If you can’t compete against Starbucks in speed, efficiency, ease of payment, brand recognition, or free Wi-fi, please, for all of us, have the best baked goods known to man. (Ideally in small sizes because if muffins are as big as a football helmet, I’ll pass and sadly won’t know your competitive advantage.)
(I’m copying the venerable Justine Musk with this outline format.)
1.
In the past year, I’ve told three friends that they were sitting on gold, because they have stories so compelling, so original—and with a three-act structure to boot—that anyone would want to read them. My friends just need to type!
Will they listen to me? I don’t know.
Maybe writing’s not the priority now. Perhaps they don’t trust me because I speak in hyperbole and am prone to exclamation (!).
(In fact, one of the reasons I love writing is that I can manage my effusiveness in a way that I can’t in real life, due to my elastic face and crazy expressions.)
I love when people get pissy at parents for posting baby pictures on Facebook, as if FB has some higher purpose and the only reason we’re not reaching it is because all that damn baby spam is in our feed.
Are they confusing The Facebook with The Economist? Do they hate children? How is “seeing pictures of people’s kids” not the point?
In my life, Facebook’s primary functions are: to reinforce my own political viewpoints by serving as a virtual echo-chamber; to illuminate my pathetic Google search history through obnoxious clicky ads; and finally (this is *key*) to serve as a repository for the best pictures of me ever taken in the history of my life.
I’ve been wasting my life in writing workshops, trying to articulate ideas, and generally believing the Bird by Bird bullshit that “the process” can help one understand the world.
All this time, I’ve been thinking like a little girl and had I been serious about myself or my career, I would’ve been thinking like a boss.
I want to spare you these mistakes and more importantly: save you time. Because even a boss can’t buy time.
TO: citizenkerry@gmail.com
FROM: aurora@googletmail.com
SUBJECT: Hi Gramma!
It’s me, Aurora! I’m writing to you from the future. Neat, right?
Basically this note will travel faster than the speed of light, spin around the world counter-clockwise to traverse time, and then land in your inbox. It’s called tmail and it was invented by some ladies at IIT in India.
2113 is great! We’ve abolished nationalism, agro-farming, language barriers, biological clocks, and all anti-gayism. (I think it’s hilarious you guys called it “homophobia.”)
Oh guess what’s not so great? We’re *still* discussing Roe v. Wade!!!
So tired of dating Neanderthals :(
*
Crossing #BeringStrait next month. Any tips?
*
Just ate half a mammoth. #JEAH
*
Me hunt and me gather and me no die in childbirth #NoteToMyEx
*
Tired of sitting around fire, talking. See these cavegirls all day. —what I say to myself, every day
*
I’ve been all kinds of catty in my life, and every instance can be boiled down to this arc:
—I envy something in another woman (her style/smarts/skills/confidence).
—I feel threatened by that trait in some way (she will take my job/man/place in a friend group).
—I make a dig.
—Inevitably what I fear never comes to fruition.
—Later I realize that envy was showing me something (a skill, a trait, an attitude) I’d like to cultivate. Or it’s something I’ll never, ever cultivate, but it would be so nice if I would!
Move on.
*
Just kidding, I have more to say. I also want to talk about Helen Gurley Brown. But seriously it all boils down to “move on” so you might stop here.
*
I’ve been thinking about this ever since the Olympics. Seems like people who bashed Lolo Jones missed an opportunity to dig a little deeper into the way our world works.
Why do we love the prettiest more than the most talented? Or do we? Do marketers have us pegged wrong? Why are some athletes so good at selling themselves?
Tell me that story.
Take yourself seriously.
Inspired by media coverage of Lolo Jones.
1. Making the Olympic finals is not Olympic success.
2. Anna Kournikova (ranked 8th in the world in tennis singles and #1 in the world in doubles) was a bad tennis player. All marketing, that hussy! Seriously, who among us wouldn’t be Top 8 in the world if we tried?
3. If you work the system, the system is your fault.
4. You cannot be a beautiful 29 year-old virgin and pose nude in a magazine. Too confusing!!! How do you expect me to reconcile that paradox?
5. If you’re a woman and you get endorsement deals that showcase your good looks and rockin body, you are: a sell-out, a sex kitten for sale, not focused. If you’re a man and you do this, you’re every famous athlete, ever.
I didn’t understand the world better after visiting Hiroshima, I understood it more. More:
-What it means to lose in war.
-About the people whose lives were reduced to one paragraph in my US History textbook.
-Why history shouldn’t be taught only from the winners’ point of view.
This is the tricycle of a three-year-old boy who was burned to death after the bomb dropped.
I only realized two weeks ago, when I visited Peace Memorial Park—which is what you visit when you visit Hiroshima—that it all happened on August 6th.
Today’s the anniversary, if you will.
Now I can’t remember if I’ve been using squat toilets the right way all these years!
