You may be curious what life lessons we can learn from a 21 year-old pop star. But has a piece of art ever made you re-think something about humans?
So, my husband and I love pop music. He grew up on BBC Radio 1 and knows all sorts of artists I’ve never heard of, and vice versa. This past summer, he was working away in our loft and I heard him thunder down the stairs.
“Kristen, being a teenage girl sounds really hard.”
Earlier, he’d been listening to Olivia Rodrigo’s first album – which is FULL of all of the angst I felt from ages 14-18. It’s angry, and heartbroken, and hopeful, all set to very singable melodies. Most of the album is, as the kids say, full of bops.
But in all of my husband’s 45 years – with three sisters, mind you – he’d never really stopped to think about the world from a girls’ perspective. He’d never been faced with raw, unabashed teenage girl emotions and they shocked him. In a good way.
Ever since that day, when we talk about our nieces hitting adolescence, he talks about wanting our house to be a safe place for all their emotions – even the scary ones. Consequently, I thank Olivia silently every time he says that.
I’m sure you have stories like that. Life lessons that took you by surprise. A movie that showed you a different life, a book that opened your eyes to someone else’s way of living, a song that took your breath with how it articulated something you’d never thought of. I’d love to hear them!
