Gemma Hartley

This straggler struggle is weighing on me! That is, the struggle of having one straggler child left at home, and I’m wondering if it will ever get better.

...[M]en get a lot of praise for the “extra-credit work” they do in regards to domestic labor (the actual house cleaning and keeping work) and emotional labor (the invisible work that ensures the rest gets done) no matter what day of the year.

Starting a new year makes me look toward the future, looking at all the choices that lay ahead of me. But it also nudges me to examine my past in a very certain way. It's the time of year I always find myself thinking about the choices I didn’t make — about the life I didn't live.

I want to live my best life and, honestly, it's exhausting. Sometimes I wish I could just take a break and say I'm content with where I'm at.

There is a time to be prudent and fair to “many sides” of an issue, but dealing with Nazis is not that time.

“Feminism” wasn’t a word I heard much growing up. When I did hear it, I equated it with a historical event, not a work in progress. I thought first-wave feminism was a one-and-done deal, and that all the work necessary for women’s equality had already been accomplished.

At Santa Rosa Christian School, dancing was a gateway drug. The gyrating, the slow romantic swaying...

A breakup, Mom, a cheerleading competition, and Valentine's Day...

You know that annoying friend who loves to vaguebook about the woes in her life or is always complaining on social media about how her kids are destroying her home and mental health? Super annoying, right? Well, that was me — every damn day, for years.

Making friends as a grown woman is hard. I figured out a few tips on how to set up successful one-on-one friend dates, as well as how to handle the territory of a budding platonic relationship with another woman.