Hey, Kool Thing
Meet Rikki, one of the main characters in my upcoming book
Kim Gordon, indie goddess, was the bass guitarist of the alt rock band Sonic Youth. Since SY’s dissolution in 2011, she’s been performing with various others and now has her own band. I went to see her July 29th show at the Castro Theatre in SF.
The newly-renovated Castro has a terraced floor plan. I stood on the fourth terrace, near two dudes in their late 40s. When I heard them mocking the people seated in the balcony, which according to them was “for the geriatrics,” I rolled my eyes and focused on the stage.
From my vantage point, I had a perfect view of Kim Gordon. She was wearing a sparkly, backless, black minidress. A Radiohead-esque video played above her and her chaotically loud band. Sometimes Kim sang like a reanimated corpse. Other times, she shredded her guitar like a crazy fiend, got down on her knees and wailed out her words, played her guitar from the ground and then stood up and swung it around her body with abandon.
Kim Gordon is 73 years old. Positively “geriatric.”
The fact that the rude dudes were mocking some older people and then cheering wildly for another illustrates the idiocy of ageism. It’s one of the “isms” that Rikki, a character in my novel, is up against as she tries to keep her tech career alive at the age of forty-five. In my own career, I witnessed ageism, feared it, tried to dodge it, more or less unsuccessfully. That’s probably why I felt compelled to write about it in Badge In Here.
At the tech conference that kicks off the story, Rikki notices how much the industry has changed since her career began. Then, the new CEO of her startup tries to sideline her with accusations of being “old-school.” A former colleague admits that her job search was harder than she anticipated because “the bros don’t want to work with their moms.” When a recruiter suggests that Rikki erase the years from her profile and her pic, she considers transforming her appearance.
No one tells Rikki that she’s too old to achieve her goals. Rather, an insidious undercurrent of rejection amps up her fear that opportunity is slipping away. At a pivotal moment, that fear causes her to do something she’ll always regret.
Stay tuned for my next installment, when I talk about the inspiration behind the other characters in my book.