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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

See all MNHQ comments on this thread

To be irritated by this Facebook post?

251 replies

MattDillonsPants · 24/02/2016 06:50

I think it's an actual poem but not certain....either way it's frigging stupid. We all, as adults have to take responsibility for ourselves. This post seems to suggest that being an eternal backpacker is a good idea!

I don't think so and I suspect it was written by someone in their late 20s who still has the energy to "bathe in bio-luminescence and lie in a dirt road staring at the moon"

FFS. Hmm

I will never be a well behaved woman.

I would rather pass my days lying in the middle of dirt roads, staring at the full moon with a bottle of summer red in my palms.

I would rather have kids when it suits me, not when society expects or throws shoulds.

I would rather live in a hammock on a beach for six months, and write like my soul means it.

I would rather be horribly broke at times, than married to a job because a mortgage payment has my ass on a hook.

I would rather own moments, than investments.

I would rather eat alone, than sit with women who bore me at 'Wives’ Night.”

I would rather swim naked with bioluminescence, have it fall like fireflies from my hair, my breasts, my back.

I would rather do handstands naked in the moonlight when no one’s watching than pick bridesmaid dresses.

I would rather drink seven year old rum from a sandy bottle, smell of smoke and ash than sit in church.

I would rather learn from life than rack up debt, in a desk.

I would rather drink the ocean, again and again—celebrate being madly alive.

I would rather my love be defined by love itself, and nothing more or less.

I don’t need a ring on my finger to prove that I am in love.

I would rather take the chicken bus, than spend useless money in safe gated communities. Sit beside a goat, listen to raggaeton and eat green mango with sugar in a plastic bag sold from the woman who harasses the bus each time it stops.

I do not need a degree to prove that I am intelligent.

I do not need to own a piece of earth with some wood on top of it—to feel successful. No one truly owns the land, anyway—we just think we do.

My savings account has diddly to do with my richness.
I would rather sprawl my single ass out like a lioness each morning and enjoy each corner of my empty bed.

I will take a job I love and freedom over a pension, any day.

I will not work and work and work to live when my body is old and I am tired.

Stocks are for people who get boners from money.

Not everyone should have kids, and my eggs aren’t expiring.

I will not drink the societal Kool-Aid on a bus, nor will I drink it on a train.
Not on a plane, with a goat, in the rain, in the dark, in a tree, with a fox, in a box!

I will not jump through societies’ hoops and red tape, the treasure hunt in the rat race we chase.

If we must have milestones—mine will be measured by how much joy I have collected at the end of each day and how often in this life I have truly, deeply, opened.

Seek, see, love, do.

OP posts:
camelfinger · 24/02/2016 12:23

It's the woman selling mango from a plastic bag that I feel sorry for. She'd probably give her right arm to set at a desk all day browsing Mumsnet instead of harassing the bus.

seafoodeatit · 24/02/2016 12:35

Blame it on the various social media sites - the various mblrs, instagrams and filter-fuckery. Everything has to be about a fucking 'alternative' lifestyle where it's all about who can come up with the most obscene new fads or bullshit to fawn over.

Please follow my holistic blog sofarupmyownassIcanseethesky where you can read ' how licking goat pits will help you bring out your inner youthful radiance' or 'how to positively reaffirm your inner goddess with an upcycled litter tray and some homemade vagina moth balls'.

AnotherEffingOrangeRevel · 24/02/2016 12:37

So has this been doing the rounds on FB then? (I'm not on FB, so can't look).
If so, who the hell has been sharing it?

AnotherEffingOrangeRevel · 24/02/2016 12:41

My savings account has nothing to do with my richness

This screams "tax dodging" to me. Someone needs to call the HMRC.

APlaceOnTheCouch · 24/02/2016 12:48

I don't think we're her target audience for this 'poem'. It's very caught up in the male gaze. It divides women into those who are wives and mothers (and hence boring) against women (like the writer) who present as carefree and sexually available. . . or else it's all completely ironic because she's actually being a very well behaved woman by fulfilling a male ideal.

In our society, Rhoda lying in the middle of the road with her wellies would be viewed as behaving badly. That's much more challenging than a woman lying on a beach in a bikini with a bottle of wine and some artfully arranged pebbles.

RhodaBull · 24/02/2016 12:54

Ha! I'm off to do it right now then. But I'll have to take the dog with me and be back in time for dd coming home from school...

MattDillonsPants · 24/02/2016 13:01

Fantastic! Maybe you could make DD sit at the side of the road with the dog while you lie there with your wine? If you do it artistically nobody will arrest you. Grin

OP posts:
MattDillonsPants · 24/02/2016 13:02

APlace I DO hope she comes here and reads that. I'd like to hear what she has to say about it. Very well put.

OP posts:
PresidentOliviaMumsnet · 24/02/2016 13:12

Ahem Here are our guidelines
Thanks

GloGirl · 24/02/2016 13:14

PresidentOlivia, I've wanted to know for a while, why are you President Olivia? Do you buy all the gin or something? Grin

crabbiearses · 24/02/2016 13:30

apologies for appearance snarking her, i was only shocked at the sun damage, I'm always intrigued to why people feel the need to roast themselves in the sun , , she's undoubtably a very beautiful woman ( not that its even relevant ) i read her ramblings as a much younger naive woman.

PresidentOliviaMumsnet · 24/02/2016 13:39

@GloGirl

PresidentOlivia, I've wanted to know for a while, why are you President Olivia? Do you buy all the gin or something? Grin

No fear, I'd be bankrupt.

It came from this thread but I rather like it and think I'll keep it in honour of the US election.

APlaceOnTheCouch · 24/02/2016 13:39

Thank you MattDillon I loved Matt Dillon when I was a teenager

Rhoda I hope you're not joking about the pics. We're all waiting . . . Grin

BitOutOfPractice · 24/02/2016 15:09

I bought a bag of pop on a chicken bus once. I got the shits for three days. Just sayin. Classic Grin

won't anyone think of the central power animals? Sad

BitOutOfPractice · 24/02/2016 15:13

"For the past three months I've been working with a holistic sex coach
I first contacted him because I was having difficulties orgasming (I was too in my head) and I also realized my need to control was getting in the way of me flowing in both relationships, sex, and my business."

T. M. I.

HI did snigger in a most immature manner to read her end this outpouring with the phrase "I'm rooted deeply"

ChickyChickyParmParm · 24/02/2016 16:43

Sending her a link to this thread is very mean spirited. What the hell? Do you think she doesn't get people pointing out what those on this thread have said to her every day? Travel bloggers and people who make their living in this kind of way are targets for internet hatred. Leave the woman alone.

And I'm not her, btw. I'm a boring mum-and-wife type that is mentioned in her poem, who hates reggaeton with a passion. I just think it's shit to pour scorn on someone like this. Save your anger for something that matters.

OhGodWhatTheHellNow · 24/02/2016 17:36

Ha, we've got one of these at school, flitted found the world half her life, then complains she can't afford to buy! Her DC's are meant to be free spirits too, encouraged to 'challenge' the teachers and not be drones it didn't work they are very well behaved
She's the class TA now, gawd help us Grin

BillSykesDog · 24/02/2016 18:00

Ha! We should ban all criticism of art and literature because it might hurt someone's feelings! (Not that this bilge comes anywhere close to art or literature).

RhodaBull · 24/02/2016 18:11

Indeed, BillSykesDog. What will they call Literary Criticism? Literary Like? Because only a tick will do.

BillSykesDog · 24/02/2016 18:30

Literary love in? Art supportive suggestions?

JosephBrodsky · 24/02/2016 19:31

The TLS would certainly be unrecognisable. Grin

ChickyChickyParmParm · 25/02/2016 01:51

I certainly agree with criticism and agree the poem is totally cringeworthy and an insult to the genre (if it is intended to be a poem). But actually going to the trouble of creating an Instagram account to post a link to this thread is cowardly and spiteful.

meganorks · 25/02/2016 08:15

Its pretty wanky. People post wanky shit on Facebook. But it is just an opinion, you don't need to be personally offended by it. Your opinion is different but it isn't fact. You must realise other people choose to live their life differently. And I see way more 'my children are everything, until you have children you know nothing about love/life's etc. Equally wanky.

Galdos · 25/02/2016 20:27

Golly, I haven't read verses like this since being a student in the 1970s, when this sort of stuff was almost mandatory to have on a poster - 'Go placidly ...'etc. Still, it made me laugh. Are cheesecloth shirts making a comeback?

PiperChapstick · 25/02/2016 22:32

Well it's just a load of wank isn't it. I hate the perception that if you haven't travelled then you haven't lived a rich life. I personally couldn't think of anything worse than travelling and I'm really proud of the beautiful house we live in that we did boring jobs for to save up and buy. That is my paradise