Rousseau Marigold Hurley (17) is the best friend of Gary 's niece , Ginny and an avid supporter of her best friend’s mom Marlene in the goal of becoming a writer. She’s also the daughter of Colleen.
She’s an aspiring writer herself and to be honest really admires Marlene for her dedication to her writing and the fact that despite being middle-aged she doesn’t give up on her dream.
Rousseau wishes she was as disciplined as Marlene is - she mostly writes short stories because her longer projects tend to end up unfinished, hence she admires Marlene 's determination to finish her first book after just a little over a year - the story, a historical romance between Karl , a Prussian solider ,during Frederick the Great’s reign and Frederick 's female gardener Christine , who takes care of the exotic fruit in the king’s orchard seems a rather interesting concept to her and really captures the spirit of Prussia , which , while it no longer exists as a state or even a Bundesland (an administrative part of Germany) - is very important to Marlene who grew up on those territories , more specifically in Potsdam where Frederick the Great’s palace of Sanssouci still stands to this day, attracting milions of tourists.
Rousseau herself is not really interested in history that much and prefers philosophy - which is one of the main reasons why her and Ginny are such good friends, because Ginny is very interested in the philosophy of Saint Thomas , who was one of the first Christian thinkers of the early church - that’s why she wants to study Theology,
Rousseau herself is named after a French philosopher - Jean-Jacques Rousseau , whose work - particularly one about pedagogy , called Émile - helped Colleen greatly in preparing for the role of a single mom after her husband abandoned her for materialistic reasons. Later on Rousseau found out that her namesake was a hypocrite who left his own five children in a Parisian orphanage while simultaneously still trying to teach others how to raise their kids - to this day the girl feels conflicted about her name , but loves the sound of it and will absolutely yell at you if you shorten it to Rue .
Another thing that ties Rousseau and Ginny together is their love of dogs - they actually met each other for the first time in a dog park where Ginny was walking her West Highland White Terrier , Fidget , and Fidget decided to say hello to Ginny 's elderly Boston Terrier , Oreo . Because of Rousseau 's custom keychain on her backpack which had her name on it , Ginny immediately complimented her name and they started talking about philosophy & theology… It was all smooth sailing from there, even though Rousseau went to a different school and was one year above Ginny, they made time at the park together quite often and this led to Fidget & Oreo becoming friends, too. Rousseau also appreciated Ginny ’ s support after the devastation that Oreo 's death from old age left in her heart - although she admits that it was the smile of her stepsister Aria which helped her through it the most. It wasn’t until much later that Rousseau found out about her mom being friends with one of Ginny 's moms, because Colleen did everything in her power to protect Rousseau from the details of the exhausting process that was separation and divorce. Why would Colleen tell her daughter that she made friends with the receptionist of her divorce lawyer?
Rousseau loves children so she’s glad that her mom married again and is happy with Ahaan , while Rousseau can play with Aria and customize her dollhouse , allowing her to sometimes unwind from the stress of schoolwork and feel like a 13-year-old again. She’s also glad that Aria has the ambition to be an Olympic swimmer and now Colleen as her new stepmom puts a lot of energy to help Aria fullfill that goal. Admittedly , as a trainer Colleen tried to make Rousseau like swimming , but Rousseau actually does it only occasionally for recreation and cannot imagine ever doing it competitevely - something Colleen accepts and doesn’t preassure Rousseau to do otherwise because she knows that her daughter knows what she wants.
Having gained the experience with children through bonding with Aria and also occasionally babysitting Ginny 's 6-year-old stepbrother, Rousseau wants to become a children’s book author - her interest in philosophy makes her able to always add an interesting moral to the story while still keeping it simple through her vivid imagination which manifests mostly by anthropomorphizing pets or animals in her stories - her newest one is about a Panther who learns how not to be jealous of other animal’s more colorful fur and see the beauty of her own black fur , as well as the advantages that it gives her. Patrick as a literary agent sees the potential of this story and other ones that Rousseau wrote, advising her to publish them as a compilation of short stores, and idea that Aria and Ginny 's brother also love. Rousseau however struggles with imposter syndrome when it comes to her writing skills and compares herself a lot to Ginny 's mom Marlene , even though she won’t admit it . Mainly , she thinks that her writing style should be more polished and less chaotic, just like Marlene’s. After higschool Rousseau wants to major in early childhood education with a minor in philosophy - a plan her mom Colleeen approves of but worries that having both a major and a minor could lead Rousseau to burnout.
Ginny was created by @I_meme_it
@CherryBomb50 created Colleen
Aria was also created by @I_meme_it
Ahaan was created by @CherryBomb50
@kitkatcookie
@chamwue
@wandering_willow
let the tagging terror begin!
