
“I want to be hot for my book party!” I said to her and she smiled. Truth be told, it’s not about losing weight. But it is about looking my best. Far more importantly though, I would like to feel my best. And then Lauren and I talked about this, whether it is shallow to want to maximize our attractiveness. Whether it is shallow or selfish to want to feel amazing. And we didn’t come to any ready conclusion. Maybe it is a bit shallow to want to be hot. But I think that’s okay. I think that’s more than okay.
We all need a shallow end.
At least I do. I love the deep end. I do. I love writing about the complex and shifting depths of human existence. I love scrutinizing the universal insecurities that shake our days. But I cannot do this all the time. It affects me. Maybe this is foolish, but it just occurred to me that I might not have control over most things in life, but I do have control over what I write about. And this is an important awakening for me. Because what I write about affects what I think about and what I think about affects how I feel and how I see the world.
This is all a long-winded and clumsy way of saying what Toddler said so succinctly,
I keep slipping to the deep end.
But there is a shallow end. A silly end. There still is. And writing about its mere existence makes me smile big. And so I will write about it from time to time. Not all the time because I love the deep end too much. But some of the time. And maybe by writing about the more superficial aspects of my existence, I will find my way to my shallow end once more. And if and when I get there, I will celebrate the fact that I can touch the bottom. And I will splash around a bit.
The blonde is back, kids. Get ready.
___________________________________________
- Is your pool of life more shallow or more deep?
- Do you think it is selfish or shallow to want to look good?
- Do you think there is something about adulthood that encourages us to drown out our shallow end (pun very much intended and amazing)?
- Are you more or less shallow than you used to be?
- Do you think that there is something important about cultivating a bit of shallowness or superficiality in life?
- Does the content of your writing affect the content of your life, how you feel and see the world?
- Could you stand to be healthier?
- Could you stand to be hotter?
you are in the middle of a wonderful time of life,
i like what rubs off when i visit your blog…
you don’t have to be anything…
just be you
love ya girl,
I am beginning to think my life pool is full of riptides. They just pull me along for the ride. When I can manage to get to the shallow end, the tide comes in and sweeps me away.
I’m a big girl but relatively fit and healthy but I would love my daughter to have a much better relationship with food than me.
Strangely enough Tuesday is my night to be shallow…..I buy myself a gossip magazine, put on the PJ’s and watch bad t.v. all night and enjoy myself. I think I’m more shallow in some ways but deeper in others. now I’m in my 30′s. I guess as long as we’re happy it’s all good!!!
Life is so odd. I’m very busy spending a LOT of time in my shallow end and my blog reflects this. And, to further draw our perpendiculars, I also colored my hair brown after many years of blonde. Perhaps, I’m looking for a small push into the deep end. A little more introspection.
Wait and see, I guess.
I think we can all be deep and shallow at the same time. It’s called balance. We all need balance!
I was wondering about this — whether it’s shallow to want to look and feel your best, or at least better — and I don’t think that it is. It sounds totally silly, but after I get my hair cut and it’s all styled, I feel 100x more confident overall. I usually end up getting a lot done, walk around a lot happier, am probably friendlier in general. And I think that kind of effect is possible with a lot of little changes we can make — to eat a little better, get some exercize, do whatever it is that will make us physically feel more confident.
I think it only becomes shallow, problematic, and an energy drain, when it folds in on itself and you want to be perfect, or whatever you’re doing is never enough.
A little bit of shallow is all good, in my humble opinion. Lovely post!
I would say at this point, my pool of life is more shallow than deep. I don’t think it’s necessarily selfish/shallow to want to look good because that’s often how we’re judged. It’s beneficial to look pulled together and put some pride in how you take care of yourself. I am just a twinge less shallow/vain than I used to be mostly due to having less time to get ready and work out. And I’m *starting* to see things big picture. I could stand to be healthier and hotter!
Great post!
Great conversation Aidan and great post. I think if I spent my day helping people with what I felt were shallow pursuits I would probably drown
What’s so nice is that we don’t have to choose between shallow and deep or healthy or hot. Often what makes us sleep better, think better and manage our moods also helps us get hotter. I also think some of what we can call shallow or selfish is actually beneficial if that means carving out some time for yourself that is light and responsibility-free.
Love that you wrote about being hot on a day I the “superstar nutritionist” discussed feeling blah. Here’s to a March that takes us from blah to hot.
Well, I say, “Bring it on!” A comment on my blog today reminded me of Whitman’s “Song of Myself” and I’m thinking about it again now reading your post: “I am large, I contain multitudes.”
I know I’m not alone in saying that I want to hear your deep, I want to hear your shallow: both are parts of you, facets of the identity that make you whole. After all, you are large, you contain multitudes.
Hm. I think it is very important to be shallow once in a while…especially to stay sane. Though, from what I see, I think life forces us to be shallow sometimes. But I think that’s more for our safety. Because if we keep on treading and treading to the deep end, eventually we might get to a point where we don’t know exactly how far deep we are, and at that point, the shallow end might be too far to get to (wow, do I know how to stretch an analogy). If that didn’t make any sense at all (which might be very likely), my point is…it’s fun being shallow. Being too deep just makes you go around in circles after a while.
Yeah, I reckon cultivating some shallowness is a good idea. A balance between ‘deep’ and ‘shallow’ is healthy.
I’m looking forward to a demonstration of goofy silly blondness.
I think my pool of life is about 4 ft – middle of the little piece of the pool that you can walk down slowly as your head gets closer and closer to going underwater. I like it there. It’s not so deep that it is cold all the time, but not so shallow that it feels like your fellow swimmers have all relieved themselves in the pool.
I think technically it is selfish to want to look good, but I think it is a good selfish. Who doesn’t want to look good? I think we all have to admit we feel better when we look good, and if we feel better, we are happier, and (as Gretchen Rubin points out in her book) those around us are happier. So, in a roundabout way, not selfish!
I could stand to be healthier in the sense that I probably drink too much and I should stop smoking occasionally. On the other hand, I eat very well, I am not overweight, I have good blood pressure, cholesterol, and all of those things. I could probably be fitter, but when I’m consistently riding 4 times a week, I think I’m fit enough. My doctors always tell me I need to lift weights for my bones, but I really hate the gym. I still think in the grand scheme of things I am doing pretty darn good!
I used to think that my blog was better when I had complete anonymity. It was easy to write about anything and everything.
But I realized that I have been writing without regard for my “real” identity for quite some time now. I write as little or as often as I want to and it is fine. Some of it is serious and some silly.
I very much enjoy writing serious posts, but the shallow and frivolous are quite fun too. I spend far too much time being serious.
Isn’t part of the joy of being a writer about being given the chance to go where our words will take us.
Yeah, so I think I realized that I’d shifted out of my shallow end when I found myself walking into In-n-Out Burger at 10:30 at night with my sweatpants tucked into my rain boots (so they wouldn’t get wet in the slushy, dirty snow) after a long, painful evening of snowboarding with my husband and husband’s friend. I think my husband was slightly embarrassed to be seen with me like that, but it didn’t really even occur to me as I was doing it. I just didn’t want my pants to be wet all the way home (2 hours away), and that desire for dry pants superceded my concern for how the many, many strangers might look at me.
On the other hand, maybe I didn’t care so much because my rain boots are incredibly cute Boggs that I’m really proud of…
AAAAND…I’m back in the shallow end…just like that!
Break out the shallow blonde! We’re ready!
I love your deep posts, but you’re right: we all need balance. A friend of mine who reads my blog recently commented to me that my posts used to be mostly funny, and now they’re mostly contemplative. It wasn’t a criticism, just an observation, but I realized she was right! I’m working on that light side of myself as well.
Bring it on blondie!
My life is definitely more deep than it used to be, although I have always been a rather deep person. Life hands you lesson after lesson which causes ‘deepness’.
I don’t think it’s shallow to want to look good…depending on the reason you want to look good. There’s a difference between being flat out vein and wanting to be attractive to yourself and your spouse.
I could stand to be healthier and hotter…I just need a nap. lol
~melody~
I try to indulge my shallow end. The end that likes to see teeny-bopper romantic comedies, that adores getting my hair cut, and watches American Idol. Ultimately, though, you can’t live your life without the challenge of the deep end. Well, I guess you could, but you’d get bored. And so you need both…the challenge and risk of the deep, along with the security and whimsy of the shallow.
We all need our laughter and silly selves, even when we live in the deep end. So we float – daydream, stare at the clouds in the sky and their patterns, and paddle ourselves gently to safer waters.
Who doesn’t need laughter?
Who doesn’t want to be healthy and hot?
It all sounds pretty real to be.
My goal in life is life is to be shallow. I want to be the old lady who keeps the weekly hair and nail appoints and has a subscription of every trendy fashion magazine delivered to her at the rest home. But my priority for this phase of my life is to keep my head above water in the deep end of the human service river.
I don’t need to tell you I love the superficial! My Superficial posts are my most favorite to write… so I can’t wait to read some of yours! Being “fluffy” is so refreshing. Too much of the deep stuff gets exhausting and difficult. So bring it on blondey!
Hurrah! This from the girl that just tonight cried (really, I did, but I plead hormones and sleep deprivation) beause she was going out to dinner with friends and couldn’t put on her “regular” jeans (four weeks post partum) and so went directly to Amazon on her iPhone do not pass go to order a new blender to start making flax seed smoothies for breakfast (nothing like a bold, decisive purchase to raise one’s resolve…) And who also subscribes (like, they come in the mail every Friday) to not one but several celebrity gossip magazines (and used to actually write for one!). I like being smart but also ridiculously shallow. It keeps people on their toes. It makes life interesting. It is, ironically, challenging in and of itself. Hooray!
It is so interesting to me that you bring this up because I was reading some of your old posts recently and thinking about the way your posts have evolved over time. Partly, I believe that it is just the natural progression of a blog (and of course this is a bras assumption given that I have yet to publish a blog). That the more you write, the better you are at delving into the deeper, murkier, and more difficult parts of life to articulate. And might it also be that as a writer, whether it be blog or book, there is a little fear that discussion of ‘shallow’ topics will be frowned upon?
I believe this post is proof that you have become confident enough in yourself to say, ‘This is who I am, like it or not’. I love it. And, based on the volume you get on this beast of a site, I know I am not the only one.
I’m 48 and I still want to look hot and I don’t feel guilty for one second. My pool is mostly deep but I really like silly and shallow too. Especially the older I get. There’s so much serious in life and that’s good. But no reason to make everything that way, right?
Great post Aidan! Welcome back to blonde!
Wow, if I didn’t love you + your writing/blog before, I do now. I’ve made the same decision in the different area of my life: reading. After years of pushing myself to reading “classics” and literary fiction, I’m switching things up with an old “chick-lit” fave, Meg Cabot, and relishing her quick, fun, modern love stories. I’m even going to delve into the YA section of the library to find some copies of the Princess Diaries books. Not that I won’t stop reading the other stuff (I think if you stacked the “unread” books in my room right now, they’d be taller than me) but I won’t feel guilty about indulging in a some breezy, girly reads more often.
Bring on the blonde! I love it – can’t wait to see what you share with us in the shallow end. Don’t we all need to watch TLC, read celebrity gossip, rent the immature movie, and go shopping every once in awhile? We aren’t wired to handle the deep end 100 percent of the time.
I love the shallow end, especially if there’s a swim-up bar nearby!
Well, Aidan, I’m with you. I feel like I just really hit my stride in my forties (I’m glad I didn’t know that earlier!) and now, turning 50 on Sunday (yes) I have to say, my fit, healthy body gives me a lot of joy! It’s kind of amazing to realize that being fit changed my whole experience of aging; it means a whole different kind of 50 than what I ever imagined, and completely different than what was experienced by both my mother and my grandmothers.
That doesn’t mean that I don’t do real work every day, or that I don’t ponder real thoughts. It means that when I head out into the world I like what I see.
Now where’s my People magazine?
So excited to read more! What a tremendous and healthy revelation, a recognition that it is healthy to just have fun! It’s easy to lose ourselves because there are so few moments that we actually get ourselves. Sometimes I remind myself, it would be a good idea to just sit and watch smut on tv. Mindless smut does the mind good sometimes.
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Oh yes, the delicate but essential yin-yang balance of life again. The serious and the silly. The complex and the simple. The frivolous and the sensible.
You betcha! Give that girl some bling!
Amen for balance! I like to embrace my inner blonde too. All depth and no shallow makes Jack a dull boy. Or something like that…
Good for you. I realized I needed a shallow end when I turned 50! I do believe that the ‘shallow end,’ as you describe it is what can help give us the creative edge.
Julia Cameron speaks about artist’s date in her wonderful book “The Artist’s Way!” Who said that shopping for stilettos or going blond and bold can’t be your artists date?
Enjoy
Oh, Aidan, I’ve missed you. We’ve had a few crises over at my place and am so glad to finally be jumping into all of your delightful posts (look out, I’m back! muwahahah).
My blog was full of deep and thoughtful until one day I went off the … um… shallow end? I don’t know whether it was my daugther’s silliness rubbing off or my real self coming out, but whatever it was I could not write something serious if my blog depended on it! So, I wrote a string of silly posts. They made me laugh and giggle and laugh again. Now I’m back on track to finding my voice.
I think that is what this blog journey is about–finding YOUR voice. Not the voice of the blogs you adore, or the blogs you wish to emulate, but YOU.
Aidan, I am so happy to have found YOU and your blog.
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