A Big Time Guilty Pleasure

The other day I was shopping at Target, and I decided to hit up the magazine rack. November issues are definitely out, and I’ve been stuck reading October issues for far too long I say! Well as I veer down the magazine isle, I notice two things as I make my way towards Vogue, Elle and Cosmopolitian: Big Time Rush is on the lower corner of some teen beat magazine, and there are two girls, more than likely a few years older than me, in front of the isle looking at wedding magazines.

Now even though I haven’t taken a teen article seriously since I was obsessed with Ryan Phillippe when I was 10, I had to read it. Now to make this clear, you’re reading a blog by a girl who is a popular music enthusiast. I could tell you everything you need to know from 50s and 60s rock and roll to the punk movement of the 70s to indie of the 80s and 90s. But the girls in front me planning the oh-so perfect wedding didn’t know that!

I was at a crossroads. “Act my age” and flip through the cooking and science magazines that were to my right, or divulge in bright colored pages that are filled with Justin Bieber, Big Time Rush and other people I’m not even sure actually exist. So there I was - I had 5 bags of halloween candy in my basket, and I was about to pick up a teen beat magazine while the girls in front of me plan their futures.

But I panicked. I grabbed the nearest cooking magazine and looked interested. (Although, I did end up buying both cooking magazines I looked through. Bourbon Pumpkin Pie? Chocolate Truffle Tart? Do I need to explain myself further?!)  So I waited, thumbing through the glamorous articles of Gourmet Holiday, while they talked. And talked. And talked. Then they were leaving, deciding on The Knot. Excited, I put my magazine up and was about to grab the fanzine off the bottom shelf. But then, The Knot suddenly wasn’t good enough for Miss Perfect Wedding Princess. Couldn’t they see I was waiting to indulge in a guilty pleasure here?!Finally, after much delliberation about which wedding magazine to buy, they left! I couldn’t help but feel if she’s this fickle about a wedding magazine, how’d she find a fiance?

I grabbed the magazine off the bottom rack and flipped through it. The page that featured Big Time Rush was pink with hearts across it. …Awesome. It was a “revealing” story about how they “truly” felt about love. ….Even more awesome. Now, I’m not making fun of how they feel, but everything besides the quotes seemed more like a fairy tale than Cinderella. The article created a world where their eyes bat in complete and utter charm as they sing you to sleep, obsessively loving you in an innocent and nonsexual way until you can’t breathe. (It didn’t say that directly, but it certainly took your imagination there.) And I laughed. Yes, I laughed a lot while I was reading it. Because if I wasn’t laughing, I think I would have been immediately so turned off, it would have kept me from having sex ever again.

You see girls, as you get older you see the downfall in this. Hot or not, no one wants to be suffocated. And if your 13-17, I hope you’re reading this, because guys ESPECIALLY don’t like being suffocated. And I’m a realist enough to see the “suffocation” that’s in this article. It’s practically smushed between every word and every line as it becomes highlighted by their dreamy quotes. (See! The article itself is suffocating!) But do not let those articles on their “love” fool you, girls. I’m not saying they don’t like attention, but I am saying they like to breathe. I like to breathe. We all like to breathe. Breathing is good. Why are these fanzines not teaching that?! For shame, teen fanzines, for shame!

However, the good news of that day was my guilty pleasure was successfully fulfilled, and maybe, just maybe, the next time I see Big Time Rush on the cover of some fanzine, I’ll find the confidence to look at it with other people around…or not.