“Best of” Lists are to December what mosquitoes are to August, but unlike the panic-inducing insect, no one wants to get rid of the “Best of.” Instead, they feed them, passing them around to their friends, acting aghast when the most fringe author/ artist/ television show has been left out, but smiling in smug recognition at any item that matches up to a notch on their own belt.
By rule, Friendsgiving is free of traditions and about 95% free of stress and expectations. While some participants see it as an opportunity to mash their family’s favorite dishes and homemade songs with those of their friends’, these are the gatherings most likely to end in bloodshed, tears, or more passive forms of aggression.
Search Google images for “Women in the office.” Maybe add a little color, loosen the bun, and take off a few years. Definitely take off the forced stock-photo grin. I was never unhappy about wearing the same coral button-up, black slacks combo four times a month. It was simple, straightforward, and comfortable. A no-brainer.
I’ve seen this all over town: friends throwing up their hands and their cares one final time, just to have their thrills and half-hearted regrets buffered by the warm sun at next-day’s brunch. It’s crazy how many people cannot seem to imagine getting someone into bed without an upper lip stained in sweat.
We hover and flap over the echoey expanse between undergrad and professional life like cartoon birds. We go almost nowhere and neither do the stacks of empty PBR cans from the shacks of houses we illegally cram ten people into. There will be a better word for this, later.
Attractive people on subways are like pee puddles: Obscenely ubiquitous to the point where you’ll only notice them after a quick whiff that makes you wonder 1) is that really what it was and 2) did you step in it.
All hope for weekend trips with sexy new men dies around this time, and I can hear its last desperate gasps for breath – just a trim! – as she circles the scissors in undulating, rapid-fire snips near the crown of my head. I recognize this move, and my lips shrivel immediately. This is the haircut given to little girls and near-menopausal mothers.
Move through these cities, use them, build breathless expectations and change our hair or clothes for them, parade them, admire and hate them, try to be more like them, strive to be opposite from them, cry in front of them, stay up until sunrise with them.
I think we can pretty clearly see signs of the moment when Americans began to veer off of the football freeway in mass numbers. Like when ad people realized their huge opportunity to jerk off a 30-second commercial and slap it between plays for a million dollars; and subsequently swapped college marching bands for Bon Jovi at halftime.