Cue my cringe, a subsequent attempt to ignore my second-hand embarrassment, and an inevitable block button. Was this the standard of dating the apps had to offer? I may have only been freshly 19, but I knew that this sucked.

Fast forward to my junior year, when, for the spring 2025 issue of DrakeMag, I wrote an optimistic article on Gen-Z dating culture and the urgent need for Gen-Z to take a breather from swiping habits. However, now, a year later, I feel that a total breakaway is the antidote to the situationship/hookup filled dating culture plaguing Gen-Z.

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Recently, in Lyz Lenz’ newsletter, Men Yell At Me (I know, I know, another Lenz shoutout; I have a problem), she chronicled her recent attempt to try dating apps again. Dating apps and algorithms today, Lenz argues, with the promise of more and more connections, have done the opposite, while placing the blame on women for any and all unsuccessful hetero romantic relationship attempts.

“[They've] monetized our antisocial behaviors; gotten us addicted to the dopamine of swiping and convinced men that there is a better woman out there, while women are told to stop being snobby bitches and just give a normal man holding a fish a chance already.”

Instead of men being held accountable for bad behavior (c’mon something we’ve all experienced) — ‘communicating’ that you’re not ready for a relationship while still engaging in intimate actions that say otherwise, bitching about the possibility of paying for someone’s meal, consistently getting involved with people even though you have ‘commitment issues’ (if this is you, there’s a special corner in hell saved just for you) — it’s all chalked up to be a woman’s fault for not knowing better.

“You had a bad date? Pick better! Your husband was awful? Pick better! Men on the apps are bad? Pick better,” Lenz says.

Alas, there is a solution before us, and no, it’s not paying Hinge’s subscription fee for premium matches:

“[You] could argue that men aren't going to change, so women better or they won't get dates,” Lenz says. “Okay, then no dates!”

See what I mean, ladies? Why spend time on dates — giving people the benefit of the doubt — when, instead, you can just, ya know, not? Why must women continue to seek out connection and intimacy with men who don’t know how to properly give it? Why must we be tasked with solving the male loneliness epidemic instead of incentivizing men to properly behave with the opposite sex? Why must we accept men’s half-assery and pay to be premium subscribers on dating apps that connect us with men whose bad behavior shows up in one form or another? Why waste your time with someone who doesn’t appreciate your efforts?

“Listen, this is some cooked brain thinking to argue that I have to learn algorithmic jiu jitsu just to go on a date with a guy who can't stop talking about his bitch ex-wife or this cool underground band called The Clash,” Lenz says. “I could throw myself off a roof and it would be so much easier and less painful.”

Stop. Start a book club. Plant some daisies. Find a local ultimate frisbee team.

Stop looking for signs of love and care in the most minuscule of moments (Oh my God, he messaged me back after one day, not two!). Instead of bending for the smallest hint (or hope thereof) of intimacy and connection, simply clock out. Don’t engage with a dating field that’s not serving you. Don’t waste your energy on dating apps that thrive on your swiping dopamine hits. Don’t waste your time on people who waste yours.

Surround yourself with people and communities who value and care about you, and focus on what brings you joy. And if you should happen to find mutual romantic feelings along the way, hurray! But that shouldn’t be your end goal.

There is more to life than trying to will yourself to move past anyone above the age of six using the word ‘squish’ unironically, or waiting for a man to ask you a single question on a Thursday night at Chili’s.

Always keep talking,

- C

We can expect abortion to be another hot contender for the political issue of the year. Recently, an article from the 19th arrived in my inbox titled, “Abortion isn’t the issue in 2026, but it’s still an issue.”

But why? Why abortion? Why do antiabortion advocates continue to get their panties in a wad about abortion? The political issue of the 2010s was gay marriage. For the 2020s, it’s all about abortion.

You’d think the drive and journey to successfully dismantle Roe v. Wade would be enough. But still, conservative ‘religious’ lawmakers across the country are seeing to it that abortion restrictions find their way to their state’s debate stage, in some way, shape, or form.

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Iowa most recently passed House File 2788, prohibiting the delivery of abortion medication from outside the state, which I’ve written about previously. This bill was signed on May 19 in tandem with Iowa’s current near-total abortion ban.

Kansas overwhelmingly rejected an amendment to its state constitution in 2022 that would’ve removed residents’ right to abortion. However, Kansas has yet to see movement on an additional amendment to secure and protect that right. And their state legislature overruled Gov. Laura Kelly’s veto and established support for fake abortion clinics, otherwise known as crisis pregnancy centers.

In Missouri, despite the voter-approved 2024 amendment to the Missouri Constitution that protects access to abortion, there were still countless abortion-related bills at their state legislature. This session, the state legislature passed the ‘Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act,’ which ensures that a “child born alive during or after an abortion or an attempted abortion shall have all the rights, privileges, and immunities available to other persons, citizens, and residents of this state, including any other liveborn child.” As Bridgette Dunlap noted in her commentary for the Missouri Independent, “This is not a thing.”

Again, I ask why? And while I ask why I scream into my pillow.

If abortion has been shown to be widely supported across the states, with even some states enshrining abortion rights into law, then why is there still this incessant need to hinder abortion access and mislead the public?

I like to think that decreased birth rates, the so-called male loneliness epidemic, and the insane costs of raising a healthy child with hardly any government help (which the 19th article noted) are all contributing reasons for the U.S.’s current political obsession. And the European socialist in me likes to think it all comes back to capitalism, the economic system America has sold its soul to.

Women’s bodily autonomy and family planning means less or no children. When a woman has contraception and her own money, she doesn’t need to submit to her husband and birth 11 children, like my great-grandmother. And because of these feminist gains, women don’t need to rely on men who aren’t offering anything substantial anyway, who instead of shaping up, are complaining that they’re ‘lonely.’ And of course, less children means a decreased workforce, leading politicians to say 1 in 3 Americans (women) are ‘underbabied.’

In caveman tongue, this essentially translates to: women’s rights bad. Capitalism good. Or more specifically, that advancements for women — contraception access, abortion access, financial independence, a choice of who and who not to marry — equate to fewer capitalist slog horses. And rather than make changes to our capitalist-dependent system, and acknowledge that women are human beings with independent minds, the solution for Dr. Oz and the rest of the Trump administration is to get more women pregnant.

And what better way to get more women pregnant than criminalizing legitimate access to abortion?

And the Trump administration and conservative Republicans in (insert your state here) don’t care about improving the lives of Americans and investing in their current or future children. That’s the point. They want Americans to have 11 children on a $7.25 federally mandated minimum wage salary. They don’t want kids to get a head start in life. They don’t want everyday Americans to succeed. They want cheap labor, so Trump and his billionaire friends can keep getting richer. And it’s all under the guise of religious superiority and morals.

When you see attacks on abortion access in your state, please know that it’s personal, and understand that it’s all pointed.

Always keep talking,

- C

I’m no a chemist, but for awhile now, I’ve been feeling like the title of this blog, Caroline’s Current, doesn’t quite emphasize the content I put out. When I originally launched this Substack, I intended to cover current events, and I do still try to emphasize trending topics and connect to broader feminist and women-centered themes, but, I don’t know man, I just don’t think its fits very well anymore. It’s as simple as that. I feel as though I’ve outgrown it.

I came up with the title on a whim, trying to utilize the power of alliteration, while trying to create something memorable.

And now I think I have.

Introducing People Call Her Snarky! Inspired by the title of Lyz Lenz’ newsletter, Men Yell at Me, I decided to make a four letter phrase over a word that people already use to describe my writing style, too.

When I wrote about abortion in relation to the Hortman shooting for The Minnesota Star Tribune, Matthew Laszlo from Anoka wrote in to the Readers Write section on June 19, 2025, to say, “The snarky opening to her opinion serves only to inflame those who don’t believe that a tiny human is an nonautonomous organism, as she says.” Well said Matt. That was exactly my goal after a Minnesota representative and her husband were murdered for their pro-choice stance.

In another instance, I wrote about Sen. Joni Ersnt (R-Iowa) and her decision not to seek reelection. “Very apt and appropriately snarky,” said Dr. Beth Younger, an English professor at Drake University.

I’ve featured it here before, as my subhed and on my ‘About’ page, but more and more I’ve felt like ‘snarky’ perfectly encapsulates my content on this platform.

25% newsy. 25% opinion. 50% snark.

But wait, there’s more! You didn’t think I was going to leave Bad Midwest Feminist out in the cold, did you? Absolutely not. I’m proud of that title. And just like Lenz’ subhed for her newsletter is “Not a Dingus,” corresponding with the title of her weekly podcast, “Dingus of the Week,” my subhed shall henceforth be, “Just a Bad Midwest Feminist.”

Anyway, just a little update for y’all. Now back to our regularly scheduled weekly programming.

Keep talking,

- C

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Being a stay-at-home parent is a financial decision as much as it is an emotional one. Some families have no other options, since childcare is expensive as all hell.

My aunts, who were able to afford childcare, paid roughly $125,000 in childcare costs before their children started kindergarten. (Insert gasp here.)

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I recently worked on an article for the Business Record, detailing a recent initiative from Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds regarding childcare grants. The grants spread $5.2 million over a cluster of grant recipients to improve hours available for childcare, hourly pay for providers, and transportation to and from the childcare facility. It’s a great initiative, one that Reynolds was extremely proud to execute. However, out of the 159 applications for the grant, only 19 childcare providers have been selected to receive $300,000 over the course of three years.

“$5.2 million doesn't go very far when thinking about child care, when thinking about a statewide initiative,” said Claudia Schabel, CEO of the Iowa Women’s Foundation.

The people I interviewed about the grants were more than happy to see Reynolds and her administration take action on Iowa’s childcare crisis, even if the action will be short-lived. The grant program is short-term if anything, and since Reynolds’ term is up this year and she isn’t running for reelection, this action isn’t expected to live on past the three years of its inception.

Schabel said that childcare is the issue that keeps people (more often than not, women) from joining the workforce, and whenever legislators hold space to improve it, it should be celebrated. In fact, HF2514, a bill signed by Reynolds on April 9, is a direct attempt to support childcare providers and employees. Reynolds’ grants and HF2514 were great additions to Iowa this legislative session, but more action is possible and necessary to support women and families.

More often than not, women and families are forced to fend for themselves. It’s very normal in the U.S. for one parent to leave the workforce to alleviate childcare costs. More often than not, that role falls to women.

The sole reason my mother was a stay-at-home parent all those years was directly related to the costs of childcare. Childcare costs are consistently a source of financial stress for families, with families spending a sizable portion of their income on quality providers.

If Schabel had it her way, she’d institute universal childcare, like New Mexico established last year.

"[New Mexico’s] initiative…removes income liability requirements and waives family co-payments, making child care accessible to all New Mexicans,” Schabel says. “It doesn't matter if you have the means or if you don't have the means, all children will get a head start in life.”

Reynolds’ childcare grants and HF2514 were moving initiatives to see implemented this year, but let’s not grant our legislators eternal salvation just yet. They can do more. They should do more. For children. For mothers. For families.

I wonder what my mother would’ve done had she not felt like it was financially necessary to be the stay-at-home parent. I wonder, if I have children, will I feel the need to do the same?

As always, keep talking.

House File 2788, an act relating to “abortion including definitions, informed consent, dispensing of abortion-inducing drugs, and other abortion-related provisions,” prohibits the delivery of abortion medication (mifepristone and misoprostol) into the state of Iowa from neighboring states where access to this medication is protected.

This bill, which is on its way to Iowa Gov. Kim Reynolds’ desk where she will undoubtably sign it, aims to restrict Iowa’s already strict abortion access, making it even more difficult for Iowans to access medication abortion.

First and foremost, f**k you Iowa Republicans.

This bill died in the legislatures’ funnel period (which is a fancy Iowa way of saying it didn’t get through a full committee), but was brought back through some sneaky political maneuvering that of course Iowa Republicans used to their advantage.

Iowa Republicans should know that there are much more pressing issues that are impacting Iowans, which don’t include inserting government officials into every Iowan’s house and mail slot. Things like household affordability, health care and child care costs are sky high on Iowans’ priority lists, but not for the Republican majority. Not for the so-called party of ‘family values.’

This bill, which no sizable Iowa majority asked for, serves only to appeal to the mission of loud conservatives, and restrict medication that is safer than Ibuprofen. Kyrstin Delagardelle, director of public affairs for Planned Parenthood Advocates of Iowa, said “Medication abortion is safe, effective, and trusted health care that has been used by over 7.5 million people since it was first approved over 25 years ago. It has been a critical expansion of access — and that’s exactly why anti‑abortion politicians are trying so hard to restrict it.”

I’m going to include the names and contact information of the legislators who voted in favor of HF2788 for two reasons. (1) Iowans should see and recognize the names of the politicians who voted to restrict abortion access further than they already have and who placed undue burden on the lives of Iowans who are already struggling, and (2) in the state where the lobbyist group, The Family Leader, led a very successful judicial campaign to unseat the Iowa Supreme Court judges who decided in favor of same-sex marriage in 2009, why shouldn’t the 64% of Iowans (a majority!) who believe abortion should be protected do the same to their state legislators?

Let me make thing extremely salient and clear: This is not a call to threaten political violence. It’s a call to express displeasure with legislators and their voting record. It’s a call for the 64% of Iowans who support abortion access to push out who represents them at the Capitol.

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The names and contact info for the legislators who voted in favor of HF2788 are as follows.

Iowa House of Representatives

1. Rep. Brett Barker (R-Story) — brett.barker@legis.iowa.gov

2. Rep. Chad Behn (R-Boone) — chad.behn@legis.iowa.gov

3. Rep. Michael R. Bergan (R-Winneshiek) — michael.bergan@legis.iowa.gov

4. Rep. Jane Bloomingdale (R-Worth) — jane.bloomingdale@legis.iowa.gov

5. Rep. Brooke Boden (R-Warren) — brooke.boden@legis.iowa.gov

6. Rep. Jacob Bossman (R-Woodbury) — jacob.bossman@legis.iowa.gov

7. Rep. Dr. Steven P. Bradley (R-Jones) — steven.bradley@legis.iowa.gov

8. Rep. Taylor R. Collins (R-Des Moines) — taylor.collins@legis.iowa.gov

9. Rep. Tom Determann (R-Clinton) — tom.determann@legis.iowa.gov

10. Rep. Jon Dunwell (R-Jasper) — jon.dunwell@legis.iowa.gov

11. Rep. Samantha Fett (R-Warren) — samantha.fett@legis.iowa.gov

12. Rep. Dean Fisher (R-Tama) — dean.fisher@legis.iowa.gov

13. Rep. Jason Gearhart (R-Clayton) — jason.gearhart@legis.iowa.gov

14. Rep. Dan Gehlbach (R-Dallas) — dan.gehlbach@legis.iowa.gov

15. Rep. Cindy Golding (R-Linn) — cindy.golding@legis.iowa.gov

16. Rep. Pat Grassley (R-Butler) — pat.grassley@legis.iowa.gov

17. Rep. Bill Gustoff (R-Polk) — bill.gustoff@legis.iowa.gov

18. Rep. Austin Harris (R-Appanoose) — austin.harris@legis.iowa.gov

19. Rep. Helena Hayes (R-Mahaska) — helena.hayes@legis.iowa.gov

20. Rep. Bob Henderson (R-Woodbury) — robert.henderson@legis.iowa.gov

21. Rep. Christian A. Hermanson (R-Cerro Gordo) — christian.hermanson@legis.iowa.gov

22. Rep. Steven C. Holt (R-Crawford) — steven.holt@legis.iowa.gov

23. Rep. Heather Hora (R-Washington) — heather.hora@legis.iowa.gov

24. Rep. Chad Ingels (R-Fayette) — chad.ingels@legis.iowa.gov

25. Rep. Thomas M. Jeneary (R-Plymouth) — tom.jeneary@legis.iowa.gov

26. Rep. Craig P. Johnson (R-Buchanan) — craig.johnson@legis.iowa.gov

27. Rep. Megan Jones (R-Clay) — megan.jones@legis.iowa.gov

28. Rep. Bobby Kaufmann (R-Cedar) — bobby.kaufmann@legis.iowa.gov

29. Rep. Kniff McCulla (R-Marion) — barb.kniffmcculla@legis.iowa.gov

30. Rep. Wendy Larson (R-Sac) — wendy.larson@legis.iowa.gov

31. Rep. Judd Lawler (R-Johnson) — judd.lawler@legis.iowa.gov

32. Rep. Brian K. Lohse (R-Polk) — brian.lohse@legis.iowa.gov

33. Rep. Shannon Lundgren (R-Dubuque) — shannon.lundgren@legis.iowa.gov

34. Rep. Joshua Meggers (R-Grundy) — joshua.meggers@legis.iowa.gov

35. Rep. Ann Meyer (R-Webster) — ann.meyer@legis.iowa.gov

36. Rep. Gary M. Mohr (R-Scott) — gary.mohr@legis.iowa.gov

37. Rep. Norlin G. Mommsen (R-Clinton) — norlin.mommsen@legis.iowa.gov

38. Rep. Thomas Jay Moore (R-Cass) — tom.moore@legis.iowa.gov

39. Rep. Carter F. Nordman (R-Dallas) — carter.nordman@legis.iowa.gov

40. Rep. Matthew Rinker (R-Des Moines) — matthew.rinker@legis.iowa.gov

41. Rep. David Sieck (R-Mills) — david.sieck@legis.iowa.gov

42. Rep. Brent Siegrist (R-Pottawattamie) — brent.siegrist@legis.iowa.gov

43. Rep. Travis M. Sitzmann (R-Plymouth) — travis.sitzmann@legis.iowa.gov

44. Rep. Jennifer J. Smith (R-Dubuque) — jennifer.smith@legis.iowa.gov

45. Rep. Ray Sorensen (R-Adair) — ray.sorensen@legis.iowa.gov

46. Rep. Henry Stone (R-Winnebago) — henry.stone@legis.iowa.gov

47. Rep. Mark I. Thompson (R-Wright) — mark.thompson@legis.iowa.gov

48. Rep. Charley Thomson (R-Floyd) — charley.thomson@legis.iowa.gov

49. Rep. Mike Vondran (R-Scott) — mike.vondran@legis.iowa.gov

50. Rep. Blaine C. Watkins (R-Lee) — blaine.watkins@legis.iowa.gov

51. Rep. Ryan Weldon (R-Polk) — ryan.weldon@legis.iowa.gov

52. Rep. Sam Wengryn (R-Decatur) — sam.wengryn@legis.iowa.gov

53. Rep. Skyler Wheeler (R-Sioux) — skyler.wheeler@legis.iowa.gov

54. Rep. Craig Steven Williams (R-Carroll) — craig.williams@legis.iowa.gov

55. Rep. John H. Wills (R-Dickinson) — john.wills@legis.iowa.gov

56. Rep. Devon Wood (R-Taylor) — devon.wood@legis.iowa.gov

57. Rep. Derek Wulf (R-Black Hawk) — derek.wulf@legis.iowa.gov

58. Rep. David E. Young (R-Dallas) — david.young@legis.iowa.gov

Iowa Senate

1. Sen. Kevin Alons (R-Woodbury) — kevin.alons@legis.iowa.gov

2. Sen. Mike Bousselot (R-Polk) — mike.bousselot@legis.iowa.gov

3. Sen. Doug Campbell (R-Cerro Gordo) — doug.campbell@legis.iowa.gov

4. Sen. Mark Costello (R-Mills) — mark.costello@legis.iowa.gov

5. Sen. Dan Dawson (R- Pottawattamie) — dan.dawson@legis.iowa.gov

6. Sen. Adrian Dickey (R-Jefferson) — adrian.dickey@legis.iowa.gov

7. Sen. Dawn Driscoll (R-Iowa) — dawn.driscoll@legis.iowa.gov

8. Sen. Lynn Evans (R-Cherokee) — lynn.evans@legis.iowa.gov

9. Sen. Jesse Green (R-Boone) — jesse.green@legis.iowa.gov

10. Sen. Kerry Gruenhagen (R-Scott) — kerry.gruenhagen@legis.iowa.gov

11. Sen. Dennis Guth (R-Hancock) — dennis.guth@legis.iowa.gov

12. Sen. Mike Klimesh (R-Winneshiek) — mike.klimesh@legis.iowa.gov

13. Sen. Carrie Koelker (R-Dubuque) — carrie.koelker@legis.iowa.gov

14. Sen. Tim Kraayenbrink (R-Webster) — tim.kraayenbrink@legis.iowa.gov

15. Sen. Mark S. Lofgren (R-Muscatine) — mark.lofgren@legis.iowa.gov

16. Sen. Charlie McClintock (R-Linn) — charlie.mcclintock@legis.iowa.gov

17. Sen. Mike Pike (R-Polk) — mike.pike@legis.iowa.gov

18. Sen. Jeff Reichman (R-Lee) — jeff.reichman@legis.iowa.gov

19. Sen. Ken Rozenboom (R-Marion) — ken.rozenboom@legis.iowa.gov

20. Sen. Sandy Salmon (R-Bremer) — sandy.salmon@legis.iowa.gov

21. Sen. Jason Schultz (R-Crawford) — jason.schultz@legis.iowa.gov

22. Sen. Tom Shipley (R-Adams) — tom.shipley@legis.iowa.gov

23. Sen. Amy Sinclair (R-Wayne) — amy.sinclair@legis.iowa.gov

24. Sen. Dave Sires (R-Black Hawk) — dave.sires@legis.iowa.gov

25. Sen. Annette Sweeney (R-Hardin) — annette.sweeney@legis.iowa.gov

26. Sen. Kara Warme (R-Story) — kara.warme@legis.iowa.gov

27. Sen. Scott Webster (R-Scott) — scott.webster@legis.iowa.gov

28. Sen. Cherielynn Westrich (R-Wapello) — cherielynn.westrich@legis.iowa.gov

29. Sen. Jack Whitver (R-Polk) — jack.whitver@legis.iowa.gov

30. Sen. Dan Zumbach (R-Delaware) — dan.zumbach@legis.iowa.gov

Of course, since these Republicans are more likely than not all bankrolled by conservative lobbyist organizations in Iowa, we can’t solely place the blame on the legislators in favor of HF2877 without also calling out the lobbyist groups who were all ‘for’ HF2877. So, here they are, too.

1. Iowa Minuteman Civil Defense Corps

2. Pulse Life Advocates

3. Iowa Faith and Freedom Coalition

4. Iowa Right to Life Committee

5. Lutheran Family Service

6. Iowa Catholic Conference

7. The Family Leader

Let’s all point and laugh while we email each and every one of them to take piano lessons or do something more useful with their time. Then push their antics out at the midterms.

These legislators aren’t interested in supporting the wishes of the majority of Iowans. Only keeping their lobbyist banks happy.

As always, keep talking.

I am not planning on getting married anytime soon, but I am graduating from Drake University in a few weeks. And white is deemed the unofficial color of graduation for women, whether high school or college.

There are a lot of reasons for this. Others are wearing white. It’s a plain backdrop against colorful cords or other honors. It symbolizes the end of an era and a new beginning.

Whatever the reason may be, the color white has a sordid history with tradition and accepting the status quo.

It’s a uniform, and an eraser of individuality. It’s tradition.

That all being said, not all traditions are bad. On Thanksgiving, my extended family exchanges ornaments for Christmas, and that’s always a fun time. And when I visit my aunt in North Carolina, she always buys me a book. Cute, right?

There is joy in traditions, but that doesn’t mean all of them are worth following. “It’s the way it’s always been done” is not a valid excuse anymore, if it ever was. So, I want to renegotiate the terms of traditions and my role in them, because in addition to being a creative, I’m also a politics major who has adopted an institutional way of examining the world.

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I have an off-white dress that I (my mom) bought at a Plato’s Closet last summer. It’s knitted with black stripes, and I bought a matching white slip to wear under it from Depop. It extenuates my height and my frame, and I love it.

Yet, it’s not totally white. It’s not short, it’s not pure with ruffles. It’s not the dresses I’ve seen graduates wear while posing for graduation photos on campus in years past.

I know, I know, it’s not revolutionary of me to wear a slightly different shade of white to graduation. In fact, it screams, “Who said I can’t wear my Converse,” and “I’m not like other girls.” If you know, you know.

It’s not my intention to start a revolution, quite the opposite, actually. I want to tweak the unofficial graduation uniform in a way that suits me and what I currently have in my closet. I want to fit within the confines of tradition, honor its purpose, while still allowing myself to push the boundaries, albeit slightly.

My mother didn’t want the traditional wedding ceremony — uniformed bridesmaids, an aisle, a church, a salad course — so she didn’t want to wear the traditional white wedding garb. But she still wanted to feel beautiful. She still wanted to wear something she normally wouldn’t on the day that became her wedding anniversary.

So, in comes her red dress with matching lipstick, and (oh look!) my off-white, black striped dress lags behind.

This article was originally published by “The Times-Delphic.”

However, I worry that those days might soon be over.

When the U.S. Senate voted on April 16 to end the 20-year moratorium on copper mining in the BWCAW’s watershed, I knew the vote would be close. I didn’t think it would pass.

Despite Minnesota Sen. Tina Smith’s hard-fought efforts to uphold the moratorium, the simple majority of her colleagues (50-49) thought it would be better for Chilean billionaires to make a quick buck. And let’s be honest, the senators who voted in the affirmative have been bought out by the mining corps. Smith confirmed as much after news of the vote broke.

“Republicans privately told me they knew this is wrong, and I wish they had voted their conscience,” Smith said in an Instagram post.

I’m completely and utterly upset that the people sworn to keep their country and their country’s citizens safe would deliberately choose not to, and instead expose its citizens to toxic mineral mining, contaminating one of the most beautifully wild spaces in the U.S.

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The Republican senators here in Iowa, Sens. Chuck Grassley and Joni Ernst, both voted to end the mining ban despite my and countless others’ efforts to reach them via phone and email. Grassley (probably an aide of his) did respond to me, saying, “I certainly recognize the value of protecting and utilizing public lands in a responsible way. But when mining is done in the U.S., it comes with far better labor and environmental standards than if that same mine is located in a country like China or Indonesia.”

Firstly, the U.S. will not benefit from this mining at all. Secondly, I don’t care. Mining will wreak havoc on public lands, whether it’s done in the U.S., China, or Indonesia. No one can ensure our public lands will be safe when the floodgates to mining are opened. Operations for the mining project would drain into the BWCA. The purest water there ever was or ever will be suffocated. Countless wilderness and mining experts have affirmed this.

If any country forcibly came to the U.S. and started damaging our public lands, we’d wage war. But since it’s Chilean billionaires who can now legally extract minerals for their own gain, it’s fine.

Columnist Jill Burcum of The Minnesota Star Tribune has dubbed this measure, which now heads to the president’s desk for his assured signature, the ‘Chilean Billionaires’ Relief Act.’ And I wholeheartedly agree.

A fellow lover of the BWCA told me that we need to keep up the fight. Absolutely! But I’ll just need a minute to finish screaming into my pillow.

I covered it for the student newspaper, The Times-Delphic (you can read that coverage here), but was also honestly anxious to hear for myself what she had to say. To my surprise, she spent an amazing amount of time addressing the issue of book bans across the U.S.

“The vast majority of Americans are opposed to book bans and book challenges, but the people who are challenging books are very loud, and they are very focused, and they show up at meetings,” Quinn said. “And so we also need to do the same.”

Book bans have been popping up in almost every U.S. state for the last couple of years, with the Iowa House having introduced House File 2324 just last February. (Thankfully, it didn’t advance.) An incredible number of genres have been put on the chopping block: Young adult, political dystopians, and, yes, even romance.

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Quinn, being a romance author of guilty pleasure books that women often keep in their sock drawers, it makes sense why book bans would be an issue close to her heart, since there may be people out there (there are) who may object to her romance novels, because, ya know, they’re known for being quite steamy.

“You know, people will couch it in terms of, ‘We’re just trying to protect our children,’ and usually somebody will hold up the book Gender Queer… and be like, ‘Do you want your kindergartner looking at this book?’ And I’m saying, ‘Nobody is putting that in a kindergarten library,’ Quinn said. “That’s why we have librarians, and that’s what they are trained to do, and they have educations. They know how to curate a library.”

She’s totally and completely right. Go to any library in the U.S. and I doubt any of the Bridgerton novels will be available in the children’s section.

When books are banned, whether they’re books that explore themes of gender identity, race, or fictional Regency era romance novels, we all lose. Even ‘frivolous,’ sock drawer-bound books are worthy of First Amendment rights and being read, enjoyed, and talked about by the public. And it’s possible that even romance novels can go on to make history as a regency era show that engages with color-conscious casting, changing the narrative of what stories can be told in period dramas (i.e., Bridgerton).

Sure, the original Bridgerton books are not really pushing the boundaries of political speech or testing life-changing societal norms. They’re smut, plain and simple, with a happy ending rarely afforded to real-life people. But is it a crime for people (women) to escape from the horrors and stresses of everyday American life and immerse themselves in a sexy romance? I think not.

“If you need to convince anyone, just remind them that never in human history have the people banning books turned out to be the good guys,” Quinn said.

By protecting the Bridgerton books, we’re simultaneously protecting nonfiction, boundary-pushing, ambitious written work, bound in critical thinking, that seeks to draw attention outside the binary.

But my God, just let people enjoy things, without shame, and without book bans.

“I hate Republicans” — spoken on multiple occasions.

“I hate Catholics” — spoken primarily in Protestant-based settings.

And my personal favorite, “I hate root beer,” which I still stand by.

I loved going on rants (still do), using harsh words (still do) and speaking at my full natural volume (yeah, you get the idea).

Perhaps the more conservative members of my family were concerned that my college years would only exacerbate these personality traits. In some ways, it did, but in other ways, college has taught me how to take a breath and think.

My first official post on this Substack was about Charlie Kirk’s assassination and good Lord, if you thought that post had been contentious, you should’ve just taken a look at my first draft. I hadn’t slept, definitely hadn’t eaten anything, all while digesting the news that this very controversial figure had been killed. And just before I was about to click the ‘publish’ button, I stopped and decided to sleep on it. The next morning, I was appalled at the words staring back at me, and rewrote much of what I’d originally spit out.

Graduating high school senior Caroline wouldn’t have done that, but college graduating senior Caroline did.

College has changed the way I view things. I’m still mouthy, but I’m less combative.

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I remember sitting on a panel with pharmaceutical students representing Planned Parenthood, along with its director of public affairs at the time, Mazie Stilwell. The student who had organized the event had pulled Stilwell and me aside and said that the questions were phrased very neutrally, and the title of the event would not say it was sponsored by Planned Parenthood, because the pharmacy club didn’t directly endorse any one organization.

This loosely translates to: “In case antiabortion students object to you being here, we’re only saying you’re here lending your voice, and you’re not in direct sponsorship with our organization.” High school Caroline would have been annoyed up the wazoo. “Just say you support abortion access! It’s not that hard!” I definitely would’ve said. While college Caroline wasn’t any less annoyed, she was more understanding. She knew the club was just trying to protect itself and was paying us a service by giving Stilwell and me a platform to discuss and answer questions on our pro-reproductive rights stances.

My college experience has encouraged me to think critically. For all the complaints that young people leave college more liberal, they’re just being exposed to new ideas and interacting with their class material accordingly. They’re thinking critically about the world around them, and if people have issues with that, then I suggest they examine internally why they think critical thinking is a no-go.

I was fully ready to continue down the road of hairy-legged, braless feminist wonder, and it’s not like any of that ended when I enrolled in higher education. But now, I think a little more before I talk, I choose which fights to engage in and which not to and I think critically about the world and its institutional makeup.

Instead of relying fully on my own previously unbaked and baseless opinions, I read political theory class materials and recommendations, and journalistic books and novels from my personal inspiration writer library: Bad Feminist Essays by Roxane Gay, The Color Purple by Alice Walker, This American Ex-Wife by Lyz Lenz and many other writings and reflections from other authors.

I engage with their ideas just as much as my own, if not more. I value the privilege to be exposed to others’ ideas.

I listen in class. There are conservative students with whom I wholeheartedly disagree, but they provide great insights, too. When I disagree with someone, I calmly raise my hand to do the same. If we spar, I like to think the disagreement is beneficial to us both.

So, thanks Drake University, you taught me well. You didn’t turn me into a hairy-legged liberal. I already was one. But you did teach me to think before I speak — before I write — to listen courteously, without twitching my eye too much. And those aren’t skills I possessed before I stepped foot on campus.

The line for payment at the Sugarlands Visitor Center wove along the store, crisscrossing around the aisles of stuffed animals and stickers. I chose a black bear iron-on patch for my Duluth Pack, and a ‘junior ranger’ pin for my roommate, and once I reached the front, I laid out my carefully chosen items and asked the (tired) cashier, “So, where do all the proceeds go?”

Scanning my items, the cashier answered, “Everything goes to the park.”

I smiled and tried to make a joke. “So, you and your colleagues don’t skim anything off the top, right?”

The cashier looked at me, concerned/annoyed. “Um, no.”

“Excellent!” I paid for my items and let the line continue its unending descent.

It was a sight to behold. The mass of people purchasing souvenirs for friends and family far and wide, the multitude of cars filling visitor center parking lots, parents experiencing the mountain tops with their kids, and crowded icy hiking paths.

Even though brochures for Cades Cove were $1.25, when before January 21, 2025, I imagine they were free, people were showing up, working the glutes, and buying magnets for the fridge back home.

It’s a subtle method of protest. And it’s not nothing. It made me think that the ways in which we choose to spend our money might be the easiest form of protest we have.

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In 1975, women in Iceland clocked out of their jobs and homes, took to the streets, and didn’t clock back in to protest wage discrimination and the unpaid labor of mothering. Wanting to showcase just how important women’s contributions were to Iceland, the 90% of women who participated effectively disrupted the economic and social order so much that a year later, Iceland passed its equal pay law.

Along that vein, what better way to protest federal parks funding cuts than by actually visiting and spending money at national and state parks? They not only offer you respite from the constant stream of news detailing the Trump administration’s anti-environment antics, but supporting them helps them thrive when the Trump administration doesn’t want them to.

On this camping trip, my group and I brought our spending money to small businesses. We bought souvenirs that crowded our car space. Our payment for the campsites we stayed at, plus the firewood and kindling we bought while there, all contributed to national park support. And with the mass of people we ran into for the week we were there, and the mass of cars we fought for parking, I can sleep better knowing that the Great Smoky Mountains National Park can continue to operate with support from people who actively choose to support it.

Choosing where to spend your paycheck may not seem like a dramatic gesture, but it can be. Your paycheck is power. Throw it behind your local bookstore, even if there’s a better deal at Barnes and Noble. That’s how they get ya. Life is more than chasing the lowest deal.

I mean, don’t get ripped off, but don’t sell your soul to Walmart.

My camping trip, as fun as it was, wasn’t just a camping trip, just as that line at the Sugarlands Visitor Center wasn’t just a line for souvenirs. Both were an example of people quietly funding a public good. It was a group of camping college students (who did not bring enough warm clothes) and lines upon lines of souvenir seekers making sure that we can have the opportunity to hike mountains for years to come.

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Anne Brontë was known for crafting stories around social issues affecting women, and both of her novels, Agnes Grey and The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, explore feminist themes. When Anne Brontë died in 1849, her sister Charlotte (author of one of my favorite books, Jane Eyre) assumed publishing control of her works. (She also assumed control of Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights, but not everything is about you Wuthering Heights fans!) When Anne’s publisher requested a reprint of her two novels, Charlotte said ‘yes’ to Agnes Grey, but halted further production of The Tenant of Wildfell Hall. First of all, judgy much, Charlotte? Secondly, this move proved detrimental to Anne’s reputation as a writer, and she remains the least well-known of the Brontë sisters.

Youngest child, and youngest girl no less! I feel both the wrath and pain she probably felt from beyond the grave, and, as the youngest daughter myself, I entirely sympathize with her. I appreciate the combined works of both Emily and Charlotte Brontë, but I don’t feel as connected to them as I do Ms. Anne.

Overlooked by older siblings, written work not taken seriously, with an intense longing to make an impact beyond a sleepy English town. In Agnes Grey, a novel often thought to be semi-autobiographical, when Agnes’ sister, Mary, tells Agnes that she couldn’t possibly be able to make a living outside of their childhood home, Agnes replies, “You think, because I always do as you bid me, I have no judgment of my own: but only try me — that is all I ask — and you shall see what I can do.”

Aside from all those personal aspects, I’ve spent a lot of time making connections and finding similarities between my writing journey and hers. We both crafted worlds where fantastical stories lived and thrived, wrote poems of love lost, and engaged with feminist ideas in our work.

However, I’ve never written a beautifully strong, renowned feminist novel, and I most definitely didn’t write The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, the book Charlotte Brontë didn’t want you to know about.

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The story surrounds the appearance of the mysterious ‘widow' Helen and her young son, who move to the dilapidated Wildfell Hall. She spends her days painting watercolors for income and raising her son with her unconventional, hands-on parenting style. I’m only halfway through the book (no spoilers, please), but the story follows Helen’s diary entries about the unhappiness she experiences in her marriage and, inevitably, her decision to escape. It was an instant success, but less than a year after its publication, the wonderfully artful and thematic Anne Brontë died of consumption.

I’ve had many internal debates regarding what Charlotte’s problem could’ve possibly been with The Tenant of Wildfell Hall that she felt the need to shield the public from a book they already liked. Jane Eyre similarly expresses her moral autonomy when she tells Mr. Rochester that she will not live with him as a mistress. Helen also expresses her personal, political, and functional autonomy. What I’ve been able to come up with is that while Charlotte was not against women expressing autonomy, she was against women shaking up the social order with said autonomy. Leaving your husband was hardly an accepted social norm. Jane Eyre decided not to marry Mr. Rochester once she discovered that he was already married, but Helen willingly left her established marriage.

In a previous article, I said that women have never benefited from the institution of marriage, and when divorce was not only unacceptable but almost unfeasible for women, a story about a woman finding her way out of the confines of marriage, and not ending up destitute or committing suicide, was pretty revolutionary.

So, what better way to celebrate Women’s History Month than to channel the revolutionary writing energy of Anne Brontë and read the book that defied marriage and its ultimate immovable social framework, presenting a version of women empowerment?

Channel the energy of Helen from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall and remember that you do not need to remain in socially accepted situations that aren’t serving you. You are always your own solution out of them, whether or not its considered socially acceptable.

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It was unofficially announced by Drake University’s provost, Sue Mattison, at the panel, and was formally announced by Jerry Parker, Vice President & Dean of Students, later that evening. We held a moment of silence for Coady, and as we did, my mouth hung open for a solid minute, and I felt the cucumber slices move uncomfortably in my stomach.

Parker’s email read, “Declan enrolled at Drake University beginning in the fall of 2023. In 2023, following his graduation from Valley High School in West Des Moines, Iowa, Declan enlisted in the United States Army Reserve serving as an Information Technologies Specialist. Declan had a passion for being involved with the Boy Scouts of America having served as a Troop Leader and an Assistant Senior Patrol Leader helping other Scouts progress through the ranks. In high school, Declan was also a member of the Valley High School Men’s Swim team. While at Drake, Declan completed the Adams Leadership Institute’s Summer Series showcasing how important leadership and service beyond self was to him.”

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Posthumously, Coady has been promoted to sergeant. He was only 20. He had a future.

I can’t say that I ever knew Coady. I haven’t recognized his face from the picture of Coady dressed in his military uniform that’s been circulating. It’s possible I passed him somewhere on campus once or twice. And it’s possible that I didn’t. Really, the last thing I ever expected when I opened my phone on Feb. 28 to news of airstrikes on Iran was that this ‘war’ in question would have a direct impact on my university, and the people and community around it.

There’s not much else to say, except I’m thinking of him and his family. I’m taking a class on international law right now, and instead of working on the project that’s due on Monday. I’m sitting in my apartment writing this, trying to make a cruel world make sense.

My professor, Dr. Rachel Paine Caufield, whom I’ve featured before, told us today, “There’s no honor in sharing [explicit] social media posts. Go touch grass.” She also urged us to conduct deep thinking, not reactionary thinking. It’s good advice. It’s digestible advice, in the weird time and space that the Drake community is currently swaying in.

Are the U.S. and Israeli military strikes on Iran legal under international law? Dr. Debra DeLaet, professor of political science at Drake University, says the short answer is no. I encourage everyone reading this to check out her blog post under Iowa’s division of the United Nations Association, answering that question with the pristine international relations expertise that she is known for in the political science department.

But for now, I’m going to allow myself to be a member of the Drake community, follow Paine Caufield’s advice, and not post anything politically explicit at this time. What I will do is sit, absorb, and process Coady’s death with my community as best I can.

My thoughts are with Declan Coady, his family and friends, and everyone else impacted by the deaths of these American soldiers.

And on this very summery day in mid-April, I had my windows down to catch the breeze, and while I was waiting at the stop sign outside the theater building, trying to take a left turn at the busy intersection, two men were crossing the street in front of me, making crude gestures and sexual remarks.

I turned my music up louder so I couldn’t hear them, but they went on catcalling me, inching closer and closer, until finally I took a right turn to escape the situation.

As I drove down the street in the direction I didn’t want to go, and my white knuckles leaked imaginary blood as I clutched the wheel, I only thought of one thing: hitting those losers with my car.

I thought of their surprised, horror-induced faces when I hypothetically hit the gas pedal and sped towards them. I thought of their bodies hitting my windshield, dripping down onto the asphalt, and me getting out of my vehicle and hitting them repeatedly with the baseball bat I didn’t have in my backseat, chastising them for being so incredibly rude to me.

Just so we’re all clear, I didn’t do any of that. As much as I wanted to, I do/did not want to hurt another human being, and I also didn’t want to commit any crimes. But I think about that moment often. How two men believed they carried the world in the palm of their hand, so they thought it was acceptable to verbally abuse a high school student, a minor.

I wrote about the experience once before, for the student-led newspaper at Drake University, The Times-Delphic. “Even though I could have run these men over, they still made their obscene comments and sexual remarks like they knew I wouldn’t hurt them. Even from the vantage point of a vehicle, I was still a target. Whether I’m behind the wheel or on the sidewalk next to one, I [am] still thought of as inferior.”

There are many instances of women getting revenge via their vehicles. The Kathy Bates scene from Fried Green Tomatoes comes to mind, with Bates’ character repeatedly hitting the car that stole her parking space, all while shouting, “Towanda!” And that car fight from Malcolm in the Middle with Lois and a woman in the grocery store parking lot, sparring demolition derby style.

But those instances were comical, meant to entertain.

A car is often a vehicle (pun intended) for women to take their autonomy into their own hands. To take advantage of retribution. To not turn the other cheek. And there are so many instances of cars being the literal and figurative vehicle (pun intended again) for women to release their anger, to liberate themselves from smothered, unladylike feelings and disadvantageous situations, usually at the result of men.

And there are countless examples of that in pop culture.

Think Thelma & Louise deliberately driving their car off a cliff, liberating themselves from a world of violent men where they aren’t protected. Cassie takes a hammer and destroy’s a mans windshield after he catcalls her in Promising Young Woman. Bernadine sets her husband’s car on fire after he cheats on her in Waiting to Exhale. In Maid, Alex finally runs from her boyfriends’s house and calls her boss from a gas station to drive her to the women’s shelter. Carrie Underwood famously sings about destroying her ex’s car in ‘Before He Cheats,’ and MARINA, in her music video ‘Venus Fly Trap,’ blows up the Hollywood sign from the safety of a black convertible.

Those are all fictional moments when women’s anger and fed-upness reaches its highest crescendo. But there are examples of this feeling and the power of cars that aren’t dramatized for the screen.

My mother’s 18-year-old female student met a 36-year-old man her first year of college, who convinced her to move in with him. He then immediately took her car keys, hid them, and said he would drive her to and from class. She, thankfully, was able to leave that relationship.

A car is mobility. A car is the chance to make your own decisions. Cars, whether taking a sledgehammer to them or using them as a method of your own escape, are, for women, an act of physical and emotional liberation.

While I didn’t run those catcalling men over that day outside my high school’s campus, my car allowed me to escape and to leave those men in the dust. I worry what would’ve happened had I decided to walk that day, had I been in that same place at the same time, without my crummy 2004 Taurus.

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I wasn’t really the ideal candidate for forest living, or so I thought at the time. I wasn’t a total novice to the world of camping. However, all things considered, living in the woods? I never thought I’d be able to handle it. But I was willing to do just about anything to not have to spend another summer working retail.

So, barely a week after my sophomore year ended, my sister drove me up along Minnesota’s North Shore to the beautiful Martha’s Vineyard-type escape in Grand Marais, and so the adventure began at Wilderness Canoe Base.

That summer was not without its challenges. Leeches, bug spray, and sore muscles from paddling became a part of my normal routine. Feeling immensely out of place among the granola addicts (my fellow coworkers), learning (and failing) to tie a bowline knot, and many frustrating, tearful mornings trying to master a J-stroke had me wondering if I would ever find a place where I belonged. A place where I could contribute without taking up space. And in the face of these blows, and old resurfaced fears of insecurity and doubt came something more meaningful than a few simple paychecks and time away from painful dynamics: solace.

For those months I spent living on Fishhook Island in the heart of the Boundary Waters, an external and internal acceptance washed through old wounds; a less painful version of hand sanitizer dripping into your hangnails. I was allowed, even encouraged, to make mistakes and grow. I felt, for the first time in a long time, like I could breathe, and it wasn’t just because of all that fresh air and open space. Years of emotional displacement led me to hang half of my heart in the coat racks leading into the dining room and the other half spread across the campgrounds, surrounding lakes, and the other summer worker bees whom I was proud to call my friends.

I left that summer wishing it had never ended. I left that summer a healed person. Still cracked around the edges, but the healing salve of breakfast pudding, funny canoe names, and community gleamed shiny on my fresh water-speckled skin.

So, imagine my horror when the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives voted last week to allow Twin Metals, a Chilean-owned mining company, to begin mining operations and detrimentally risk the health and well-being of a place that has given me so much peace.

Because that’s the priority right now. Not getting ICE out of Minnesota.

In an action directly taken in the face of the thousands of people who oppose overturning protections for this public land, H.J. Res. 140 now goes to the U.S. Senate. This bill, sponsored by U.S. Rep. Pete Stauber, would repeal Public Land Order 7917, which protects 225,504 acres of National Forest System lands in Minnesota from mineral and geothermal leasing.

Minnesotans’ attention spans are understandably focused elsewhere, and Stauber knows that. Why else would he have introduced this bill now?

While Minnesotans are reeling from the chaotic and deliberately callous ICE presence in their state, while our country is distracted trying to come to terms with our new federally mandated normal, the BWCAW is being auctioned off to private hands. And not that this decision won’t result in monetary gains, but that so-called incentive will never reach the pockets of Minnesota residents, or any American citizens for that matter. Firstly, mining in the Boundary Waters will only make Chilean billionaires prosperous. Secondly, wilderness tourism will bring more jobs to Minnesota than mining ever could.

Only a select few will benefit from the passage of this bill. The nonprofit Friends of the Boundary Waters says, “Science, public opinion, process — all tossed aside for a brazen legal maneuver that will mostly enrich Chilean billionaires at the expense of America's public lands.” And, I’m sure, enrich a couple of our legislators (*cough* Stauber *cough*) in the process, too.

The bill has not been passed yet. Keyword yet. But the Senate votes tomorrow, Feb. 10. So, call your senators now. Email them if you’d rather not talk on the phone. Post online. Talk to Minnesota Sens. Amy Klobuchar and Tina Smith to pull whatever strings they can in the Senate. Leave a message to urge Twin Metals, and for that matter, ICE, out of Minnesota.

The Boundary Waters was more than a summer escape for me. It proved that there was room for me, even when I was sure I didn’t belong. My summer working there is stuck in my soul, and serves as a reminder that even in events of turmoil and fear, there is still goodness. There is still God. There is still something bigger than myself. And the blood-thirsty mosquitoes will always be ravaged by dragonflies, and the sun will always find its way back after a death-like hull.

My experience within the BWCAW is barely a fraction of the reverence, beauty, and uniqueness that its vast waters hold. It means more than copper. It means more to the people who love it, have loved it, and return to it to feel its crystal presence every year.

In a guest opinion article for The Minnesota Star Tribune, Tony Jones says, “You’ve probably had friends from around the country ask what they can do to help us in Minnesota. Tell them to call their senators and ask them to vote against Stauber’s bill. Because when this is over, when ICE is gone, it’ll be nice to climb into a canoe and paddle the unspoiled waters of our beloved sanctuary, the BWCA.”

Well said, Jones. Now, everyone, follow his lead, and pick up your phone.

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This may come as a shock to acquaintances or professors, when I willingly share my opinion on digital platforms, and I love to ask questions and clarifications in class and in office hours, but I sometimes have a hard time sticking up for myself. I am a woman, a people pleaser, and a product of Midwest niceness, just as I am someone who pushes against it by operating a Substack dedicated to my opinions.

And as it turns out, not having to argue the price of a bottle of water is something that I didn’t know I’d been taking for granted. There are many aspects of the U.S. that I’m happy to critique, but the inability to haggle the price for a piece of pottery has never been one of them. I'm very happy doing my online shopping, waiting for a sale to force the price down on a pair of pants or, when available, using a coupon. Haggling is something I wasn’t comfortable with.

Having recently returned from a J-Term experience in Ghana, I discovered that haggling is a core tenet of Ghana’s culture and commercial landscape. It’s an accepted fact that you should never pay the first price a merchant offers you. The people pleaser inside me (and probably all Midwesterners) was not initially interested in getting the best deal possible for a beautifully handcrafted piece of pottery.

And no one was forcing me to haggle. If I wanted to pay the first price I was offered, I could just do that. But I also didn’t want to back down like that. I was a participant on this trip to immerse myself in Ghanaian culture, just as much as I was a tourist coming to see the sights. And I didn’t want to just accept that I was a stupid, defenseless tourist who would pay the sticker price. I wanted to show that not only was I aware that the merchants around the country were trying to get me to pay top dollar, but that I wouldn’t allow it to happen. Having recently been emotionally ripped off, I was about to do whatever I could to make sure I wasn’t financially ripped off.

So, when I saw these truly beautiful paintings some merchants were selling at the Kwame Nkrumah Memorial Park, I knew that I wanted one. As I walked over to take a closer look, my professor yelled after me something along the lines of, “Be careful! Say ‘no’ a lot!” She was totally right. I was walking into what would be my first experience in the lion’s shopping den.

The men running the stand were very pleasant, smiling while they showed me the artwork hanging around, I’m sure, thinking that they’d struck gold. An Oburoni (the Ghanaian term for white westerner) who didn’t know how to haggle. When I found a painting I liked, I took it out of the stack and knew that a battle was about to go down. I asked the price and the merchant said 165 cedi (the Ghanaian currency). I paused for a bit because with as much thought as I’d put into this moment, I hadn’t thought about what I’d actually say. I heard myself blurt out, “I’ll give you 100 cedi.” And the merchant running the show looked really surprised. He clearly didn’t expect that I would know how to negotiate the price. He shot back with, “120 cedi?” And I shot my hand into my purse to grab the money before he had time to go higher.

And with that, I walked off with my painting.

Sure, I probably could’ve gone lower still, but I was happy to get a lower price at all. And I got one because of me. Because I advocated for myself, I had more money to spend elsewhere in my wallet. And as the trip progressed, so did my haggling skills.

Below is a little poem I wrote to remember the haggling experience. The prices aren’t exactly to scale, but allowances need to be made for poetry.

Now, I realize I can’t directly haggle for goods in the Midwest, or anywhere in the U.S. for that matter. When I run to Aldi, I can only buy the goods that I directly have the funds for. But the spirit of haggling I shall henceforth bring to my relationships with work, school, and people.

You want me to wash the dishes? No, I’ll do mine and leave yours. You want to talk on the phone right now? No, I’m busy, I’ll call you tomorrow. I want a firm commitment, and you don’t even though you said you would? I’m walking away.

When the seller refuses to negotiate, I can always walk away.

The Midwest nice mentality may have raised me, but it doesn’t need to own me. I choose to carry the spirit of haggling that Ghana taught me into my daily life in the Midwest, and beyond.

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This is the third time this year that Minnesota — specifically the Twin Cities area — has caught national attention. The targeted assassination of Minnesota lawmaker Melissa Hortman and her husband at their home in June, the school shooting at Annunciation last August, and now ICE’s degrading impact on the city under claims of ‘removing fraud.’ (Technically, the bulk of the ICE events have taken place in January, but I’m still counting it as a contributor to Minnesota’s news events from 2025 because ICE’s presence was ignited in December.)

From 2024, when I was so incredibly happy as a Minnesotan that my governor was chosen as the Democratic presidential candidate’s running mate, to now, the awful start that 2026 will now be known for.

I’m not alone in my disapproval of ICE’s actions, its presence, and Trump-lovin’ Republicans in their support for a siege on peace in the Twin Cities; in fact, I don’t think I’m alone in my anger either. But above all, I don’t think I’m alone in my exhaustion. According to an editorial from Rochelle Olsen at The Minnesota Star Tribune, Gov. Tim Walz said on Thursday, “Just give us a pause. Let us breathe. We’re exhausted as Minnesotans. We’re exhausted as Americans.”

Just when you think Minnesota’s luck couldn’t get worse, ICE shows up, swarming the streets. Just when you think your job applications, your InstagramReels algorithm, or your everyday living anxiety can’t get any worse, your president orders an ICE raid for no reason other than to put Minnesotans and Walz in their place.

President Donald Trump’s targeting of Minnesota doesn’t surprise me. What surprises me is the scale of insults and atrocities that have occurred as a result of the targeting. A woman is dead, a man shot, countless people — including U.S. citizens — handcuffed and dragged into unmarked cars with masked ICE agents, and reports of insulting encounters with ICE agents when they’re not busy handcuffing innocent people. I can’t imagine their fear. And I can’t imagine others’ exhaustion if I’m tired from just reading the daily news updates in my email inbox.

How can Americans be expected to deal with school work, work work, and their families and friends when a government that’s supposed to support them and keep them safe so callously embarks on a mission to cause them harm? How are we supposed to juggle it? The answer? We’re not.

ICE’s deployment in Minnesota is a direct attempt to further weaken Americans’ resolve, mental and physical health, to make us too tired to accomplish daily tasks and plans for the future. It’s punishment for being a blue state. It’s punishment for being the state that houses Walz.

Are Minnesotans’ lives worth less because they live in a blue state? Are their lives worth less depending on their 2024 voting record?

This should be seen as an assault against all Americans. If you don’t see it that way, if you openly voice your support for ICE’s antics and crash a vigil for a woman killed by an ICE agent, you need to reevaluate your f*****g life.

There’s not much else to say when your federal government is exercising an obscene amount of untoward power against its citizens, residents of one of its states. But please be safe, keep reading, keep writing, stay calm, and wish for a quick road to the end of this mania, caused as a direct result of our president’s ongoing and never-ending derangement.

Oh, and if you are interested in keeping your spirits up, watch videos of ICE slipping, falling, and driving in the Minnesota ice and snow. “ICE slips on ice” might just be the pick-me-up that you need.

However, despite the song’s obvious amazingness, it’s still representative of a very obvious patriarchal standard: marriage.

Even Raye’s amazingly sung bridge doesn’t distract from the fact that men have always benefited from marriage immensely more than women ever have: legally, emotionally, physically, career-wise, and, yes, even in the day-to-day labor of regular living. Who’s responsible for the majority of childcare? Who’s responsible for any/all household labor? Who’s responsible for caring for and emotionally maintaining your marriage. Ladies, I’ll give you a hint: It’s not your prospective husband.

In her book, This American Ex-Wife, Lyz Lenz says, “Marriage is an institution built on the fundamental inequality of women. As much as we’d like to think everything has changed, you only have to attend a modern wedding in a church and see a couple exchange rings, a symbol of bondage, and know that no matter how transformed the institution is, it’s still inherently unequal. A wedding is still woman’s work—setting the stage for a partnership where she will still cook, clean work, raise kids, and feel like she has to look good doing it. And just because a couple doesn’t quote scripture doesn’t mean the model still doesn’t hold its power,” (53).

Lenz also notes, “Politicians and columnists and policymakers all tell us that everything from childcare, income inequality, and healthcare to poverty, delinquency, and unwanted pregnancy can be solved with marriage. … Heterosexual marriage is a metonymy for social order,” (48). So, of course, when everyone and everything is telling you that marriage is the answer to your woes, it’s hard not to feel like you’ve won when you’ve got a rock the size of Neptune on your hand.

Comedian Taylor Tomlinson noted during one of her comedy sketches that though her engagement with a previous partner didn’t work out, “… something happens when you slip that ring on your finger. Something in your stupid lady, lizard brain goes, ‘level completed.’” Something about showing off a diamond ring on your finger feels pretty good, right? There’s relief in achieving some social standard.

However, even diamonds fade.

Marriage undermines women so consistently that many people choose to opt-out all together. 12th grade girls are less likely to say they want to get married someday, and women have always been less likely to remarry after their first marriage ends in divorce or their spouse dies, seemingly eager not to repeat the false image.

From the days of dowries to men today statistically completing less housework than their wives, marriage has always been a socially acceptable way to bond women to social order. Whether or not you’re choosing to get married for love, you’re still signing an inequitable business contract. In her book, Lenz quotes a study on marriage from Yale University. “‘About the 75 percent of societies known to anthropology involve at least one explicit and substantial transaction related to marriage, and most societies have more than one transaction.’ Your marriage is no exception: what do you think a ring is?” (51).

So, while Raye’s song is incredibly catchy, and diamonds are most certainly a girl’s best friend, the very act of waving around the symbol of your impending marriage and talking endlessly about it to your social circle, isn’t just joy and excitement. With your diamond ring comes (maybe) love and happiness, social approval, and a down payment for your upcoming sacrifice: the unpaid labor, the babying, the mothering, the family and relationship prop, and keeping up a slanted image.

But hey, at least there will be cake.

So, without further ado, here are 12 things I learned this year — one for every month.

1. When you’re so mad all you can do is cry, just cry.

   1. It releases serotonin *wink wink*

2. Only hold grudges for a little bit.

   1. I have often quoted Reese Witherspoon’s line in Big Little Lies with the utmost relatability: “I love my grudges, I tend to them like little pets.” But, I’m beginning to realize that this isn’t a realistic way to operate. Eat some chocolate and move on. People make mistakes, as do you, so don’t hold it over their head forever — but a little while is okay.

3. There is joy all around you.

   1. I oftentimes open my phone in the morning only to see some terrible news piece greeting me. This is to be expected and it’s nice to have something to count on (thank you news outlets for keeping us informed). But this can be draining for even the most cynical of individuals (me). But in the mornings after I’ve listened to NPR I see parents walking their smiling kids to school outside my window. I see my cat stretching on the carpet soaking up the sun. I see friends greeting each other outside Drake Diner and bidding each other goodbye after a lunch well-served. In the midst of turmoil and turbulence, joy is scattered everywhere.

4. It’s just as special for a friend to buy you flowers as it is for a lover.

   1. When a friend buys you flowers from the local flower store, and a German-looking pastry from the bakery nearby all for your birthday, it means she listens. And that’s special in and of itself.

5. It’s just as important to visit National Parks as it is to visit NYC.

   1. One day you will go visit Big Bend National Park, and then one week later you’ll go to New York City with your fellow journalism fellows, and you will be struck at the mass of people in relation to the empty mountain tops you saw in rural Texas. It’s important to walk through the Met Gala halls, take tequila shots at Stonewall, and eat vegan ice cream just as it is to hike eight miles uphill, get sunburned, and share undercooked rice over a camp stove while singing show tunes.

6. Mistakes make for great stories.

   1. One day you will accidentally kind of commit a low-level crime while swimming in the Rio Grande with a bunch of other Drake University students. It is important that you laugh this off, buy a purse from a vendor on the river, and tell your friends all about it when you get back home. Share a laugh.

7. Listen to your gut. It’s right more often than it’s not.

   1. Your body will know that something is up wayyy before your brain will. If something/someone is off, you’ll get a weird feeling in your stomach that’s hard to shake. Yes, it usually happens at inconvenient times, but it’s important to sit with the discomfort, identify the feelings, and map out the next steps.

8. Even your worst fears aren’t the end of the world.

   1. As a person with deep seated anxiety, and a fear of driving long distances by myself, car trouble is something I constantly worry about, even when I am not, in fact, driving. But even if you do experience car trouble, everything will be okay. When your tire blows on a highway on the border of Wisconsin, you will call a tow truck, and make it out alive.

9. Take calculated risks

   1. You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take, or something else similarly inspiring. There’s very little chance that you’ll regret applying for an internship at the Minnesota Star Tribune. Even though I thought I had zero chance, my application was chosen out of the LinkedIn pile. Taking a chance led me somewhere good, and that’s not to say every job application will end up that way, but, hey, there’s always a chance.

10. Say yes! (to the dress and to new opportunities).

    1. Yes, buy that pretty white slip on Depop, and yes, listen to your gut, but also listen to others input as well. When your professor thinks you should try making content on a new media platform, try it out! You might even find that you enjoy it more than you thought you would. Saying yes to new opportunities can be challenging, but they’re challenging you for a reason: To assist in your professional and spiritual growth.

11. Miracles happen everyday, especially in journalism.

    1. Is the job market getting you down? Are you sad because you’re lacking in funds to continue buying products from Primarily Pure? (Highly recommend by the way.) Does it seem like everyone and their mother is a communications major, so how can you possibly set yourself apart from the crowd? You will. Don’t sweat it. Miracles are more common than you think. Stay positive and things will happen.

12. Really, you’re a writer. And a darn good one at that.

    1. Everyone is good at something, and you’ve found your something. Use it, cater it, grow it, honor it, don’t ignore it or feel sorry for yourself because you’re not a mathematician. Someone kind once said that you build things with words, so continue doing so. Lord knows we need more journalism shaped developments.

There you have it! Take what you will and leave what you don’t. All in all, 2025 had been a very difficult, joyous, embarrassing, and worthwhile year. I thank it for everything, but now that I’ve reflected, I’m desperately excited to see what’s store for 2026.

With the click of my heels and a sigh of relief, my fall semester is finally over. It wasn’t bad or anything, but I’ve been counting down the days until its conclusion for a long while now. The busyness has ceded and I slept for 12 hours the other day.

My capstone project, Bad Midwest Feminist, aired it final episode, turning over my mic to the audio editor, who has no doubt been wanting that thing back. I feel as though I should clear the air because while I developed the much loved title, the actual project itself was not fully my idea.

When my capstone professor called me into her office one fine September Wednesday I was sure she was going to tell me that she hated my story ideas that I’d pitched to her the day before. My original ideas — a profile on a board member of Iowa Abortion Access Fund and analysis on birth centers in Iowa — she explained to me as I held my breath, were good ideas. Nothing wrong with them, but nothing nationally renowned either.

“Here’s what I thought of when you told me those ideas,” she said. “Feminism.”

Now, of course, feminism is a very broad topic that can encompass a whole multitude of things, and I have been trained these last 3 years in my journalism career to centralize, centralize, and then centralize your topics again. If I had a nickel for every time I pitched a story idea about a broad topic (say the Boundary Waters for instance) and (insert your Drake School of Journalism and Mass Communications professor here) told me to pick a focus within the broader topic and hone in on that, I’d probably be better off financially than I am now.

How in the hell could my professor want me to disregard everything I’ve learned about journalism storytelling and devote my capstone project — my bachelor’s thesis — to a broader than broad ideological perspective? Pictures may speak a 1,000 words, but had my professor taken one of me during that 20 minutes in her office, you’d only have seen me baffled.

Think on it, she told me. Alright, alright, alright. So, I did, and pretty soon, my internal wheels started to loosen. I checked out Roxane Gay’s book of essays, Bad Feminist, from the library, and something in the introduction caught my eye.

And I thought that if there was any one thing that wrapped up the stereotypical ideas and notions of feminism in the Midwest, this was it. And suddenly, I was making plans. Suddenly Bad Midwest Feminist started to take flight.

If you open up a browser of your choice and type ‘feminism in the Midwest,’ you won’t find a succinct answer or description. You’ll find stories, specific women-centered stories that occurred in a Midwest location, but nothing absolute, nothing that everyone agrees on. For that matter, if you simply look up ‘feminism’ you’ll find a wide variety of information, too. People claiming that there is such a thing as ‘conservative feminism,’ that abortion isn’t or shouldn’t be a feminist ideal, and that real feminism can’t possibly exist in a place where folks vote Republican.

Of course, the dictionary definition of feminism states that feminism is, “the advocacy of women’s rights on the basis and equality of the sexes,” so that much we can agree and accept on, but I became fascinated in my attempt to uncover what feminism really meant in the Midwest and what its dwellers really thought of it.

Most Americans cite that they believe in and support gender equality even if they don’t outright identify as feminists, but there’s a lack of a Midwest focus; a focus on an area that often gets written off as being too cold, too rural, too red, and where nothing goes on.

As a Midwest resident, born and raised, I find this stereotype insulting and lacking (as most stereotypes usually are), because I’ve met countless people within Midwest confines who are supporters of and advocate of women. However, when I got to thinking about it, I wondered whether these folks actually identified as feminists, and why the hell, if they didn’t, didn’t they?

My grandmother was a nurse for 40 years and never desired to be a housewife, but she also believes that contraception is a sin.

My mother was a PhD candidate, but decided to give it up after she had her first child.

My neighbor growing up supports women, but, in her own words, “…doesn’t like abortion.”

The Midwest, its own region, needs its own definition of feminism, and over the course of six interviews with a state representative, an employee at Chicago Abortion Fund, a professor, a nun, a construction worker, and a rural councilwoman, I came up with one.

Insert and add to this definition as you will, and listen to the perspectives from my guests to help you come up with your own.

I recently made a comment on an Instagram reel I saw as I did my nightly scroll. It was a repost of a popular Saturday Night Live Skit that came out a few years back. I actually remember watching it with my dad when it first came out. You can watch the full thing here, but essentially it’s a song poking fun at the fact the matriarch of the family is always the one doing the majority of the holiday labor: cookie baking, family hosting, cooking breakfast, and, yes, purchasing gifts for their whole family, and oftentimes only receiving one joint gift from their husband and kids (a robe) if anything at all.

In my comment I said, “This song is amusing and all, but it’s making light of a very real pain that so many wives and mothers I’m sure can relate to. The feeling of not being being a priority, but making everyone else one, not just during the holidays, but daily, too.”

Someone rightly pointed out in a reply to my original comment that the SNL clip includes a voiceover and a call to action at the end of the skit song that says, “Your mom does everything for your family. This year, get her more than one present. Moms like stuff, too.” Another person said SNL was using their platform to satirize a very obvious problematic feature of the holiday season. Yet another person asked if I even knew what comedy was.

Yes, the skit song is funny, and, yes, comedy most of the time is humorously making light of serious and mundane topics that the vast majority of people can relate to. However, this SNL skit song, and other jokes like it, make me sad.

It makes me sad that there are wives and mothers on Christmas Day hoping to receive something other than a basic mom gift, sometimes receiving nothing at all, and being disappointed. That the people she spends the most time with, who would know her well enough to gift her with something other than one singular robe, would take notice of the fact that she and not Santa is the one spending long hours walking the aisles of Target and TJMax, and waking up early to cook breakfast after wrapping presents the night before.

The skit song is funny, and it’s pointing out something that should be perceived as sad, something that should be changed.

A user on Reddit discussed how her boyfriend simply wouldn’t have thought to do any of the holiday prep that she did for the both of them and recounted how, “Now that I’m grown and live in my own apartment with my boyfriend I realize that pretty much all of the specialness and magic of Christmas was actually just all the work my mom did to make it special.”

What’s the husband/father doing during all this unpaid Christmas labor you may ask? Enjoying Christmas just as his kids are.

I love my father very much, but I’m wracking my brain for a memory of a Christmas present for me or my siblings that said ‘From Mom & Dad’ where my father was not as equally or more surprised as I was while I dug into the wrapping paper. And in the years that he has given my mother a present, it was more often than not picked out by me or my sister.

In her book, This American Ex-Wife, Lyz Lenz makes light of women — wives and mothers — and their unpaid contributions to keeping their home running. Household chores and prepping for the holidays are still seen as work to be completed at the hands of the head woman in your home. And asking for help usually goes in one ear and out the other of their male partners.

“It’s worth pointing out that while studies show that women do more housework than their male partners, this work goes largely unobserved by men, half of whom statistically perceive themselves as doing equal work, while only 3 percent of women agree. Add in the fact that husbands add an additional seven hours of labor to a home — labor done by their wives — and it’s a bleak picture of domestic partnership,” (127).

And these discrepancies in home and family upkeep come out full throttle during the holiday season.

A wonderfully written article from The Guardian says, “On top of everything else working women already do on any given day, now add shopping for, buying and wrapping presents (and sending them on time); addressing cards (and sending them on time); planning meals, attending parties, stuffing stockings, decorating the tree … and on and on it goes. All of this time-consuming, behind-the-scenes activity can make the [holiday] season especially fraught, particularly for women who buy into the culturally popular (but maddening) messaging that asserts: this is a me’ job. I’m a better multi-tasker, so I’ll just do it. If I don’t do it, no one will,” (Eve Rodsky).

However, women don’t want to sit up with their feet up while their husband and kids cook Christmas breakfast. They just want some initiative to be taken. They want their kids and husband to all participate in the gift exchange and flip the morning pancakes. They want a thoughtfully planned gift that their family didn’t rush out to buy the night before.

So, now that we're in the midst of the holiday season, everyone, just do something. Husbands, take your children grocery shopping, and maybe, while you’re at it, pick out something for your wife/mom. Even better, do it all the time! Kids home from college, stop sleeping in and help prep a turkey or cookies without being asked. Adult children, offer to host the family holiday gathering at your apartment or newly purchased house.

Put in some effort, but also give your mother some damn credit for all the holidays of your youth, because I’m guessing any and all of your pleasant memories are on account of her. I’m off to call my mom right now.