Jeneration X: One Reluctant Adult's Attempt to Unarrest Her Arrested Development

by Jen Lancaster

  I last another five minutes before I go inside, step out of this soaking wet albatross, and step back into one of my unliberating, unforgiving, thigh-revealing tank suits.

  And I have to wonder if the great ladies in history couldn’t have accomplished a little bit more if they weren’t weighed down in thirty pounds of swim skirt.

  My girlfriends have come to my house for our annual long weekend. I’m here in my thigh-revealing tank suit and they’re all done up in their adorable, flippy swim skirts. I watch as their suits engorge around them, and they’re suddenly surrounded by circles of sodden Spandex.

  When we get out of the pool to eat lunch, the complaints begin in earnest.

  “Jesus Christ, it’s freaking cold out here,” says Angie.

  “I feel like I’m wearing a wet diaper,” says Wendy.

  “There’s just so much fabric, I can’t seem to dry off,” says Poppy.

  One by one, they peel off to put on regular clothes to finish their lunches.

  And there I sit in my girlish one-piece, smug as a bug in a rug.

  Oh, tank suit… I shall never forsake you again.

  Reluctant Adult Lesson Learned:

  “Everyone is doing it” was a lousy reason to go along with the crowd in eighth grade and it’s a lousy reason now. If the whole carpool wants to jump off a bridge, then demand they drop you off at the office first.

  C·H·A·P·T·E·R F·I·F·T·E·E·N

  How Do You Talk to Girls

  “You know I feel so dirty when they start cooking cute; I want to tell her that I love her but the point is probably moot.”

  I finish dicing the last of the celery for the mirepoix while I wait for the pancetta to finish browning. Oh, crispy pork fat, you’re the most delicious pork fat of them all.

  As I survey the rest of my mise en place ingredients, I’m overcome with a sense of satisfaction. A couple of years ago, I was content just to shove a couple of naked pork chops under the broiler, splash on some preservative-laden barbecue sauce, and call it a meal. But now? I’m creating a culinary masterpiece, slowly building flavor one layer at a time. In two hours, this is going to be the most beautiful Bolognese sauce anyone has ever seen, and that is not an exaggeration.

  “’Cause she’s watching him with mirepoix!”

  I giggle and toss the celery in the pot.

  “And she’s lovin’ him with that carrot, I just know it!”

  There go the carrots.

  “And he’s sautéing golden brown late, late at night!”

  And finally, the onions. I grab my spatula-microphone to belt out the next verse. “I wish that I had Bo-lo-gnese! I want Bo-lo-gnese! Where can I find a fresh sauce like that?” [What, you don’t change the words when you sing?]

  My interest in cooking neatly coincided with buying my first iPod. Turns out I don’t get so bored with all the scrubby-peely-choppy tedium if there’s music involved. Yeah, we have a decent stereo, but Fletch has a tendency to overcomplicate home electronics, so the path from “off” to “The Smiths” requires a master’s degree in sound engineering. Also, I’m far too impatient to listen to a whole CD at a time and I tend to go all MC JazzyJen, [My DJ name.] and having to switch artists every three and a half minutes is exhausting. Cooking’s one of the few situations in which I can multitask [Notable failures include driving while talking to passengers, swimming while cocktailing, and running while breathing.] and I’m totally over eating cereal for dinner, so it’s all worked out nicely.

  As I stir and shimmy and slaughter the lyrics, I feel a presence. I glance up to find Fletch frowning in the doorway.

  “What’s up?” I ask, removing my snappy new replacement earbud.

  (Libby ate the last set.)

  (Libby, bless her heart, is kind of an asshole.)

  He looks grim. “Did you know Rick Springfield is dead?”

  What? No! Noooooo! Not Rick Springfield! Rick, also known as Dr. Noah Drake to General Hospital fans, was my first real musical love. Before he came along with his velvet-revolver voice, feathered hair, and stunning assortment of Members Only jackets, my interest in music was strictly secondhand, an offshoot of my brother’s esoteric band du jour. [With a brief but intense dalliance with Andy Gibb. But I was only in fourth grade back then. No one really understands true love until middle school.] Much as I tolerated the Marshall Tucker Band and Jethro Tull, nothing about their songs really spoke to me. [The flute doesn’t rock as hard as one may think.]

  Rick Springfield’s one-two punch of talent and good looks had me smitten. I’d sit in my bedroom, tape recorder at hand, listening to Kasey Kasem’s American Top 40, ready to hit RECORD the second I heard the opening notes of his melodic stylings. And every week, I’d buy Tiger Beat or Teen Beat, basing my purchase decision on whichever magazine featured more pictures of him, and, please, Jesus? Let him be shirtless.

  I found out recently one of my friends harbored the same kind of crush on our boy Rick. Except she grew up in Beverly Hills and she and her wealthy friends would pool their allowance to hire a limo driver to cruise past his house whenever they could. To this day, she can recite his old license plate number. I thought I was a committed fan when I framed his Working Class Dog album cover, but clearly not. Also? I suspect her allowance was higher than mine.

  “Jessie’s Girl” was one of the first videos I ever, saw, too, and Rick tore out a piece of my tender thirteen-year-old heart every time he smashed the mirror with his guitar neck in utter frustration. No, Rick, no! I’d shout. Not Jessie’s Girl! You don’t want Jessie’s Girl! You wish that you had Jen-ni-fer! You want Jen-ni-fer! As I’m only thirteen, I don’t have a real concept of what statutory rape entails, but that’s not the point; I should be your girl. You should spray-paint MY name on that brick wall. My parents won’t mind.

  The pinnacle of my young life was when my friend’s dad drove a carload of freshmen girls up to South Bend to see Rick perform at our first concert ever. [My friend Poppy’s first concert was the Rolling Stones and Blackbird’s was Led Zeppelin. Yet when I told them mine, they were jealous.] Of course the minute I discovered a recording artist who was sure to return my love [George Michael, of course.] I was totes over Rick, but for a brief moment in time he was my pink heart, yellow moon, orange star, and green clover. To this day, every time I see a bull terrier wearing a short-sleeve dress shirt and a skinny tie, my heart beats a tiny bit faster.

  “I can’t believe it! He was fine last week—I mean, I just saw an interview with him about Late, Late at Night. [Kudos for whomever titled his memoir.] What happened?”

  Fletch’s lips get all white and puckered. “Your singing killed him.”

  Nice. I swat at him with a saucy spatula but he manages to dodge me. “If you’re going to come in here and be all critical while I’m slaving over this gorgeous Bolognese sauce, you can have Lucky Charms for dinner.”

  “Jen, I could hear you over the sound of my power tools. In the basement. At first I thought the ungodly screeching was one of the cats caught in the drill press, but then when I really listened, I realized they wouldn’t howl to the tune of ‘Jessie’s Girl.’”

  After an (insincere) apology and a promise to tackle the dishes, I grudgingly allow Fletch to have my Bolognese for dinner and it is spectacular. The trick is adding a quarter pound of diced mortadella (with the inset pistachios if you can find ’em) and slow heat for maximum flavor concentration. And don’t even get me started on the importance of using San Marzano tomatoes!

  While we’re eating, I reflect on my first concert experience. Now that I’m an adult, I have a whole new appreciation for how much bourbon it must have taken Mr. Moon, my girlfriend’s poor father, to wash the sound of a station wagon full of shrieking freshmen (and the stench of Aqua Net and Love’s Baby Soft) out of his head. Yet here I am thirty years later and the night’s as vivid in my memory now as it was then and so I’m thankful he afforded us the experience.

  “Hey,” I say, the kernel of an idea forming, “w
e should take Joanna’s daughter to her first concert. How fun would that be?”

  Fletch deliberately sets down his fork. “By ‘we’ you mean you and Joanna, right?”

  “Um, yeah. Considering the last concert you saw was Ministry, I’m thinking Taylor Swift isn’t quite your jam.”

  “Then I wholeheartedly approve.”

  In Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand stated that there’s no such thing as real altruism. She espoused the principle of ethical egotism, meaning that a person’s moral obligation is to promote their own welfare.

  Translation?

  I still have the musical sensibilities of a teenage girl and I kind of want to see a shitty pop concert in the guise of doing something nice for my pal’s kid, so I need to find a way to make it happen.

  Not long ago I asked for some upbeat, treadmill-worthy iTunes suggestions and I ended up downloading the super-sugar-pop playlist of your typical eighth grader, full of glitter and Katy Perry and Lady Gaga and Justin Bieber. Despite an almost pathological desire to douse that kid with a can of mousse, I’ve played “Baby” more times than I care to mention. So the idea of taking Joanna’s daughter to see him wasn’t without appeal. More importantly, I could write off the cost of my tickets in the name of research—win, win!

  Joanna threw a wrench in the works, however. “Anna doesn’t like Justin Bieber. She says he’s for younger girls.”

  Fine.

  I have the musical taste of a tween.

  We can still work around this.

  Joanna buys four tickets for the Chicago leg of the Glee tour and her daughter Anna loses her freaking mind when she finds out we’re going. (Joanna doesn’t let her watch the whole show, but she gets to see the musical numbers and I guess that’s enough.)

  I make sure Anna’s aware that it’s me who masterminded this whole idea because, for some odd reason, it’s important for this kid to like me. I’ve never been one to win a child’s favor before, but this is Joanna’s daughter we’re talking about and I want to be her Auntie Jen, largely because she’s a fine young lady and her parents have done an amazing job of raising her. In fact, at her last birthday party, she asked for donations to the local animal shelter in lieu of presents. How cool is that?

  Anna’s favored me more since she came swimming here last fall and I made some decent headway with a marshmallow-scented Philosophy gift set and the Monster High book, but I’ve ground to cover still.

  You see, our last big outing together was kind of a misstep. During Christmas break in 2009, Joanna and I had the bright idea to take Anna to the museum and then to high tea because Joanna’s mom and her friend did this when she was Anna’s age and she has such fond memories of that day.

  However, our edited-for-tween-listening college stories did nothing for her, [Even at ten and a half, she didn’t buy that we were reading the Bible with all those Sigma Nus.] nor did the Matisse exhibit.

  I’m not sure how to say this next part because the last thing I ever want to do is offend Joanna. I adore her and her daughter so much, and yet I need to get it out… Little girls ask a lot of fucking questions.

  For two hours we trudged through the museum, and, to her credit, Anna’s behavior was exemplary. But she was relentless about gaining an understanding of stuff we had no idea how to answer, like why this particular artist worked in the medium he did, what’s the deal with all the tiny dollhouses and who came up with the idea to miniaturize everything in the first place, and how come everyone’s naked in that portrait? Good Lord, my dogs drive me to drink and they can’t even talk. I can’t imagine the lush I’d be with the barrage of questions all day long. Were I to hear “Hey, Mom? Hey, Mom?” that many times in a row, I’m pretty sure I’d hang myself.

  Anna didn’t care for much of what we saw [Likely because we’re shitty docents.] until we came upon this massive painting featuring hundreds of amoeba-looking blue circles hanging over the staircase leading down to the first floor.

  Anna stopped to gaze up at it. “What’s this called?” she asked.

  “Oh, liebchen, I don’t see a placard so I’m not sure,” Joanna replied. “Let’s try to find out.”

  We spent fifteen minutes looking for some sort of guide or description or replication in the gift shop, and failed to turn up anything. However, Anna was on a mission. She found some art that spoke to her, damn it, and we were going to find out its backstory.

  Or die trying.

  Another ten minutes of interrogation later, I realized that A) Anna has a brilliant career in litigation ahead of her, B) I should buy better museum shoes, and C) I need to nip this question foolishness in the bud.

  I snapped my fingers. “Hey! Wait, I totally remember! The artist is Von Rizcheck and it’s called Ebb and Flow, like those iceberg pieces you see in National Geographic specials about Alaska. Notice the darker blue parts around the circles? That’s the Antarctic Sea and the painting is the artist expressing his concerns about global warming.”

  Seemingly satisfied, we finally moved on.

  Above Anna’s head, Joanna mouthed, “Von Rizcheck?”

  I shrugged and replied, “Maybe?”

  And there in the Art Institute, I learned a valuable lesson that will surely change the course of history because I’m the first person to have discovered it:

  Sometimes lying to children is the path of least resistance.

  That’s my gift to you. You’re welcome.

  Anyway, Anna eventually found out the real story behind the painting [It’s by Georgia O’Keeffe and is called Sky Above Clouds. I would have gotten away with it if it weren’t for your fine, meddling school system, DuPage County!] and now perceives me to be full of shit, so this concert is a prime opportunity to work on my image.

  Speaking of my image, what do I wear to impress a twelve-year-old? Joanna’s going to the show in full Coach Sue Sylvester gear but A) I don’t have an Adidas track suit and B) no. I’ve been all about the beachy-preppy-tunic-and-long-white-shorts thing this summer, but I’m not sure the kids are into J. Jill and I bet their math teacher wears polo shirts, so my usual Lacoste is out, too.

  I settle on a funky white T-shirt and some stupid pants with silly stitching and sparkly side panels I bought while in a panic in Pittsburgh after spilling an in-flight Bloody Mary on my good travelin’ trousers. (Lousy turbulence.) I loop a lightweight Burberry scarf around my neck and throw on some wedge sandals. To curry extra favor, I wear the necklace Anna made for me out of a domino and some glitter paint. When I’m donning the pants, I notice the button is one enormous rhinestone and I wonder exactly how drunk I was when I got off the plane and headed to the mall. A lot, I think.

  I’m meeting the gals at Allstate Arena. When I park, I pay special attention to being as close to the exit aisle as possible. The last place I want to be is trapped in this parking lot for an hour with twenty thousand little girls all hopped up on Vitamin Glee. What’s surprising is given the audience, I thought I’d be in Minivan Central, but most of the vehicles around me are all shiny and new and sporty. Weird.

  Anyway, I’m excited for the concert! I’ve adored Glee since the premiere episode, which lives on my iPod. Every time I take a flight longer than an hour—which is almost daily when I’m touring—I rewatch it. I normally have distaste for pilot episodes because they’re almost uniformly terrible with stilted dialogue and awkward exposition, no matter how good the show is once it hits its stride. The problem is a pilot episode has to establish the why here/why now aspect, as well as providing enough character development to make the viewer invested, so they tend to be all words and little action. Rarely are pilots anything less than painful.

  However, the first episode of Glee was the best I’ve ever seen, from the second Mr. Schuester stepped out of his crappy old Honda to the final chorus of “Don’t Stop Believing.” Everything about it was perfection, which is why I feel it’s my job to voice my displeasure on the Internet every Tuesday night after yet another disappointing episode. My constant constructive criticis
m is exactly what the show’s writers need to get back on their game.

  Again, you’re welcome. [And P.S., Very Special Episodes are a privilege, not a right, and aren’t meant to air every damn week. Ryan Murphy, I love you, man, but enough already.]

  I find Joanna, Anna, and her friend Morgan easily. Joanna’s stocked my seat with a large beer and a cold water, unsure of which I prefer.

  She’s a keeper.

  As we survey the crowd, I’m surprised by the demographic. I’d envisioned Rick Springfield, Take Two, except there are people here over the age of fifteen. A whole bunch of them, in fact. And they’re not all chicks. At least half the audience is comprised of gay men. Guess that explains all the fancy cars in the parking lot.

  Of particular interest is the couple sitting directly behind us. I’d guess they were in their sixties and don’t have kids or grandkids with them. We’re not sure why they’re here. We’re trying to figure out their story when the lights come up and a shaggy-haired breakdancer appears onstage. When the roar of the audience dies down, I hear the gentleman ask his companion, “Is that Justin Bieber?”

  Turns out they’re not sure why they’re here, either.

  After the opening act, we have a short respite before the main event and that’s when Anna and Morgan ready their signs. They spent the afternoon perfecting their artwork and I step back to admire their craft.

  “‘Anna + Artie = love’?” I ask Joanna. Although Artie’s character is adorable with his nerd glasses and wheelchair, I kind of thought the girls would go for more obvious choices like Finn or the blond boy with the lips. [Or, if you’re Team Cougar, Puck.]

  Joanna beams with pride. “She’s sensitive.”

  The lights come up again and the opening notes to “Don’t Stop Believing” play. And that’s when I hear The Noise.

  The Noise is like nothing I’ve ever heard before and probably nothing I’ll ever hear again. Were one to try to replicate it, one would need to set off an atom bomb in a bubble gum factory or perhaps burst a Hello Kitty Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloon with a unicorn horn.