Did you catch this?

The piece "Every Teenager Should Have a Summer of ’65"  by Joyce Wadler in the New York Times made me smile today. I loved the above illustration by Rebecca Mock that accompanied it as well.

girls just want to have fun

So, despite the fact that I am breathing down the neck of 40, I tuned into "The Carrie Diaries" the other night. I just can't pass up teen dream (teen dream= genre designed for young adults that is often found charming by those long past their sweet 16) television- especially if it might be halfway decent quality.
  After watching the pilot, I am not sure if I will become a loyal viewer, but I will always credit the show for introducing me to this cover of "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" by Greg Laswell. It is pretty fantastic.

Video: youtube

getmortified

There really is a site for just about every subject out there and that means there are fantastic places like getmortified.com . Getmortified.com is essentially a home for angst and awkwardness - it calls itself a "comic excavation of the strange and extraordinary things we created as kids". Adults share everything from their childhood journals and letters to the movies and photographs of their youth. (My personal favorite- reasons they deserve to marry Jon Bon Jovi)

The site also features the publications to come out of these often hilarious walks down memory lane and the live performances folks will give recounting their own mortification for an audience. I would love to catch one of these shows I don't doubt they are funny, but I also bet it feels so liberating for the participants. Imagine being brave enough to share your own special brand of teenage craziness in front of all those people?

{Image courtesy of getmortified.com}

Guilty Pleasure

Image courtesy of ekline.tumblr.com

I am a big fan of Netflix. I got the subscription from a friend after I had my first baby (best gift for a new mom ever!) and our schedule was still nuts- nothing like having the movie you just missed in the theater or an old, obscure, favorite television series at your fingertips for a 2 a.m. feeding.

Recently I re-discovered season 1 of Felicity and have been remembering how much I liked it. Oh, and I am completely aware that half of the people reading this would roll their eyes at that, but I can't deny it. Before J.J. Abrams was all about Lost or Alias, he was responsible for this young adult dramedy, so it is better than your average teen television program.

Just a few things that make season 1 worth a watch...

*There is something totally relatable about Keri Russell's portrayal of Felicity. She is awkward and unsure and every emotion registers right there on her face. Being a freshman in college is all sorts of exciting, terrifying, empowering and she pegs it.

*Just enough humor to balance out the melodrama.

*Watching the show now I just can not get enough of that 90's fashion- mini butterfly clips anyone?

*Noel Crane... my number one television character crush. I don't know about you, but there were no super dreamy, responsible, sincere, graphic artist resident advisors at my college. Swoon.

*The writers unabashed affection for the greeting "hey". Sometimes it appears close to two dozen times in a single episode....but I guess if I went back to a day in college, I might be astounded by the sheer volume of "hey"s.

I suppose I am so fond of the show because it is great escapism. Sometimes there is nothing like some college drama to distract and entertain!

Video courtesy of educatedfish via youtube

Reason to love rain (#5)

Because even when it looks like this...


Rain is still so romantic (especially as a metaphor for teen love):
photo by recurrent dream (via here)

passage from the young adult novel via ffffound
(By the way, the Alaska of the title? A girl, of course.)

a confession

via weheartit

Are you ready to be shocked? Brace yourselves, faithful readers.

Alright, here it is... I adore Taylor Swift.

Now, I know that this news totally blows your mind because you think of me as so incredibly edgy with my many posts on poetry and cats, but you are just going to have to believe it.

This confession is also major because I don't want it to reflect upon and embarrass the two dear friends that I share this blog with and who are both the epitome of hip (what with Mae's concern about archiving her children's school work for the long hall and Lorelei's near mania for children's libraries - there is a real chance that these ladies are going to cut me loose!).

via weheartit

Alas, I kid. Those two are as dorky as I am (thus my love for them), but loving Taylor Swift is still a goofy thing to admit to since I am not 15 (I'm more like two 15 year olds and a first grader).

Other celebrities her age annoy me to no end (cough, Miley) so I'm as surprised as anyone as to how much I enjoy Ms Taylor. Sure, she has cute style and is up for anything (check her out on SNL), but I think the heart of her appeal is that there is a real sincerity to her songs about young love.

Her songs are, yes, simple and sweet, but in that way they are also able to capture an earnestness and vulnerability that reminds me how it felt to be in high school when every emotion was so new, so heightened, so raw - even when you were happy.

via weheartit

Anyway, I sent the acoustic version of Taylor Swift's Fifteen to my friend Ruby who, because she is such a beautiful writer, knew exactly how to express how this teenager singer taps into a thirtysomething's nostalgia:

"It makes me remember the first time I ever held hands with a boy. It makes me remember the first time I ever got caught kissing a boy. Joe Silvio. Italian hunkahunka, football player, Catholic, older brother to a new born baby sister. It makes me remember the poem I wrote in high school about all those people there. I memorized a bit of it...In a place of jagged edges, may our circle of light shine through. In a place where there are no benches, tell me where to sit, to read, to believe what I say I believe. It reminds me of my dramatic nature, my mother's dramatic nature:-), a smug teenage self rolling my eyes. I'm with you, friend. That kinda shit does all sorts of things to you. It's really nice to be all ages at once, as Madeleine L'Engle says we are."

Doesn't Ruby just nail it? Taylor Swift's songs totally speak to the inner geeky teenage girl and it is nice, every now and again, to feed her needs too.

P.S. Oh, and I am so outing Lorelei... she loves herself some Taylor too. So does her 1 1/2 year old daughter who is obviously already laying the groundwork for her future teenage soul...

Passing Notes

Image courtesy of kimwerker.com

I have seen more than a few bloggers lament the lost art of note folding and passing. I have to admit to my own boxes of both intricately folded/crafted notes and hastily, passionately scribbled out messages from all four years of high school. Every now and then I take them out and (in a cleaning frenzy) consider parting with the pile. But, I always wind up reading them, laughing, crying, and, in the end, tucking them away for another time. I can never throw out those boxes, the crazy combination of silly gossip, hysterical storytelling, endless venting, and proclamations of love....not just yet.

Recently, I started considering how high schoolers now won't have this time capsule of notebook paper to mark their adolescence. Not that their feelings or dramas aren't out there- with social media networks, blogs, and texting there are more than enough venues, but how much is ever put on paper? I wonder if they even know what their best friend's or boyfriend's/girlfriend's handwriting looks like? I could identify who sent me a note just from they way they wrote my name on the thick triangle of folded paper stuffed in my locker grate.

My best friend's handwriting had a funky backward slant and her lettering was as skinny as she was- but to be fair, she often put "You" on the outside of a note. The notes that came from her were in the coded language we used to keep both our private thoughts and snarky comments from falling into the wrong hands. I'm fairly sure if there were Inspector Gadget self destructing messages available to us we would have used them, but lucky for me-I can still read and even understand every word of these notes twenty years later. Lucky for me, I can torment her with them...

Among the countless notes from her, from bored lab partners, from heartsick friends, from ticked off frenemies, are my very first love notes. Even with the misspellings and the small talk of a 15 year old boy (that includes stories of who passed gas in math class and ruminations about the best Pink Floyd album) they still hold some of the sweetest, most genuine things I have ever had written to me. I still feel flush when I read them and all the years and broken hearts since then can't take away from that. I love that.

In my search to find some photographs of old school folded notes, I came across some very funny "analysis" one blogger posted of his high school notes to his then girlfriend/now wife. He not only dissects one of his own, but one of hers as well - nostalgic humor at its best. http://www.pharaohweb.com/blog/2008/04/18/1754/

Thursday, a mad scientist's lab, and Etsy (girl edition)

"vintage biology wall chart - frog" via luckylittledot

So I wanted to design a mad scientist's lab, but wanted it to be cute and fun because I imagined it belonging to a super smart and cool middle school girl (I was thinking specifically of Janie, the science-lovin' bff of Harriet, yes, of "Harriet the Spy"). So this room is a bit madcap with its mix of sciences (an English teacher put it together, after all), but the room also has plenty of girlishness (hello pink in the amazing vintage biology wall chart up at the top of this post).

And, I know, I went a little nuts with this week's room. But I was so nerdy excited about the idea of it and I found so many neat things on Etsy that I could not pass up. It definitely is one of the favorite rooms that I've done for our Thursday Etsy posts.

Anyway, does anyone else think that one heck of a cute monster could be made in this room?

And if a monster if to be made, a scientist will need 2 key tools - a vintage microscope and a pair of Victorian scissors that would make Mary Shelley proud:

"Small Metal Microscope" via Hindsvik

"Victorian Scissors Necklace" by mamaslittlebabies

The basics for an evil genius:

Safety first! "Lab Assistant goggles" by doubleastiching

"Vintage 1960s Chem Lab Chemistry Set" via AustinModern

"Vintage glass jars" via bluebellbazaar

"Vintage Pyrex Labware Colorful Chemistry Bottle Set" via 26olivestreet

"Vintage E. H. Sargent Red Litmus Paper Glass Vials" via MachoMachismo

I don't know much about biology (or robotics or chemistry), but the following things seem to make a lovely starter kit for making a buddy for Frankenstein's monster:

"Antique Anatomy Model" via shavingkitsupplies

"Porcelain glove molds" via bluebellbazaar

"Velvet Dental Case" (with teeth!) via Hindsvik

"4 Tiny Vacuum Tubes" via BookBasement

"Happy Crocheted Heart" by taterutus

And because a girl has to have interests aside from the animation of bodies:

"Knitting in Biology 101 in an actual dissection tray" by CraftyHedgehog

"Fungal Specimen Box No. 2" by specimen7

"Wild Mushroom Environment" by jessrees

Philippines China Sea Butterfly on vintage map by REALBUTTERFLYGIFTS

3 real butterflies on a vintage map of South America by REALBUTTERFLYGIFTS

For taking notes and corresponding with those kids at MIT's Artificial Intelligence Laboratory:

Robot notebook by presentandcorrect

"Elementary" notecards by radiolaria

"Microscopic Life Postcards" via SnowBearProductions

A scientist needs some beautiful walls too:

"Illustrated German Pull Down Biology Charts (Mammalian Embryology Reproductive Organs)" via HelloVictory

"Doll House no 311 (with heart and lungs) - Original Mixed Media Assemblage" by sushipot

"Bricolage no 37 (with intestines) - Original Mixed Media Collage on Panel" by sushipot

"Crankobot Paper Robot Puppet Toy" by crankbunny

"Moss for your Wall 5" by Ottoman

"Lichen for your Wall 11" by Ottoman

And, of course, our girl needs a lab assistant:

"Robot with a strawberry heart" by Littlebrownbyrd

Thirteen

Image, "Embrace", courtesy of onephotonerd at deviantART

Won't you let me walk you home from school?
Won't you let me meet you at the pool?
Maybe Friday I can
get tickets for the dance
and I'll take you

Won't you tell your dad, "Get off my back"?
Tell him what we said 'bout 'Paint It Black'
Rock 'n Roll is here to stay
Come inside where it's okay
and I'll shake you

Won't you tell me what you're thinking of?
Would you be an outlaw for my love?
If it's so, well, let me know
If it's "no", well, I can go
I won't make you

-"Thirteen", Big Star

"Thirteen" by Big Star- in my opinion it is one of the best little love songs going, but if you don't want to take my word for it....

"Chilton wrote this acoustic ballad about two kids in love with
rock & roll, featuring the deathless couplet, "Won't you tell your dad
to get off my back/Tell him what we said about 'Paint It Black.' " It's
simple musically; as Chilton said, "I was still learning to play and stuff." It never came out as a single or got any radio play, but "Thirteen" is one of rock's most beautiful celebrations of adolescence." - Rolling Stone

Do yourself a favor and listen. Tune into the teenage heart.

http://www.last.fm/music/Big+Star/_/Thirteen/+lyrics

This is, like, really moving.

Because I'm watching it yet again. Because it needs to be said. Because no one should think that Browning or Shakespeare or Mr. Big in the "Sex in the City" movie say it any better. The best love letter ever written just might be the one Brian Krakow wrote (via Jordan Catalano) to Angela Chase on the brilliant "My So-Called Life."

For your reading pleasure:

Dear Angela,
I know in the past I've caused you pain, and I'm sorry. And I'll always be sorry till the day I die. And I hate this pen I'm holding, because I should be holding you. I hate this paper under my hand because it isn't you. I even hate this letter because it's not the whole truth. Because the whole truth is so much more than a letter can even say. If you wanna hate me, go ahead. If you wanna burn this letter, do it. You could burn the whole world down. You could tell me to go to hell. I'd go. If you wanted me to. And I'd send you a letter from there.
Sincerely,
Jordan Catalano