I Love Mess

Groups of women are a tricky business!

If you have a life, you may not have heard that the villain of High School Musical, a Disney Channel movie series that ruled my middle school experience¹, Ashley Tisdale², recently wrote about how she felt excluded from her celebrity mom group.

When I first read her article, I related to it. Over the past few years, I have attempted to join two book clubs. Neither group accepted me. Everyone knows what it’s like to be left out! Even celebrities! And the feeling absolutely sucks!

HOWEVER, I do not think Tisdale came off well in her article. Instead of trying to be curious about why she felt the way she did (and perhaps questioning her role in the situation), she responded with anger by throwing a bomb in the group chat.

“This is too high school for me and I don’t want to take part in it anymore.”

Let me translate this: “I had a bad time in high school. I felt unaccepted. And I am feeling like that now, and it feels bad, so I am out.”

This is such a dramatic thing to do (second only to writing an article in The Cut about it). This is classic high school behavior! A text like this is only filled with bad intentions. The only outcome she wanted was for the group to pour out support for her. She wanted everyone to say, “What do you mean? We LOVE you! Please don’t leave!” This was not the response she got. Although someone did send her flowers. But that was not enough!

She continues,

“To be clear, I have never considered the moms to be bad people. (Maybe one.)”

Let me translate this again: “To be clear, this article is about one particular mean girl.”

Ashley! Girl, ask this girl to coffee and hash it out if you want to really understand. Don’t nuke the whole group and feel self-righteous without doing any critical thinking.

This brings me to my book club fails. I think this has nothing to do with “mom groups” specifically and everything to do with WOMEN. Groups of women are SAVAGE.

I used to live in a small-ish town. I moved there a year after one of my good friends from high school did. My friend tried to start a book club. She wanted a friend group and a book club is a good excuse to hang out casually in a group and get to know one another. I love books, and I wanted to meet new friends, so I was very happy my friend had taken the initiative.

However, upon arrival at the first gathering, it became clear very quickly that this book club wasn’t a good faith effort at connecting with new friends. It was a gathering of women who were already in a clear friend group + me, my high school friend, a girl I went to middle school with. The three of us were 100% NOT part of the existing friend group and they were NOT accepting new applications. The other women would chat about the bachelorette parties and backpacking trips they had planned with one another, while the three outsiders would nod along as if it wasn’t incredibly rude to discuss your in-group plans in front of the out-group people.³

This hurt my feelings! I wanted to be included! But guess what - these women knew each other and they didn’t know me. I can’t blame them for making plans! (I can blame them for blasting them in front of me but oh well).

Any time I hang out with a group of women, I get a hangover. Not because I drank too much, but because I analyze everything I said afterwards and decide that I am a moron who can’t be let out in public. This is not a fun time!

But in my book club analysis, I did come to one valid conclusion: I have strong opinions!⁴ I am INCREDBILY judgmental about book taste. The books that the group chose were…BAD! I hated them! And I don’t think I was very subtle about my views. I said to myself, “People may not like my strong takes.” And that’s okay! More specifically, “People may not like…ME!” Is that okay!?!⁵

Maybe. I obviously want everyone to like me. I want to be invited to all the parties! But also, I am an acquired taste. I don’t like everyone, so why would I expect everyone to like me? A friend in college once said to me, “I admire Jane so much. I can meet five people and get them all to like me. But only 2 might like Jane. But those 2 LOVE Jane for who she is. While the five who like me only like me because I’ve contorted myself into someone I think they will like.” This always stuck with me. It was true. Jane was HER OWN PERSON. But I loved her! And I would tell myself this anecdote any time I felt like people didn’t like me. No one likes to be someone they are not just to be accepted. We’ve all done it, and I’d argue that feels even lonelier than being left out.

My second book club fail was basically the exact same story. The group was already established and they did not think I was cool enough to make the squad. But maybe I should practice what I preach and look deeper into why I was unable to break into TWO separate book clubs? Although I will say that again, this group had an in-group and an out-group (and this time the out-group was bigger than 3 people). So I don’t necessarily think it was that personal.

Tisdale ends her rant by saying:

You deserve to go through motherhood with people who actually, you know, like you.

While you do deserve to hang out with people who actually like you, that doesn’t mean you are entitled to people liking you.

I am basically piggybacking off what Tricia Gilbride had to say about this, but with one caveat. I think women are socialized to enjoy excluding one another from a young age. I was a total betch in middle school. I would do ANYTHING to be included, even if that meant being mean to other girls.

I do think that having a child is weird for women in so many ways. But one way is that society at large assumes that all mothers are friends once they procreate. I am thinking of that scene in Night Bitch when Amy Adams is at the library muttering to herself about how having a child does not automatically mean that she should be friends with all other mothers. Ironically, I was forced to watch that movie at my friend’s birthday hang out, where she invited three mothers over and made us watch that movie. It felt very meta. WE AREN’T FRIENDS JUST BECAUSE WE HAD A BABY!⁶

TLDR: women are mean whether or not they have children!

One last thing: I perused Tisdale’s TikTok and she does look insufferable! So I am siding with team Hilary Duff’s husband. However, if you want a deep dive, you must be a paying subscriber to Allie Jones’s Gossip Time.

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Another last thing: I should have noted this when I first published this, but the title was inspired by/taken from Emily Kirkpatrick, who writes the newsletter “I <3 Mess.” I love her podcast with Jessica DeFino, “Mess World” and it feels wrong that I published this note without acknowledging where the title originated. A lot of people have stolen Emily’s ideas and I don’t want to be lumped in with that group! This is a more formal acknowledgement/apology to Emily. I love the title of your newsletter and I hope you’re not mad at me for copying you. You are fabulous.

1. I hate musicals. Don’t come for me! I LOATHED High School Musical. But I was in middle school so what did I do? Pretended to love it with my WHOLE CHEST. My love of Zac Efron was not fake though.

2. She wants to go by her married name now, but IDGAF. No one knows you by that name.

3. This happened to Tisdale, too. They planned a group hang at Tisdale’s party and then didn’t invite her! That is next-level rude!

4. Don’t worry, this is not a new conclusion.

5. NO, IT IS MOST CERTAINLY NOT.

6. I couldn’t find the library scene on Youtube but I found this incredible monologue.