'Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking': Validation for the Less Vocal

Power is not a word usually associated with introversion.

I've lived most of my life as an extrovert even though I am an introvert, and although I feel powerful and confident, my introverted side often makes me feel less than powerful.  I surround myself with extroverts - my husband, my two daughters, and my two best friends.  And I don't think that most people, especially my past students, would ever think I was an introvert.  A few years ago, a student wrote me a letter at the end of the school year that said, "At first you annoyed me because you never stopped talking, but I realized somewhere along the way that you were an amazing and caring teacher and I really loved your class, so thank you."  It's not the first time I was told that I talk too much, which is ironic since throughout my life I've basically forced myself to not be so quiet in large groups.

I remember times in high school and college that I felt like I was choking to find words to share in class.  I worried about my face turning red, that my words didn't come as quickly as the people around me whose hands flew up as soon as the teacher posed a question. I once skipped a school day because I didn't want to give a speech. Not to mention the slew of other introverted traits I possess - I'm sensitive to my environment both emotionally and physically.  I prefer to hang out with one other person.  I am not a pack animal.  I prefer a quiet dinner over a loud party. I like to work alone. Being "on" all day as a teacher exhausted me. I am rejuvenated through yoga and reading and taking long walks by myself. I prefer to think before responding. Finally,  I don't like to be in the spotlight even though I have been in high school plays and musicals, been the leader in numerous activities and committees, been a camp counselor, a high school English teacher, the singer in a band, and a hostess with the mostess.

I prefer to be quiet because life feels loud to me often.  Even while I was living in London, my favorite days were spent in museums or taking walks by myself in new parts of the city.  I loved hopping on the train by myself and going to a new country to figure it out alone and spending the afternoons writing in a cafe.  The idea of traveling in a group made me more nervous than navigating a foreign city alone.

Susan Cain's book 'Quiet' helped me to validate my introverted power and make me think deeply about my core personality, but even better it helped me to appreciate the parts about me that most often I associate with some negative feelings. As Cain puts it in her introduction, "It makes sense that so many introverts hide even from themselves. We live in a value system that I call the Extrovert Ideal - the omnipresent belief that the ideal self is gregarious, alpha, and comfortable in the spotlight." So many times in my life, I have apologized either to myself or to others about something that stemmed from my introversion.

Cain starts 'Quiet' with how extroversion became our cultural ideal and when our society started to value the doers and talkers with big personalities versus the Eastern ideal of the wise leaders who spoke little and meditated often.  Cain gathered research on the introverted leaders that our country needed to propel itself forward, and those that shaped the culture we live in - from Lincoln to Martin Luther King, Jr., from Rosa Parks to J.K. Rowling, from Einstein to Spielberg. As I read example after example and felt more and more validated about being an introvert, I thought that she missed the point that not all introverts are being overlooked in our society and in many professions the introverts are sought out - maybe not in the business world or in education, but in many places introverts shine even brighter than extroverts. She is sometimes harsh with her research and examples of the over impulsive, extroverted leaders who feed only their egos without really ever thinking about the financial ruin they will inevitably unleash on the country.

When I shared some of the parts of the book with my very extroverted husband like the Harvard Business School model which leans heavily on students working together and extroverts leading the way or the part about Tony Robbins and his leadership retreats, my husband said, "Did she say anything good about extroverts?" I thought about this as I read.  I came to this conclusion - it wasn't really that Cain made the point that introverts are better than extroverts, it was more that as a society we seem only to value the extrovert in leadership positions and in our education system and even in the way we parent.  We view introversion as something we need to fix; we feel the need to bring introverts out of their shells and open them up as if converting them into extroverts will make them normal.

Cain's research made me think about my own teaching style.  I am an introvert who ran a very extroverted classroom.  I did make it my goal to help the quiet kids speak, giving them opportunities to be heard drawing from my own experiences as the quiet one that had great ideas but didn't know how to share them effectively.  Why did I feel the need to fix them?

The stories Cain shared about brilliant Professor Brian Little who lectured and dedicated himself to his students in the most extroverted way possible, so much so that none of his students would ever guess that after giving speeches at conferences that Little, a very introverted man,  would hide in the bathroom stall to avoid more talking during lunch.  I've done this.  During my last year of teaching, one of my favorite times during the day was my 30 minute lunch break where I ate alone in my classroom.  I was able to recharge and reset myself to be extroverted for the rest of my students for the rest of my day. This is what Cain calls a "restorative niche" - the place you want to go to "return to your true self."

'Quiet' opened my eyes to how lopsided our culture is in terms of the "Extrovert Ideal." Cain doesn't try to make the point that we all need to be introverts, but she does produce compelling evidence (her depth and variety of research studies include adults, leadership, children and relationships) that our society often tries to encourage everyone to be extroverts and rather than changing our core personalities, introverts need to have a "quiet revolution" and revel in the gifts they possess.

I know that after reading the book and clicking together the pieces of my life, the tension spots in my marriage, the times I felt my most comfortable and most uncomfortable, that many of those pieces coincided with my introversion.  I may not be starting a quiet revolution, but I at least feel validated for the powerful person that I am because of my introverted core personality.

'All Joy and No Fun': An Unflattering Mirror

Do you know how badly lit dressing rooms can make you feel horrible about yourself? You see the dark circles under your eyes, your skin takes on a sickly green pallor because of the fluorescent lighting, and your thighs are way bigger than you remembered? You know that the reflection belongs to you, but somehow you are your worst version of yourself in that dressing room and nothing fits or looks even remotely appealing enough to purchase.  That's what Jennifer Senior's book 'All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenthood' made me feel like; it focused on the worst reflection of parenthood.

Anyone who is a parent knows the difficulties that come with it.  In the baby stage sleep becomes a luxury.  In the toddler stage, patience isn't just a virtue, but something that you need to continually remind yourself about minute to minute as your 2 year old tests the limits of your sanity.  The elementary school years are an activity puzzle - how do I ever get myself to two or even three places at one time? Parents balance work, couple hood, wellness, meals, exercise, activities, school work, projects, homes, yards, pets . . . it's a never ending cycle of crazy, but the upside of all of this struggle is that we love our kids.  Really, really love them.  They are our gift, our legacy, our present, our future.  It's so worth any ounce of frustration or burden that we feel temporarily in the throws of modern day parenthood.

I didn't get that sense from Senior's highly touted book about the plight of the modern parent.  In the introduction she says, "There's the parenting life of our fantasies, and there's the parenting life of our banal, on-the-ground realities." She delves deep into the heart of the "banal reality" tension spots and pokes those spots until they hurt to figure out what is the effect of parenthood on adults.

I literally got depressed as I read the unflattering portraits of parents who deal with many of the same issues that I deal with:
1) How parenting affects my marriage
2) How parenting affects my "me time"
3) Why do I put my child in activities that cause stress in my nightly schedule and keep all of us in a constant game of GO?
4) How do I keep my temper at bay when I can't seem to accomplish anything because of constant interruptions to the flow of my day?
5) How will I change my parenting once my kids are teenagers?
6) Do my husband and I actually share parenting responsibilities or do most of the responsibilities fall to me?

Senior starts with the premise that parents are no happier than non-parents and in many cases parents are less happy than non-parents, and then she dissects why this is the case.  She studies the history of parenthood and the transformation that occurred somewhere in the 1950s when kids went from being useful to protected.  "Children went from being our employees to our bosses." As sociologist Viviana Zelizer put it, children became "economically worthless but emotionally priceless."

As Senior searches for answers about why parents are so unhappy she misses the key part of the equation until the very end of the book - JOY.  Ask any parent if they hate being a parent, and I can say with some certainty that they will answer with an emphatic, "no!"  Joy and fun do exist in the realm of modern day parents.  We love our kids deeply which is why we drive them to theater rehearsals and Envirothon meetings and swim lessons.  We want them to succeed and have opportunities that we had or excel beyond what we could have ever imagined.  We want them to have choices and to be emotionally prepared for life and for being humane to themselves and others.

Parenthood is about connection, creation, joy, fun, chaos, messy days, clean days, meals, conversations, relationships and so much more than can ever be captured in a book that pokes open the raw spots that every parent deals with but hopefully doesn't dwell on.  If we only thought of the bad parts of life, we'd all go a bit nutty.

Near the end of the book, Senior uses the metaphor of "Raiders of the Lost Ark" when one of the characters asks, "what are we digging for, and what have we found?"In parenthood, we aren't always digging for something.  Sometimes we just need to let it be without all the dissecting of whether or not we are happy in each moment and know that life ebbs and flows more than that.

Is parenting hard? Sure.  Is it worth it? Absolutely.

'Carry On, Warrior - Thoughts on Life Unarmed': The best girlfriend you will ever have

Sometimes in life we find exactly what we need, exactly when we need it.  That's what happened to me when I found 'Carry On, Warrior: Thoughts on Life Unarmed' by Glennon Doyle Melton. I've never read Glennon's wildly popular blog Momastery.com.  Instead, I first encountered Glennon's ideas while searching for TEDTalks about Mental Health and Mental Illness for Stageoflife.com's latest writing contest.  In Glennon's TEDTalk called "Lessons from the Mental Hospital" she shares her truth about how she learned to feel her feelings and then share those thoughts with others when she had a mental breakdown and spent time in a mental hospital.  She explained that she sees her feelings as the guides in our lives and said, "I honor my feelings as my own personal prophets . . . I've learned to be still and receive the gifts." Although her voice quivered while she spoke from nerves and emotional energy, her ideas worth spreading resonated with me.  Oddly, the day before I happened upon Glennon's TEDTalk, I just picked up her book from the library - I liked the title and the bright lettering on the cover (whatever, I know you pick books by the covers and titles, too).  Serendipitous perhaps? I'm not sure.

I do know that since I cracked open Glennon's book which is a collection of her most loved blog posts from Momastery.com and other material not previously printed, I have already recommended Glennon's book to three of my friends.  Before I get into what I took away from the book there are a few things about Glennon you need to know:
1) She had a pretty messed up life before she got pregnant with her first child.  Drugs, alcohol, bulimia, self-loathing, depression . . . she is very upfront about this fact, and explains how those low moments shaped her.
2) She talks a bunch about the role of religion in her life and the presence of God.  For some, this might be a complete turn off or make them squeamish. For others, it might make them like her even more, but just be aware that God talk is VERY present in this book.
3) Glennon makes no excuses for the person she used to be or the person she is now.  She is flawed (for example she doesn't know how to cook - she doesn't even own pans NOR does she clean.  Her vacuum seems like an alien to her, but she taught her daughter to use it as a baby carriage, so her daughter now vacuums the house).

Because I didn't know anything about Glennon other than watching her TEDTalk, I approached her book with an open mind, and it was the first time in awhile that I laughed out loud while reading a book about parenting (right now I'm reading 'All Joy and No Fun' by Jennifer Senior and it is depressing the heck out of me).  When Glennon talked about her trips to Target and the officer telling her girls that they were disturbing the peace, I felt validated for those not so great mom days in grocery stores or retail store check out lines.  We've all been there, but when we see other people going through it, we generally turn the other way or feign superiority.  Why do we do that?

I also wrote things down in my journal about her deep connection with her children.  She doesn't really give advice, but her stories of her own life are so open and honest, that it helps.  One of my favorite chapters was "Don't Carpe Diem" where she explains the two types of time.  Chronos time is regular time. "It's ten excruciating minutes in the Target line time, four screaming minutes in time-out time, two hours until Daddy gets home time.  Chronos is the hard, slow-passing time we parents often live in." The other type of time is Kairos time which is "those magical moments in which time stands still." Like when you really see your children for the beautiful human beings that they are.  You actually see the length of their eyelashes or the curve of their cheeks.  It's the Kairos moments that Glennon tries to hold onto throughout the Chronos days of parenting and living.  "Carpe a couple of Kairoses a day. Good enough for me." I've been calling my awareness to those Kairos moments when Raina and Story hug each other and say, "I love you, baby" just because they felt like it, or how beautiful Story is when she sleeps.

She also offered this tidbit which I wrote down on its own page in my journal: The most important job as a parent is "to teach my children how to deal with being human." I guess I never thought of it like that before, but I am glad that Glennon wrote it, and glad that I'll remember it.  Being human isn't easy, so teaching my children how to deal with life is an important job.

Mostly Glennon's book reminded me to offer myself grace and kindness.  To forgive myself and know that life and parenting are permanent do overs.  If you screw up one moment, the next is a do over.  And that is okay just like not liking vacuuming or having a really bad afternoon with your children is not the end of the world.  My biggest take away lesson is to "embrace being human rather than fight against it." "Carry on, Warrior: Thoughts on Life Unarmed" was exactly what I needed to read at the exact right moment in my life because Glennon's truthful thoughts on her life helped me find truth in my own life.  To me, that's Chronos time well spent - reading a book that validates being messy and being human.

'The Invention of Wings': The story of sisters, mothers and freedom

I admit it.
I like Oprah.

I didn't know that was such an odd thing until I started reading Oprah's latest Oprah 2.0 book selection 'The Invention of Wings' by Sue Monk Kidd, but apparently over the years of her television metamorphosis from queen of talk to queen of everything she garnered some vehement critics.  My very wonderful, yoga friend Sarah loves to read, but after I told her I was reading Oprah's latest book selection, her face scrunched tight and she said, "I purposely try to avoid anything she reads or suggests.  Oprah bugs me."

Huh?
I guess I missed that chapter in pop culture.  I do know that when I moved back to the United States after living in London for a year, I cried the first time I watched Oprah.  I missed her show that much.  I can't say I am still a devotee or that I've paid much attention to what's she's been up to since her talk show ended years ago, but I am not adverse to her reading material even if the bulk of it tends to be a bit depressing.

I can see why Oprah selected Sue Monk Kidd's third novel which follows the dual narrative of Sarah Grimke and her handmaid, Handful (a.k.a. Hetty).  The story opens in the early 1800s on Sarah's eleventh birthday when her mother surprises her with her very own slave (Handful, age 10) as her main gift.  Sarah who already shows tendencies of going against the grain of the southern way of life refuses to except a person as a gift even if her present has a nice blue bow tied around her neck.

The beginning of the story captured me as it intertwined the lives of two worlds - the world of the privileged white plantation owner's disobedient and headstrong daughter and the world of the oppressed and abused slaves who lived to escape punishment and retribution from their owners.  Handful and Sarah's friendship grows and Sarah even teaches Handful to read, even though to do so is against the law.  Sarah suffers her own abuse from her family in the form of a stifling of her spiritedness.  She developed a stammer when she was only four years old after seeing one of their slaves whipped, but she also develops something even more dangerous and horrible - an incurable desire to be a lawyer which was unheard of for women in the early 1800s.  Even worse still, she has compassion for her handmaid and treats her as equal as she can.

The narrative also shares Handful's devotion to her deviant, seamstress mother, Charlotte who refuses to be enslaved even though she is a slave.  She tells Handful that their owners may have their bodies, but they can never enslave their minds.  Charlotte plays a sharp contrast to Sarah's mother who the slaves call Missus, a sharp speaking, angry, merciless woman who believes in punishment and tradition.

The story spans decades and follows Sarah's growth into one of the most notorious abolitionists and pioneers of the women's rights.  As Sarah moves North, Handful's life becomes tangled in proposed slave revolts, a bout at the deplorable work house (which is where slaves were punished severely for disobedience), and a longing for her mother who disappears one day.

I loved parts of this book, and other parts felt a bit thin and underdeveloped.  I appreciated the entire story and it's significance after reading the Author's Note and discovering that Sarah Grimke and her sister Angelina were indeed real women who rallied for anti-slavery much to the dismay of men and especially Southerners.  They were ahead of their time for the suffragist movement, but they influenced other great women who fought for the cause.  Sue Monk Kidd wove together pieces of history and developed the storyline of Handful based on a document that showed the Sarah did indeed receive a handmaid as a gift for her mother, but records indicated the handmaid died of an illness in her teenage years.

By bringing history to life and giving Handful the wings she needed to expand the storyline of hope and freedom, Kidd shows the same writing prowess she displayed in 'The Secret Life of Bees.' 'The Invention of Wings' isn't merely about coming of age as 'The Secret Life of Bees,' but it shows how an entire country gained the courage to rally for human rights of all because of the courage of a few brave souls who knew change was needed even if it wasn't the popular thing to do.  These revolutionaries stood up for those who were unable to stand up for themselves, and the entire country benefited from the bravery of people like the Grimke sisters.

This book is another important reminder of our past as a country.  We have come so far, but we still have work to do for equality.  As much as Oprah might bug some people, I am glad she continually challenges society to take a step back, contemplate our history and consider where are we now. As Sue Monk Kidd says in her Author’s Note at the end of the book, “History is not just facts and events. History is also a pain in the heart and we repeat history until we are able to make another’s pain in the heart our own.” That’s why we read these sad stories that Oprah picks and why she continually chooses them for her audiences.


 

'Glitter and Glue': Understanding the value of moms and motherhood

Motherhood sometimes sucks.  Some days I question everything- how I lost my temper when Raina told me I had to do the laundry because her hamper was overflowing (doesn't she understand that I already completed 5 loads of laundry that day and the overflowing was due to her use of 3 towels at bath time?), or how I told Story I didn't have time to read another Ariel book with her on the couch because I needed to answer emails.  Some days I feel inadequate because I don't want to make Valentine's Day treats for my daughter's class or I don't offer to volunteer for the PTO, and I am relieved when my husband takes over after dinner time because I am alone in a room without being bombarded with the shrill, "Mommy, Story's being mean to me!" battle cry from Raina.  Some days just making it through a grocery store run without my four year old melting down feels like a huge accomplishment.  Some days being able to accomplish work, laundry, a healthy dinner (even if Story refuses to touch her broccoli), helping Raina with her flashcards and math worksheets, and playing The Voice with Story before 7pm feels like I am a superhero.

Motherhood also rocks.  When Raina comes downstairs in the morning, even though she is 9 years old, the first thing she wants to do is sit on my lap.  She curls her now gangly limbs into an odd ball, and fits herself neatly on my legs as I read the paper.  Story lights up every day when I pick her up from her Montessori school, so proud to share her work with me.  We sing the songs from "Frozen" as loud as possible in the car as we drive to piano lessons, and after our latest round of 19 inches of snow, we built Olaf and snow forts in the backyard, giggling as Story slid down the sliding board into a huge mound of snow.

Kelly Corrigan gets both sides of motherhood.  When I read her 2008 memoir "The Middle Place" about her bout of breast cancer I cried as she cried through the prospect of not being there for her two little girls.  In her latest memoir "Glitter and Glue" she pays homage to her mother as she recounts her travels to Australia where she worked as a nanny for a family who had recently lost their mother to cancer.  Through her memories of this coming of age time for her, she pieces together her past with her mother who "looked at motherhood as less a joy to be relished than as a job to be done." Corrigan's mother described herself as "the glue" of their family while her gregarious, lacrosse playing, doting father was "the glitter" adding dazzling intensity to her days.

Something about Corrigan's truth telling with bouts of humor and clear details about life and living makes me love her.  Her style isn't academic or breathtaking, but it shows the clear struggles and triumphs of figuring out who we are - as people, mothers, daughters, lovers and wives.  Some critics complain that Corrigan over sentimentalizes or forces parallels between past and present in her latest memoir, but I would argue that nothing is more overly sentimental and sometimes even forced than being a mom and understanding motherhood.  As each chapter draws to a close, Corrigan writes a kernel of truth which isn't something that astounds the reader as much as it gently reminds them of a larger point like, "What is it about a living mother that makes her so hard to see, to feel, to want, to love, to like? What a colossal waste that we can only fully appreciate certain riches- clean clothes, hot showers, good health, mothers - in their absence." The Tanner children will grow up without their mother, and she realizes while she is their nanny (playing the mother role in their lives) the value of her own living mother as she watches their daily rebuilding of a life without their glue.

Any high school student who read Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" could tell you that we need to appreciate the simple things in life because those are what Emily Webb misses most in death - clocks ticking, Mama's sunflowers, hot baths, coffee, and newly ironed dresses.  Emily's big question is "Do any human beings realize life while they live it?" and maybe the answer is that some do - those who write about their lives and try to seek understanding, those who have experienced great suffering, loss, disease, and maybe a few who just greet each day and decide to appreciate and respect and notice all the simple beauty around them.

Kelly Corrigan has suffered, and she writes about what she knows in the face of her suffering, what she has learned from her glittery father and what she has learned from her mother holding things together.  Because that's what moms do, they hold things together.

In this brutal East Coast winter while we all try to hold ourselves together with dignity and dig ourselves out from yet another snowstorm, and we get the agonizing call from the school that yet another 2 hour delay and funky routine is headed our way, we may not always feel like the supermoms that we believe our daughters and sons need.  Some days being a mom really rocks and some days it really sucks, but mothers, as Kelly Corrigan puts it, are the "sole distributors of the strongest currency" our children will ever know: "maternal love." 'Glitter and Glue' felt like an early mother's day card for me, and gave me exactly what I needed during this winter - validation that I am doing everything just the way I need to be doing it.  I am being a mom to my two daughters the best way that I can.  Some days I am the glitter, but more often than not, I am the glue in their lives always holding everyone together.

Lean In: Stay and Sit at the Table

When my best friend gave me "Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to Lead" by Sheryl Sandberg for Christmas I didn't race home to read it.  I actually avoided it for a whole month by preoccupying my reading time with fast paced memoirs and sappy romance YA novels.  I heard of Sandberg's book, but reading the diatribe of Facebook's COO with a bunch of business talk and women empowerment stuff just didn't resonate with me.

In the last year much has changed in my life.  I removed myself from the manic pace of work and traded my 15 year career as an English teacher for a more gentle approach to life that centers around my family, writing, reading, running our on-line writing community Stageoflife.com, and yoga.  I no longer feel tied to or pressured by a schedule.  I have time to not only look at my children and get them to their activities, but I am engaged in their lives now.  I see them in the morning when they are at their best.  I see them in the afternoon when they are at their worst.  I see them after dinner when they just want to play and be silly.  I am present in not only their lives but my own.  So . . . let's just say, I wasn't interested in reading a book that encourages me to go back to a manic pace of life or even step up the pace more frenetically by joining the competitive business world.

After I read through the stack I placed on top of Sandberg's smiling face to keep her from staring me down at night and making me feel guilty for not even attempting to read my best friend's well thought out Christmas present, I finally relented last week.  At first my overwhelming emotion while reading was contempt.  Why though should I feel contempt for Sandberg's mostly gentle and thoroughly researched study of how women exclude themselves from leadership positions?  She doesn't finger wag or even place judgements.  She doesn't pretend to have all the answers, but simply wants to start a conversation stemming from some alarming statistics in relation to women leaders and women in the workforce like "the percentage of women at the top of corporate America has barely budged over the past decade.  A meager twenty-one of the Fortune 500 CEOs are women.  Women hold about 14 percent of executive officer positions, 17 percept of board seats, and constitute 18 percent of elected congressional officials." But it doesn't end there.  Even from Sandberg's personal experience she brings up important points about maternity leaves (women leaving before they actually leave work), women being reluctant to join in discussions at the board meeting (she urges women to sit at the table), women not being liked when they achieve powerful status in the workplace (gender discount theory), and discrepancies of how much more work women do in terms of childcare (three times more) and housework (two times more) in relation to their partners (on this point, Sandberg makes a plea for women to make their partners real partners in all areas).

The whole time I read "Lean In," I asked myself, "Do you like this book?" and I couldn't really answer my own question.  I learned while reading it.  I reopened my questions about why women choose what they choose.  I faced my own choices of the last decade since I became a mother and struggled with balancing work and being a mom, maternity leave and going back to work, and trying to find a balance of power in my own household.  I remembered my fire and intensity in high school and college always wanting to be the leader of organizations and planning my future of successes and accolades.  And I wondered where did my ambition go?  Why did I lean out so far away from the work force, and instead create my own safe haven where my creativity can flow at my own pace? Why do women choose what they choose?

It wasn't until I watched Sandberg's TEDTalk that I truly appreciated her message.  I may not have been dazzled by her writing style, but when she speaks, I want to listen.  Her TEDTalk showed me why she has garnered such success in her life from Washington D.C. to Silicone Valley.  She reflects calmly, but carries a weighty and important message about the future of women and men in our country.

Her final thought in her TEDTalk is the same as in her book, and when I read it (and listened to her say it) I truly appreciated Sandberg for starting the conversation and being an activist for choice and change.  She said:
"My greatest hope is that my son and my daughter will be able to choose what to do with their lives without external or internal obstacles slowing them down or making them question their choices.  If my son wants to do the important work of raising a child full-time, I hope he is respected and supported.  And if my daughter wants to work full-time outside her home, I hope she is not just respected and supported, but also liked for her achievements."

With two daughters of my own, I hope they can choose whatever they want to do with their lives and that they can dream big without reality and lopsided statistics weighing them down.  I want them to be able to lean in or jump in wherever they want to be knowing that they can do whatever they want to do, and that it isn't just a nice thought coming from their mom, but the truth of the world where they live.

I think this book will be one that people talk about much the way women today talk about Gloria Steinem and her fight for women's equality, and Betty Friedan and her book "The Feminine Mystique."  And although I leaned out (way out) and was happy and relieved to do so, I hope this book gives more power to the women who want to lean in . . . all the way.

Fangirl: Not as good as Eleanor & Park, but still lovable

I loved Rainbow Rowell's book "Eleanor & Park," so when I saw "Fangirl" on the New Fiction shelf at Kaltreider library, I checked it out along with a stack of my daughter's picture books (many of them involving animals in underpants.  She's four what do you expect?) and a few memoirs for me.  I wanted something fun to read amidst the depressing ice and snow storms that are plaguing my life (and much of the East Coast) right now. Rowell's second YA novel did momentarily transport me from this gray winter, and although I know legions of girls who will adore this novel,  I didn't like it as much as "Eleanor & Park." 

The story follows Cath, an introverted, Simon Snow ultra-fan, and popular fan fiction writer, as she ventures wearily into her first year of college.  Although she is terrified to leave her mentally fragile father, her twin sister, Wren, can't wait for the parties, new friends and new adventures.  During Cath's first weeks of college, she only leaves her dorm room for classes, but refuses to even visit the dining halls to eat (and instead nourishes herself from her stash of protein bars).  Her sassy roommate, Reagan, decides to make Cath her "project" and helps her to journey out of her shell.  As Reagan and Cath become closer, Cath and her sister drift further and further apart.  

And, since it is YA, you guessed it . . . there is romance.  The romantic interests in this book shift a bit from a boy in Cath's writing class, Nick, to her roommate's ex-boyfriend, Levi. The innocence of the young love almost hurts to read, but it did make me smile.  

What didn't make me smile was the interruptions of Cath's fan fiction "Carry On" throughout the book. I know the book is called "Fangirl" which means that the fiction within the fiction won't bother most readers, but I didn't enjoy the gay courtship of the two main characters of the Harry Potter-esque fantasy story that Cath wrote.  I actually skipped most of those parts to focus on the developing relationships between Cath and Levi, and Cath's side worries of her father, disappearing and reappearing mother and her sister's avoidance of problems.  Those story lines were the true heart of this book, and the fan fiction detracted from those.  

Cath, although a bit neurotic and melodramatic, became endearing and lovable as she faced her fears and challenged herself to break from her self-imposed fiction prison.  She began living life for real rather than only living to write the fantasy world which was based on a popular fiction world of another author. 

Although fan fiction is not my thing, so I can't relate to the devotees of reading alternate story lines of popular series, I know that many people are addicted to fan fiction.  I can think of so many of my students who loved the world of Harry Potter so much that all other books were spoiled for them, or during the Twilight craze girls in my classes that fantasized about Robert Pattinson and his pale face and sweeping widow's peak (which, by the way is Levi's trademark that Cath comments on all the time). 

To me, Rowell shows her talent as a writer in this book by keeping many story lines afloat, moving between fan fiction writing, writing excerpts of the fantasy book Cath writes her fan fiction about, and giving her characters enough quirkiness and likability that even someone like me who doesn't like fan fiction can still find things to love in this book.  

I am already looking forward to another Rainbow Rowell YA novel that explores an unlikely relationship between two multi-faceted people, who face odds due to family issues in their blossoming love, but find a way to make things work.  I just hope the next one she writes doesn't include fan fiction of any sort.