Bad blood Ivanka Trump's former friend recounts the failure of her emancipation from her family
A little memoir, a little gossip about the life of the rich: the article published in Vanity Fair is a reproach for having supported the father's policies, but also expresses the bitterness of not being able to recognize the person of the past
It often happens that high school friendships don't last. Sometimes they fade with the passing of the years, sometimes new encounters and interests push people away, sometimes different sensibilities still develop. However, what happened to freelance journalist Lysandra Ohrstrom is rarer: her best friend from high school became, in 2016, the daughter of the president of the United States. Not only that: she has taken important positions in the administration, has deviated from the political positions she held with friends, has - in fact - become the most important member of a new royal family (even if only for four years ). "Ivanka Trump was my best friend from high school", this is the beginning of her article in Vanity Fair, in which she adds gossip and anecdotes about the youth of the almost ex First Daughter of America to the bitter memory of a vanished friendship. Her goal is to nail her to her responsibilities, that is, to have married and supported the ideas and policies of her father.
Lysandra and Ivanka met at Chapin, a girls-only school on the Upper East Side in the 90s and became friends there. Not immediately: Lysandra managed to reach "the popular side of the class", dominated by Ivanka and five other very precocious pre-teens, only after a few years. Only the last one was invited to the 13th birthday party - which was memorable: 15 girls in three limousines headed to the Taj Mahal in Atlantic City, to spend the afternoon in the attic of the hotel while two men from their father's escort stood guard.
In general, the lifestyle was that: grunge fashion, but with high-end stores and brands, rich kid vices borrowing a credit card from dad (yes, Donald Trump), huge mansions in downtown New York and equally great in the countryside.
And many trips: the first of the two girls was in Paris, for a study holiday, where they were doing "harmless pranks", that is, pretending to get lost in the subway and go to the cinema or the Picasso museum. Once they left at dawn and went to London, returning the same day. It was from there that they became "more sisters than best friends" because Ivanka had her flaws as hers, she "loved to talk about herself and was vain without shame", but at the same time she proved "funny, loyal and exciting". They went to see movies together, but also on horseback from Costa Rica to Nicaragua just for the fun of it. Adventures and days spent together. Lysadra was also a bridesmaid at her wedding.
And then the friendship broke up. To tell the truth, the text does not explain well why. The differences begin to become increasingly clear after college: one of the two goes to Beirut for a job as a reporter, while the other (Ivanka) enters the world of real estate. But apparently the real tear goes back to her father's candidacy and, above all, to the fact that after the unexpected victory in 2016 Ivanka takes advantage of the situation and gets on her diligence. The accusation, as an old friend, is simple: I no longer recognize you. "Ivanka had spent her entire career developing and embodying a smoother, more intellectual offshoot of the Trump brand, which blended the look and language of millennial white feminism with the mythological narrative of paternal business acumen and entrepreneurial spirit." . Sophisticated celebrity, not her father's nouveau riche style. And then she "she threw to the winds an image that she had built with so much work". Her fault, in short, is having "linked her destiny to that of her father".
These considerations are followed by a dense series of malice: the phone call in which Ivanka had asked for some reading advice and, faced with the suggestion of "Empire Falls" by Richard Russo, she would have replied: «" But why do you want me to read a book on the poor the fuck? What part of you do you think I might be interested in? "; or the habit of measuring the wealth of others, also referring to the characters in the films and the discrepancies between the locations and their work: «" And since when can a teacher afford a BMW? "» or «" Why should a policeman be able to afford a house like that? ”»; her role in her in the "hot dog case", in which she had pushed some classmates to show her naked breasts at the window to the hot dog man and then, when she was accused by the executives, she pulled out of her; the time when she, in front of her friend's necklace, which reproduced the name Lysander in Arabic letters, she said she was annoyed because she "was very" terrorist ""; her habit of eating at McDonald's, swearing and going to costume parties never dressed in theme.
On the other hand, even in wasp contexts where families like the Trump family were mocked and mocked, she "managed to win everyone's sympathy, she was polite, refined and funny". She read The Atlantic. "Everyone was amazed at how distant she was from her parents."
In short, the whole article is a kind of embittered disavowal. Ivanka did not do what her friends expected of her, that is, dissociate herself from her father's positions or, in her case, try to mitigate them. On the contrary she has chosen to pose her as if she were "a member of a royal family". With this move, she cut ties with the past and marked her destiny: "You will be loved by the people you despise and despised by those you would like to be loved by," read a tweet, announcing a life of hell for a woman condemned to stay. together with representatives of the middle class, which he despises so much.
In truth it will not happen. "I expect Ivanka to find a soft landing in Palm Beach, where casual white supremacy is a must and where, if you have enough money, most sins are forgiven." It is her right place, "away from the consequences of the economic and social policies she has implemented over the last four years, away from the protests that will follow and also from the need to interact with her fans of her MAGA of her ".
