August 26, 2020: Not Even Slightly Original Sin -

I know, I know, nobody has been truly original in the sin department for a long time, but I would just like to pile on (so to speak) about the Falwells and their pool boy. You all have done the work of pointing out the holier-than-thou hypocrisy, and the ten-commandment issue, and whatnot, and I just want to add to those content-based-complaints, my own style-based-complaint, about the utter predictability and lack of imagination displayed here.  

"Pool boy" is a generic term, Falwells.  "Pool boy" does not have to mean "pool boy." You can make this situation your own. 

Surely, in your retinue, you had a dog-walker, or a gardener or a private chef, or - how about this? - on the university admin team, maybe there was a chancellor or a provost or something, SOMETHING, someone who was not literally a pool boy. "Provost" would have been at least a word people don't sling around in jokes already. (Well, not in my world, maybe in academe "provost" is a common punchline.)

I know, we are all clichés.  I, for instance, was surprised and a bit hurt to realize, some years ago, that "mom jeans" were a humorous thing. My mom jeans were my GOOD jeans, my dress-up jeans. The SNL skit where they pranced around looking dorky, while the voiceover said, "This Mother's Day, give her something that says, 'I'm not a woman any more - I'm a mom!'"- I admit, that was a blow. Also, I did not look better in my not-mom jeans, meaning we'd hit damned if I did, damned if I didn't, middle-aged woman as silly by default. Grrr.

Not only that, but many years earlier, I had suffered my one and only car crush.  Usually, I don't notice cars, unless somebody has done a home-made decorating job, and even then I would tell you that I saw something zebra-striped with a classic troll doll as a hood ornament, not that I saw a decorated Subaru. 

But we were motoring along and suddenly There She Was, and I gasped and said, "Look! It's the most beautiful car in the world!" 

My husband looked, and then gave me the side eye. He said, "Oh, come on. That's like having a crush on Farah Fawcett Majors." 

It was a Corvette.

So I get it. I don't get to claim less-clichéd-than-thou. But still. Still, I do wish that public figures would put their backs into it a bit more (as it were). I think they owe us, the public, that much.