Everyone knows that abuse is bad. The word itself has a terrible sound to it. Hearing it makes you want to run like hell. Why on earth would anyone put up with it?

The trouble is, abuse feels very different from the inside than from the outside. What from an outsider’s perspective looks like abuse often feels like confusion, fear, and shame from the inside. And, unfortunately, confusion, fear, and shame don’t prompt people to run like hell. They prompt people to hunker down and wait for the storm to pass. But abusive storms don’t tend to pass. They tend to stick around because, from the abuser’s perspective, life is more bearable when beating someone else down.

So here is a woman who grew up in a family with certain expectations. All families, of course, have them. The specific expectations this woman was bound to were confusing to her. She was obligated to be a good, supportive family member. She was happy to try to be that! But being a good, supportive family member, according to her family, meant certain things. And, as she grew older, she started to realize more and more clearly what those things were. Here were a few of them:

1. The information in books is part of a huge conspiracy. Why are you reading? Get back to work!
2. Do not, ever, go to a hospital or take a family member to a hospital—even in a dire emergency.
3. You’re a woman, so you shouldn’t roll up your sleeves, even if it’s swelteringly hot—you whore.
4. If a male member of the household threatens you with a knife, it’s because you deserved it.
5. If a male member of the household gives you a sprained ankle, it’s because you deserved it.
6. If a male member of the household breaks one of your bones, it’s because you deserved it.

You love and adore that male family member who sprained your ankle, broke one of your bones, and hurt you in other physical and emotional ways. You trust him. He is, on the whole, a good man. And he probably knows more than you; so if he treats you poorly, you are probably not worthy of being treated well. You should work on yourself. You are far from perfect. You are the problem.

Fortunately, as Tara Westover recounts in her memoir Educated, she was able to educate herself through an astounding combination of advice and help from other family members, illuminating college courses, advice and help from kindhearted people she met at her university, and a whole lot of book reading. Through a slow and often painful process, she finally recognized the abuse for what it was. And she finally felt the need to avoid her family.

But she was torn. She did not want to give up on her family. She wanted to go home on a regular basis, participate in holiday gatherings, and be the good daughter and sister she always wanted to be.

Multiple friends of mine commented to me that reading Educated was a frustrating experience for them. They didn’t understand why Westover kept going home, over and over, even after she realized that her family’s treatment of her constituted abuse. But I felt that I understood her dilemma perfectly. It’s important to think about things from her perspective: the inside perspective. She clearly loves her family. She clearly wants to do everything in her power to contribute to positive family dynamics.

But she also clearly loves the sovereignty over her life that her education gave her: her newfound, spectacular ability to recognize the facts of the situation, without merely getting caught up in the emotional knots her family was tying.

Westover was so torn by her dilemma, in fact, that she wrote her PhD dissertation on it. She studied historical texts with the goal of answering this question:

“What is a person to do . . . when their obligations to their family conflict with other obligations—to friends, to society, to themselves?”

And she comes to the conclusion that family obligations do not, cannot, automatically trump all other obligations. I am reminded here of the man suffering from schizophrenia who realized that he needed to estrange himself from his family in order to move toward better mental health. And so sometimes a person must sever ties so as to avoid severe damage to the self.

But there is an amazing silver lining here. Without giving away the end of Westover’s memoir—which is fabulous, by the way—I would like to note that people come out of the woodwork to support her. And back when she was attending the university, people similarly came out of the woodwork to help during times of desperation and need.

I don’t think this was just phenomenally good luck, though she did experience her share of that. I think that there are tons of good people in the world who are more than willing to help, if you are only able to recognize who they are, and that you might need it. People have come out of the woodwork in my life, and I’m sure they have in yours, as well. Sometimes it’s more about figuring out who in your life is being helpful and who is being harmful, and making decisions accordingly.

Surely we can no more condemn Westover for trying to keep up her family ties, than for ultimately letting them sever. Talk about a rock and a hard place. But this is the stuff real life is made of.

Who is in your woodwork, waiting to pop out and support you, even now?

It really is hard to wear clothes as a woman. If you wear anything cuter than a giant paper sack, you risk being judged for revealing too much. But if you go for the giant paper sack, you risk being judged for being too dowdy.

As a result, many of us opt to wear cute clothes, but then restrict our movements so as not to reveal too much. And sometimes we feel the need to restrict our movements even when wearing the giant paper sack. Honestly, it’s not so easy to find a shirt that reveals absolutely nothing when you bend over to weed the garden bed. And if you do find that shirt? Well, it’s probably so tight that you end up revealing everything anyway.

Tara Westover describes this womanly dilemma very clearly in her memoir Educated. She writes of the disparaging comments her dad and one of her brothers repeatedly made about women who dressed or acted immodestly, in their estimation. As a young woman who wished to do the right thing, she took these comments to heart:

“I worried that I might be growing into the wrong sort of woman. Sometimes I could scarcely move through a room, I was so preoccupied with not walking or bending or crouching like them. But no one had ever taught me the modest way to bend over, so I knew I was probably doing it the bad way.”

These words she uses, “the bad way,” are so very revealing (ha—no pun intended!). These words seethe with the judgment of others and the shame of oneself. Westover has drawn a perfect picture of what it’s like to be a teenage girl in America. Her family veers toward the religious and conservative end of the national spectrum; but this attitude is not so different, I posit, from that of American families that veer in other directions.

Our culture, unfortunately, teaches us that women should be careful to be simultaneously cute and modest. It’s a pretty impossible task.

What is so bad about having a body? What is so bad about wanting to look good? I have been obsessed for the past two decades with a culture that placed no restrictions on women as regards covering their breasts. What must it have been like to live in this society? I’m not advocating that we suddenly cast off most of our clothing; the situation is not quite so simple. But I do agree with Westover that we must do a better job of casting off the judgment and the shame. (Here’s why you should never be ashamed.)

Women have bodies. It’s not something we can exactly help. If a woman bends down to weed a garden bed and flashes you, don’t jump to the conclusion that she is a slut. She probably just wants some tasty veggies. And if she is, in fact, bending over purposely because she wants to turn you on? Well, that’s a nice compliment. Veggies or a compliment: this is a win-win!

What are you cultivating in your garden of perspectives on yourself and others?

One thing Anna Burns, author of the prizewinning 2018 novel Milkman, does astonishingly well in the book is to portray the scary, unsettling realities of being young.

So many novels glamorize youth. One can find so many confident youngsters in books. They know how to make tough decisions, they know how to make and keep friends, and they know how to relax while alone. And they never, ever have an awkward conversation—unless of course it’s perfectly staged and thus not awkward at all.

One might argue that all of these well-adjusted kids should serve as good role models for all the less-adjusted kids of the real world. But this will only be true if those real-world kids don’t see through the farce. And this will only be true if the less-adjusted kids are not actually all that different from the well-adjusted ones. For the kid who’s mainly adjusted, but needs a few tweaks, sure. Such lucky kids might be able to see a better version of themselves in the heroic kids in books. But for the kid with big issues—and what kid has no big issues?!—even the most realistic novels can seem like farfetched fantasies.

I am probably biased in this matter, having grown up as one of those less-adjusted kids myself. Not to mention one of those less-adjusted adults. So for me, it is a relief to read a novel that keeps it real in the areas of social awareness, personal awareness, and level of mutual affinity to one’s world when one hasn’t been in it for all that long.

The protagonist of Milkman is an adult, but only barely so. I could very much identify with her social-emotional state at that age, as described in this passage:

“At eighteen I had no proper understanding of the ways that constituted encroachment. I had a feeling for them, an intuition, a sense of repugnance for some situations and some people, but I did not know intuition and repugnance counted, did not know I had a right not to like, not to have to put up with, anybody and everybody coming near.”

(Yes, she is referring to the man who appeared and drove up in one of his cars, as mentioned in my last blog post.)

Before closing today, I would like to mention that the author keeps it real in other ways, as well—most notably as regards politics. While the terms “Ireland” and “Catholic” are not used even once in the book, Burns is brilliant about making her setting clear. The protagonist, against her will, for she’d rather hide within her nineteenth-century novels, is embroiled in all the politics of her place and time. Burns does not sugarcoat the hard truths of this place and time. Additionally, she tells her story with great respect for humanity, in all its strangeness and variety.

How well adjusted were you as a kid? How well adjusted were you as an adult?

Lest you think I’ve abandoned writing about books in favor of writing about travel, let’s talk books today. My next blog post will preview a book about America—promise! But today, let’s linger overseas. Let me first tell you about a famous English-language bookstore in Paris called Shakespeare and Company. It’s located across the street from Notre Dame, it has an exquisite selection of books (in English!), and it has a motto to live by (see the photo). And let me now tell you about a book I read about Paris, before traveling to Paris.

Book Club Fiction and Women’s Fiction

Paris by the Book, a recently published novel by Liam Callanan, was given to me as a gift by a family member, upon my sharing that I was planning a trip to said city. Although it’s not the type of book I usually read, I read it before my trip and thereby learned a few facts about the city, and picked up a few additional French words. Paris by the Book is what publishing professionals call “book club fiction” or “women’s fiction.” These labels don’t mean that the book can’t be read outside of book clubs or by men. They merely mean that the book is well suited to be read in women’s book clubs . . . which are a huge source of revenue for the publishing industry.

In such books, there is often a relatable female heroine. And such books often raise issues that pertain to modern women’s lives, without being too inflammatory: issues easily discussable over wine and cheese in someone’s stylish living room. Often, the reader doesn’t need a lot of background knowledge to understand the book, or too much grit to make it through the entire thing; in other words, such books are accessible to a wide audience.

Literary agents with whom I’ve had contact seem to wish that my books were in the “book club fiction” category and/or “women’s fiction” category. Such books sell like hotcakes. When one women reads one, all the women in her circle have to read it, too.

Paris by the Book is indeed an easy read. There is indeed a relatable female heroine. (She is an American woman with two daughters; they all end up traveling to and living in Paris.) And indeed, the book raises issues pertaining to modern women’s lives.

Yeah, I’m a Woman

In fact, the book seemed so relevant to my own life that, upon reaching a certain point, I had a strong reaction. Anger. I was so angry! At a character in the book, yes, but also at people in my real social circles. I had trouble sleeping one night, I was so angry. And upon finishing the book, I immediately gave it to a female friend to read, because I’m eager to discuss it with another woman.

Book club fiction? Women’s fiction? Spot on. And, as my Airbnb host in London said to me, upon my confession that I could not stop crying while watching the play Emilia, “If it provokes an emotional reaction, it must be doing something right.” (I describe the play and my reaction to it here.)

Art’s Purpose

And that’s what art is all about! If I’m reacting, a connection was made. True, other people might react completely differently, or not at all, to the same work. However, if the artwork is making a connection with at least a substantial proportion of its audience, it’s doing its job. It’s expressing something in a format that other humans can understand. It’s communication in the emotional sphere.

Paris by the Book is far from perfect. I agree with the critique of it in this excellent review. But a certain key aspect of the book caused me to react, and this prompted me to think. Why am I so upset about this? wondered I. And I learned something about myself, and others, as a result.

When was the last time you had a strong emotional reaction to a work of art—such as a novel, play, or visual piece? Did you learn something about yourself, or others, as a result?

What do women really want? Flowers? Chocolate? Doors opened for them? To be tied up on a train track and saved in the nick of time?

Honestly, I have no idea. I have a hard enough time figuring out what I want—let alone all women on earth!

So let’s talk about something I do know about: what you want. You, apparently, want to read a blog post called “What Women Really Want.” Furthermore, it’s likely that at least some of you want to read such a blog post not because, ten minutes ago, you were thinking to yourself, “The best use of my time right now would be to read a blog post about what women really want!”—but, rather, because you saw the title and felt mildly intrigued, while also feeling disinclined to do something more cognitively demanding than clicking a link.

In other words, it’s possible that some of this post’s readers—not you, of course!—fell for the clickbait I so slyly threw out there. But, trust me, they’re not alone! I succumb to clickbait all the time. I mean, it’s called “bait” because it lures us helplessly in! Moth to a flame! Nonetheless, however you ended up here, I’m genuinely glad you did, because I want to tell you about a great book called Digital Minimalism by Cal Newport.

Newport dedicates three separate chapters of the book to three different ways that we can spend the free time we will acquire if we stop mindlessly clicking around on the Internet. According to Newport, these three uses of time are essential to human health and happiness, and yet are often neglected in the digital age:

• Solitude
• Conversation
• Demanding activities

At this point, I’d like to share a passage from Newport’s book. It’s from his chapter on demanding activities, but, in my opinion, it applies to all three of his recommended uses of time:

“The value you receive from a pursuit is often proportional to the energy invested. We might tell ourselves there’s no greater reward after a hard day at the office than to have an evening entirely devoid of plans or commitments. But we then find ourselves, several hours of idle watching and screen tapping later, somehow more fatigued than when we began. . . . If you instead rouse the motivation to spend that same time actually doing something—even if it’s hard—you’ll likely end the night feeling better.”

Obviously, demanding activities are hard. (I’m trying to learn French at the moment, and facile isn’t exactly a word that applies.) But I would argue that solitude and conversation are also hard, at least for us moderns. With various technologies filling every waking moment, carving out time for solitude and conversation is hard to do. It’s also hard to learn how to enjoy being alone, or how to enjoy being social, if those aren’t activities that come naturally to you. But I agree with Newport that the hard work does pay off.

And if you have made it through this entire, 500-word blog post? Congratulations: that counts as a demanding activity! Will you also make time to be alone and to be social today?