I was alone on a Friday night and in no mood to join the drunk and hollering crowd parading past my house. My two choices were: read a magazine or study organic chemistry. Tossing my o-chem book aside, I was faced with a new decision to make ­­­— should I read my Cosmopolitan or my National Geographic? I landed on National Geographic, and I had one of those angels-singing, beam-of-light-shining, harp-playing Hallelujah moments … or what most people know as an “epiphany.”
I used to idolize Cosmo. I used to want to work for them, and I used to obsess and giggle and squeal with unadulterated ecstasy every time my new issue arrived. Cosmo was my escape from real life. In Cosmo, the only stresses that exist are “that slut at work,” or “that slut lookin’ at my boyfriend,” or “that slut who’s being a skank.” Of course, there’s also “I have to be married before I’m 35,” “How do I get a man?” and “Now that I have him, how do I keep him?” That basically covers everything negative about a Cosmo girl’s life. I wanted to be that girl. I wanted to only care about my hair, my clothes, my makeup, and how to catch that man. I wanted to be the uber-confident girl who could walk through a room and turn eyes because her butt looks so great in those jeans. I didn’t want anything to do with the realities I was facing in life at the time I discovered Cosmo — the death of a best friend, the imminent doom of leaving for college, and the fact that someday, I would have to get my driver’s license.
Then college started. I realized that there were more than 22,000 people at this school, and the style of my hair, the brand of my jeans or the color of my nails were not in fact the center of anyone’s universe. And while some of my friends were still obsessing over their shoes and their clothes and whether someone would think they were weird for doing, or saying, or wearing something not straight off the conveyor belt, I was learning not to care what people thought about me.
But I digress. Bottom line, I matured a little bit and Cosmo started to get a little boring. Don’t get me wrong, it was still oodles of fun to snuggle on my couch with some girlfriends and giggle over the delicious abs and the cliche tips on how to impress the boss, the mother-in-law and the opposite sex, but then I started to realize that all the magazine was telling me was how to change to make someone else (specifically, a man) happy. At first I was able to ignore it, because I was aware of it and didn’t let it affect me. But then it just got annoying.
No, Cosmo, I’m not going to wear high heels because men love them. No, Cosmo, I’m not going to spend all my money on expensive hair products because men love the “bad girl bump.” And NO, Cosmo, I’m not going to belittle myself by changing to please someone else.
Around this time I started to write my weekly blog and column, all dedicated to science. This of course required me to troll science news sites, science magazine sites and science departments on campus for interesting things to write about. And though my passion for science was never dampened by Cosmo, it was like Cosmo had put a low-level perception filter over science and only when I was looking for science did I remember it existed.
So I re-subscribed to National Geographic, and I cancelled my subscription to Cosmo.
And I realized just now, reading my National Geographic, that I am no longer reading something that wants me to change who I am. I’m reading something that defines who I am. I’m gaining knowledge, I’m learning, I’m immersing myself in everything that interests me. Cosmo was always so easy to read because it requires no thought. It’s an escape. National Geographic requires the mind to make connections and revel in the beauty and miracle of life, to change perspectives and walk a mile in someone else’s shoes, to admit that human beings aren’t the only important life forms on the planet, and to realize the Earth isn’t the only planet in the universe.
Thanks, National Geographic, for making this Friday night.
[email protected]