SQUAD
I’ve been reading through the old issues of Rookie month-by-month and I was a little disappointed that I wasn’t enthusiastic about was Girl Gang. The previous two months had themes that still resonated with me as an adult, and although I enjoyed all of the music and movie references to girl gangs, I did not feel the desire to be part of one in any way as I viewed and read this issue.
This issue came out in November 2011, so obviously it predates Taylor Swift’s 2014-2015 SQUAD and #squadgoals, which is probably the most recent pop culture manifestation of a girl gang. Those years were the last time I felt the longing of wanting to be part of a group of girls who were friends. Perhaps this really IS a teen thing.
This was the first image that popped up when I Googled “taylor swift
squad”, which actually messed up the point I wanted to make about being in a
version of the squad that was less white and full of people that actually
looked like me, but then again, I am not (nor will I ever be) model-sized.
At the time, in 2014-2015, when the squad was at its peak, it
hurt extra hard because I was a super lonely 22-year-old that did not feel
anything like the Taylor in the song “22”. I had just graduated from college, I
had moved back home and had spent months jobless, looking for something, anything
to fill the countless hours I had to spare. I hadn’t made any real, substantial
friendships in college aside from my first roommate from the summer of freshman
year and my last pair of roommates from my senior year. I was surrounded by Facebook
and Instagram posts with lengthy captions about the “countless people I’ve met”
and “memories I’ve made these past four years”, memories that I didn’t
share with anyone. My high school friend group had splintered, all of us going
on our own ways even though we all still lived in the same 10-mile radius. My very best friend in the world was nearing
the end of her college journey upstate and had gone through some awful personal shit
that very understandably made us quite distant from each other at the time.
All I had was me and seeing Taylor’s squad everywhere just was a
constant reminder of what I didn’t have: a bunch of talented, photogenic, similarly
aged friends who could talk to each other, have parties together and make
everyone jealous by their sheer power of being together.
I only had myself
and I didn’t like myself that much, either.
To Taylor’s credit (and I’m really not trying to blame her
for my feelings because there’s so many legit “white feminist” things I could call
her out for if I felt like expending energy I don’t have), she later recognized
that she had the power to make people feel a certain way by showing off her
squad all the time in her ELLE article, “30 Things I Learned Before Turning 30”:
“Even as an adult, I still have recurring flashbacks of
sitting at lunch tables alone or hiding in a bathroom stall, or trying to make
a new friend and being laughed at. In my twenties I found myself surrounded by
girls who wanted to be my friend. So I shouted it from the rooftops, posted
pictures, and celebrated my newfound acceptance into a sisterhood, without
realizing that other people might still feel the way I did when I felt so
alone. It’s important to address our long-standing issues before we turn into
the living embodiment of them.”
Reading that quote is reassuring to me: frequently thinking about
days of middle school torture as one approaches 30 isn’t a thing that only I
do. It is also a thing that can also happen to multimillionaire pop stars, too.
As a frequent loner in middle school, I wanted
to be a part of the popular girl group or the cool girl group (which were two
different groups), but really, having a set of any type of friends was
ideal. It would be us against the world. We could go to each other’s houses, be
each other’s project partners in class, sit with each other and tell secrets at
lunch. I got my wish to be part of such a group in high school, but I always
knew in the back of my head, this wasn’t a forever thing. Once we graduated,
this would be it. We all had different dreams and desires. I knew to just
appreciate it while it lasted. That didn’t mean I had given up on the girl gang
idea. I wanted to be a part of another one in college. I wanted a group of girls who felt exactly the same as I did. I wanted
rules. I wanted an aesthetic. I wanted to belong.
As I saw my acquaintances form social groups and join teams or sororities, I became bitter. Must be nice,
I thought, as yet another girl I knew posted themselves doing the sorority squat. I wished I was part of a sorority. None of them wanted a flabby, depressed,
dorky-looking Chicana, not even the Latina ones. But then again, I don’t know, maybe they
would have accepted me, had my extreme social anxiety not clouded my
thought process at the time.
Later in the article, she states:
“Something about “we’re in our young twenties!” hurls
people together into groups that can feel like your chosen family. And maybe
they will be for the rest of your life. Or maybe they’ll just be your comrades
for an important phase, but not forever. It’s sad but sometimes when you grow,
you outgrow relationships. You may leave behind friendships along the way, but
you’ll always keep the memories.”
I think I’ve learned this too, now. Once I started my first
post-college job and took the time to apply what I learned about anxiety
through therapy to my real life, I met so many new people (of all genders) and
started to get the courage to hang out with my co-workers, which took away that
pang of wanting to experience things. It was like a second chance at college life:
going to bars and dancing, going bowling, eating out in large groups after
closing. I was amazed. I was doing things I had not been ready to do in
college. I was being young. The fact that retail is a mentally and physically draining
line of work pulled us young people together in a way that was
beautiful. It couldn’t last, of course. People leave because they move away or graduate school or they transfer to other shifts or stores as they get promoted or they get fired (!!). I left last
year for my first real big girl job. I miss the relationships I had there so
much, but I had to leave in order to start my career in the field I truly want
to be in.
Maybe that’s why the Girl Gang idea doesn’t resonate with me
anymore. Think about the best example of a girl gang in pop culture: the girl group.
I love, love, love pop girl groups. I love the classic groups, like The
Supremes, The Shangri-Las, The Ronettes, of course. I love the 1980s dance and freestyle
groups, like the Cover Girls, Expose, and Sweet Sensation. Spice Girls, Destiny’s
Child and TLC were essential to forming my musical tastes as a child growing up
in the late 1990s/early 2000s. Fifth Harmony gave me hope for a brief moment in
time, that the idea of a millennial girl group is not a ridiculous one (Little Mix has some bops too). My favorites were and continue to be the 2000s-era
British girl groups Sugababes and Girls Aloud. All of these groups have had some sort of
dramatic lineup change or breakup or hiatus and therefore, I’m over the idea
that any type of girl gang is lasting. Maybe I’m cynical (look at All Saints!)
but I don’t believe in girl gangs or squads anymore.
And really, does it have to be an all girl gang? Of
course, when you’re younger and know nothing, friendships being determined by sex
and by a similar gender expression are important. They are ways of navigating
the great unknown of puberty: body changes, hormones, liking other people and
all that fun stuff. But as you get older, you start realizing that having anyone
that gets you on multiple levels is the important thing.
And at 28 and in the middle of a pandemic, a squad is just not practical. What I want right now in terms of a social life, is the following:
- A romantic partner (particularly in these lonely, lonely winter months)
- The ability to see my two besties in person rather than FaceTime and spend more quality time with them (quality over actual quantity of friends, overall, is the key thing here)
- Being able to see other friends in person safely, which probably won’t be the case for a couple of months.
Girl gangs are clearly a young teenager thing, but my desire
to be part of one lasted into my 20s. I have learned in these last couple of years that there are other types of relationships
that are important to me, and these past couple of months has taught me to
really appreciate what I actually do have. I have a great family, and in many ways,
the #famsquad is the closest thing I’m going to get to having a set of people
who automatically just get me and give me that unconditional love that I need. Being
holed up with my mom, dad and brother for the past few months has been good to
me. I have most of what I need. May 2021 bring us all good health so I can tend to the other parts
of my neglected social life.
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