We Read It So You Don't Have To: Oprah's Interview with Michelle Obama

The First Lady is on the cover of the latest issue of O magazine, which your Gaggler can honestly admit she’s never purchased before. (Full disclosure: I’ve actually read the magazine a few times, thanks to my old roommate Sarah’s grandmother who gave her a subscription for Christmas one year. You’re the best, Mrs. Schumacher!) This month, O has stripped the cover free of its usual mess of headlines about weight loss, organizing and bettering one’s self in favor of a nice photo of Michelle and Oprah hanging out on the South Lawn at the White House. Inside, it’s basically the same thing: Pics of Oprah and Michelle hugging on the Truman Balcony; Oprah and Michelle walking through the East Wing; Oprah and Michelle laughing and clinking glasses of soda on a couch. In fact, there are no photos of Michelle alone, only with Oprah. Oh well, I guess that’s what Vogue is for.

And now for the summary of the story: Oprah thinks Michelle is amazing and super awesome. Thanks for reading everybody!

Just kidding! Aside from some occasional over the top fawning—and come on, who doesn’t fawn over the First Lady, especially her wardrobe (Jason Wu, call me!)—the interview has interesting moments, but is really super long. Oprah opens the story by talking about how she was searching through her bathroom cabinet looking for cough medicine when she had an epiphany: Holy smokes, she thought, Michelle will never have to go out and buy cough syrup again! Well, technically, Oprah, she probably will, but that’s neither here nor there. And wait a minute: Oprah, you buy your own cough syrup? Wow! We really are learning something.

Kicking off the interview, Oprah confesses to Michelle that she was very nervous going through White House security. (We feel you, girl. You should have been here when the guards at the West Gate used to burn those potpourri candles. Yikes.) Michelle tells Oprah about what it feels like to roll up to the White House at night, when it’s all lit up, and what a privilege it is to live in the “people’s house.” Oprah says, wow, until this very moment when Michelle said it, she didn’t really think of the White House as the people’s house. “Yeah, it is the people’s house,” Oprah declares.

Oprah asks Michelle all the deets on Inauguration Day. Some of stuff we can guess: The First Lady was really cold, and her feet were killing her by the end of the night. But here’s one funny anecdote: Michelle says during the inaugural parade, she and the president tried to convince Sasha and Malia to walk with them down Pennsylvania Avenue, but they refused, opting to stay in the new presidential limo. Why? “While we were out, they were partying in there,” Michelle says. “When we got back in, the music was blaring.” Haha. Those girls rule.

Michelle tells Oprah that her daughters have been surprisingly well adjusted considering everything going on. Yet she notes the irony that even though they live in the White House and their lives are dramatically different than before, they are actually living more normal lives than ever, with Dad home for dinner every night, etc. Michelle tells Oprah that she’s tried to keep the White House as normal as possible for the girls: She’s told White House staff to not make their beds, and the girls have to do chores in the kitchen and help set the dinner table, just like regular kids. “I want the kids to be treated like children, not little princesses,” Michelle says.

Now here’s an interesting part: Oprah and Michelle talk about Michelle’s mom, Marian Robinson, who is also living in the White House, but apparently is quite the rogue. Oprah confesses that she talked to Mrs. Robinson, who told her she doesn’t eat dinner with the First Family because “that’s Michelle’s family.” It doesn’t say the First Lady laughed, but we secretly think she did. She tells Oprah all about what her sassy mom has been up to, how she’s super social and goes to the Kennedy Center all the time. Mrs. Robinson takes care of getting the Obama girls to and from school, and Michelle tells Oprah she'll catch up with her mom occasionally in between. “Then she’s like, ‘I’m going home.’ And she walks upstairs,” Michelle says. Snap.

Here’s where Oprah sneaks in a Robitussin: What’s it like, she asks, to walk into a world where every need is taken care of? “You’ve gone from doing everything…picking up your own cough syrup… ” Oprah says. Michelle confesses she misses going to Target—and on this subject, we totally feel her pain—but she says she can’t complain. “If you want pie, there’s pie,” Michelle says. “If something breaks, it’s fixed. In an hour.” Yeah, but it’s Target, Michelle. Target!

From here, it got, how do we say, a too little Oprah for your Gaggler: Lots of touchy-feely questions about emotions and Pilates and decorating and stuff. (Michelle, for the record, really wants to try Pilates, but hasn’t had time.) Oprah brings up rumors that Michelle might be pregnant, prompting your Gaggler to ponder for a moment how she missed all that speculation. Nevermind, Michelle shuts it down. “Not pregnant,” she says, laughing. “Not planning on it.” Then Oprah delves into the state of the Obama marriage. “Has your love deepened?” Oprah asks. Why yes, Michelle says. Yadda yadda yadda. Your Gaggler selfishly skips ahead.

Wrapping up the interview, Oprah gushes that she is touched by the affection women feel for Michelle and tells her she has a “confidence that comes from such an authentic place.” Hmm. Michelle says she’s increasingly comfortable in her own skin and that she all she can do is do the best she can and “live life with some gusto.” Yeah, okay, but what about that cough syrup?