It's the time of year everyone talks about new year's resolutions. "Oh hi so and so!" they say at the grocery stores, the banks, the concrete seas that swallow box stores whole and shit them out in tiny alleyways, where the third graders don't venture anymore. They stand with frozen chicken in hand, giggling nervously about the need to lose weight. They gush over cilantro. They ask about family and report back to the suburban soldiers who just don't give a shit anymore.
I've never made new year's resolutions. I turn over no new leaves; I make no new self. I am still me, drinking beer and reading Zadie Smith. I laugh too loudly, write too many letters without sending them, receive stares from passerbys witnessing my version of "Boots of Spanish Leather," complete with new haircut shakes and all.
What is it about the specific marking of a passing of time that makes us reevaluate ourselves? What is it about arbitrary country lines that makes us nationalists? What draws us to countdowns, to straight lines, to rigidity?
My resolution for society? Drink champagne at noon during a siesta, write a collective novel maybe with Antigone playing some sort of lead role, smash dirt in your flannel shirt/face. Stop narrating.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment