Maxwell 51: Empty Nesters, Empty Vesters? End of an Era

[Black Aliss]

On 9/26/2021 at 9:02 AM, Black Aliss said:

It's different in that they are no longer responsible for cleaning anything but their own dorm room, someone else cooks for them, and there is no longer anyone to insist that they get up before dawn to read their bibles, and also do bible study before bedtime. I'm sure they miss their nieces and nephews, but their own lives are much easier now.

Bad form, I know, to quote myself but I just thought of another reason their lives are so different now. Silliness. We're seeing so many posts about what some might call "morale events", pep rallies, and just general silliness, like abcadmissions' instagram "meme mondays'. If Steve ever permitted even a small measure of silliness we sure didn't see it documented on their blog.

[FloraDoraDolly]

11 hours ago, HereticHick said:

The Maxwell ladies have been posted on ABC's official instagram again. Poor Steve-jovah-- his daughters have become bible college poster girls!

https://www.instagram.com/p/CUN44-VjVVv/

"Bible college poster girls"

Was this on anyone's fundie Bingo card for 2021?

[ClareDeLune]

HAHA SUCH A BAD INFLUENCE https://www.instagram.com/p/COJV_uuJB1s/

[sableduck]

On 9/28/2021 at 1:35 AM, FloraDoraDolly said:

"Bible college poster girls"

Was this on anyone's fundie Bingo card for 2021?

Honestly, they look so very happy.  

[HereticHick]

2 hours ago, ClareDeLune said:

HAHA SUCH A BAD INFLUENCE https://www.instagram.com/p/COJV_uuJB1s/

I firmly believe that this college lets you have more than 2 goldfish at a time in the cafeteria. All this madcap living must make Teri's head spin

[GreenBeans]

On 9/27/2021 at 7:42 PM, HereticHick said:

The Maxwell ladies have been posted on ABC's official instagram again. Poor Steve-jovah-- his daughters have become bible college poster girls!

https://www.instagram.com/p/CUN44-VjVVv/

One of them (Mary I think) is also in a photo in a post of April 16. It’s the fourth photo here:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNtIGqIlni1/?utm_medium=copy_link

[mystikchick17]

24 minutes ago, GreenBeans said:

One of them (Mary I think) is also in a photo in a post of April 16. It’s the fourth photo here:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNtIGqIlni1/?utm_medium=copy_link

Dang, that's definitely Mary sitting at a table with BOYS WHO ARE NOT HER BROTHERS. 

Maybe these two will stand a chance of escaping the family compound and getting married. One can hope. 

[HereticHick]

1 hour ago, mystikchick17 said:

Dang, that's definitely Mary sitting at a table with BOYS WHO ARE NOT HER BROTHERS. 

Maybe these two will stand a chance of escaping the family compound and getting married. One can hope. 

Wait, she was there in April? I thought Mary and Anna just started inperson classes this August?  Were they touring the campus? 

[GreenBeans]

1 hour ago, mystikchick17 said:

Dang, that's definitely Mary sitting at a table with BOYS WHO ARE NOT HER BROTHERS. 

Maybe these two will stand a chance of escaping the family compound and getting married. One can hope. 

Ha. I hadn’t even thought about that, because this scene just looked so completely normal - just a couple of college students having lunch or a coffee together, nothing romantic or sexual about it. Isn’t it crazy how fundies make everything about sex?

[JermajestyDuggar]

29 minutes ago, HereticHick said:

Wait, she was there in April? I thought Mary and Anna just started inperson classes this August?  Were they touring the campus? 

That’s what I’m thinking. They are Maxwells. They definitely have to visit before sending their adult daughters states away. 

[Alisamer]

I was out of town when all these shenanigans went down and I haven't been able to find the post about it - but what was it like? They basically had a wake when they first married a child off and he moved so very far away (across the street). Was there weeping and wailing?

Or was it more like "oh by the way also all the girls have moved out, and two are attending college" and then quickly moved on to something else?

It's the Maxwells. The girls could have been attending since last Fall for all we know, the way they curate everything they let people see. 

I would love to have been Arnold though, watching that all go down. I wonder what sort of discussions "led" Steve to relax his grip enough for them to leave the house?

And were the girls as shocked as we were that they finally said "yes" to letting them leave?

[Bluebirdbluebell]

48 minutes ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

That’s what I’m thinking. They are Maxwells. They definitely have to visit before sending their adult daughters states away. 

Why not visit? I would try to visit an area first before moving there.

[JermajestyDuggar]

12 minutes ago, Bluebirdbluebell said:

Why not visit? I would try to visit an area first before moving there.

I think there’s nothing wrong with visiting. Some people would and some people might not. But the Maxwells definitely would. Because Steve would have to see it for himself before allowing them to go. 

[Alisamer]

4 minutes ago, Bluebirdbluebell said:

Why not visit? I would try to visit an area first before moving there.

Yeah I think in my 10th and 11th grade years we visited almost every college in the entire state, with my younger sisters in tow for most of them. We did tours for many, but drove through many more. Any time we were near a college, we'd check it out. If there was a tour, we'd go to it. Open house? We were there. Going to an open house at one college? Mom would call all the other nearby colleges to see if we could schedule tours and make a weekend of it.

My mom was in charge of all this. She did NOT do this for either of my younger sisters (3 and 4 grades below me). I'm really not sure why - if she figured she'd already seen them all and they'd seen enough to decide, or what. Or maybe it was because middle sister wanted to be an accountant and just decided she'd go the same place our accountant aunt went, and youngest wanted to be a nurse so there were only a few logical choices there, while I wanted to go into graphic design which mom knew much less about. 

But yeah, I'd be more surprised if they didn't visit the college before going there. And hopefully the girls got a chance to speak to some other students or former students before deciding, also. 

Now that I think about it, I wonder if part of it was that I was sure I wanted to move away, and I'm the oldest. The local community college had a highly regarded graphic design program, and I could easily and cheaply have lived at home and gone there for the first two years, but for some reason I didn't even consider it. Which was absolutely the best choice for me. I ended up 3 hours away in a different city and it was great. 

[JermajestyDuggar]

I only applied to two colleges. I got into both but I only visited one. And that’s the one I chose. I’m the type of person who knows what they want. I knew where I wanted to go. When I have a rare time where I can’t decide, it’s a fucking ordeal. I can’t handle it because I’m so used to being decisive as hell. 
 

Edited to add: @Alisamer you sound like me. I moved across the state 3.5 hours away even though there was a college close by home. I was like no way! I need to get the fuck out of here! And I’m glad I did. 

Edited September 29, 2021 by JermajestyDuggar

[Bluebirdbluebell]

6 hours ago, mystikchick17 said:

Maybe these two will stand a chance of escaping the family compound and getting married. One can hope. 

 

The girls "escaped" recently. Sarah managed to move out of her parents' house with getting married. Anna and Mary go to college in a different state and not nearby Missouri.  They live in West Virginia. 

There is no "family compound". To me, a compound is an isolated tract of land that has many people and many different households living together. The Maxwells live in suburban neighborhood with many non-Maxwell neighbors. While the adult children used to live at home, the married children have their own homes on their own land. With the exception of Nathan, there are neighbors in between the different Maxwell residencies. 

I think it's disingenuous to refer to Maxwells as having a compound when there are other fundie families who have real compound; the Botkins, the Duggars, the Nauaglers, etc. By Duggars, I mean the TTH is sort of a compound as JB has a few of his married kids and their kids living on his propery. Also the TTH is not close to other neighbors.

Both Jesse and Joe Maxwell have been able to live in a different suburb nearby, and Sarah has moved out. 

When a fundie girl gets married, she is told to obey/submit her husband and pop out a quiver. It's often an out of the frying pan, into the fire situation. Marriage doesn't usually seem to give fundie women, just the illusion of freedom. If the situation is bad enough (like the Rods,), I am glad they get married, but the Maxwells girls are in much better circumstances.

Anna and Mary started out going on mission trips by themselves for a month or two at a time. They are now living at college. Their freedoms are expanding and hopefully their freedoms will continue to expand while they are single. One can hope.

[daisyjane1234]

A question to the sleuths who are better at sleuthing than me. In the crowd picture posted to ABC's Facebook page on Sept. 18 Anna and Mary are in the crowd watching some sort of three legged soccer game.  Both appear to be sitting closer to a guy than to each other.  Any chance the baseball hat wearing dude near Mary is the same guy in the picture of the gang at the outdoor table?

I'd post the pics, but I am useless at that stuff.

[kpmom]

28 minutes ago, daisyjane1234 said:

A question to the sleuths who are better at sleuthing than me. In the crowd picture posted to ABC's Facebook page on Sept. 18 Anna and Mary are in the crowd watching some sort of three legged soccer game.  Both appear to be sitting closer to a guy than to each other.  Any chance the baseball hat wearing dude near Mary is the same guy in the picture of the gang at the outdoor table?

I'd post the pics, but I am useless at that stuff.

It could be the same guy, similar looks, same backwards baseball cap.

In the crowd picture though he looks like he's sitting a row behind Anna and Mary, rather than near them.

[fundiewatch]

Isn’t the outdoor table picture from the spring? It looks like the school has a pretty standard visit in April for the students coming that fall. Anna and Mary were online students in the spring, per the academic achievement announcement from ABC. 

[theologygeek]

On 9/28/2021 at 1:35 AM, FloraDoraDolly said:

"Bible college poster girls"

Was this on anyone's fundie Bingo card for 2021?

I still can't get over how they went from climbing a mountain in a dress to watching sports in a gym in shorts.  

12 hours ago, GreenBeans said:

One of them (Mary I think) is also in a photo in a post of April 16. It’s the fourth photo here:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CNtIGqIlni1/?utm_medium=copy_link

Mary is glowing in that picture.  She looks so happy.  

[GreenBeans]

1 hour ago, theologygeek said:

I still can't get over how they went from climbing a mountain in a dress to watching sports in a gym in shorts.  

Mary is glowing in that picture.  She looks so happy.  

She looks happy and so completely normal, I can’t get over how (other than with basically all the photos on their blog) there is nothing weird about this setting. It’s such a normal picture. College friends eating at a cafeteria table, bright smiles, food and phones in front of them, wearing normal clothes, no odd posing or caption - absolutely nothing fundie about that scene, and that’s truly remarkable!

[HeartsAFundie]

20 hours ago, JermajestyDuggar said:

I only applied to two colleges. I got into both but I only visited one. And that’s the one I chose. I’m the type of person who knows what they want. I knew where I wanted to go. When I have a rare time where I can’t decide, it’s a fucking ordeal. I can’t handle it because I’m so used to being decisive as hell. 
 

Edited to add: @Alisamer you sound like me. I moved across the state 3.5 hours away even though there was a college close by home. I was like no way! I need to get the fuck out of here! And I’m glad I did. 

You guys sound just like my son.  We have a community college, a large state university and a small state university all within driving distance and my son noped out immediately, opting for a small state university 2 hours away on the other side of the state.  Although I cried like a baby dropping him off at the dorm for the first time during freshman year,  it was the best decision he could have made.  He became more independent, and I learned to stop doing everything for him. 

[Black Aliss]

On 9/29/2021 at 4:46 AM, ClareDeLune said:

HAHA SUCH A BAD INFLUENCE https://www.instagram.com/p/COJV_uuJB1s/

I hope there are better headship options at abc than those three.

[HereticHick]

According to this post, ABC fall break just started: https://www.instagram.com/p/CUdVqbOhYwd/  

Thy have no classes today (Friday) and Monday. Do you think Anna and Mary went anywhere, or just stayed in the dorm?  Also, there is a 5K on campus later in the month. I wanna see them participate!!

[browngrl]

Thanks to those who've posted pictures of Mary and/or Anna. It's nice to see them enjoying themselves at school. I wonder if they sometimes regret the years they spent torturing themselves to fit Steve's rigid rules. I suspect that Mary and Anna do not but I suspect that Sarah does have regrets. Who knows though. I'm coming to find that I hardly knew the Maxwells at all.