We're Going to Need More Wine

by Gabrielle Union

I remember the moment I realized I was free, looking in a mirror and saying, “I choose my motherfucking self.”

From a young age, most girls are not given the most basic information about their bodies. And we grow into smart women who often don’t go to doctors on a regular basis because we are too busy putting others in our lives first, and don’t share personal medical information with each other, either. People talk about our bodies solely as reproductive systems, and we remain just as clueless as The Virgin Mary’s learning she was but a vessel for something greater.

First of all, they never want to hire anyone black in hair and makeup on a white film. Hair and makeup people hire their friends, and they naturally want to believe their friend who says they can do anything. “Oh yeah, I can do black hair,” they say.

Maybe one day, when I’m a real grown-up, I will wear my hair natural and I won’t contour my nose. Hell, I’ll just be me. And hopefully people will accept me the way I am.

“There are so many more people than you realize,” she told us girls, “people who look up to the same sun and the moon and the stars. It’s your birthright to explore this world.” It’s only as small as you make it.

I am grateful I was raped in an affluent neighborhood with an underworked police department. And an underutilized rape crisis center. And overly trained doctors and nurses and medical personnel. The fact that one can be grateful for such things is goddamn ridiculous.

You think you’ve priced yourself out of this shit. You’ve done all these things and then this happens.

The other question I get asked is “What were you wearing?” I got raped at work and people still want to know what role I played in what happened to me.

You can love what you see in the mirror, but you can’t self-esteem your way out of the way the world treats you.

light-skinned African American women had “a clear advantage in the marriage market and were more likely to marry high-status men than were darker-skinned women.”

Dark skin is weaponized and continually used against us day to day. What if it’s not simply preference or acquiring a status symbol, but a learned tactic of survival?

who maybe isn’t even your type, but just looked your way . . . and you needed that validation fix.

Splendor in the Grass

WAITING TO EXHALE

I know a lot of people talk about closure, “giving yourself time to mourn.” Ehhh. Let’s not play these games. I think the whole “pussy moratorium” thing is just some puritanical garbage to keep women chaste. I see it all the time in Hollywood. After the end of a relationship, an actress or famous woman has to publicly announce that her legs will be closed until further notice. Like some exorcist has to come in to flush out the demons from her vagina.

Choose red wine if you’d like a warm hug and maybe a nap. A Malbec is that slightly bitter pal who rallies to say, “There, there, we’ll get through this.” A Cabernet is a model of efficiency, drinkable with a high alcohol content. With all of its varied flavors, Pinot is the one who’ll encourage you to keep a sense of mystery. But if you want to skip all that and just get to the point where you fuck one of his friends? You go tequila all the way. I prescribe straight, no chaser. Either way, first round is on me.

Leave it to Oprah to get to the heart of the matter.

“What positive happened in your life because you tore this woman down?” she asked. “And, by the way, you showed exactly how much power she has over you because you spent an hour talking about her to a roomful of people.”

There is an epidemic now of people “being real” when they’re being anything but. It’s the person who loves being “someone” who notices every little thing wrong with what you say, do, wear, or think, and has to point it out. Those mean women, and mean men, affect people’s opportunities and experiences, at work or with their children.

Negativity and the exploitation of other people’s pain drive so much of our culture and conversation.

“An empress does not concern herself with the antics of fools.”

Women are told to “lean in.” Yeah, right. “Lean in so I can push you over.”

in corporate America there’s a reasonable fear about “mentoring” young women to be their best selves if that means they could take your job.

We need every woman on the front lines lifting each other up . . . for the good of all of us and the women who come behind us.

We put on the mittens, we utter singsong hellos, and we stay where we belong.

a girls’ girl to the end.