Episode 309: How to Enjoy Yourself with Glynnis MacNicol
Doree and Elise chat with return guest Glynnis MacNicol (author of I’m Mostly Here to Enjoy Myself) about learning to enjoy herself now instead of later, the nuances of deciding what fruit best embodies you on a Parisian dating app, and discovering at 46 that everything we’ve been taught about our bodies is a lie.
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Transcript
Doree: Hello and welcome to Forever 35, a podcast about the things we do to take care of ourselves. I'm Doree Chare.
Elise: And I'm Elise Hugh. And we are two friends who like to talk a lot about serums,
Doree: Who like to talk a lot, period.
Elise: I know I kind of paused there.
Doree: You did. We
Elise: Do talk a lot.
Doree: I think it was an apt pause. Elise, I wanted to tell you about a nice thing that a friend of mine said, which is about the podcast, which is that how you talked about going to see bad comics starting out to support them?
Elise: Yes.
Doree: And also that's my self care this year. Yeah. To give Out of Town Friends an interesting time. And she said that felt very Forever 35. To me, it's like a kind productive thing to do for others, but also an interesting slash fresh activity.
Elise: Well, thanks. It's really fun. I keep doing it.
Doree: I want to go with you sometime. Do you have any desire to do standup?
Elise: No. I remember Kate asking me this when we did our pass off episode.
Doree: Oh
Elise: Yes. Because Kate was like, I think you have a type five.
Doree: That's right. I forgot about that. Don't you don't. Okay. I mean, look, that's fair.
Elise: I am actually quite shy about being in front of live audiences. I'm not shy about speaking into a microphone alone or speaking to a camera for a live shot as a TV news reporter, the idea that it goes out to a lot of people didn't seem to really cross my mind when I was doing it. And so I just felt like I was standing out by a murder scene at 11 for the Eyewitness News just speaking to the photographer and the camera. But I remember there was one time I was in Singapore covering the Kim Jong-Un Donald Trump summit of 2018. I was going on Anderson Cooper's show and we were in a commercial break and it's like a long commercial break, four and four and a half minutes.
Doree: Oh, that is long
Elise: Before we came back. And I was seated next to Anderson and I remember the producer saying something like, he's not very chatty. He's not a chatty guy. Don't chat him up. But I can't really help it if you're just standing right there or you're sitting there three inches away from someone, whatcha going to do awkward,
Doree: Awkward, just stare into space
Elise: For four and a half minutes.
Doree: Yeah, that's a long time.
Elise: So I think I mentioned to him, I was like, I heard that you don't really chatting. And he said, I'm really shy. He's like, I'm painfully shy and I feel awkward a lot of the time and I totally got it. And I mentioned to him that Terry Gross of Fresh Air, she doesn't like to do interviews in the same studio as her guests. She only likes to hear them. And so there are some famous interviews of hers where Bill O'Reilly, I think just got up and walked away, but she didn't really know until after the fact because she couldn't see them. And she did this for the same reason, just that she kind of feels awkward in person or shy. Just shy really. Probably not awkward. And so there's a lot of broadcasters who are like this.
Doree: I mean, I relate to that. I also feel like it'ss easier because you feel like you have a structure when you're doing an interview or even just right now we're just chatting. This was not planned or scripted, but there's a format to it. And that feels safer to me than just a conversation. I remember, and I've talked about this on the podcast before about how I feel, especially post covid parties that are just go to talk to people, parties. I'm like, ah,
Elise: We all had to Reacclimate.
Doree: Yes. Especially if it's a casual friend, like a casual acquaintance. I'm always like, Ooh, I don't know. I don't know if I can do that. I was invited to a book party the other night and Oh, okay, I was going to go and then I had you flaked.
Elise: Yeah,
Doree: I flaked. I had social anxiety because I wasn't, I'm not close with the people whose book party. It was very nice that they invited me, but I was like, I'm going to go alone and have awkward conversations. And I really talked myself out of it. It was interesting. Now that I'm thinking about it, I'm like, oh, that was interesting.
Elise: Next time you have an invite like this and it's sort of in the middle of town, just remember your friend Elise is always down to do things at the last minute.
Doree: I should have just texted you.
Elise: Yeah. I'm like, I'm the friend where people are like, Hey, so-and-so dropped out of this thing that's in two and a half hours. Can you come? And I'm like, yeah, sure.
Doree: So that actually raises a question for me, which is are your kids old enough to be left alone?
Elise: My oldest is, and so she can watch the younger kids.
Doree: Oh, what a dream.
Elise: And on weeknights, I have help. I have a nanny who works five hours during those crucial hours of dinner, bath, bedtime routine, getting ready for school the next day. So she works from four to nine. And so that window is
Doree: Nice. This party started at six. I should have texted you.
Elise: Oh yeah. That's when I go to random cocktail parties and don't know how to get out of conversations.
Doree: Okay, cool. Well next time I'll ask you before we get to our wonderful guest for today, I just wanted to let everyone know about a special guest that we have coming up in a couple of weeks named Rachel Goodwin, who is a celebrity makeup artist. You may know her as being Emma go-to makeup artist. She broke into Hollywood by working alongside photographer David La Chappelle. Why am I telling you this? Because Rachel is going to be answering your questions about makeup, celebrity makeup, when should you wear certain makeup? How should you do makeup? What makeup she like anything makeup related
Elise: And skincare. She does a lot of skincare too. She gets tons of skincare products to test out. She's been doing this for years.
Doree: She also has products, services, hacks, anything we want your questions. So you can leave those for us by voicemail at 7 8 1 5 9 1 0 3 9 0. You can text them to us at the same number 7 8 1 5 9 1 0 3 9 0. You can email them forever 35 podcast@gmail.com and we'll be taking questions for the next week or so. So send those questions in please. And also a reminder that on our website forever 35 podcast.com, we have links to everything we mentioned on the show. We have our Patreon at patreon.com/forever three five. If you're a Patreon subscriber, you heard our episode recently with our favorite books Pop Culture Rex of the Moment, which was very fun to do. We'll be doing those monthly. Also, there's tons of bonus content right now on the Patreon. So
Elise: Our morning and evening routine PDF is there.
Doree: Yes, it's all
Elise: If you're curious about our morning and evening routines
Doree: And our newsletter is at Forever 35 podcast.com/newsletter. And now I want to introduce who is the author of the memoir. No one tells you this and the new book. I'm mostly here to enjoy myself. And she also created and hosted the podcast Wilder and she lives in New York City and her new book is about when she left New York for Paris in the spring of 2021. And it's just a funny, insightful, sexy account of her time in France and we got to ask her so many great things. So here's Glynnis. It is so delightful to get to talk to you again on Forever 35. Welcome back to the show.
Glynnis: Thank you guys for having me. I'm so excited to be here.
Doree: You just reminded us about how your first book came out six years ago, which is when we first talked to you and a Wow B It's
Elise: Been a minute.
Doree: Oh, it's been a minute. But see, it doesn't feel like it was that long ago, so yikes.
Glynnis: What is six years?
Doree: What is six years?
Glynnis: It feels a really long time ago. On the other hand, I'm like, I can't believe it was six years. And then you think, I don't know, COVID was such a wrench into everything that a week ago now feels like a long time ago and 10 years feels like a blink. Maybe this is just aging. I think it's hard at this point for me to separate, is this the normal experience of aging? Is it covid? Is it social media that flattens all experiences? So you're constantly being, I feel like my algorithm on Instagram was showing me all these photos of nineties people like L No DiCaprio and Kate Moss. And when I saw them in a present day photo, I thought, my God, what happened to them? And I'm like, no, they're the same age as what happened to them. You also don't look like 1996. It's such a weird perversion of our time.
Elise: Yeah, it's strange because I often still feel like I have so much growing up to do and yet people look to us as if we're supposed to be the grownups now.
Glynnis: Oh, I know.
Doree: Yeah. What?
Glynnis: Yeah, that too, where I'm like, it did my parents feel this young at because I turned 50 at the end of the summer and I'm like, did my parents also feel incredibly young at 49? And then I look at photos of them when they were 49 and I think, nope, they did not. There's no way that they were, they had a different sense of time and responsibility or everything I guess. I don't know.
Doree: Well, this is all great intro fodder for discussing your lovely delightful engrossing new book. How many more adjectives can I use?
Glynnis: I'll take it, I'll tell you.
Doree: But as you know, we do like to start off by asking our guests about a self-care practice that they have. I mean, I guess you could argue that you basically wrote a book about a self-care practice, but I would love to hear if there's something that you're doing at this particular moment in time that you would consider a self-care.
Glynnis: So two things which are probably going to sound extremely basic, but I have started doing without fail, 15 minutes of stretching every day. And part of that is because when I get out of bed I notice I need it more. But part of it is I live on the upper west side of Manhattan and so every time I walk into Zabar or Ciella or Fairway and it's an older sort of neighborhood, I'm like keep stretching because you, it's like the distance between you and the cane or the walker or the bent over back is shorter than you think. So literally now every morning I just do it and if I traveling, I notice the difference. The last two weeks I've been booked, tour is not the best example, but I have tried to really not casually have alcohol, I haven't stopped drinking by any metric, but I think that I really, instead of just casually having a glass of wine or two with dinner when I'm out, I really am likes start with a club soda and just see if you're fine with that for the rest of the night. I sort of try, oh, intentional sounds like an Instagram therapy word, but I try to be more intentional with alcohol consumption because I feel it so much the next day and sleep,
I don't know if you guys are experiencing this, but sleep
Elise: Is such that is
Glynnis: Your sleep. And I have to say the first sign that I'm in perimenopause is my sleep is off so erratic and not reliable that I really am sensitive to. I start becoming a little bit more neurotic about anything that might impact sleep. No coffee after 9:00 AM no sugar after two, that sort
Doree: Thing because 9:00 AM wait, hold on. 9:00 AM
Glynnis: I have five cups of coffee before 9:00 AM and
Doree: Yeah,
Glynnis: That's it for the rest of the day.
Doree: I'm sipping on my late morning, early afternoon iced coffee. My cutoff is more like two, it used to be 3 3 30 and then that was just like, oh, this is not working for me, but maybe I need to go earlier. This is interesting.
Glynnis: I actually feel it. It's almost like I've trained my body. Every once in a while I'll think, oh, I'm outside. It's hot. I'll just get an iced coffee and I'll take two sips. And if it's around 11 or noon notice it's almost like having alcohol too early. I just don't want it anymore.
Elise: I like how these self-care practices cost nothing or cost less money.
Glynnis: Yeah. So
Elise: That's always excellent.
Glynnis: I will say I just read, I don't know who wrote it, but that piece about sunblock, skeptics that maybe was in the time sunscreen, skeptics. Yeah. The internet is not doing most people any favors, but I have been, sunblock has been self-care for me since I was 10. So that's nothing new. But I continue to be, just to reinforce people who might be on the fence, self sunblock devoted, that's more expensive than my, I stretch to the daily every morning while I listen to the back news of the world.
Elise: Maybe I'll start foam rolling to the daily every morning and see how that goes. For me, I've been phone
Glynnis: Rolling. The daily is a great time period to do it with because you're just like
Elise: Unit of time, it's going to run
Glynnis: And sometimes you need to do something while you're listening to that news. You're like, oh god. Yeah.
Doree: So we're just going to take a short break and we will be right back.
Elise: Alright, well let's talk about something far more exuberant, which is your time in France. Your book, which is called I am mostly Here to Enjoy Myself, is also the line you used on a dating app, the dating app of the moment there during 2021 when you were in France called Fruits. Fruits with Z,
Glynnis: With a Z
Elise: With a ZI love this so much. Please dish about fruits and how you sort yourself on that app by various fruits and whether these fruits actually correspond to anything meaningful.
Glynnis: So it's funny because I Fruits has now suddenly made a reappearance in Paris. I don't know if it's Olympic related, but I hadn't seen it since 2021 and I don't know what it has to do with it. People keep sending me posters of their advertising in the subway. So there's always a different, it feels like, and maybe it's the same here, there's always sort of a different dating app that's in Vogue and one year it was hinge and one year more people were on Bumble. Then one year it was happen with H-A-P-P-N where you just connect with people who were geographically close to you, which I always thought was questionable. So when I landed in Paris in August of 2021, after more than a year of being extremely by myself in my very small studio apartment on the Upper West side, I asked friends, I'm like, oh, so what is everyone using now? What's been the Covid app? And they said, fruits. And I said, is that a real thing? And they said yes. So I downloaded it, and you're supposed to, the premise of the app is you categorize yourself based on one of four fruits, peach, cherry, watermelon, and grape. And each is supposed to be, I might get them wrong, but peach was like watermelon was no seeds attached. So you wanted to hook up, but you weren't necessarily looking for a long-term relationship. Oh,
Elise: Okay. Okay. That's what you decided. You were right. You were a watermelon.
Glynnis: I decided I was a watermelon. Grapes was supposed to be, I mean was a watermelon is really how a mature person starts off there, but I could not have created a better storytelling device. But grapes was like, you just want a glass of wine. One of them was you were only there for conversation and one of them was you were only there to have sex essentially. But to be clear, no matter what you picked on that app, everybody was just there to have sex. And it was just like, there was no pretense. There was no like, oh, I just want to get to know you and how are you. It was literally, they had had a very strict lockdown in Paris also, and I think that summer everyone was in a frenzy. It was just like everybody could not get out of their clothes quickly enough, including me. So everybody on the app was, there was no sort of formality to it. And it quickly became apparent that you might've chosen the fruit that you wanted to eat. It was sort of, that's
Elise: What I didn't understand at all. It was like how do these fruits really correspond to the idea or the classification? There was a whole definition thinking it.
Glynnis: I was with racism. Yeah, okay. Oh yeah. There was no thinking happening, Elise. There was very little thinking happening. Just be horny. Choose a fruit. Yeah. Okay, got it.
Doree: Glenns, one thing that I loved, there were so many things I loved about your book, but one of the things that was so interesting to me as someone who has done her fair share of online dating was the differences you noted in how French men kind of approached this whole situation versus your experiences with American and specifically New York men. And I was wondering if you could talk a little bit about that. What was refreshing about that? What was maybe, I don't want to say scary, but felt overwhelming or how did that feel to you in the moment and how do you think about it now?
Glynnis: I would say nothing was scary to me that summer, and I actually added a few details to one revision because some friends in New York had Reddit and certain things they were like, but what did you do? And I thought, oh, I need to put this in there or people because that's how people's brains work. Whereas that summer I was very, nothing felt scary. And I think that was partly the mindset of that summer after everyone having been so alone, I think not just French men, because Paris is an international city and I would say has become increasingly international, having spent so much time there over the years, it's become a much more, it's not as French as it used to be, if that makes sense. There's a lot more diversity there. So some of the men I was interacting with were European and not just Parisian or not just French, but I will say there's much more comfort with sex in Europe just in general. And the French have, there's not shame attached to sex, which I think is what happens in the states.
There's much more, I think they prioritize enjoyment much more. And I think it's a bit of a cliche, but it proves out sometimes where there's this sort of, to be a good lover is considered part of manliness. There's this, I want to prove your enjoyment proves my manliness as opposed to you are an accessory, which I find is, I mean, it's hard to talk. It's very, very insult. Yeah, exactly. And it there's a lot less anger there. That's what I found actually. What I find is a major difference. And I think this speaks to not the moment, it's been longer than a moment, but the mentality of America right now, particularly directed to women is there's so much anger when I get on apps here, and even if it's the anger of being like, I'm not like this person. It's political, it's charged except
Doree: That one guy.
Glynnis: Oh, the what? But that was a kink. It was so interesting. Here it feels like people are just angry and there it feels wasn't when I met him in person, I was like, oh, you're very into spanking. And that is not unusual. The amount of men there who were like, I'd like to spank you. I'm like, oh, this feels very French. But I realized that he had that was sort of, but he was a different kind of anger. It wasn't like I'm angry at the world with him. It was an entire way of being in the world, which is two different things.
I mean, it was fun. I didn't actually feel nervous with him either. I did not. Nothing made me feel scared. The fact this all that this is signaled scary to some people here, never. There is a reflection of, I think it's an indictment of the manner in which we still narratively talk about women alone opposed norm as opposed to the reality that how most women are experiencing life. Because that just seems like a normal thing that most women I know do. Men there, which literally never happens in New York would say, they'd say, what are you looking for here? And I'd say, I sort of thought about it and I'm like, I'm mostly here to enjoy myself. And then they would go, well, I would like to help you enjoy yourself. And I'd say, okay, explain to me how exactly. It's pretty quickly, I was so overwhelmed with responses. I was like, and then get sexy completely immediately. And then I could tell, I was like, oh, you've put some thought into this. Okay, well this, it was like I was taking applications. And that in itself makes you feel very powerful.
Elise: Let's build on this because you have been on Forever 35 before to talk about how you have veered off the conventional route of success laid out for women and you've been doing just great. And in your book in this one you write that it of course irks men, but it also somehow irks a certain type of white woman. And so I'd love for you to talk a little bit about what you think is so irksome or scary for people about women who are free and are enjoying their lives and not following the whole fine romance, get married, have kids narrative.
Glynnis: So I think it's interesting because with men, I think men have a issue with the idea of women sort of doing what they want outside of centralizing men in the narrative. But I rarely encounter men. I mean, this has shifted a little since the book, but I rarely encounter men who have an issue with me personally. I think men, whereas women might have the idea of you is fine, but it's on the face-to-face where suddenly their backs get up. When I start talking about myself, I have extraordinary empathy. I think it's very difficult to exist in a world where there are rituals around certain life decisions. Rituals we have for women are weddings and baby showers essentially. And those are huge universal ones. When you don't participate in either, you sort of fall off the cultural map, which is what a lot of the last book was about.
I think when you call into question, when you say, oh, I don't need these rituals or I'm actually happy without this, then you're saying to someone who's measured some part of their success in life by external factors that may not be making them happy, but you can lean on the fact that you're following the scripts that women have been rewarded for and it sort of says, oh, well, maybe you could have made different choices. And I think that's hard. And also that happens to me in different scenarios. I've had younger people have different ideas of ambition than I do, and it's like when you're so proud of yourself for accomplishing something and they're like, I don't really see the value in that. You're like, so it's just always telling to me that older women who are 65 and on are very celebratory, but there's this sort of strata of women who had more access to more choices and sort of stuck to a conventional narrative that maybe did not satisfy them, but they could at least hold onto the rewards of that narrative.
I think it gets their back up a little bit. There's so many other ways to live, but is there a cultural narrative? And the truth is, right now, I think what's happening is all those diverse ways to live are making their way into the cultural narrative. And this violent pushback we're living through right now is the response to that. It's backlash that you are questioning those power structures in ways that feel threatening. And a lot of what's fueling where we may or may not be headed in the next few months comes from that like, oh, I can be happy in a different way.
Doree: You write in this book about how you had a lot of interest in your first book. No one tells you this in turning it into a TV show. And those conversations ultimately went nowhere. And that's something that it seemed like a lot of the producers and maybe executives who you met with sort of had trouble with was this idea of like, well, what's the narrative arc? What does the protagonist want? And it seemed like they were unable to conceive of a world where what you wrote was the story and that there wasn't this satisfying third act where, oh, she gets married or she has a baby on her own. And that's the conclusion. So I was hoping you could talk a little bit about that.
Glynnis: It's hard to think of. Yeah, and I think that's still true. I've encountered some very well-meaning people just in the last 10 days that the book has come out and they're like, I really love this mean, are you sure that you didn't have an emotional connection with some of these men? It would make me feel better if I knew that you were still in touch or you had a relationship with some of them. And I'm like, not the point, but it makes people feel uncomfortable. This idea, I think we are so we do not understand success, and I'm not just talking about financial or career success, but we don't understand a resolution around a woman's story if it's not like, oh, she's looking to be made whole and we can have some assurance that one of these men by another. Yes. I'm like, I'm 50.
This is not, and I think again, to that point, part of what's making some people uneasy about this is we don't know how to talk about sexually viable women in midlife, right? We sort of tend to skip that over. We sort of go from up until 40 sex in the city. We have Samantha who was always a bit of, I loved Samantha, but she always, there was something like they relied on her for comedy way in a sort of strange way. And then we sort of skip ahead to Golden Girls where you've got blanch, but these middle years where you're so attractive still and so sexually powerful. I don't know that we're quite, we have a little unease around them in America. And so with no one tells you this, there were so many people that were like, oh, this story resonated so much with me or I love it. And then when it came to pitch the series, it was like, what is she looking for if she's not looking for a spouse or what is she looking for if she's not looking to be a parent and how do we know that she's successful if she doesn't acquire one or both of these things? And yeah, I'm like the story,
Elise: You're like, this is undermining the entire point.
Glynnis: Exactly. It's like the story is how to live outside of an established narrative and the fact that is the challenge. And it was so interesting. We really struggle. We really just don't know how to talk about women's lives outside of two sort of very specific choices, which are amazing choices, but it's like they're not the only choices. Right.
Elise: I would love to talk a little bit more about fruits. Just kidding. Elise is getting on fruits. I going
Glynnis: Back if it's still there on September.
Elise: I I'm just kidding. Really? Yeah.
Glynnis: I mean I feel like if they have an influx of users this fall, I should get a cut of that. But I'm curious to, when I go back in September, I don't think it exists in the States. I think you could probably open it, but I don't actually think there's any users on it here, which is quite amusing actually.
Elise: It's a shame. It's a shame is what it is.
Glynnis: Maybe it'll find its way over here.
Elise: No, but what I wanted to ask you about was just really being in your body because you were 46 at the time. You got to fuck around France and eat all the cheese and take all the lovers and just be in your body and you emerge from this experience observing that everything that we are told about is a lie. Say more
Glynnis: Aging feels to me like an exercise in power. And I'm not using men as a metric for being attractive to men is not certainly the end all to be all. But I do think to suddenly realize that, oh, if I want to go and have a 27-year-old come over to my apartment who's gorgeous, that is available to me as much as the 47-year-old is available to me and also my brain works better and also my comfort with my own body is so appealing in the world and that I feel in my body. And this idea of, I think for me anyway, and this is probably a result of the election in 2016 to some degree, this sense of why am I restricting myself for who? For the people running this, for the people running this country. It seems once you start questioning all of it, I think it starts to become like, why do I feel bad about these photos of myself where I thought I looked so ugly, who benefits from me feeling bad?
I'm like, why would it? Because especially being so alone during lockdown, and I would look at photos of me at parties and think, oh, I was horrified of this photo at the time. And I'm like, why? You're just so alive and with people and happy. And I think once that questioning starts happening and so many of the things you've been warned against prove untrue, it's now shifted into, I assume it's all a lie until proven otherwise. I've just switched instead of assuming that all of this is going to happen, I flipped it and I'm like, I'm sure there'll be not great things about aging. There are not great things about being in perimenopause, but when people talk about perimenopause or menopause is this great change. And I'm like, wasn't that puberty and wasn't that? My body has always been unruly to some degree and this is just a new state of unruliness that is not particularly enjoyable, but neither were the cramps I had every month from the age of 14.
It sort of feels like the problem is not that my body is less unruly, it's that we have less information about it's unruliness than I did when I was 14. But I just feel like so much of these narratives, my first question is, you're feeling bad about your life for yourself? Ask yourself who benefits from that feeling? Rarely you. And then you look around and you're like, most of capitalism runs on making women feel terrible. They need to buy something to feel better. And I'm a little bit, just to be clear, there's at least seven products on my face right now. I am not. I have You're appreciative of the choir. I wrote a whole book about this. Yes, exactly. I'm not suggesting we all go live in the woods, but I just feel a little bit like I'm, I'm going to not feel bad until I'm really given a reason not to feel bad.
There's so much to not feel good about right now. Mostly having to do with elected officials and the environment. I'm not feeling bad about myself because one part, my body points in one direction and one part of my body points in the other direction. I mean, I say that and then I saw a photo of myself at a book event the other night taken from a bad angle at the back. I was like, oh, you no longer have a jawline and you look like the hunchback of Notre Dame. Don't go there. Don't go there. I was like, that's capitalism talking 90. Exactly. And I was like, just know when you're 90, you're going to love this photo.
Doree: That was, it's so funny you brought that up because that was something I was going to mention slash ask you about because I so related to your calculation about the five-year gap, because I feel like historically for me it's been a 10 year gap and it's just not a healthy way to live. And I feel like over the last few years I've been sort of working through this, but it's a very debilitating way to feel. So I really appreciated you kind of articulating this.
Glynnis: Thank you. And also, it's not like I don't do it. It's not like I don't see photos and I'm not like, oh God, this is horrible. I just really consciously say to myself, you're going to love this photo at some point. My whole goal is to diminish this space of time from seeing a photo of myself and enjoying it from, that's
Doree: The thing, five
Glynnis: Years to six months. I'm just trying to
Doree: Shorten it. It's that whole thing of like, oh, why was I so hard on myself then? And then having that same empathy for yourself now. Exactly. That's the challenge that I'm still kind of working on. That's the challenge. Yeah, exactly. Okay, let's take a
Glynnis: Break and we will be right back.
Doree: The other thing that I just wanted to ask slash talk to you about is something that Elise alluded to in her question, which was about eating all the cheese because there's so much evocative food writing in your book that I just really enjoyed and made me so hungry. And I think it also seemed to run counter to the ways in which 46-year-old women are supposed to think about food, and I really appreciated that. So I just want to read one of the passages that I was highlighting. I read this on Kindle and I highlighted so many passages. Oh no. So I'm just going to read this because I was like, oh, oh yes, you wrote, I buy salted butter from the Marsha Bastille and make my eggs in it, eggs with it in the morning, dropping huge squares into the frying pan so that the eggs turn crisp and brown on the outside almost as if I'm deep frying them.
I slather it on my daily baguette in thick squares and then add equally thick squares of lint flite chocolate on top. I start to gauge the schedule of the boo lingerie and make a point to stop by at 1500 hours in the hopes of increasing my chances of getting a warm pan of chocolate. When I do the pastry is still gooey with butter, soft and melting instead of crisp and flaky and the bars of chocolate baked inside ooze out across my fingers sometimes leaving streaks of chocolate around my mouth. And then you go right into, you say, every morning I take a shower, pruning myself the way I imagine gardeners attend to their gardens and then slather cream over every inch of my body, followed by oils, and then more oils. My body feels like a velvet glove. And you talk about enjoying your body and new, and I just was like, oh, this connection between food and the body and pleasure and enjoyment. I mean, this is everything.
Glynnis: Oh, thank
Doree: You. Yeah. So I was hoping you could just talk a little bit more about this connection between food and sensuality and how it kind of felt for you and what you were kind of thinking in the moment about these connections.
Glynnis: I think Thank you. That actually made me hungry.
Doree: Me too.
Glynnis: And I can barely cook. I think part of what that summer was, was what I hope anyway. You don't have know what would've happened if there wasn't covid, but accelerated version of realizations I would've come to anyway, even if it might've taken longer, which is the sense of why am I restricting myself? Why am I not enjoying what's available to me? But in that summer, because, excuse me, I had been so deprived of literal touch for a year and a half that I sort of boomeranged into it out of, I mean, I joke that when I think of that summer, I think of the videos that you see of animals in captivity who've been allowed back into their natural environment. I literally, I don't know how much thinking was happening. It's like I got a little taste and I was like, well, that's not enough.
I want all of it. I had a makeup session and I was like, how quickly can I take off my clothes? I had a little bit of butter and I was like, I want seven types of butter. And I think in that moment after having so much deprivation, it was this like, oh, I can't, the rationale for not enjoying this feels so flimsy after having so much restriction enforced on us for such a long period of time. And I do think I was very alone. I think we all got the most extreme version of our life choices during lockdown, which is I got the most extreme solitary, but many friends I would say were happily married, but they were not like, I don't want to be this married to this person, or, I love my children, but I don't love them 24 hours a day, seven days a week forever.
It was so extreme. But for me it was just like, how could I not avail myself of this when it was available for so long? It had not been available. And then secondary to that is so much of the food in the book is connected to community that I had reconnected with a group of friends that I had there. It was the sense of sitting around a table together and being able to enjoy all of this together and the conversation and the camaraderie that all comes with it. It was so tied together. But there was this physical sense of just, I'm stroking my own shoulders right now. There was this physical sense of touch where I was like, oh, my whole body feels very alive and all parts of it, and how can I butter myself up literally internally and externally as much as possible?
And it didn't seem like a challenge. It didn't seem like I had to talk myself out of it. It was sort of the reverse, that sense of like, oh, I can't believe that I ever thought this was a problem. I can't believe that this ever was a consideration for me. And since then, I've dialed it. I do not look like this all the time, but I've dialed it down because that's just real life, but not that much. I really do think it seems absurd to me that we restrict ourselves to the degree we do for the things that we restrict ourselves from. And I might've had this in the last book, but when my mother was dying, she lost a lot of weight from her illness. And I remember coming home and being shocked by how thin she was, and she said, isn't it wonderful how thin I am?
Finally, I'm as thin as I want to be. And I thought, oh my God, you're dying. You are enjoying this. Your body wasting away because your whole life, you felt terrible about not being thin for some reason, death is a victory for you and not in a good way. And I've never forgotten that. And I thought, I do not want, in the same way, looking at photos where I think, why didn't you enjoy yourself at that moment? I really don't want to spend any more time feeling bad about myself for things like that. Right. Me, me neither. Yeah. Amen. There's things that I do or have done that I probably should feel bad about, but not stuff like that that's externally placed on me where you're like, boy, I she'll feel bad about having this four types of butter. I'm like, no. Or this chocolate. Also, food is, as everyone says, butter in France, so it's easier to feel good about eating it.
Doree: Yeah. It's not a Baja fresh taco. Yeah, exactly.
Glynnis: It's not like I'm going to Starbucks and getting the process thing. It's so much easier to feel good about it when it literally, you see them pull it out of the oven and it's all made from fresh ingredients.
Doree: God so evocative. Well, Glynnis, I feel like we could talk to you for another three hours, but we will be somewhat respectful of your time. So thank you so much for coming on again. I mean, we'll see you in another six years.
Glynnis: Exactly. I hope we'll see each other in another six years. An underground podcast. Exactly.
Doree: Gs, where can our listeners find you if they want to follow you on social media, get your books, et cetera?
Glynnis: No one tells you this on Instagram, and the website is gly mcniel.com. And I have a newsletter called Good Decisions because we like to make decisions. But guys, this was a delight. This
Doree: Is so fun.
Glynnis: Thank you for having me on. I feel like,
Elise: No, we having
Glynnis: Want to crack open like a martini shaker and pour us salt a drink, but
Elise: I'm going to write you separately to get all your Paris tips too, because
Glynnis: So many of the places in the happy.
Doree: Okay, Elise, you have to tell her what you did after reading this book.
Elise: Oh, yeah. See, I'm a bit of a spontaneous person. The listeners know I am an Enneagram seven because our listeners are familiar with Enneagram, and it's kind of the impulsive, adventurous time. And so I was just reading your book and booked a trip to Paris in October,
Glynnis: But what, I might be there in October too, so maybe I'll show you it in person. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Oh, I love hearing that. That's a good month to
Elise: Go to. What else could go right? What else?
Glynnis: I love hearing that delightful and good. This summer's going to be a nightmare there with the Olympics. So October is a better decision. Yes. Oh good. This is so fun. I'll send it to you. Absolutely.
Elise: Yay. So thank you for inspiring guys. Thank
Glynnis: You so
Doree: Much, Elise. I just love that g Glen's book inspired a transatlantic journey for you.
Elise: I haven't been to France in a while. I really haven't been on the York continent since before Covid, but I'm a big traveler, former foreign correspondent, and I just spent so much of my foreign correspondent years on the Asian continent. And so I'm really excited to go back. And you remember a few weeks ago, one of my intentions was to spend more one-on-one time with my daughters. And so it's going to be a one-on-one mother-daughter trip
Doree: With this one of your daughters.
Elise: Yes, with my middle daughter, Isabel, who was actually wanting more One-on-one time. Oh my. And I asked her where she wanted to go and she said she wanted to go to Paris to eat all the baguettes
Doree: Stop
Elise: And the crepes. And so she really just wants to go, oh my gosh, to go eat back at this
Doree: Is the sweetest thing I've ever heard.
Elise: Rob was so funny. Rob was like, they have French bread here in California.
Doree: She's like, is it government regulated, Rob? Is it price controlled? No, I love that
Elise: So much. So you to lys, it was just a delightful conversation. I love the way her brain works and the way her life has really expanded outward
Doree: And
Elise: Into herself in both directions.
Doree: So Elise, last week I talked about how I was going to be kind of channeling a lot of my anxiety into my new tennis team. Tennis.
Elise: Yeah. How is that
Doree: Going? I'm pleased to report that the channeling has fully begun.
Elise: Oh, great.
Doree: I think I'm driving everyone crazy. I mean,
Elise: Really, but you're not dropping the ball with work either. You're all over it on the podcast too.
Doree: I know how
Elise: You're so efficient.
Doree: So one of the players who was on our team in the spring who I like and is a good tennis player, I wanted her to be on the team in the summer and she was like, look, we never practiced. And I was not the captain of this team that she was kind of not complaining about, but just being like, this is why I don't want to rejoin. We never practiced. It's really hard when people just show up. She's pretty competitive. And I was like, look, I hear you. I fully agree. And I was like, I'm going to set up practices and clinics for our team and it'll be more of a thing. And I think she was like, okay. But then I did, I surveyed people. I found out when is the best time for people and got in touch with an old coach and set up a clinic, and then this other coach is going to do another clinic weekly. And so I messaged her. I was
Elise: Like, Hey, you really following up on your intention? I was
Doree: Like, here are the practice times for next week. And she was like, oh, wow, you really followed through. Thank you for following through on this. So I think I'm winning her over slowly. But also I do think people, I mean, I like to have practices. I think it's helpful also when you're playing doubles with someone. It's not fun to just show up and be like, oh, nice to meet you double's partner. You know what I mean? It's nice to play with 'em. So I've gone a little ham, as they say.
Elise: Good. Having fun with it.
Doree: I am having fun with it. And so
Elise: It's not at the expense of anything else either. It's
Doree: Not. You're not
Elise: Spending time with your family
Doree: Or anything. Great. It's not. It's been very fun. What about this week? So this week I am on a new kick. Who were we talking? Was it Shema or Casey? Someone recommended one of guests. I think it was one of our guests who recommended the Caroline Chambers newsletter.
Elise: Oh, it was a mini app about weeknight dinners, right?
Doree: Oh no, it was a listener. Listener recommended this, yeah. Was a
Elise: Listener.
Doree: Yeah. Yeah, it was a listener. So she writes a newsletter called What To Cook When You Don't Feel Like Cooking. I subscribe to it. And now you're obsessed. I'm now obsessed and I'm making one of her recipes tonight. We'll see how it goes. And my intention is to make another thing that is new to me, either from, I bring her up because I was inspired by her newsletter and her recipes, but it doesn't necessarily have to be from her newsletter, but I'll probably use that as a guide. So I just want to make something else new.
Elise: I've been feeling I'm going to try, I'm going to the butternut squash ravioli that Henry likes because you mentioned that to me. And I'm going to go get a bag of that and give it a try. I could do that today for lunch even.
Doree: Yeah. Great. There you go. What about you, Elise?
Elise: Well, just checking in on my last one. It was to read a lot, both fiction and nonfiction. And I have done it. I have fared much better with my reading intention than I did with my prenatal vitamins. I wasn't taking prenatal vitamins for any reason. I'm not pregnant or anything. I just got them in bulk at Costco.
Doree: Yeah, sure.
Elise: And yeah, it has all the good stuff, folic acid, et cetera. So I have been reading every day. I've been intentional about getting up and spending at least 20 minutes reading before checking any of my devices because that is also one of the summer rules at the Hue House. I've made a checklist on the fridge that says, before you pick up a device or turn on a television, have you? And one of them is read quietly for 20 minutes, played outside.
Doree: I love that so much. Helped
Elise: Your sister. And so they have to do their things. We're only doing it during the summer because I think that we can actually maintain it, but it's been fun. And so it means that I also get my 20 minutes of reading, which has helped me follow through on my intention.
Doree: Oh, that's so lovely. I cannot wait until my child can read.
Elise: It is a superpower. It's a superpower. I'm
Doree: Just like counting the days. Okay. What is going on this week?
Elise: For this week, I think I'm going to take the inspiration of Glynis and try and improve my sleep. She talks about how her sleep gets all over the place because of if she casually drinks too much and so maybe I need to cut down on casually drinking and increase my quality sleep. So that's my intention. Hold me to this. I'm going to try and I have a Fitbit, which I really only wear to monitor my sleep, so I'm going to try and get my sleep scores up.
Doree: Amazing. Never a bad idea to try to get better sleep, so I'm all for that. Alright, well this has been a delight. Thank you, Elise. Thank you listeners. And just a reminder, forever 35 is hosted and produced by me, Doree Frier and Elise Hugh, and produced and edited by Sam Huo. Sammy Reed is our project manager and our network partners. Thanks everyone. Thanks y'all. Bye.
* Transcripts are AI generated.