How to live with them, and without them
On family matters
If you, like me, have a family (biological, blended, chosen, or otherwise), you might understand my excitement at being asked to help edit a series of dispatches all about “the family.” Now, I thought, I might finally figure out how to deal with these totally bonkers people I apparently love and apparently cannot get rid of. (I am referring, of course, to only those members of my family who do not subscribe to this newsletter.)
Of course, we at The Drift did not select the topic to help one associate editor with his personal life. Scaremongers and scapegoaters on the right were targeting trans youth and so-called “groomers” with increasing aggression and inanity. On the left, there was renewed excitement — and confusion — about the possibilities of family abolition. Polyamory was shifting from radical act to pitiable punchline; feminist and queer discourse was being captured by subway ad copy. It seemed an opportune occasion to ask smart writers to reflect on the stalemates and the new ideas in family life, on their experiences at the margins and at the frontiers.
That’s what we did. And, though it may not have been the section’s original intent, I did learn a lot over the course of editing it. One of my favorite pieces in the package is very explicitly instructional: an eighteen-step guide to egg-freezing written by Nancy Ko. The conceit is totally tongue-in-cheek, as you’ll realize well before you get to step six. (“Get cancer.”) But as I’ve revisited the other pieces in the section with Nancy’s step-wise guide in mind, I realize that they each have true pearls of wisdom to offer. I’ve collected a few of them here. I hope they help you live with and without your loved ones as much as they’ve helped me.
Date, then break up with, a wrestler turned Bitcoin millionaire.
Take an interest in improving the lives of the already living.
Don’t be afraid to admit that which threatens your image of yourself.
Sincerely,
Jordan Cutler-Tietjen
Associate Editor
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Image credit: Ivy Sanders Schneider
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