Not a member? Sign up now
March 20, 2012
We’ve been together fourteen years now, and my passion has shifted from film to family. After years of making shit up, now I’m entranced by the cold hard reality of it all, the wonder of the mundane and average; the blurred line between life and diversion doesn’t require made-up people and situations anymore, and the investment in recording simple conversation is about time, not dimes. When we launched Plus One, I got to combine my love of podcasting and my love of talking to (and making fun of) Jen. Sometimes, we’re even joined by Harley, so I get to incorporate my entire family in my art— which is only fitting, as I’ve been my wife’s art project for over a decade now and my kid is gonna have to dwell on this earth for all time as Silent Bob’s daughter. Now I’m more interested in capturing their feelings, thoughts, ideas, and chatter. Motherfuck make- pretend characters in a ninety-minute stoner comedy; gimme real, interesting people with a point of view. And as far as I’m concerned, I’m surrounded by real, interesting people. Now it’s their time to take center stage— whether they’re public people or not.
There is nothing more beautiful in hockey than the assist: you give of yourself so that someone else can achieve their goal.
And I know all the podcasts in paradise will never make up for the life Jennifer gave up in order to join my traveling sideshow, even if she did promptly make it her own. It’s a debt that humbles me, and one I can never repay in full. We can accomplish very little by ourselves in this world, so we look to others to help us flesh out our whimsies. And every once in a while, a player so great comes along, they improve your game. I’ve achieved a lot of my goals, but usually because someone was there to feed me a pass I could one-time into twine.
One of my favorite aspects of the Gretzky mythos is his insane stats that dominate every other top athlete in their respective sports by massive margins. When he retired from the game, Gretzky had 894 regular-season goals — a jaw-dropper of a number. But the real story is told in his assists record: 1,963. Nearly two thousand times, the greatest hockey player who ever lived passed the puck to someone else to put in the net. That’s more than double the amount of times he took the shot himself. Instead of trying to grab the glory, he shared the wealth and elevated others. Gretzky was a team player with an astounding work ethic and an uncanny ability to see not only where the game was, but where the game was eventually going—and rather than keep that light under a bushel, he spread it around, using it to illuminate the talents of others. There is nothing more beautiful in hockey or in that excellent metaphor for hockey called life than the assist: you give of yourself so that someone else can achieve their goal.
Jen has been my Gretzky for years now. She regularly feeds me passes and elevates my game. I score and win because I’ve got an unselfish, talented teammate who feels it’s better to give than receive and believes it’s better to assist than score. And on top of that, she’s got one up on Gretzky: she fucks me. And being fucked by Jennifer Schwalbach is my idea of heaven, because she can fuck like a demon.
If life had anything like the Hockey Hall of Fame, Jen Schwalbach would be inducted into the Builder category. And under her plaque, it’d say, “Jennifer Schwalbach always seemed to know where the puck was going but used that talent to help others reach their goals instead — particularly an anonymous, untalented fat boy from New Jersey who fell in love with her hard." Without a doubt, she truly is the Great One.
Excerpted from TOUGH SH*T by Kevin Smith. Copyright (c) 2012 by Kevin Smith. Reprinted by arrangement with Gotham Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA), Inc.
Do you want to meet an independent filmmaker and inveterate hockey fan of your own? Try Nerve Dating.
Tags
Kevin Smith
Commentarium (37 Comments)
somehow, after reading this, I am still unclear on what it is about.
It's about this:
Ladies, be careful who you give up your livelihoods for. You could be really going places in your career, only to throw in the towel for the guy who wrote Jay and Silent Bob Ran Out of Ideas VI. And after 14 years, his ode to your sacrifice is a Nerve column comparing you to Wayne Gretsky.
And even this column originally appeared in print first. Kevin Smith recycles more than Al Gore.
This column is actually an excerpt from his book that came out yesterday, the day the column ran, so Kevin "recycled" material most people hadn't read yet. The gall of him!
I only clicked on this article to write "Kevin Smith, please go away! You're the film world's Nickelback."
" I donated a teaspoon full of what was hopefully the best parts of me, but Jen knew that in order to make a whole person, more time needed to be donated than the five minutes it might’ve taken me to muster the building blocks of Harley. Jen knew it was going to take sacrifice, and since my head was way up my own ass about movies, she knew in order to will this family into existence, she’d have to be the one to give things up, and maybe even give herself entirely."
I feel sorry for his wife. Lazy butt.
Dr. Oz says you lose an inch of penis length/girth with every extra 35lbs. This guy's packing nothing but mushroom cap. I feel sorry for his wife too.
Dr. Oz is an idiot.
This would have been something special if it were about half the length that it is.
Treadmill, hit it already
This is nothing more than a updated version of the Victorian ideal of the "angel in the house." She is his helpmate and inspiration, supported and loved by him in exchange for sacrificing her independence to his needs. Bah, humbug.
Motherhood and family, even with an insanely busy spouse, does not and should not constitute the whole identity of a talented woman. She could have married Kevin and continued her career. She could have raised Harley and continued to write. I have no qualms with women who choose to be housewives, but I hate to see it elevated to sainthood, and I hate seeing someone with a strong voice chose silence. Also, for women not married to the very rich, choosing to be the angel in the house often amounts to being left impoverished and unskilled at divorce or widowhood. It is a risky gamble to believe that your spouse will always 1) earn enough to support the household, 2) remain healthy enough to keep on being the only earner, and 3) choose to support you if your marriage fails.
If I wanted to read about how wonderful it is for a woman to "give up her life" to wifehood and motherhood, I'll read Caitlin Flanagan. But of course, I already read Patmore in college, so I don't need to read these modern recapitulations.
GET OVER IT. The whole point of feminism is that women get to CHOOSE what they want these days, and if this is the life she wanted (and since SHE made it happen, we have to assume she did) then that's fabulous, and it's great that he acknowledges and appreciates her sacrifices where so many partners would take it for granted after more than a decade together.
There is nothing to get over. I respect her right to make the choice she did. I stayed home with my babies when they were babies. However, I dislike that her choice is basically characterized by her husband as "giving up her life," and I want to disavow the idea that only by giving up all professional aspirations can a woman support her husband and raise her kid. Also, I know from (nonpersonal but close friend and family) experience that when Dad drops dead of a heart attack at 50 and Mom hasn't worked in 20 years, or Dad has a stroke and can't work as an electrician any more and Mom has to get relicensed and compete in a field full of nurses half her age, the whole family suffers terribly. There are real risks women take in giving up their professional lives.
My main point is, the romanticized rhetoric of the angel in the house has changed very little from Patmore in 1854 to Flanagan and Smith in 2012.
Totally agree with you, Perigee. You give up having your own income at some serious risk. IT has nothing to do with feminism, imo, it's just a fact as you never know what will happen, as you pointed out.
Yep, the point of feminism is that women can choose to do whatever they want with their lives. It doesn't mean we have to celebrate whatever they choose, the same way freedom of speech doesn't mean we have to celebrate everything everyone says. There are plenty of women whose life choices that women CAN make and I would not prevent them from making but I do not feel the need to idolize, and "sacrificing your career to follow your husband and raise his kid" is definitely one of them.
Wow, what a bunch of bitter pricks you all are.
Seriously. The guy's trying to say "thank you and I love you" to his wife. I'll never understand some people's need to belittle people they don't know anonymously over the internet. Fat jokes, penis length insults, and irrelevant politica agendas. Hey bitter pricks: make something, put your name on it, and then we'll see how much love you get from the unwashed masses.
I agree, I thought it was a touching essay about appreciating his spouse and giving her credit for the role she plays in his life and the life of his daughter.
And being Canadian, I approve of the #99 reference!
Welcome to the Internet's commenters. As usual, a smidgeon of insight wrapped up in a suffocating blanket of knee-jerk snark and anonymous cowardice. Lovely world we've created eh?
@David Blackstone: Yeah, FUCK commentary, criticism and thought! Automatic mindless praise should be the proper response to any kind of attempt at creation!
because penis length insults are thoughtful criticisms.
I thought it was very sweet. Thanks!
I once lent Chasing Amy to my aunt, she said it was smutty frat boy humor, I guess she didn't see that it was "...a film about male sexual insecurity and the nature of love."
Besides that, this was a very charming piece and it seems like Kevin and his wife are pretty content with their decisions despite the raging naysayers on here who revert to their feminist lit courses to dissect the guy's life.
What the heck do you think smutty frat boy humor is about if not male sexual insecurity?
I wish this annoying Emo Hack would go away.
At first I was touched. Then I considered the source and realized it sounds like dude is trying to work his way out of the doghouse.
My thought exactly. This could be called "How I Cheated On My Awesome Wife and Back-paddled Hard."
That would be a great title, except Kevin never cheated on Jen. So that isn't very relevant, now is it?
Not good enough. The lip service is not good enough. Totally agree on Perigee's comment about "The Angel in the House" (which is about a woman writer in the nineteenth century who is constantly praised by her husband for being so totally self-sacrificing that she totally sacrifices her writing). I know so many talented, intelligent, creative women...and I would consider it FAR more romantic if their men said not "Thank you for abandoning yourself entirely for my benefit" but rather "DON'T abandon yourself for my benefit because I love you too much to see you dwindle away to nothing. I'm a grown man, I don't need you to diaper my ass AND the baby's. Let's work this shit out like grownups." My $0.02.
Why do you even care? This isn't your relationship and it wasn't your choice. People make sacrifices and concessions in relationships. This is Kevin's thank you to Jen, for doing something for the greater good of them and their family, something he most likely never even dreamed of asking her to do, but something she did nonetheless. So let him say thank you and leave your two cents in the piggy bank.
This isn't actually the same person but I don't disagree with what the person above me wrote, so I'll defend 'em: If Kevin Smith wanted no one to comment on his relationship or the statement he is making about it, he had every opportunity to just not write about or publish it. This is not a private thank you note or love letter, it is a published article. Thus, it can and should be held to a bit more scrutiny. Asking "What does this say about gender relations today?" is a totally valid line of commentary and "Why do you care?" is a nonsense rebuttal. Why do you care enough to shut down thought, but not to entertain it?
Why would I entertain the question of what this article says about gender relations? This isn't an article about gender relations in a broad context, but rather, a completely specific situation. And I think that Kevin completely made his gratitude known for what Jen did for him and their family. If the roles had been reversed, would this be a problem? Honestly, women are damned at all if they want to give up something for marriage or family, because they are seen as playing into gender stereotypes of being the mother and housemaker. The point of modern feminist thought is that women have a choice to decide what is best for them. This is Kevin thanking her for the choice she made.
I thought this was really beautiful, sweet, and genuine...and I'm a total fucking cynic. What is WRONG with you people??
I think that both sides of the comment war have something - it's true, we can't lambast the lady for making her own choices. If she's any bit as awesome as the man claims, it will have been the right choice for her.
HOWEVER this does not mean that there could not have been some compromise, with each of them giving up some aspects of their career, if he had been more self-aware and family-centred when he got her pregnant. the article reads to me as mostly an apology for being a dick and forcing the woman to choose between housewife and mother or no relationship. Compromise should always be the first thing on the table IMHO - both for equality-type feminist reasons, and to preserve the skillset and employability of both partners in case of emergency.
As it is an apology, those criticising the arrangement have a point, which he is hoping to answer with the apology. It's a poor answer but better than nothing.
Spoken as a woman who is broody as fuck and loves making sandwiches.
As usual, some people lack perspective. You gonna go the grave thinking I coulda worked for MTV or USA today more, or thinking, I'm so glad I got be a Mom to that girl, and wife to that guy.
You wrapped it all up about as nicely as it could be said.
For anyone worried over her career being mothballed, and him dropping dead of a heart attack, thus leaving the family penniless....I am pretty sure after several hit films, he's got a couple bucks squared away by now "in case of emergency." He might even have fucking life insurance.
So now that you've done your PSA and reminded us how housewives are, in reality, endangering the safety of their households by fully raising their own children...and how righteous and valuable you are for pointing that out, do the following:
Ask yourself, aren't *you* betraying *your* family's earning capabilities by pissing away $80K on a degree in Women's Studies?