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Three things I hated about “The Fault in Our Stars”

This summer, like everyone else on the planet, I succumbed to the hysteria and read The Fault in Our Stars.  I laughed, I cried, I was moved.  I really liked this book–except when I hated it.  I know hate is a strong word and good people aren’t supposed to use it, but look:  it’s a lot more fun to write about what I hate than to write about what I deeply dislike.  You get me.

So, here is what I hated (ooh, that’s a rush!)  about The Fault in Our Stars:

  • I hated, hated, hated that they slept together.  Wait, “sleeping together” is a euphemism that muddles the facts on this issue.  Let me rephrase:  I hated that these two minor children went to a hotel room and had sex with each other. I know it was “AugustusandHazeltheCoolest,” I know they were superduper In Love, and I know that they were both soon to be taken by cancer and thus needed to experience the joys of the flesh before returning to the dust of the earth.  But really:  wasn’t it still teen sex?  What’s more, I hated the writer’s seduction of the reader, so that by the time they reached this point in the story, they were happy for the teen sex.  (After all, where is YOLO more applicable than to two dying cancer patients?)

I hated the subtle but powerful message that 1)  teen sex is okay (no, commendable!) as long as you’re In Love, 2) being In Love and Having Cancer makes it extra-okay, and 3) Being In Love, Having Cancer, and being Smart/Witty/Just Generally Cool makes it extrasuper okay.  Subtract the witty dialogue, subtract the heartwrenching illnesses, subtract the dire circumstances, and you still have teen sex, and it’s still wrong.  And I hate that now this same message has been plastered on the big screen.  I realize that teen sex is so common in the media that we barely bat an eye anymore, but maybe that’s the problem.  Maybe we need to get a little more indignant when it’s served up like popcorn to our already hormone-soaked children.

 

  • I hated how ridiculously articulate these kids were for their age.  Okay, I get the author’s angle:  snappy dialogue makes for much better reading than the standard “dude, like, whatever” of teen speech.  However, even the most verbally gifted teens (or adults, for that matter) do not constantly wax poetic the way these young folk did.  And though it did make for dynamic characters, it also made the characters seem much older than they were, which led us straight to Problem #1.

In the author’s defense, he is writing for a teen audience, and most teenagers actually see themselves as this insightful and articulate—they just can’t, um, articulate how, like, articulate they are.  And so August and Hazel give their adolescent audience a voice (i.e., that’s what I was gonna say!)  And while the advanced dialogue is entertaining, it’s a too-common thread, too frequently woven, in the cultural cloth that blurs child- and adulthood.  (See Problem #1.)

 

  • I hated how, through all the talk about dying, living, and loving, the idea of an afterlife or even (gasp!) diety was clearly absent.  Facing imminent death would, I imagine, force the Question of the Ages even upon two “intellectuals” like Hazel and Augustus.  There is one scene at the book’s end wherein Hazel sees children playing outside and has a warm fuzzy about the circle-of-life-in-general, and there are a couple short references to “not knowing” about a hereafter, but that’s about it.

This irked me because Augustus and Hazel are portrayed as the ultimate I.Q. studs, and so their ignorance of all things religious is conspicuous and, in my opinion, unrealistic.  I’ve always noticed that thoughtful people (like Hazel and Gus) tend to think about the larger questions of existence, which leads them to at least contend with the concept of religion.  But popular culture has written a narrative in which intellectualism (put a big fat “psuedo” in front of that) and religious belief cannot coexist.  And Green’s story strictly follows that narrative; these poor souls were zooming toward death’s door without an iota of interest in what might lie behind it.  Regardless of one’s family culture, it seems like the questions would have come up.

It would have been splendidly refreshing to see our heroes, at their life’s end, wrestle with religion, or even the vaguer notion of “faith.”  Even if they concluded a disbelief, chewing on the possibility would have lent authenticity to their plight; it’s what most people facing death do.  But alas, in this book, nothing.  Sad.  And so predictable.

And now for the fun part of my post, ’cause this is what I loved about The Fault in Our Stars:

  • The writing.  It was sharp, interesting, original, and oh-so-readable.  John Green is a genuine talent.
  • The plot.  Two cancer victims in a doomed relationship?  Green makes it work.  Bittersweet in the best sense; sincere but never saccharin.
  • The parents.  I loved (loved!) how tenderly, positively portrayed the parent-child relationships were in this book.  The parents loved their children and the children loved their parents, and their hearts broke constantly for one another.  No dark issues, no raging resentments.  Talk about splendidly refreshing.
  • Hazel and Augustus.  Loved them both.  Despite their inflated oratorial skills, the character development here was outstanding.  You meet them, you hang with with them, you love them, you are devastated for them.  Which is why this young adult book makes grown-ups cry.

And though I scathed some of the messages in this book, I loved some of the others, like how love as a youth can be as real and meaningful as love as an adult.  I believe that.  (But it still doesn’t justify Problem #1.)  I also loved the message that a girl with tubes in her nose can still be beautiful to the boy who loves her.  We need more of that.

Conclusion:  The Fault in Our Stars is just one more twisted, emotionally confusing puzzle in a long line of puzzles that my brain will have to sort out while while I’m doing laundry.

What did you think?  Did you read it?  Are you going to?  Tell me.  (No wrong answers here.  I won’t judge you if you loved the “love” scene.)  (Well, I might judge you a little.  But don’t worry, I won’t say so on this blog.)

I really liked “The Fault in Our Stars”–except when I hated it.

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Posted on by jsmith

How to train your dragon—er, dog—while keeping your cool.

Last Saturday I took my dog, Maude, to her first obedience class at Petco. 

Wait.  Did I really just say that out loud?  Because if so, I can now add it to the growing list of things I Swore I’d Never Say, such as:

  • I live in Kennewick.  Still.
  • I eat soy sausages for breakfast.
  • I want to get my hair cut like my mom’s.

But life plays funny tricks on us, and no trick is funnier than that of a canine-loathing young woman who, with the onset of age and children, morphs into a Devoted Dog Mom.

And so it was that last Saturday–a brilliant August morning ripe with sunshine and possibility–I did not enjoy a late summer jog followed by a late summer swim, nor did I water my flowers and pretty up my porch.  Rather, I used that bright morning to enter a dark world from which, I suspect, there may be no returning.  Because, see, you don’t step through those sliding doors at Petco with your dog on a leash and pretend to be a casual pet owner.  The minute you’ve buckled Lassie into the car and driven her to the store as if that’s a normal thing to do, your days as a casual pet owner are over—and with it, any semblance of coolness in which you’ve ever staked a claim.  (Although, let’s face it, I think that ship sailed with your first soy sausage.)

Casual pet owners pick up a bag of Kirtland dog food from Costco once a month; Devoted Dog Moms bring their darlings shopping with them–to a specialty pet store, natch–and would just as soon own a cat (!) than buy a supersized bag of no-name food from a warehouse club indifferent to the needs of their precious pup.  (I mean, like Costco knows anything about dogs.  Buying dog food there is like getting a manipedi from Walmart.)  (Which I have done.)  (But am not proud of.)

Casual pet owners do not sign up for twelve-week obedience training courses that require them to spend three months of Saturdays contending with Rocky the Evil Boxer and Opie the Whining Daschound, along with their respective owners.  It’s enlightening (read: disturbing) to find truth in the old saying about owners looking like their dogs, but true it seems to be.  Rocky and Opie are the canine clones of their masters (mistresses in this case): one dark and brooding, the other fair and flustered.  It’s uncanny, and I can’t pretend that I am the single exception to this rule. So the fact that Maude is a large furry dog with curly black hair confuses me somewhat.  We must look alike, but how?  Is our dog/owner similarity in the eyes, the nose?  The breath?  Wait…Maude has terrifically skinny legs and buttocks.  Could it be?  Oh please let our similarity lie in the skinny legs and buttocks!  Imagine what that would mean for me.

Back to last Saturday:  after Rocky, Opie, Maude, RockytheHuman, OpietheHuman, and I waited fifteen minutes for the dog trainer to show up (dog trainers have lives too, you know!) we were greeted by a boisterous woman who put us all in “the ring” with our pets.  The Ring was a corner of the store partitioned off with corrugated cardboard bearing the Petco logo and was, we soon learned, a place of privilege.  One did not reside in The Ring unless one was worthy—which is why Rocky and Opie had to be taken out of the ring, repeatedly, for their gross misbehavior.  Every twenty seconds or so, Rocky growled and lunged at Maude, with the apparent intent of tearing Maude’s head off.  Opie whinnied and cried every time Rocky tried to eat Maude, obviously scared even though she was not the one under attack.  (Opie must be very empathetic in nature.)  So out went Rocky for attacking and out went Opie for whining—along with their owners, who were also required to leave The Ring until order was established.  This scene played over and over, like an endless 8-track loop, for the duration of the class.  But despite the dire and repeated consequences, Evil and Whiny refused to behave.

But.  Guess whose dog never had to leave The Ring once?

Guess whose dog sat at her master’s (mistress’) side, looking cute and contented, throughout the entire class?

Guess whose dog received multiple bacon treats for being such a good, good girl and even earned the coveted title of sweetheart from the Boisterous Trainer?

My dog, that’s who.

And I don’t mean to brag and make you all jealous—really, people, that is not my intent here—but:

  • watching my dog just work The Ring at Petco was a fine way to spend a beautiful summer morning.

A sentiment which will now be added, in bulleted format, to the growing list of Things I Swore I’d Never Say.

Buying dog food at Costco is like getting a manipedi from Walmart.

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Posted on by jsmith

First day of school blues. Not.

Exactly one year ago, I wrote about how difficult it was for me to watch my children start another year of school.  I bemoaned the bittersweet nostalgia of another year gone by, the harsh reality of babies-turning-toddlers-turning-children-turning-teenagers, all of which had happened, seemingly and suddenly, while I wasn’t looking.  Exactly one year ago, I waxed poetic about Father Time’s indifference to Mothers Everywhere; I cried over Days Gone By and ached to return my growing cherubs to their Splendor In The Grass.  Exactly one year ago, I took front-porch pictures of my three darlings with a lump in my throat and a knot in my heart.  It was a tender time for me.  Always has been.

Until now.

This year, something changed.  Whether this change was within or without, I cannot tell you.  Whether this change was good or bad, I cannot tell you.  All I can tell you is that this year, on August 26, it was not difficult for me to watch  my children start another year of school.

This year, my heart was not knotted and my throat was not lumped.

This year, when confronting the rapidly diminishing childhood of my offspring, I tasted none of the bitter, only the sweet.  (As in:  SA-WEET!  School’s back on!)

This year, I was relieved giddy ecstatic delirious pleased to send my wee ones off to another round of school.  I was happy and excited to see them go, and they were happy and excited to be going.  In short:  we were all happy and excited to get away from one other.

Don’t get me wrong, we had a great summer.  We traveled and swam and camped and got along with each other.  We were busy and tired, all in good measure.  But as the weeks wound down and the calendar cooled, none of us could finish summer fast enough.  We’d loved it, but we’d had enough of it.  And I, for one (don’t judge) had had enough of my children lying around the house all the hot and dry day long.

And so the first day of school was, for this mom, awesome.  No tears, no lumps, no knots.  No schmaltzy posts about a sepia-tinted yesteryear and how it all-went-by-so-fast.  No regret as I closed the front door, only a relish in the silence that soothed me like a cool washcloth after a long day:  soft and fresh and long overdue.  I took a deep breath, thought about what fine children I’d been blessed with, and then dove into the business of the day.  No looking back, only looking forward.  (Which, by the way, I’ve found is much easier on my neck.)

Take heart, young moms.  It won’t always be as hard to see your children go as it was for you today.  They get older, and smarter, and stronger, and easing them out into the world will eventually feel as natural as shielding them from it does now.  You will both grow into it, promise.  Watching them grow up gets, bit by bit, a little more gratifying and a little less heartbreaking.  It all works out.

If you’re like me, you’ll start to feel kinda like a (star) quarterback who’s thrown each of your kids a long, beautiful pass–and now it’s up to them to catch it and run.  Maybe feeling that way means I’m heartless, maybe it means I’m healthy.  Either way, it means I’m happy.

And these good people seem happy too:

Ethan:  Fourth grade, new Nikes (first name brand he’s ever requested–and so it begins), and actually a very happy boy but refuses to smile in pictures.

Megan:  Eighth grade, fabulous hair, and most excited about being an Office Aid this year because–wahoo!–it gets her out of P.E. (which tends to interfere with the fabulous hair.)

Rachael:  Tenth grade, fabulous smile, and most excited about getting her license in five short months.  Another milestone that should taste bittersweet, but instead has me salivating with the prospect of terminating my endless chauffeuring duties.  Bring it on, baby!  Mama’s gettin’ her groove back.

 

Looking forward, instead of back, is much easier on my neck.

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