Younger Part 1 | 14
Show Notes:
TV Land's Younger recently ended its run with season 7. Julia and Christina discussing the friendships of Younger and why they are jealous of yet another fictional world Darren Star created.
Transcript:
Julia: Hey friends, it's Julia. And this is pop culture makes me jealous and on today's show. Christina and I are talking younger, younger first aired on February 24th, 2015, based on a book of the same name, the television show was created and developed by Darren star. The premise. 40 year old. Liza is newly divorced, has a teenage daughter and finds herself needing a new job after attempting to gain employment as herself, the 40 year old version, she ends up in a bar and meets Josh a 26 year old tattoo artist.
Josh mistakes lives to be closing. After this, she and her friend, Maggie concoct, a plan to pass her off as a twenty-something to reenter the publishing industry. She quickly lands the job of assistant to empirical presses, marketing head, Diana trout, while empirical press lies and makes friends with Kelsey people.
The show stars, sending fosters, Liza and Hillary dufus, Kelsey Peters, and a whole host of other incredible actors as Liza navigates the 20 something world, she claims to be a part of her 40 year old world is still front and center lies his decision to portray herself as a younger version is a means of survival and.
He just rolled of publishing. In the first episode, we meet Lise and Miller. She's newly divorced with a teenage daughter and she is putting herself back out there to find a job before becoming a mother. She worked in publishing and 15 years later, she's attempting to bark on that career. Again, in interviews she's faced with sidestepped.
Age-ism no one respects the 15 years, she just spent keeping a human alive and a functioning member of society. When she decides to pretend to be a 20 something, she faces the other side of that coin and an interview with Diana trout at empirical, she's constantly being told she is a child and doesn't have the wisdom to do the work.
Even though I was 31. When the show first aired, that didn't change the fact that I knew that my next phase of parenting, the two Newt. Would fly by. And I had no idea who I was going to be or what I was going to do to ensure my life had substance to keep me going as an empty nester. Then in 2016, I was fired from a job and spent the next few.
Desperately trying to find work that fit my skillset all while putting myself through graduate school, suddenly the idea of lying about my age sounded pretty appealing. Why is this two lives the completely different from my own experience, we're still something I could relate to. My biracial life has always forced me to live in two worlds.
The roads that lead to the intersections of my experience are many, but the one that will never change is my ambiguous. Ethnicity in my experiences that lie within that though younger has a predominantly white cast that rarely addresses racial issues. Liza was what kept me into the show. Well that, and Josh and Charles and Zane and Ms.
Two-part special Christina and I will be looking at younger from all angles. I never got the experience of leaving home and living in. Somewhere else. So when television and movies have these unrealistic storylines of 20 and 30 somethings living their best lives before having a family, I have a twinge of jealousy now in my late thirties, I don't really know if I have the stamina to live my best life.
Post childbearing. I'm tired by nine, like wiser. And yet I still kind of dream of that unrealistic life happening for me. I just wanted to pop in real quick and say, thanks for listening and sticking with. I really appreciate it. And you taking the time to listen really means a lot. If you're listening to us on apple podcasts, I would love it.
If you could drop us a review, I know it's not always an easy task or sometimes we think we'll do it real quick. And then we get distracted. Heavens knows I'm the queen of getting distracted. It would really mean a lot to me. If you just drop a couple of notes on what you think of the show. Five stars, but you know, you tell you, I understand you have to be true to what your, your belief system is about this program with that said, I'll let you get back to the show.
Now, when did you discover younger? I didn't write this question down, but I'm curious where you found the beginning or did you come in like, cause it was 2015. It released in 2015.
Christina: Okay. Yeah, it was not from the beginning. I, I discovered it when I got Hulu for the first time. So. I think I got Hulu like three or four years ago.
Okay. And so I think they had like two or three seasons.
Julia: Yeah. At least they had a really long gap of time there for between a couple of the seasons. I forget specifically which ones, but it was like
Christina: when I first heard about the show, because I think I heard about it like way before.
Julia: I,
Christina: well, of course they've heard about it before started watching it, but was it TD lands plan?
Like that was their plan to get a younger demographic on their
Julia: channel. That's a really good question because it's not their first original show, but it is their first original show that sort of has this younger concept. It's based on a book. Oh,
Christina: okay. So I don't know. I don't know why I have this feeling or vague memory.
Maybe it was a dream who knows, but I want to say, like we discussed it, it could have been in like a college class or something. We discussed how TV land had a
Julia: certain demographic could market.
Christina: And especially during that time. And it was a lot of like old reruns, like, um, golden girls and stuff. And so it just had to like in like Gunsmoke and just like an older demographic.
Julia: Well, that was the solution of TV land was to sort of go back to the golden days of TV,
Christina: TV land. Not a younger demographic, but they started making a couple shows that were gearing towards different demographics. Because when you go towards just solely an older demographic like that
Julia: demographic, no offense dies
Christina: off.
Like yeah, you gotta kind of have to appeal to newer people and stuff. And then also like, Yeah, of course, with changing markets, they probably wanted to adapt and just dabble into new things anyway. And so I'm guessing, like mixing the, like the ideas of why is age-ism such a thing probably helped as well.
I don't know, honestly, this could be my own
Julia: theory that the conversation, it's not a bad theory because for those of you listening younger as a show that TV land developed, well, Darren star, who's a sex in the city fame. Developed the show for television. I feel for life at like the first two seasons really hit for me because.
Her daughter's in high school and she's, you know, independent and she's studying abroad and she's got to figure out who she is now. And she never stopped loving literature. She never stopped loving books in the industry. And, you know, we learned throughout the show that she's still very into that. She's trying to figure out who she is now, and she's in this weird place because she's, she's got to play, pretend to survive because.
You don't give a 40 year old woman an entry-level position. That's very, very rare when I lost my job in 2016 and I was only 31. And just the hurdles I faced at 31 to try to find a job in between all the part-time jobs and all the freelance work. It still wasn't enough, but I D I repackaged my resumes.
So you wouldn't think that. Over 30. I appreciate the relationships of all the women on the show, because I think it's shows, like, I don't know if this is your experience in your twenties, but my experience in my twenties was not like, Hey, we worked together and now we're going to be friends. And then we actually become friends.
Like nobody makes like, oh, I guess you and
Christina: I did that. I dunno, Julia, all the friends that I've made have been by a work or. Just yeah. Force schools,
Julia: situations where we cannot leave.
Christina: Yeah. Here's how people become friends with me. Julia is because I don't ever actually want to be anyone's friend. So people just mistake like my
Julia: niceness for friendship.
Christina: And it just keeps lingering to the point where someone asks or I ask somebody to do something like outside of work and it might not necessarily be a friendship, all
Julia: the fringe, but it's just an
Christina: olive branch and then it goes too far. And next
Julia: thing you know, Is this telling me that you didn't actually,
Christina: you just made, I actually remember very well when you, we worked our first shift together.
I want to say Jesse was also there and Jesse like fascinated for some reason, we thought you were needed
Julia: by me.
Christina: Yeah. We thought you were just so cool. That's
Julia: cause I was that's when I was young and hot. If you met me now for the first time, you'd be like, who is this old ag with her secretary walk? What does that even mean?
So let's talk about the robust female relationships on the show, I think. Yeah.
Christina: Who is your favorite character?
Julia: So, this is hard because when the show first started, I really related to Lisa and her struggle like facing single motherhood for the first time is really hard, especially when your child, in my experience, especially when your child is in their teen years, because it's a totally different thing.
Now you have to figure out not only how to pay. Uh, teenager, but now you have to figure out how to be an independent person again, like that's just, that's a lot. So the first two seasons, I really, really am like, ah, Eliza, you're my girl. Like, I would love the opportunity to have a do over, like she's having.
Start at the bottom of a career I've always wanted and worked my way up because by season two, they have their own, she and Kelsey have their own imprint, super hot tattoo artist boyfriend who finds me super hot. Yeah. Well, yeah, cause obviously Eliza was 40. Exactly. She's just living. Best life. And I love that and I never had that.
I never had the pre kid life. I never had the pre-child life. I was 20 when I had mine. So everything was like very Modesto in the sense that everybody parties, if they go to MJC, like nobody actually takes MJC seriously at 18. And there was no, and it was just, it was like, it was an extension of high school.
There was no actual adulting involved. So there was just a lot of partying and. The same as what lies is getting to redo, right? Like she's moved to New York, she's having this experience of being young and free and sort of. Not having the burdens of like adulting that would normally happen for a 40 year old woman.
And so, so the first two seasons, I was like, I'm Eliza, Diana's sort of, I've lived my life and now I'm feeling lonely. And like season three starts to like, feel real to me. And I start to kind of get her, even though I haven't lived my life in the same way as Diana has. Um,
And now I just don't know. I love them all, except for quaint fucking hate Quinn. That's a separate topic we can talk about later.
Christina: I've got Quinn can suck
Julia: it out of the main cast. Who's your favorite? Okay.
Christina: It's not easy. It's not easy. Here's what I really, really admire about Lysa and like her character throughout all of the seasons is either.
And it's super tricky to word this because I know that like, let's just get it out of the way she's lying. Like she's lying. Huh? Okay. Aside from that lie about her age, she handles herself with such grace and elegance and the way she words everything and the way she has such like understanding for people and their situations.
And. I love that. Like, she has such a sweet and genuine heart and it radiates. And I think that's why I like her character so much. I love how fiery Kelsey is while also remaining like, like I go get her, like, she has all these like big, exciting plans for herself, but at the same time, She's she's entered.
Like I resonate with her. She's struggling, like
Julia: messes up,
Christina: but then she owns up to him immediately and tries to turn it around so herself and it's like, she's so good at that. But then she also
Julia: doesn't see how she keeps putting herself in that same cycle of like mess ups. And I resonate with that
Christina: because I too just realize that I do that.
Julia: And I'm like, okay, let's face this and fix it. Right. We all
Christina: do it to an extent, but like, I appreciate that about her character. And I love that her and like, I really do have each other's backs and like in a professional sense and in like a personal sense and I that's super awesome. And on the flip side, she also has Maggie in her life, which is just a completely different type of relationship.
And I love that. Like, I love that they're different lifestyles. They're different. I like that. They're, they're like a great example of unconditional love and a friendship.
Julia: What happens when you've been friends with somebody for that long of a time? What's great about Maggie's character is that she can live in lies is duality with her.
Christina: She gets to not only like live there with her, but kind of be like, Not a guide cause she never actually pushes her sways
Julia: her. She just let
Christina: her be like an open canvas, almost like for her own emotion. She's like, I don't know. What are you feeling? Can you tell me what you think you're going to do next? And it's like, she's almost just like her free little spirit guide.
Like you are
Julia: going to pick this up.
Christina: I'm just here for it. And it's so nice. Cause it's such, that's really honestly like a true friend right there. Like as long as you're not hurting yourself or anybody else, like a true friend will support like your little authentic path and be like, you're gonna make mistakes, but you do you,
Julia: man.
I want to go back to the live a lie though, because I feel like she lies about her. But she's not like living. Okay. Yes. She's living a lie, but she's not really living a lie. Right. Like she's lying about her, but she still she's still herself. And that's the part that I think is kind of hard, hard, because again, generational differences.
Aren't Christina, my generations, like wasn't so big. You know, our parents white light us, and then we find out and we're like, oh, okay. You know, cause we're white lying our children, but like my child's generation. And I see it sort of with like the younger millennials too, where there's just this, like, everything has to be the truth.
We need all of 100% the truth. And I'm over here. Like, no. I don't need the entire truth, unless it's like, you know, you have an STD and I need to know kind of stuff, right. Like for, so for me, it's gray, like lying is a great area. And my son's generation, there is no gray area in lying. And I'm so curious how that transition happened because licensed.
Lied about her age, but she still being who she is. She's still her personality, her character traits. She's not changed anything else. Other than like, she doesn't really talk about her past in the beginning. Omits things, which line by mission as a whole different topic. But I guess I understand that because I'm the person who's like, I will tell you what you need to know about my life when I'm ready to tell you what you need to know about my life.
So like when Kelsey and season three episode 12 finds out that lie has been lies, has been lying and she feels like their entire relationships alive and same with Josh when he finds out that she's really 40. And he just is like, everything we've felt is a lie. And I'm like, But not really.
Christina: So not really.
Is it,
Julia: am I just being like weird? Do I need to get on this train of like lying is black and white? Cause I feel like it's great.
Christina: It's not, uh, I agree that it's gray. I will say though, that their feelings are valid, that they have a moment where they feel that panic of what else are you lying to me about?
If you lied to me about something so simple
Julia: and stupid. About your
Christina: age, because if someone, I, and this is coming from someone who's had a multitude of people lie to me about a multitude of Def like stupid things. I remember dating a guy once who lied to me about like, uh, someone being like alive or not.
And then later on, I found out they were alive and I'm like, why would you lie about that? Like, it's not something you would lie about. And in that moment, like you have all of these whirlwind of feelings. If you can lie to me about this so casually, what else could you lie to me about? And so I think it's more so that because they, all of these people do forgive her
Julia: pretty quickly.
Yeah. Once they find out the truth about the situation and why she
Christina: is. And I think that's why I don't think it is. I don't think these people are responding to a black and white light. I think they are responding to gray area, but they're having a very valid response, which is there is shock. And in shock, I have a valid reaction, which is.
You're surprising me with a bunch of info that was, I'm not equipped to handle. And that has way more questions for me now than answers. And I think that's more where it's coming from. Not necessarily like not getting the gray area, because I think they all get the gray area, which is why all of them come to their, like her defense and want her to keep going with millennial and keeping the face of it.
And the attitude of it.
Julia: That's just my take on it though. Yeah, no, I think that's a fair take and I, and you're not wrong. They're totally valid in their feelings. I guess, as a person who's been lied to multiple times, uh, especially by her baby daddy and best friend about whatever it was, the fuck they were doing.
There were other things in the relationship about those relationships, that piece of information that was missing and then came to light. Didn't change. How I viewed those relationships in the long run. It was other things later on.
Christina: Okay. And this is like a completely different side, different topic, but, okay.
Lauren, what are your thoughts on Lauren? I love her
Julia: on the show. She was stressed me the fuck out as a real friend,
Christina: she looked like Tori spelling
Julia: to you. Oh, Kinda. Yeah. And now that you say it, I could see it.
Christina: I like, I knew she wasn't Tori spelling, but I was like, ma'am I can't un-see it. Now I think
Julia: that she's a necessary tool in the show because she forces the, the women out of their boxes.
And she's so the opposite of everybody on the show she's fluid. Bold. She doesn't really have a whole lot,
Christina: like I can appreciate the overtop, how her character is and who she is and what she brings to the table. However, I can't stand her. However, it's a fancy, but why
can't
Julia: you standard? Drives me crazy.
Christina: She stresses me out every time she's on screen. I just feel panicked. Like ma'am. Have you ever seen the movie? I'm sure you have superstar with Molly. Shannon. Yeah, of course I have. I feel uncomfortable when I watch that movie. Like, I just feel like my skin's crawling for her and that's how I feel.
Whenever Lauren comes on the screen, I'm just like,
Julia: you're feeling embarrassed for her. Yes,
Christina: but not like I'm not embarrassed for her because I like your embarrassment. No, I think I'm embarrassed because it's so completely opposite of what I would be. And I automatically try to put myself in other people's shoes and I can't think of myself being that way.
And so I just get so embarrassed. If I was like that, people like, I don't know, I just get so embarrassed for myself. So I
Julia: would say that in I'm not a group girl. And I think that's one of the reasons why I love shows like younger and sex and the city, even though they have their issues, it's their group.
They're a group that is ride or die for each other. And that's not how I roll. I have my individual friends that I'm giving my heart and soul to. And then. They have groups that they're in, that they plugged me into when we, when we do stuff, when they do stuff in that situation, because I'm not a group girl, I'm a solo friend.
I do have the potential to be Lauren. When she's on a calm day, I know trends, I know hip stuff like anxious, that hip stuff. I clearly am not very cool if I just fucking said I know hip stuff, but, you know, I noticed.
Christina: And hip
Julia: stuff. Right. But that's, you know, part of my job is to my, my day job is to be aware of current culture and a lot of capacities.
Um, and so I, when she's like, here's an episode in season one where a license it's like $1,800 to pay for her daughter's tuition, but nobody knows she has a daughter. So she's like, oh, you have to pay $1,800 for my, uh, And, and, and Lauren's like, oh, just like your panties for like $200 a pop, easy peasy.
Like I'm the friend who's going to know that. I think she knows random shit like that. Like that's, and, and in fairness, there are things that I don't know. So when I do have a friend that pulls a thing like that, but there's like random shit. I know. So people who don't stay current on culture, like I'm there Lauren, because they're not current on cold.
It makes any sense?
Christina: I understand. Like I, like I said, I do. That's why I don't know how to word it. I appreciate her character. I, I not embarrassed for her. I'm not embarrassed by her. Okay. She's just so opposite. And so far from my personality type that I can't help, but feel just residential embarrassment.
So I'm like, I can't even think. Like, I honestly can't understand that there's people that just feel that confident.
Julia: Like, what is that like?
Christina: Yeah. If that's more what it is, like I just, I can't, I can't connect with her and that's why I'm like, that's why I don't like on it. It's not her it's me,
Julia: but I, I think that crank her up, that like that on purpose.
When you dial her back, she's totally like the friend that you need, that's gonna push you out of your box. But when she's like on. Fire like the, I don't know if you remember when she threw the bridle or the engagement party for Kelsey and fad, like she got a fucking Hawk, like who does that?
Christina: I think that that's, I guess probably more, my problem too, is at, I get the TV has to do that, but I don't like that.
There's always a character on every show. That's just so. Outlandish
Julia: like that there are characters. You're not a character
Christina: exactly where it's like, I mean, yeah, we all have friends who are kind of crazy, but it's like, is anyone really that good of a friend with someone who's that intense all the time?
Like, I don't know.
Julia: I'm sure there's listeners email us at pop culture makes me jealous that she emailed us. And send us a voice note about your friend who is like Lauren on younger. We are dying to know what that kind of extrovert is. Okay.
Christina: And tell me why you love them. Why do you love them? I need to know.
Give me it all. Yes.
Julia: Help these two introverts out. Yeah. The
Christina: introvert in me is
Julia: cringing. Yes. Yes. Yes. I want to talk about in episode 12 of season three. Kelsey. And I know that you started in a different spot, but that's the pinnacle of the show because that's when Kelsey finds out that lice has really been lying to her about her age this entire time,
Christina: I guess I didn't realize like how long ago it had been that Kelsey found out versus everybody else.
Julia: Yeah, because it's small. Right? So Josh might done at the end of. Season one, Kelsey finds out at the end of season three, and I think everybody else finds out by season four because they're not yearly. Right. So season two picks up, right? Like literally days after season one's storyline ends it's days later.
And then it's season two and I think season three and four, like that. Because Kelsey is turning 30 in season seven and she's 26 in season one. So we've seven seasons to get to four years.
Christina: Hula hoops was that part to follow a little, but I mean, like we got their focus a lot. Well, you know, I'm not
Julia: going to lie.
I've rewatched the show multiple times because I want my life to be in New York. Living. I actually, I don't have the, I don't have the stamina to be somebody's assistant and start from the bottom like that, but I definitely want super hot boyfriend to walk down the streets of Manhattan
Christina: with. I don't know if I want to be a new Yorker or if I just want to visit New York and then be like, Ooh, I'm
Julia: and you know what I want to do?
You know what? I here's my perfect. I don't. I have a permanent resident here where we live, but maybe I keep this apartment for the rest of my life or until my landlords die. I don't know. And then I spend months at a time somewhere. So I live like a local, but I'm know I'm going to come home and reset at some point.
Oh, I like this plan. I that's literally been my dream since I was 18. Not even 16. That's always what I've wanted to do. Go to Europe for a couple years and then come back, like just float. Collect experiences like my parents' generation, which is the boomer generation is very big on have the steady job for 30 years, you have to have good retirement.
And I'm like, I don't want some of my life in an office. That doesn't sound like fun to me, even if I have my dream job, I don't want to spend my life dictated by, well, I guess my dream, I guess my dream job, it wouldn't feel like it because on days when I have to do photo shoots or video shoots, it doesn't feel like work.
And I'm like, I could do this shit all day, every day easily. But when I have to get back into the office and do editing and like that kind of stuff, that's when I'm like, I'm in low power mode. I love editing, but also I've been doing this for 12 hours and it's. Like do something else.
Christina: I think it's fair though, to want anything that Darren creates because it's unrealistic and nobody would actually live like, oh my
Julia: God, I'm only in Paris.
That, and then that shit got nominated for a golden globe. Like, Nope, you got nominated for a golden globe at a desperation because we were all in the midst of a pandemic and couldn't fucking go to Paris. I didn't watch that one, not like my friends over, like, I ha I have one friend who stuck through the entire season and she, and I love it, but it's not a great job.
Like it's not golden globe. And everybody else I know is like I saw, I watched the first episode. I was like, this isn't for me. Fair. I also want to live a life where three hot men are all chasing for my affection. So give me that. So Kelsey finds out that lies has been lying. And then the opening of season four is they're not talking.
They don't have, their relationship is on the rocks.
Christina: Yeah, sorry, it's coming back to me slowly, but that kind of goes back again to like what we were talking about earlier where like the reaction, like her reaction was hurt and anger, and she wanted to distance herself from Liza. But again, like, I really love what Liza does, where she just sticks true to herself and she gives her space and she gives her time to feel her feelings.
And then she continues to say like, when you're ready, Like when you're ready to let me show you that I'm still the same person. The only thing I did lie about was my age. Like,
Julia: I'll be right
Christina: here. And as soon as
Julia: Kelsey comes back, she's like, okay. Yeah, you're right. Yeah. Because everything they built is strong enough to get them through that.
And I just, I really loved that. I loved that. It. Kelsey could see. It really was just about the age and that she recognized and realized that this woman still helped her navigate all of these difficult things that she went through. And as a solid piece of the foundation, she is building in our adulthood, whatever people want to think about younger, I think they do a really good job at showing.
The versatility of female relationships and just how complex they are. You know, I think we get a reputation of we're bitches to each other and we're catty and we're back stabby. And, you know, it's hard to have relationships with women, but younger demonstrates just how complex it really can be. Granted it's a fictional world.
And sometimes there are moments that I'm just like, okay, but it's TV. There's going to be those moments.
Christina: Hey, you make the really good point. I would also say it points to the fact that like age really, you can be friends with anybody like your age really doesn't matter, especially. In your workforce. Like, I feel like that's when you do get the weirdest friendships, because you're like, you guys are all here, whatever your circumstances, whatever your roles are, like, you might be different ages.
But like sometimes I remember like one of my favorite co-workers of all time is Rady. No one would ever think that. Someone who's like my mom's age, she's a grandmother to like four grand babies. Now, one of my best friends at work when we work together, because she was hilarious, we would sing, we would dance.
We would have fun. We would, she would teach me things. I would always be like,
Julia: wow,
Christina: I'm not a very good woman. Not am I reading? I didn't know this.
Julia: I understand. One of my best friends is. 18 or 19 years older than I am. And I've known her since I was 15. We met at church when I was still forced to go to church. And, you know, she saw this like awkward punk rock kid and thought it's a human that I got to mentor and keep tabs on. And then we just blossomed into really great friendship.
She really like, I Hmm she's it's okay. This is where I get more fed. You ready? It's gonna be real fucking hard when I can't like, like when she goes, I it's going to be like losing an aunt.
Christina: Oh, that says a lot though about like how much she means
Julia: to you. She hosted my bachelor's degree, graduation party.
She let me host it. She let me have the party at
Christina: her house. Is this the lady that I visited you? Like she has a pool. She's got a really cool house. Um, and like she had all these. Yeah. I sat and talked with her. She has a button. Yes, yes. Okay. Let's talk
Julia: about like, okay. I have had a lot of office jobs in my life.
Never have I ever dressed like any of these women to my office job? Like, is that allowed in publishing? I would expect that in a fashion house, like this very chic style, like, is that normal for New York city?
Christina: That's what I want to know. Or like, where is that normal? Where do you get these clothes? How do you get the confidence to start wearing these outfits on the regular?
Like, I, I love living in there. I'm. I had, if I wore that, you know, how many people would look at me and just point out the fact that I was wearing that, like, listen, that's
Julia: because we live in fucking where everyone shops at Macy's and H and M and these hell of expensive boutiques that make us all look like basic bitches.
Christina: Order is like sheen. And so I have like these Q I basic, I don't care though, these cute, like white shorts though, that I wore today. And I'm not kidding. Like, I didn't even wear them like that long. And like, people were like staring
Julia: and I'm like, they're white shorts. They're people own white shorts guys.
It's true. But think about where we live and our shopping options. There's not a lot of options, big time designers. Aren't going to open up a shop here for us to buy clothes in. You know, we've got target. And most of my clothes, when my sister used to live in Seattle and we'd go shopping, it was like not going to lie.
I did when I was a size eight, which in my mind for fashion to be a fashionista was the ideal size, which is unfair because now that I'm. Not as high as eight. It is very difficult to find clothing. And it's frustrating. So ask, I'm sorry, this is a personal
Christina: question. You don't have to answer, but can I ask why you thought a size eight was ideal?
Just because of my mild. Pop culture, media reference like a two or a four, like a four in my mind was the ideal
Julia: size two and four is too skinny. You can see your bones and that's not healthy. Even when I was a four, you could see my hip bones and I don't have fucking hips. That's not, it's not cute. And if somebody is that size, because that's their natural physical, that's different.
But when you are a girl like me, who's curvy. And thin, or I was done. It was the ideal size because literally every style I wore looked good on my body. And so, and I felt confident and comfortable in that. And so some of those styles don't translate into larger sizes. Not because they can't translate, but because nobody makes certain stuff.
In those sizes and that's really fucking frustrating, but when we'd visit my sister in Seattle, it was man girl, the bulk of my credit card debt was like fat, fantastic clothes, but I also would buy shit for a deal. Um, and like I had all kinds of like, well for Modesto, Great designer names. I had a very excellent wardrobe and then I went to grad school and got the grad school blues and just ate all my feelings instead of working at all and continuing to work out.
And then COVID happened. So of course everyone got the COVID wait, I can see New York city being that fashionable, but is that
Christina: reasonable, but how do you have. I guess like the income with. Not the income I get, like you're working all the time. Of course you have the income to look nice, but how do you have the energy to put that much, like to apply your makeup like that and to do your hair like that every day, and then to make it to work on time and then to have time in the morning to go get coffee as well.
And again, it makes why is the sun always at the same? When they're going to work, like let's shove realistic weather.
Julia: I was that girl. I had full makeup. I had full hair once a week. I'd wake up at four o'clock in the morning too. And I didn't go to the gym, but I would shower, wash my hair, dry it, and flat, flat, take a flat iron or curling air into it.
The other days of the week, I'd go to the gym, come home shower and like apply full face makeup. Touch up my hair, totally pieced to get. I had my shoe game was strong. I had shoes for outfits. You know, one pair of shoes could go with like three or four different outfits, but also I'd have like three pairs of shoes that could go with one outfit.
It was God blessed, the person who falls in love with this version of Julia, because he 100% missed out on the Julia that made an effort in her physical appearance every single day she
Christina: liked doing it. I did
Julia: at the time, because you know, like we talked about in the mother's day episode, that's what I thought I had to do to be, to fit the profile of being the mom.
I thought I wanted to be. Okay. But now, then I got fired and then it was like, and then I continued to make that effort in my attempts to gain sustainable employment. And it wasn't working, the things I did to survive in my nine to five situation, those same tactics weren't working. So then at some point.
I think my second year of grad school, I was like, fuck this shit. I'm going to wash and go with my hair. As often as I want, I would never have worn workout clothes. In public, unless I was actually going to the gym now, I'm like, I gotta go to the store to get milk. This is Walmart. Cool. Do I have a bra on?
Yes. Okay. Let's go. That never would have happened five years ago. I
Christina: grew up with that personality of never carry what I looked like. My mom would bait, Christina. Kay. Are you leaving the house like that? Maybe? Yes.
Julia: Nope. We didn't leave the house like that. You look good, you looked good. And it, and it wasn't a perception thing to the public.
It was, you don't want, my dad was in law enforcement for 30 years. Right. So there was this mentality of like how you behave outside of the home. Do you want that shit on the front page? How are you going to feel if somebody put your behavior on the front page? Like, would you be proud of it? Like what if somebody snapped your phone?
Would you be proud of that? And so, so that is my nowadays. I'm like, fuck, I don't want to run at anybody. Cause I look like shit half the time. So that is in the back of my head. Like I look like shit literally runs through my head every single day because I'm not making an effort. I'm not putting together outfits like I used to.
And I think that's actually probably contributing to part of my, my little blues situation that's happening.
Christina: I was going to say that makes me sad though, that like, that you feel. Like not good when you don't get ready. Like, you don't feel pretty enough or something because I think you look really pretty without getting ready.
And I think that you should feel really pretty without getting ready. And I think that's why, like I genuinely like Nope, feel pretty necessarily, but I genuinely do not care what people think about me because I'm like, my look should not matter. What you're or like what other people's opinions of my look should not matter.
It should be how I feel. And so it should always should come from, with in, and for me that means I'm not going to get ready so much until I get comfortable with my looks to the point where other people have to get comfortable with my
Julia: looks like it's, it's the total opposite of the
Christina: spectrum, but it's like, I still have those thoughts where.
Well, no, I don't think I look better than anyone not wearing makeup. I just do it because I don't want to hide my own face and then wipe it off later and then be like, oh, well, shit. Like I'd rather just look at my face all day and be like, well, And just never have that like extra layer of like, well, maybe
Julia: there's hope, I guess I should clarify my full makeup face because I did do dancing and theater for a long time.
So like, in my mind, stage makeup is totally different, which is what you would, what I think a lot of women are doing the aversion of nowadays
Christina: because
Julia: the contouring and all that shit, like I'm not here for. I'm not here for that. When I did full face makeup, I'm talking eyebrows, eye shadow mascara. Yes. I, you know, accentuated my cheekbones and made my skin on my face.
All one color. But when I washed my face off, you could still see me.
Christina: Okay. This, this makes me happy. And I'm glad you clarified because you're right.
Julia: We were, I can't do that in a game. I
Christina: get ready every day, but for me getting ready. Like making sure my eyebrows aren't wild putting on mascara and putting on chapstick.
And like, to me, I'm like, I look alive, I look bright. Let's go places where other people let's put things on everywhere and
Julia: I don't get this. You know, it works for them, I guess. But for me, I'm like, if I wash my face off, like if I, if I go home with a guy or I bring a guy home and he doesn't recognize me the next day, that's a fucking problem.
That's was,
Christina: that's always my concern. That's always been my concern. I'm like mine, I guess it's cause I'm a swimmer. I'm like, you can't go swimming with these people. Right. That was an actual fear of mine. I'm like, what am I going to do? Jump in the pool. And then be like, oh no, I'm melted. Right? Exactly.
Julia: So for me, it was not part of my armor.
I guess it just made me feel better. I wish we lived in a world where we could, like, I wish I lived, how do I say this? Our world just doesn't work that way. It's very much like, oh, you look like shit in public. What's wrong with you? Like, why would you do that to yourself? It's very, we, we want to say it matters.
We, well, we do say there's a whole culture about it, right? What's inside of you is what matters. The outside is just an extra, it doesn't like that. Shouldn't be your value, but we're receiving messages every single day that are outside is our value.
Christina: What made you jealous about that? Like about the younger world
Julia: mine's too.
Okay. For this particular episode, the first part is, is that lights I got to, it looks like lysis seamlessly got a do-over and she's got this hot boyfriend and she's just kind of living this best. The other part of it is she's got a girl group. I'm not a girl group girl, but I wish that I was regularly.
It's just, it's just hard. It's, I'm a very independent person to adapt to. So being in a girl group, I've tried a couple of times and it doesn't really work for me, but I wish I could. And seeing it on TV makes me so happy. And then I do, I do. I feel, I feel very, I feel a little jealous when I see it, so well done.
Like it's done on younger cause like what could be, and I can't figure out how to make that work in real reality. I get that.
Christina: I think those are good reasons to be chose about that world.
Julia: Super hot boyfriends. That's all I want. Just want hot men fighting for my affection. That's all I want. All of them that used to be my life.
That was my twenties. And now it's gone.
Christina: Oh, that's going to be your forties.
Julia: Oh yeah. If I can lose some of this fucking grad school, wait. No, actually, it shouldn't matter if I'm skinny.
Christina: Thank you for coming to the conclusion on your own. I was waiting, I got a lot
Julia: of deprogramming to do body appearances and whatnot.
Let's talk about what about younger makes you jealous about whatever, all the
Christina: things, all the lives I'm jealous of their wardrobe for one. Of these they're like these apartments, like, I don't understand how you're finding these apartments. How you're keeping them and how they're staying. So like clean and put together when you have this busy social
Julia: life and work life, like
Christina: I'm barely at my apartment and it is always the best thing.
I've had
Julia: my 30 dishes on my thing for, I don't know, a week. I'm pretty sure
Christina: I ran the dishwasher today, reloaded it. And there's still dishes in the sink and I don't even know how they got there because we didn't make dinner. So I'm like, where,
Julia: where did they come? In Maggie's defense though. She does talk about how she's lived in Brooklyn forever.
So she says to me, she's like, she's
Christina: control. And then Josh has a tattoo studio and he lives above it, or some
Julia: decent sized apartment. Like I, you hear horror stories about real estate in New York, in New York. And I'm just like Darren star. Thanks for making us think that we can live in New York in the most unrealistic way.
I mean,
Christina: people do that to California all the
Julia: time. Oh my God. I hate it. When they drive across the golden gate bridge to get to SFO. That's not fucking real unless you're coming from a county.
Christina: Sorry. So like driving across golden gate
Julia: bridge is a pain in the ass also true.
Christina: Like you're only going if you really, really need to go.
Oh, okay. But that's what makes me jealous. Is there. They're nice apartments and how they're always clean. Despite having like these nice fancy lives. Like, I don't believe you
Julia: don't believe it. Like who's
Christina: doing, who's doing your chores. Who's doing your chores. Who's grocery shopping for you. Why do you always have groceries
Julia: and like good groceries, good food.
Yeah. Who's, who's getting your daily harvest
Christina: bowls. Ma'am like, why are you, why is everyone also like pinnacle health people? Like how come everyone knows how to eat properly all the time? I
Julia: can't feed myself well for Shea. I, you
Christina: know, I just ate a whole box of Mac and cheese for dinner and I'm 27 years old.
That's not healthy. Okay. So
Julia: I literally, I do that part time. I'd love you for that. Since Christina and I recorded, I've reflected more about the conversation we had about appearance and reading hood feminism by Mikki Kendall. I realized that by being a well-dressed perfectly put together brown woman, especially when one is a solo mom, it was imperative to not read it.
Any stereotypes or negative narratives that would come with looking the part of a poor single mom. My appearance was the first thing that people always noticed about me anyway. So why not? Quote, shock them with my look, not fitting their perception of a single mother, strong, independent, disciplined, stable fit.
All of these labels were important to my surface. When in reality, everything was held together by flimsy. The workout routine I had wasn't financially sustainable. The independence was only half true. I was strong in public only to come home and cry myself to sleep at night. I was only disciplined if I had the means to be.
And when my employment status changed, my mental health took a dive and was no longer able to keep my image and. To make matters worse. I realized that I hadn't much of a social network to lean on and the depths of the emotions I was experiencing, I was lucky and grateful to have my parents, but it's a different type of support system than that of one's peers embarking on establishing new relationships while attempting to gain, study employment and enrolling into graduate school.
Placed me in a position that I had never been in before. It was an experience when might have it 25 and single, not 32 and responsible for another human and household. And then I went from beautifully polished to damaged and doll. While many in my support network would argue against most of these things.
The truth is the change in the way the world treated me now was difficult to navigate as my world is so predominantly white. How do I explain to my white friends what it's like being the prettiest woman in the room without sounding arrogant or conceited. Now I have the language to explain it because I have spent time connecting with the mixed, biracial community online to learn and grow.
But in 2016, I wasn't ready. I've spoken in other episodes about the racial prejudice I've experienced, but I've never talked in depth about the other side of that point, which is benefiting from the fetish, the fetishization. Race woman. And it's only in my current state that I'm realizing this truth. I am in the embassy of this realization and still have a lot of exploring and learning and growing to do younger is a reminder that the surface shit needs to change age, beauty and size.
Isn't an indicator of one's value and worth. Yet. We are constantly seeing reinforcements of this in pop culture. Everything works out for Liza. Her truth comes out. People eventually understand her motives. They realize the relationship they've developed with her is real. Her fictional worlds challenges are temporary.
Her ups and downs are buttoned up after two or three episodes ending in the expected resolution. But in my world, it's far more complicated and won't be resolved after one season. .
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