In Defense of Gwyneth

Gwyneth Paltrow rocks. And I mean it. She is a gorgeous actor, a loving mother, and a rare soft voice of domesticity and patience in a world of fast moving sex pot celebrities. She is more introspective than you and I will ever be and is consistently thoughtful in the literal sense. (I do have a point, bear with me.)

While I've always thought her lovely (since, what, Emma? Hook?) I embarrassingly feel I've gotten to know her through my very favorite television show, Spain: On the Road Again. I love that she starred in a PBS special about Spanish cooking and culture and I love that she did it on her own audacity, without motive or angle. She did it because she simply loves Spain and relished the opportunity to travel it with Mario and Mark (at least I like to believe so) and let us watch.

Through Spain we learned that Ms. Coldplay speaks fluent Spanish. She watches Dora the Explorer with Apple and Moses and didn't cut her hair for a long while because of her dead father. She was humanized for us in a way that we rarely see beneficial (think: any other celebrity reality show you've EVER seen.) She was kind and interested and sincere. And, as I've said time and time again, I think our world could use a little more sincerity.

Yes, I've fallen with the rest of the dreamy twenty or thirty something waspy New York minded girls, into Gwyneth-envy and into Gwyneth-mode. We LIKE Goop (see it there, on the side bar?). Its fascinating that this classically trained actress decided one day to Martha Stewartize herself with a blog about anything but her films and her career. It's really quite unique and fairly odd when you stop to think about it. Academy award winning actress turned blogger? Really?

But, being impressionable girls, we like her fashion hints and her book recs and her fancy fresh recipes. We like that she wears soft, lovely clothes and then tells us where she buys them. We wear leggings too! And belts with white dresses! And big chunky gold bracelets! And jumpsuits! (just kidding about the jumpsuits, we don't go that far. We also don't buy into the Kabbalah or the weird juice diets. There is a line, after all.) But we like her approach, we like her livelihood. We do.

However... we aren't really the popular vote on this. Gwyneth gets a lot of slack here in the big city. She has critics galore who think she is sappy and insecure and nonsensical. It is really cool to 'not like Gwyneth' and to laugh at Goop. She is an easy target because she does take herself slightly too seriously. Sincerity isn't funny because it doesn't laugh at itself. Whoops.

In fact, I have a few friends who watch Spain simply to laugh at GP. If I posted more posts about how lame Goop is, I might be more popular. You all might think I'm funnier and more clever than Goop ever could be. And I get that, we can trace it back to high school. But I'm not gonna call it lame. I'm not going to roll my eyes at her attempt. I think this world NEEDS Gwynnie and her thoughts of lavender. We need a svelte blonde actress to help us roast chickens and assemble salads. We are the better for it!

I like her. I admire her. I reach to emulate her.

THAT SAID... this is hilarious. Watch this and then this.

You can't take it all too seriously, now can you?