I Can Barely Take Care Of Myself By Jen Kirkman - A Review

Ten days into 2018 and I've finished my first book of the year. Is your envy seething?

After reading Jen Kirkman's latest book a few months ago, I really wanted to read her first book. They were both really good, but this one focuses way more on the fact that she doesn't want children (something that I love reading about). Here are some of my favourite parts, written out ahead.

• "I don't know why that happens - that when you're hanging out with someone you know you're going to fall in love with, you just don't know where to begin and you start picking up pieces of your life as though they're old photos randomly gathered in a box and handing them over to a virtual stranger for safekeeping. It's like saying, "Here. I'm excited and hopeful and I don't know where to begin but I think one day we'll eventually have enough time to unpack this thing and make some sense of it all.""
• "It's a weird thing society puts on us women. They tell us that we can have careers (well, after they told us we could vote - they sort of said it would be okay if we wanted to have a career, as long as we agree to get paid less than a man for the same job), and then they tell us that we aren't real women if we have careers but no babies, and if we dare pick a career over a baby... we better at least talk about that career like it's a baby in order to blend in and not call attention to the fact that we're selfish women who are not carrying on the human race."
• "I wasn't sure that Matt was the One. But I took a leap of faith. Romantic love is not parental, instinctual, unconditional love - it's complex. And what if I change my mind about having kids and I decide to have one and then I change my mind again? As gut-wrenching (and expensive) as it is to change your mind about who you love, it's a hell of a lot easier to get divorced than it is to toss a kid back into the sea and tell them that they'll meet someone else someday who will really love them."
• "Parents talk a lot about how much strength and dedication it takes to raise a child. It does. It also takes a lot of strength and dedication to carve out a life that doesn't seem normal to anyone else."

So much love for this woman.

I Know What I'm Doing - and Other Lies I Tell Myself: Dispatches from a Life Under Construction by Jen Kirkman - A Review

Jumping right in here, I absolutely loved this book. I didn't know too much about Jen Kirkman before reading it, but good god do I want more from this woman. Best parts ahead.

• "Bob Odenkirk once said that people should make their art, whatever it is, "as though their parents were dead."" - Love this, will continue to remember this from here on out.
• "I would never want to go through another wedding--a wedding that involves, literally, everyone and their brother attending. What's romantic about making out with someone in front of your uncles? I think the sexiest man in the world is the guy who could approach me at a bar and say, "Hi, I'm an orphan."" - Hahah, love this woman.
• This idea: "Go visit your family on the Fourth of July. There's a lot less drama because nothing is expected of anyone. Without the pressure of having to buy gifts or feel merry and bright - it was the best holiday we ever spent together."
• I will forever enjoy any person who expresses disdain for any kind of Live, Laugh, Love paraphernalia. 
• The idea that she buys a new coat in every new country she visits as that country's souvenir to herself IS JUST A GREAT IDEA.
• Love, love, love: "I saw a burrata appetizer that looked like a small bag of heavenly, oozy cheese - I guess because that's what it is. People should feel bad for people who don't have burrata - not boyfriends."
• "Trust me: traveling with a man doesn't always mean that everything in your life is perfect."
• "...and gazed at the unstoppable stars in the sky." God, I love the way she speaks. Am I, like, IN love with her?!
• "I never understood why traveling is something reserved for lovers only." YES.
• "Having someone who is more frightened than you is the greatest gift to someone who is a little bit frightened. It gives the less frightened person the chance to soothe someone else - which in turn self-soothes."
• "I don't know if I'm a true romantic or just an idiot with an ample imagination or if there's even a difference."
• "A female customer said to me, "You may not have direction but you have style. Your outfit is fantastic. And I hate people and talking to people so for me to even say this - you know you've got it going on." Those kinds of interactions always make me think that if women ran the world there could be world peace."
• "There's no reason to stress out about what you do for your fortieth or whatever-ith birthday. It's not about doing something one night to make memories for the rest of your life - it's about looking at the rest of your life and say, "Am I going where I want to go? Am I who I want to be? Am I defining my personal success based on other people's morals or goals? Can I only achieve happiness with outside validation or would I be truly happy just sitting in a pile of wood chips, being me? How can this year not be a repeat of last year's mistakes and patterns?""
• "All my romantic relationships have ended. Were those relationships not successes? Is success in a relationship only determined by it never ending? That's like saying that someone's life was a failure because... well, death."
• Mental Note: I've got to remember to read Joan Rivers' book Enter Talking because of how fondly she spoke of it. 

Those were just a few of my favourite parts of the book. She also included quotes at the beginning of each chapter, and I know we all think we're above a really good quote, but the fact is that we are not. Quotes are the fucking best. If you're in denial about that, well, I don't wish to debate your sorry ass. I purposely didn't include the quotes from the book that I especially loved in this post because I intend on posting them over the coming weeks. No one wants to be bombarded with twenty phenomenal quotes all at once, your heart can only really take on one at a time, there's a science behind this, I'm telling you. So I'll dole those out in good time. I wish I could endlessly read about this woman's life, she's so funny and great. I can't believe it took me this long to discover her.