America250's Potluck

Refusing to let anyone else define what this milestone means

My Sunday afternoon was devoted to reading Harper’s Magazine. The cover of the magazine shows the President’s face depicted in a cloud of red smoke. The headline is “Twilight’s Last Gleaming: An Exhausted America Turns 250.” From cover to cover, the magazine provokes a complicated dis-ease with the semiquincentennial. I loved it.

I put that discomfort beside the fact that I wrote a murder-mystery and family play to celebrate and am in the middle of working on Founding Father Karaoke. This feels like the most American thing of all to me: it all belongs.

Today, Sarah and I discuss how we’re approaching this milestone, what it means to us, and what role, if any, the President plays in observing 250 years since the Declaration of Independence. - b

Topics Discussed

- Why celebrating America's 250th feels awkward this year
- The America250 commission vs. Trump's separate "Freedom 250" / White House rally
- What the 1976 Bicentennial actually got right
- The military's place in the anniversary — a component, not the centerpiece
- Holding patriotism and clear-eyed honesty about the country's failures at the same time
- America's Potluck and celebrating at the level of your own town and table
- Outside Politics: naming your "mom aesthetic"

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Episode Transcript

[00:00:00] Sarah: This is Sarah Steward Holland.

[00:00:04] Beth: This is Beth Silvers.

[00:01:04] Sarah: You’re listening to Pantsuit Politics. Guys, I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but America is celebrating a big birthday this year. It is 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4th, 1776. The birthday invitations have gone out, and the country looked at them and went, “Do we feel like a party?” So today, we want to make the case that the answer is yes, a party is in order, not in spite of how hard things are, but because of it. And outside of politics, we’re going to discuss our mom aesthetic. Are we butter moms? Cozy moms? What’s the vibe?

[00:01:02] Beth: What is the vibe?

[00:01:04] Sarah: Before we get started, we are continuing to celebrate America 250 on Substack, and we are two weeks away from very exciting America 250 episodes on my show, Good Morning, and Beth’s show, More To Say. On Good Morning, I will be reporting the news from 1776. I will be reporting the news for that day, 250 years ago. I got a costume. I come in by candlelight.

[00:01:38] Beth: I’m so excited.

[00:01:39] Sarah: Felix helps me out. I don’t want to set the expectations too high here, guys, but- I slayed this. I’m just telling you right now. You were born to

[00:01:50] Beth: You were born to do this.

[00:01:52] Sarah: I was born to do this. I cry when I announce the news towards the end. I’m just telling you, I learned some things. It’s really good. I want to say with confidence it’s really good, and you should definitely come join Substack so you can participate in my 1776 News Brief. Beth, what do you have planned over on More to Say?

[00:02:13] Beth: I too am committed to intergenerational America 250 celebrations, so Ellen and I are having a little chat about what being an American means to us.

[00:02:21] Sarah: Love it.

[00:02:22] Beth: And then the big event is that we’re going to do Founding Father several years ago, a listener reached out speaking of things we were born to do, and asked me, “What would the Supreme Court justices sing if they all went to karaoke together?” And a whole genre was born from that. I haven’t pulled it out in a while. So I have really been working. I’ve read some articles about what the Founding Fathers’ Enneagram types would be, what their Myers-Briggs would be. I’m really trying to get in the heads of these people as I choose their songs. It’s a personal thing, your karaoke song.

[00:02:52] Sarah: Is it just the fathers? Can we get Abigail in there?

[00:02:55] Beth: You know there will be women at this party, too. There’s no way I’m doing a men’s only karaoke party here. So that’s the plan for More to Say. I know that sounds weird. You might be thinking, how does that come together? I just ask that you trust me. I think good things happen when you just trust me on More to Say.

[00:03:11] Sarah: I love it. So we have very exciting shows ready for our paid members over on Substack. Click the link in the show notes and join us for Good Morning from 1776 and Founding Father karaoke. Up next, why are we celebrating to begin with? Beth, it is the semi-quincentennial of the United States. Was this the first tough part of the celebration? Bicentennial rolls off the tongue. Semi-quincentennial a little bit less.

[00:03:59] Beth: It’s a hard word to say, and I am going to give credit where due. I think Congress in 2016 deciding to go with America 250 was a wise choice.

[00:04:09] Sarah: Smart call. So look, everybody’s been working at this for a while. There have been commissions, there have been committees. Now, did Donald Trump roll in with his partisan Freedom 250 and screw it all up? Of course, he did. But that doesn’t mean that the America 250 Commission’s work should go uncelebrated.

[00:04:36] Beth: I read a long piece in Harper’s Magazine this weekend about America 250. The whole magazine is excellent and worth reading cover to cover. I rarely do that with a magazine, but I did yesterday. This piece talks about how because Congress wanted a bipartisan committee, from the beginning, this committee has had an impossible task to both properly observe this milestone for our country and not get into anything that is disputed on a partisan basis. And since 2016, everything in our country has been disputed on a partisan basis all the time. And so that means that most of their work has been intended to be uncontroversial. So they had a contest where students wrote essays, and they’re going to get some field trips for rewards. Lovely. But how do you really acknowledge 250 years since the Declaration of Independence apolitically? Which is what they’ve been trying to do.

[00:05:43] Sarah: You can do it, but it’s not going to break through. You understand what I’m saying? In our current media environment to do something apolitical, non-controversial means that it’s not going to get a lot of coverage. I’ve said recently in my bookshop, I’ll say “Oh this is for America 250.” And people will say, “What?” I’m like, “ it’s our 250th birthday.” So I think that unfortunately it is the flashy stuff Trump has been doing that’s occupied the field, and I refuse to accept that. I refuse to say the only way I can celebrate is tuning in for the UFC fight or for his big old Trump rally he announced in the middle of the night last night because everybody backed out of his- in theory, non-partisan party he was going to have through Freedom 250, and now it’s going to just be a plain old Trump rally. And I think that he’s leaned in such a way and he garners so much attention that I’ve had so many conversations with people where America 250 comes up and it’s that means you have to like Trump. You have to celebrate with Trump. And I’m like, “Absolutely not. Absolutely not.” I reject the idea that this has to be tied up indelibly with him.

[00:07:03] Beth: Another piece from Harper’s Magazine, not to have mentionitis about it was talking about the bicentennial and the difference between then and now. And one of my criticisms of the UFC fight is how marketing-oriented it was. It was about sponcon and merch primarily. And it was good for me to read about the bicentennial and how merch was a big part of it. People really went for the kitsch of the bicentennial, and it was helpful to have stuff that everybody could be into on the other side of Watergate. It was like we had this terrible stain on the nation, and we washed it away with commercialism. And I understand that. I do that in my own life all the time. No judgment, America. This is a thing that we do. It feels so different to me now. I watched some of the UFC fight last night and I was thinking about what is it that really bothers me here? What really feels different? I read some pieces about how the South Lawn has been transformed before, how we’ve put baseball diamonds there. We had the Beach Boys there in the Reagan years. We’ve put tennis courts there. We’ve done all kinds of things to the South Lawn. So it’s not just the construction element. And it’s not just the recreation of it or the spectacle or the royal court feeling of it. It is the tonnage from this administration where every single thing that takes place looks like a personal favor to the president instead of something that is for the country. And the more I learn about the UFC fight, the clearer that becomes to me. But even if you just say, look, they did it for his 80th birthday and America 250, you can see that he doesn’t separate the two. He is America, and America is him now, and that’s going to be true for as long as he’s in office. And so I can see why people don’t want anything to do with that, and that is what motivates me to really lean into it.

[00:09:03] Sarah: Yeah, it doesn’t bother me because it is so fully absorbed as a celebration of him. I don’t even see it related. Just because he uses the term 250, just because he likes to trot it out, to the branding of it all, there is no real branding, emotion, marketing narrative that speaks to this country and its 250 years of history. How much more accurate to Trump branding, to the Trump politics, to the MAGA of it all, could a knock-down, drag-out, bloody brawl be? Like, what does that have to do with all of us? It’s just about him. It’s just about celebrating him. So to me, it doesn’t even feel related. I’ve never really felt anything Donald Trump does or has done sincerely celebrates, appreciates, expresses any kind of gratitude for the depth and breadth of the people of this country. To me it is branding, and his brand is so far away from what I think about when I think about 250 years of American history. That’s not to say that there hasn’t been moments of sincere fighting, including during the Revolution or the Civil War, or that there hasn’t been populism or nativism. I’m not erasing the darker parts of that 250-year history. But when you talk about appreciating and celebrating and seeing the totality of the people of this country, both now and for the last 250 years. Nothing about that feels Trumpian to me. So I’ve never even considered him and everything he stands for as leading or even being an essential part of America 250.

[00:11:19] Beth: I wonder how you think about the military gloss over everything that he is coming out of the White House in relation to America 250, acknowledging that he’s not going to be our guide to meaningfully consider the promises on which this nation is founded and how we’re living up to them. I think a lot of people do find it appealing to hear 1,200 seats at this fight were reserved for active duty military members. The television production of it really focused on, first responders. There were members from all of the armed forces branches standing at attention and saluting as the fighters walked out of the White House. That did bother me to have people who could actually be called into duty in the Middle East right now for war to be saluting people who fight for sport. I didn’t love that. But I know that I’m an outlier on that. I think a lot of Americans do think the military should be a big part of this anniversary. So I wonder how that strikes you.

[00:12:23] Sarah: As a part of my America 250 practice, I am reading Rick Atkinson’s The British Are Coming, the first in his Revolutionary War trilogy. Also seems like an appropriate moment to announce Rick is coming on the show to talk to us about the Revolutionary War and his trilogy, and it is incredibly war-focused in great detail. And so I’m never far in my own head from this moment we’re celebrating and the military reality that it precipitated. The stark military reality. We fought for eight years. So many people died in really gruesome ways. And I think part of what Trump and the MAGA movement has precipitated in me is a reclaiming of all these things that I think I saw as cliche, passe, eye-rolly, because I just refuse to let them occupy the entirety of this narrative. And the word patriotic does not bother me anymore. It’s a big word. It can hold a lot of different things. That’s what we’re going to talk about. But in the same way, I feel some widening of my aperture when it comes to the military. I don’t have some sort of knee-jerk negative reaction to any military presence. The reality is that not just in 1776, but over the course of our history people have given their lives. They’ve paid the ultimate sacrifice so that we can be here at 250 years, and I think that should be a part of any acknowledgement as much as the mistakes and the, discrimination and oppression. That has to be a part of the full picture as well.

[00:14:26] Beth: I think the military is a component. I think it would serve the military and all of us if the military were a component instead of the key component of these observances, that we recognize that the nation is built on fighters and warriors and also teachers and librarians and municipal servants and people who work at the Social Security office. I think that I’ve really been searching for places to consider beyond the military what makes a nation, beyond war what defines a nation, beyond the war what pieces have been put in place that have gotten us here. For this to have lasted 250 years, what was required beyond the military? That’s something that I’m really personally searching for in connection with the semi-quincentennial.

[00:15:19] Sarah: I think there’s all kinds of difficult aspects. And the point is not to turn away from them. It’s not to say, “ Trump’s running it. He’s ruining it, I’m out.” I hate that reaction. It gives him so much unnecessary power. He has enough as President of the United States. It’s not to turn from any commercialization or militarization or even like whitewashing. It’s to see it all as the complex reality of any big historical marking of the passage of time. If you’re marking 250 years, it’s going to contain a lot. It’s going to contain death and destruction. It’s going to contain organization and neighborhood building and ordinary citizens and extraordinary citizens, and I think trying to look at that all clearly is the work of this milestone. So let’s talk about all that up next. I have to say, Beth, one of the main reasons I am pretty committed to America 250 is just let’s just do a little reality check here, guys. I was not alive in 1976 for the 200th celebration, and while I really hope I’m alive for 300 at 94, I don’t want to be overconfident, and my ability to celebrate might be a smidge limited by my age. So it’s like you kind of only get one. You only get one chance to buy the limited edition design cinnamon rolls I bought this weekend with stars and stripes on the can. Or to do a July 4th murder mystery party, or to look around and see that everyone is trying to decide what this means and thinking through this history and reading all the David McCullough books you can possibly squeeze in before July 4th.

[00:17:32] Beth: It is nice to be part of a milestone. I’ve been thinking about this personality inventory I took a number of years ago that told me that I am a low affiliation person. I don’t tend to think of my identity as tied to groups. I’m happy to do a thing while it lasts and then move on from it. I’m not very nostalgic. And I’ve been thinking about that in connection with America 250 and why this does mean something to me. It seems as a low affiliation person, I would blow this off. And I realized, in part, that I think when I did that inventory, most of the connections in my life were fairly superficial to me for a bunch of different reasons. I have been building my connection to America as idea and aspiration for my entire career. I think law school put a deeper hook for me into sort of the American experiment than I had before, and spending every year since immersed in Supreme Court opinions and news and the community around this podcast. Every day there is a new hook for me into what is this thing that we’re trying to do together civically? And I love that. And so part of the celebration to me is just realizing I do feel a sense of identity as American. It’s complicated, but I feel it, and that’s important, and it’s something that I want for my children. I want them to feel that they are part of a lineage here. They have a heritage here, and those things can exist without being the province of, racism, nationalism, xenophobia, whatever. There’s a healthy way to claim that heritage.

[00:19:22] Sarah: I’m a high affiliation person. I don’t need to take the personality assessment. I know that about myself. It’s probably because I’m an only child. I just like to be a member of things. And look, let me wax poetic. I love being an American. The most basic aspect of citizenry to me is just geographical. What we’re talking about when we’re a citizen of a nation is some borders around a place. And I don’t care who you are. I understand if people have complicated, difficult reactions to America’s history. But I hope putting all that aside, you can look around at the geography of America and see how incredibly lucky we are to live in this country. It is a beautiful place. It is such a beautiful, incredible place. Obviously, I’m a huge national park person. We are celebrating America 250 as a family by driving in an RV from Texas up to Montana. I’m going to drive right up the middle. I cannot wait. Just the borders that contain these places from Yosemite to Yellowstone, from Mammoth Cave to the shores of Maine, like I just am overcome. I just think it’s so special. So that’s like a huge part of how I feel about being American. It’s just the actual physical place feels so incredibly special to me. And then I think we talk a lot about our frictionless existence, like our pursuit of ease, and I think that can show up in the ways we think about relationship and identity, and I think so much of the work we do here is to push against that and to say anything worth having, anything worth doing is hard, and it involves friction and difficulty and sadness and grief. And so the presence of all of those difficult emotions and how I feel about being an American is, to me, a feature, not a bug. I have difficult, complicated feelings about everything I love. My husband, my children, this work, my family, being a woman, being a human. To me, it’s like that’s not a problem. That is the reality of feeling connected and called to be a part of something. So all of that difficulty with America, and it is there, always there, in a weird way just makes me love it more. So like a moment to look at that-- that’s why I like birthdays, generally. I’m just a birthday person. That’s another affiliation I like. So a birthday and a moment to just-- especially coming off COVID and these very difficult re-examinations of so many pieces of our history and much like 1976, a difficult moment where people don’t think there’s a lot of promise in front of America; it feels really important and essential to say, “Yeah, but I love it anyway. And yeah, I’m going to keep trying, and I’m going to keep putting my good things in the river, and I’m going to keep looking back at all the people who came before me and see what I can learn from them and acknowledge their sacrifice and work and contributions and say, ‘I’m so honored to be a link in that chain.’” Because I am.

[00:23:19] Beth: I think one of the pieces that makes it precarious to feel patriotic, that’s always been part of the country, is a sense that maybe I’m okay right now, but what if I’m not? It could change in a second. It has changed before. We see how we have made progress and then taken steps backward in so many different ways. I like the opportunity and appreciate the opportunity with this anniversary to consider the people who were here before the Revolutionary War, and to think about those tribal nations that are still here and that still try to negotiate with our government even though our government has screwed those tribal nations over and over again, who still have built this nation and who still meaningfully give to it. I think it’s a good opportunity to look back at the writings of founders wrestling with slavery, who knew from the beginning that institution could lead to civil war and then did, and then to consider how people dealt with that and what they believed was worth dying for as they were building a new nation. Even as we are in the middle of Pride Month, and you sense a lot of fatigue around Pride Month this time because there is that looming sense that are these hard-won rights going to be taken away from us. And even as we’re dealing with the post-Dobbs world in which many of us have daughters with fewer rights than we had when we were their age and you have that sense hanging over like it is a stormy time. And I think that gives me meaning in reexamining this history and considering where we’ve been, and it helps me ask different questions than if I were medicating with America 250 the way that they did during the bicentennial. In some ways it feels important to me to take this anniversary and not just numb out on red, white, and blue, but really go to the history and think about my place in it. You said a link in the chain. Okay. What is that link? What are the things that we are fighting for, and how are we fighting, and what’s the evolution of that fight over time?

[00:25:48] Sarah: Yeah, because I feel like the examination of all of this history always draws me to the deep humanity of the people who came before me. I am not trying to romanticize them. I am not trying to create heroes. I don’t think I am papering over anything or apologizing for anyone when I say think about what was happening in 1776. Do you honestly believe as a human yourself who looks out across the world where there is still great harm and suffering and inequities, and think that these people should have, what, in 1776, cast off, created a whole new form of government, cast off the rule of a king to create something new and to also upend the entire understanding of gender and race at once? Sometimes I wonder when we speak about these people, when we speak about people that came before us at any time, what do we think should have happened? Perfection in an instant? I’m not participating in perfection of an instant. I know that there’s great suffering. My historical experiment is always I think in 250 years they will look back on us and ask the same sort of questions we ask about them. I think it will most likely be around consciousness and animal welfare. I still participate in the industrial farm complex. I still eat meat, even though I can see it. I can squint and see in 250 years what they will think about us. And I just have to grant that grace to myself and to every human that participated in this 250-year history, and every human that will get us hopefully to the next 250 years. I’m not saying they’re perfect. I’m not saying we’re perfect. I am saying that I am grateful and honored to be participating in the journey to more perfect in all things, as a citizen, as a friend, as a podcaster. That’s all I can do. I can just say, “I like being here. I like being in this country with these people. I like trying.” I’m glad that for 250 years we have kept trying. That makes me enormously proud. Even when we get it wrong, even when we mess it up, even when it feels like we’re in the midst of messing it up right now, I want to keep going.

[00:29:14] Beth: I’m interested in the felt existence of 1776 in a lot of ways because I think about how much more comfortable our lives are, and what is the relationship between comfort in life and your commitment to ideas? When you think about the women who started efforts to support the war, who melted down their serving ware for bullets, and who served as nurses and sewed shirts for the soldiers. When you think about them and the fact that they have children dying of typhoid fever, and they’re trying to keep the farms running, and just the daily experience of keeping a fire going consumes so much of your life. They still made space for really big ideas and hosted really philosophical conversations about what the meaning of a nation is and what role government should play and who should get to be at the table for making decisions. And I just look at my life, which is so much easier. I never have to keep a fire going all day. I never have to think about whether my water’s clean to drink. I don’t worry about my children dying of typhoid fever. I just wonder what percentage of my life is devoted to ideals the way that people who came before me devoted their lives to ideals and what does that say? And I just think that tension between comfort and principle is like really fruitful territory to explore.

[00:30:53] Sarah: Yeah, I really liked putting on my costume for 1776 and in the grand scheme of things, there wasn’t a lot to it. More than what I wear every day, but nowhere near what they were actually wearing because it kind of gave me this very physical experience of thinking about that time period. And look, I think the importance of America 250 is because it is a call to envision what are we doing here together? What ideals are we still pursuing? I think that we are desperate. The reason people think our future isn’t bright, that our best years are behind us, is because there is not a vision for that future right now because there is not an articulation of what a thriving American populace will look like in the face of artificial intelligence or falling birth rates or climate change. I think that’s another reason I’m so devoted to this milestone because that’s what you do. You take the moment and think, “Okay, here’s what people sacrificed to get us here. What are we willing to sacrifice to get us to the next 250? What are we trying to pursue together?” And a liberal democracy, full participation, freedom of speech, religion, press, assembly are ideals that are not perfected yet. They are still worth pursuing. And that’s why I value our work so much because more than most, we do get to think about that, and we do get to talk about that. And I guess America 250 to me is this moment to be like, “Join us. Please.” We have to not just have limited edition cinnamon rolls or UFC fights. We have to talk about what are we doing here together, because we have... I don’t know if we’ve lost that ability, but it looks a lot different now. We’re not having town halls like we used to. We are so atomized and maybe we’re listening to a podcast, but we have to take that somewhere. And so many Americans are. They’re running for office. They’re creating organizations. They’re coming together with their neighbors and their family members and their friends. And that is beautiful and worth celebrating. And no flashy cage on the White House lawn can erase that.

[00:33:30] Beth: It is the together to me that is so essential. For another project that I’m working on for our audience eventually, I was looking at the history of salons and the way that women gathered, philosophers, intellectuals in drawing rooms, across the world to discuss big ideas and just thinking about how we’ve been trying to do that over the years. With our members, we have read Habits of the Heart. We’ve read a number of The Federalist Papers. We’ve read the Alexis de Tocqueville Democracy in America. We’ve been trying to ask these questions for years now in community, right? Together. Okay, where do we come from? What does this mean? Where are we going? And it gives me a lot of confidence in asking these America 250 questions because there is a lot of homework behind the way that I’m searching for that future vision. That has to translate into my own living room for it to feel worthy of the splashy red, white, and blue fireworks moments. And I sense that a lot of people want that now. It is not good enough to have a red, white, and blue Monster energy drink. It is more okay, but I want to sink into the sense that I’m connected to other people here, and that we’re doing something together to leave this thing better than we found it.

[00:35:00] Sarah: Obviously, we have lots of options available in our Substack, but we wanted to share this national initiative that we think is the truest, most beautiful reflection of what we’re talking about when we say celebrate America 250. It’s called America’s Potluck. It is a nationwide--

[00:35:21] Beth: you got me.

[00:35:21] Sarah: I know, right? I don’t even need to tell you anything else, do I?

[00:35:22] Beth: Just the name. That’s all.

[00:35:24] Sarah: A nationwide community-driven initiative encouraging neighborhoods and communities to gather for a shared meal on Sunday, July 5th to mark 250 years of American life together. Their goal is to have 25,000 potlucks. We have the link in the show notes, so you can click it, find out if there’s a potluck near you, host one if there isn’t. I think this is the most beautiful way to answer this complicated milestone with a grounded, integrated, holistic approach to celebrating America 250. I love it so much. Because again, we are not celebrating because everything is perfect. We are celebrating because it isn’t and we want to keep trying together. Beth, The New York Times had this piece about your mom aesthetic. Apparently it is a big deal on TikTok to create content and name your mom aesthetic. So it’s like butter moms, which is like a ‘90s mom situation. Or maybe you’re a cozy mom, and you’re really into matching pajamas and snuggling. The idea is by naming an aesthetic, you give some sort of comfort and consistency and I guess a foundation in this very scary world of parenting

[00:37:03] Beth: I read this and realized a couple of things. My instant reaction was to think, “Dum, dum, dumity-dum. I hate this,” and then I tried to pull back from that and I realized that I had very different aesthetics with my two daughters because my life was very different with the two of them. I think with my older daughter I was, when she was a baby, rushing to work in the mornings, picking her up from the babysitter in the afternoons, always wearing a suit with a yogurt stain somewhere on it. And that wasn’t a performance for anyone, that was just the reality of my life. It was stressed and hectic and pulled in a lot of different directions. It was better with Ellen. I had less of that. I was coming, I think, a little bit more into myself. I was older. I had taken a step back from my career. And then the other thing I realized as I interrogated what do I feel beyond this is so stupid get off my lawn kind of reaction, was that I think part of what bugs me in this, and a lot of the internet mommy content, is that it becomes about one person as the definer of the relationship with the child, right? If you are doing cozy mom, do you draft cozy dad or cozy other mom into the equation? You know what I mean? It feels like you’re the main character now, and the child is an accessory, and then if there’s a partner in the picture, that person also is just an accessory to your plan for the family unit. And I think we’ve woven in and out of a lot of different aesthetics here, or just life patterns because we’ve had a very equal partnership all through all through their growing up.

[00:38:57] Sarah: Counterpoint, doesn’t bother me at all. Here’s why I like it. I was thinking, like, when I was in the mommy blogging world, the battle lines, the identity was either stay-at-home mom or work mom. I wrote so many blog posts about being a stay-at-home mom versus a working mom. So I’m delighted that those are no longer the lines because everybody works in all kinds of different ways, and it’s way more complicated, and that makes me so happy. I like that this is individualized in a way because I think the mom noise can become so loud that any exercise that says, “ You can decide what kind of mom you want to be. You can pick. It doesn’t have to be this perfect standard or this tradwife or crunchy mom or whatever the name.” You can just make up your own. And I think that’s a really positive direction. Because as much as parenting is a team sport, there is something about mothering that is very distinctive and can be lonely and can be physical. A lot of it in the early days takes place in your body, on your body, a part of your body. So I don’t know. I kind of dig it. I think it’s empowering a little bit.

[00:40:30] Beth: That’s an interesting interpretation that has some appeal to me. I bump up against the marriage of my personal desires as expressed through aesthetic. Because that’s what it is, right? It’s more than clothes. When you lean into an aesthetic hard like this, you’re really painting an aspirational vision of your own life, right? This is how I want to feel. This is how I want other people to interpret me. There’s a status component, for sure, as well as a spiritual component, I think. Internally, this is what I want to cultivate in my life. And I think it’s tricky, and this is going to be true whether you’re trying to define an aesthetic or not on TikTok. But there is this tricky dimension of motherhood that is always like how much of me is mother and how much of me is person, and how is my child impacted by that ratio? And I wonder if I were trying to turn my aspirations for my life into content in that particular way, what would the effect on my children and my family dynamic be? I don’t know.

[00:41:46] Sarah: I have a mom aesthetic. I’ve never named it until this exercise. But I’m calling it camel coat core. That’s what I’m calling my aesthetic.

[00:41:56] Beth: Okay. You do love alliteration.

[00:41:59] Sarah: I have said for a long time that I think some of the most positive portrayals of motherhood are in holiday films. So the camel coat core is a callout to Kate McAllister, my favorite mom, the mom I aspire to be, in Home Alone. With, I think, an assist from Sybil Stone in The Family Stone, who also wears a camel house coat. A very rich, beautiful camel house coat for what it’s worth. And I think both of these mothers and the way I envision motherhood and think about motherhood has been they don’t get it all right. She leaves her child at home. Sybil fights with her kids. But there is an aspect of I am creating experiences for you, which I think is definitely a part of my mom aesthetic. Nowhere is that more true during the holidays. There’s always a aspect of the moms in A Christmas Story and Home Alone, all these stories, that there is I’m crafting an experience for you, especially as a young child. Which has definitely been a part of my vision of myself as a mother that I’m set directing here, to a certain extent. At certain times positive and negative consequences of that, of course. But that I’m here, that we’re trying to create this experience as a family together, but that family is at the center of it. I like that these women clearly have strong marriages, that they have careers or had careers, that they’re full and complete people that screw up, but that just really fiercely love their kids while also looking so good in their camel coats. So that’s mine. Camel coat core. I named it. That’s my mom aesthetic.

[00:43:56] Beth: Good for you. I guess the closest thing I have to this is something that came up when I worked with a parenting coach for a little bit because I was really confused by sibling fighting in my house. She had me choose an avatar for who I want to be as a mom from pop culture, and I picked Moana’s grandmother because I love that she’s willing to be sought out for advice, but isn’t trying to dole it out constantly. She gives both her son and her granddaughter room to make mistakes and to feel their feelings and to be mad at each other. But she is there to narrate a little bit when they ask her. And when they don’t ask her, she remains there. She lets her presence be there even when she’s not being called upon and that’s what I’ve always wanted for Jane and Ellen to know that Chad and I will just be here. We’ll be here, and they can always be with us, and we’ll be wishing the best for them and putting our energy around them no matter what’s happening. And I have really tried to draw from this avatar a sense of playfulness and lightness because I can be super serious, and I can use way too many words and I can feel that the stakes of everything are very high. And when I have that sense coming on, I try to like physically emulate Moana’s grandmother, just move more fluidly, laugh a little bit, relax into the moment.

[00:45:25] Sarah: I’m trying to think of a good word for that. Like I’m trying to think. What’s an S word for mothering, caring, parenting? Because you have a surf, a swim. You know what I’m saying? Like a surf mom. I guess it doesn’t have to... I just wanted to be a little...

[00:45:47] Beth: maybe I can just be a Pisces mom. That’s what I am in general.

[00:45:50] Sarah: Pisces mom. Pisces parent, then you’re getting back to the.. Okay, we did it. Okay. Pisces parent, camel coat core. I like it. I think it’s fun. I think it’s fun. I think being able to like zoom out and do a little macro examination around your mothering and your parenting, never a bad thing. Never a bad thing. You can get a little consumed, for sure. But I do think like just an overall direction can be helpful. I cannot wait to hear everybody’s mom aesthetics and your thoughts, of course, on America 250. Please do not forget to join us on Substack at pantsuitpoliticsshow.com to get all of your America 250 treats. Until Friday, keep it nuanced y’all.

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