I'm all for snark. I spend much of my day conversing or emailing with a moderate to an inanely high level of snarkiness and it works for me. It's cute. I like to think that it illustrates my intelligence and lets potential suitors, friends, enemies and frenemies know that, yes, I'm witty and - I don't know - artfully judgmental. But what's the point: I snark, therefore I am?
When I saw the post on Gawker, I feared my jugs were up. They were to be featured in Jane, although the rest of me would remain anonymous. It was for their May boob story, an homage to chicks with tits - as in all of us - to show off the many beautiful shapes and sizes they come in. But when the list of participants was leaked to the media gossip site read the world over - as in all of New York City and possibly even LA - I thought about it and dropped out the next morning. Would they really try to cross-reference my name with my boobs?
It reminded me of the recurring nightmare I had when I first started developing breasts, around the time I felt like a freak for entering puberty at ten and slouched my way through school for fear that other kids might notice that, yeah, I had tits. The dream always started out with me in my favorite tee, one that I stole from my older sister: off the shoulder, turquoise, Esprit emblazoned across the chest in hot pink letters. Talking to Marcello, the cutest boy in school, it would slip off revealing a nip before, well, let's be honest here, it was hanging out like Tara Reid on coke. Both of them, in fact, in all their pubescent glory.
I couldn't go there, or couldn't I?
The thing is, if there's no sense of irony in America, we certainly dole out our lion's share of snark. Irony, and even sarcasm, is a cushion that keeps acerbic emotion from becoming uncomfortably genuine. Snarkiness is more like its snot-nosed cousin, the one who whines "nanny nanny boo boo" after irony pees its pants, or worse yet, a tee shirt malfunction in the fifth grade.
So I wrote back to the editors, tossing my boobs back in the ring. But by then, as Gawker was "sad and sorry to report," the shoot was canceled. And too bad. A girl out there feeling awkward, judged or maybe even happy about her breasts could have found something in common with the 53 pairs featured in Jane. Now she'll just have to Google her own guide to boobs. Here's a hint, limit your search terms: Tara Reid, nip slip.