Housewives of our Lives

Housewives.

A term that almost disappeared in the politically correct folds of our language. No one would call a Black person Colored. No one would call their cleaning lady...a maid. Housewife was almost permanently buried in the graveyard next to Injun and Celestial. But someone brought it back from the dead. Hello, Mrs. Lazarus, love your garden!

When housewives started driving SUVs instead of minivans, they were renamed Stay-at-home-Moms. When people realized they often took care of household accounting, schedules both social and familial, community involvement, and part time jobs in order to help make that college tuition, they were "graduated" to a trade: Homemaker. There is no term that does not have diminutive connotations despite the struggles of these women (and often forgotten about men) to hold a family unit together. But at least it wasn't the word housewife. You're chained to the house and you exist as a wife.


SOMEONE saw this disappearing from our vernacular and said "Holy shit, we need a reality TV show." We need to re-meem 'housewife.' Good job, boys. America now hears this term at least once a day.

The idleness of the wealthy has been a long standing literary and cultural trope. The women scream obscenities at each other and create drama over trivial matters. The idea is that they have so little to do, that they are forced to create problems and then the working man/woman says, "THANK GOD my 9-7 job and 800 other responsibilities and obligations tire me out so much that I don't have those issues."

I love the campy quality of this clip:


But these aren't the aristocrats mocked by Jane Austen; they are common women who clawed into a higher income bracket. They are ridiculous, but they understand the middle-class life, thus defy the previous isolation of the aloof wealthy person. Danielle was a stripper. They are the American Dream. Apparently.

One of the women, Caroline, is a smart, emotional person with an unfortunate accent. She is the wisest person on TV right now. She called out all reality TV stars on "characterization" during the reunion. She said no one can blame editing. She admits that she said those things and acted that way, even when she was making a fool out of herself. She repeats, editing has nothing to do with it. Brilliant.





This is a picture of the founder of New Jersey. Lord Berkeley:



Lord Berkeley was an idle wealthy person. In an insignificant moment in his life he granted NJ its independence and sold it to Quakers who weren't comfortable in New York and wanted to move there. Funny. I just had a Quaker wedding with a man from Jersey. I, too, could be a Housewife of New Jersey.

Or at least get points for knowing who they are.