It that time. Happy Tuesday & Sport Illustrated Swimsuit Edition season. I’m just going to lay this down here…

Sensitive little bird? Spoilers not your thing?

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At 81-years of age, Martha Stewart is gracing the cover of this years Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition.

I know, I had mixed emotions too. Although initially I was like what the actual fuck… Martha looks stunning.

I attribute a lot of it to professional photoshopping, but still. At 81, I wanna look like that. In society today, there is an unspoken standard for how a woman should look and act.

Girls are immediately, involuntary entered into the world of pastel pink and ugly puffy print dresses the moment we are born. It’s like the lack of a penis grants the golden ticket to the land of training for everything that sucks.

Any self identified Woman that tells you they don’t struggle with gender roles and they look exactly as their husband or boyfriend expects- and is perfectly content in that existence- is full of total shit. We’ve all been through a pandemic lockdown. How was it?

Did you enjoy being locked in your house without the ability of leaving for toilet paper? It isn’t like you’d have gotten some anyways. While y’all were hoarding the shit paper, I was Amazoning laundry detergent and vinegar. Let’s go.

Welcome to what is expected of a housewife and mother. Single dads feel us! An unemployed female in a relationship is still expected to provide a clean home, clean-well manner children and quality food. “You don’t work, so this is your job!”.

Yeah, I’ve heard it too. Many, many times. Usually followed with, “Get a job or go to school. I don’t give a fuck, just do something other than play World of Warcraft.”

(That’s why he has an account and still plays 16 years later…)

I spent the majority of my adulthood learning to housewife and mother in the Northern most Southern State in the Union. You want to talk about some expectations… date a Southern Boy. Yeah the accent is like butter, or full on fellatio- but you are in for ever home economics NASCAR edition.

I was raised in a house where Martha Stewart was Moms deity, yet my Dad was the steward. The children had no expectations of household chores outside of keeping our rooms acceptable. The laundry room was off limits, no one wanted to go that far into the scary dark basement anyways. Moms office was down there too. Left off the stairs and you were behind that door and safe from the monsters.

My Mother was an entrepreneur. For the majority of my childhood she worked out of the basement of our home as a private interior design contractor. I remember going to work sites as a kid and being overly unamused while she told the construction contractors what to do. She idolized Martha.

I remember when Martha went to federal prison on felony charges of insider trading in 2004. Here was this middle aged white woman that created a media empire going to federal prison for a bad investment. I was certain Martha was done. Instead she spent 5 months making the woman’s prison suitable for garden parties. She was released in 2005 and by 2012 fully reinstated as the chairwoman of her self-branded empire.

Fucking impressive.

Now we are in 2023, and the here’s our Leo Lady, Martha (♌️Aug. 4, 1941♌️) on the cover of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition. Here is an 81 year old woman on the cover of the arguably most popular summer launch publication at the absolute height of her power saying, ‘look good, feel good ladies!’ Martha is the oldest swimsuit cover model in SI’s history.

Of course the Twitterverse immediately took to the photoshopped or not debate. Y’all, it’s a fuckin’ major magazine- y’all be photoshopping your family vaca pics- shut the front fucking door.

Clearly it’s photoshopped. Can’t tell? Let me provide a reference…

Of course I am going to jump for the filtered tan skin… but still.

Martha looks amazing. I don’t care. I will intentionally go to stores to see if this year still features the naughty cover. I haven’t seen one of them since Hustler was still featured convenience store publications.

You know them. The ones in the island racks next to the register beverage coolers. You can quench your incurable dehydration from wandering the aisles while distracted yourself from the less than concerned 20 something’s half asses register effort. Self checkout is so much fun.

But more than the way this feature looks, the message behind it is bigger. Woman don’t have to fit into the mold. Be unapologetically you. The man tried to hold Martha down, look at this queen rise. Eminem eat your heart out. This is what resilience and revenge looks like. Classy. -🍋💋