Wow or Eww?

I've never been a person who idolizes people, I even wasn't into group bands in my teen years. Of course I had my room walls full of posters and collected articles that I later scrapbooked in my personal journal, but that was it. No hysteria for concerts or daydreaming about celebrities.

I've always been more concentrated on how not to spend time trying to be like someone else. Because a person who spends his life looking up to others is someone who will never see his own value. And in the end, what is fame all about? "The advantage of being known by people of whom you yourself know nothing, and for whom you care as little." (Lord Byron). Thus I struggle to understand this general obsession with becoming celebrities ourselves.

Of course there were people I liked. Jon Bon Jovi had more room on my walls. I simply loved him for both his music and looks, two characteristics that have remained intact over the years. I still like the way his band's longevity and continual success proves his fame, despite a sea-change in the music industry.  And I love the man he's become over the years.

Both images taken from examiner.com

Today there're a few people I admire in the celebsphere, for both trivial and a little more important reasons. People who generally feel confident about themselves, like singers Adele, who makes music for the ears, not for the eyes, and Alanis Morisette, whose looks is one-of-a-kind in a word of blonde-haired, blue-eyes beauties.

I also like people who don't struggle between being a vamp and looking like a credible artist, like Jennifer Lawrence (she's young and not immune to Hollywood), and women who admit their killing bodies is result of physical activites and healthy nutrition, opening up about how much importance they put into it, as a form of respect to partners and their jobs (Heidi Klum and Demi Moore).

What I like best, however, is babyzone. I like to see how celebs manage the delicate balance between raising children around glitz and glamour and keep them grounded. If I visit celebritybabyscoop daily I may be part of the orgy motherphilia Erica Jong refers to, but it's not like that. I don't need role models,  I'm just curious to see how others choose to parent because my life is much about parenting at this point, and the whole thing interests me and entertains me.

Jong's article saddens me, by the way. I recognize myself in many of the Attachment Parenting principles but I don't like to be demonized for this. I'm not sure why feminists seem to be against  stay-at-home mothering. I can't imagine regretting the time, energy and attention I'm putting into my child.

Even Michelle Obama's decision to give up her career  to support her husband was questionable. And when she talks non-mummy stuff, some seem shocked (like NYTimes reported). Would she have been more inspirational holding down a job?