Stepford Mom Encounters

Snark alert! If you are searching for a feel good story about rainbows and unicorns and a couple hand holding verses of Kumbaya, look elsewhere. In fact, you'll never find that here so surely you're misdirected, misguided, or mistaken.

I happen to live in an area teeming with Stepford Moms. I bet they lurk where you live too. I have a hunch their uniforms are different in each locale. Surely the Stepford Moms inside the beltline of Raleigh don't look like the hipster chic moms of Santa Monica or the earthy bohemian moms of Portland. I'm talking about the women who have dogeared Lisa Birnbach's Preppy Handbook and are on the perpetual hunt for the ideal bloody mary recipe. The prep school crowd, whether they went to one or not.

Full disclosure, I went to prep school and I live in the same zip code in the same coveted neighborhood as many of these moms. I am not, repeat not, one of them. For starters, I am likely one of five brown people in my whole zip code. I've met one other brown person who happens to be a good friend (but not just because we're brown). The Stepford Moms are not brown, at least until August after three months of sunning themselves at the beach or the club. They don't grace the municipal city pools, no siree. I'm talking about my town's version of Kate Middleton wannabes. A whole swarm of women Holden Caulfield would loathe.

Allow me to illustrate my point. Here's what I just saw in a habitat known to be a common gathering ground for Stepford Moms, the public library, in said zip code.

It is fact that these women have fantastic taste and svelte pilateed bodies. Not a thigh touches or an ass sags, breasts are perky, natch (with the help of Doc Op or Wacoal). The majority of the Stepford Moms are blondes, approximately 2% of them are natural blondes. Not a soul has red hair and freckles. The typical outfit on a spring day consists of white designer jeans with a striped grosgrain belt (mostly I see Paige, J Brand, Hudson, or Citizens of Humanity: the Sevens are reserved for roughing it on the playground or for preschool volunteering), Tory Burch flats in colors that are not practical in the least bit but nonetheless fabulous (lime green, orange, mustard yellow), Lily Pulitzer tunic or Trina Turk ruffled blouse, hobo or otherwise slouchy bag (lots of Kooba and Marc Jacobs), Nicole Richie-esque sunglasses bearing an obvious logo perefectly propped upon their heads (I'm guessing there are a lot of fake Chanels.), and something monogrammed, like a sunglass case, library tote bag, or water bottle koozie. And monogrammed children are a given. I could write a whole separate post on the culture of monogramming among this set. These are not women who buy clothes at Target, Old Navy, or god forbid, the thrift store or yard sales.

The Stepford Moms chatter about all of life's most important topics. When to go to the beach, what private racquet club has opened up the waiting list, tennis match pairings, nanny bargains, private school application pitfalls, sample sales and boutique party nights, Bunco, diamond cleaning, interior decorating guffaws, and the latest fiasco involving the help (their word, not mine). From what I've overheard, the economy, health care, education, reproductive rights, civil liberties, civil unions, equal pay, planet earth, or CSAs do not creep into conversation, even in passing. I'm guessing these women are not Facebook fans of Rachel Maddow or NPR. But maybe I don't give them enough credit.

What strikes me is not just the apparent shallowness of this ilk; I am in awe of how they all look and talk and laugh and point and toss their hair in the exact same way. I swear if you put a Glamour magazine black bar across all their eyes you'd think you were looking at the same woman. Apparently individuality is not a core value among this set (my favorite quote ever about individuality is found in this song).

They all try so hard to be the same, sound the same, think the same. It seems to me that they are afraid. Afraid to be themselves, to stray from the crowd, to think irreverent thoughts, to break the pink and green mold, to turn their paradigms sideways and backwards and upside down. Afraid of rejection. Afraid of not belonging. Afraid of being singled out. Afraid of being exposed. Afraid of being an individual.

What scares me is a flock of lemmings.

Whispers

Lately there's been a gaggle of folks whispering, "So, have you met the new neighbors?" The seemingly innocent conversation starter has a whole host of dynamics attached. Gossip. Disbelief. Judgement. Novelty. Curiosity. I give my neighbor Chuck and Mac Daddy, a lot of credit for the genuine aplomb with which they responded to that very question yesterday. They were like, "Oh sure we met. They seem so fun and cool. We're really looking forward to seeing them once they're settled in." They were being honest, not making a statement, based on their bona fide candor. It's pretty easy to diffuse the situation when the instigator doesn't get the response he expected.

The hushed tones of such questioning are akin to that mother's whispering of unseemly words in St. Elmo's Fire. I find such behavior so irksome. You see, the new neighbors are two women. Who live together. They're not related. One is not the landlord and the other a paying tenant. No one is the caretaker of the other. They're not even roommates. Give up? They're gay for goodness sake. BFD. Not even newsworthy. Yawn. There's certainly juicier gossip than that in the 'hood. Hell, I'm potentially fodder for better grilling meat considering some of the stuff I write on this here very blog.

Are we so far removed from diversity of the population that a gay couple moving in two doors down is all that interesting? I recall a few years back when similar whispering ensued when Republicans moved onto the street. We were flabbergasted. Republicans?! Moving in here? What ghastly horror to invade our progressive little precinct! They'll ruin our voting records! Tell me it's not so! It turns out that more and more are sending moving announcements (on engraved Crane stationery, no doubt) from our zip code, but that's for another day. I'll have plenty to report on that divide once the election heats up. But I digress, as I so often do...

I find it more difficult to explain to Bird and Deal why someone has guns in his home than why two women live together or why one of Bird's buddies has two mommies. In fact, all the kids in class think it's pretty darn cool that this little boy gets to have TWO mommies. To these children, mommy equals love. I might be the only Indian in the world who's bad at math but even I know that this equation balances, no matter who the mommy is. Love, in all its forms, is infinitely easier to explain than violence or danger, or the potential for it, in all its many, gruesome forms. Love makes sense. It is indeed patient and kind.

The face of the American family isn't necessarily changing, it's just that the myriad forms of families are finally marching out from the under the rock we've collectively buried them under. Back in the 80s there was a whole lot of whispering going on among my friends' parents because my mom and dad were divorced. I was the only one whose parents weren't married, and in retrospect, the whispers and pitying looks I got all spelled: Gossip. Disbelief. Judgement. Novelty. Curiosity. To top it off, my brother and I lived with our dad. Not our mother. That's still practically unheard of, so imagine the judgement passed and speculation going on back in the day.

Times are changing folks, and let's keep up! No use staying shackled to closed minded ways that don't provide opportunities to teach our children (and ourselves, for that matter) about the diversity of the world. It's enriching to have the world open up to us verus closing in on us.