Enjoy yourself. It's later than you think.
[Alt text: Black and white illustration of the 2-Tone guy shedding tears. Image via Chema Skandal.)
My feeds are full of year-end lists. Bests and worsts. I get it: Listicles are an easy way to get pageviews and ad impressions. But "best" and "worst" feel like arbitrary and absolute ways for regular people to look back at 2022. So I'd like to suggest Highs and Lows.
I scrolled quickly through all the photos I took this year to jog my memory, and here's my incomplete list:
High: Weekly group tennis lesson with amazing instructors. I think I’ve gotten a lot better at hitting the ball, but that’s not even the point. It’s something I can look forward to every week, and I always leave smiling. #confidence!
Low: Extreme anxiety when I moved into my new apartment and for much of this year. "Where did all this stuff come from?" "What in the fuck do I do now?" "How do I start over at age 50?"
High: Celebrating my 50th birthday with four of my oldest friends.
Low: Losing a friend to pancreatic cancer. And being so self-involved/out of touch that I didn’t even know he was sick until about 6 weeks before he died.
High: Having San Francisco friends stay with me for 10 days over the summer.
Low: Pet sitting for three different sets of friends in three different states for a week or two each time. I love my friends and their pets, I’m glad I could help, and I would happily do it again. But the isolation was not good for me, mentally. When your baseline is "I have no idea what I’m doing with my life and I’m worried I’m doing it all wrong," and you kind of run away from dealing with that to walk some dogs / feed some cats, and you’re completely alone, then your anxiety goes into overdrive, you drink too much wine, and you watch The Bear at least 5 times in a row back to back so you don’t have to think about the bigger picture.
High: Regular outings with my aunt’s dog in Rock Creek Park. I’ve re-socialized him to see most approaching dogs not as threats but as potential playmates. He makes me laugh, and the walks are good for both of us.
High: Going trick-or-treating with my niece and nephew. And all the time I’ve been able to spend with the kids, being an auntie and going strawberry picking and petting goats and making ice cream cake and trying to think of old stories and hosting sleepovers and falling asleep during Disney movies.
High: Feeling like I actually helped an Afghan refugee with his asylum application.
High: Finally leaving the country for a week, and learning that I can still throw myself into new things. It just takes twice as long for me to adjust.
Low: Terry Hall just died, at age 63, from pancreatic cancer. (Why don't they screen for that? If they can do colonoscopies, then they should be able to look for pancreatic problems, right?)
Here is Prince Buster’s song, Enjoy Yourself (YouTube). And here is The Specials’ cover of that song, live in Japan in 1980 (YouTube). The latter made the song more fun? But the message is the same: Life is short. Make the fucking most of it. Now.
The few times I saw The Specials play, Terry never really looked like he was enjoying himself. Maybe that was his shtick, or maybe it's a result of the extreme trauma he suffered as a kid, and his subsequent lifelong mental health struggles. But that music and the energy and everything else those '80s bands threw down for U.S. bands to pick up on (heh) in the '90s... it's a hell of a legacy, and I'm so grateful for it.
How about you?
It's been a while since I solicited personal stuff from you. If you think highs and lows are a useful way to look back at the year, I'd love to read a few of yours. Even when things have been truly terrible, there have to be a few lighter and happier moments, right? You can reply to this email, and as always, anything I share will be anonymous.
Links
We’re drowning in old books. But getting rid of them is heartbreaking. (WaPo)
Welcome to the menopause gold rush. Every semi-famous or self-important woman "founder" is coming up with a new way to monetize menopause and it's shameless and exhausting. Unless your CBD tincture or whatever can actually fix hot flashes or brain fog or estrogen evaporation, I call bullshit. Still, I guess it's better that women are getting rich off this than men. (NYT)
Life lessons for 2023. (Kottke)
A mechanical keyboard that works with your laptop and looks like an old typewriter. (Awesomer)
This kid knows her flags and is not tolerating your bullshit. (Twitter)
Neurotic Boston mother, part 548. (Twitter)
Some really amazing and creative Christmas trees. (DeMilked)
I listen to the radio in my car, and can now sing all the lyrics to that "I Know Victoria's Secret" song — and wish it had been released in the '80s. This whole time I thought it was Taylor Swift but it's someone called Jax. Anyway here's a flash mob dancing to the song in front of an actual Victoria's Secret. (YouTube)
Samantha Irby on New Year's diet resolutions. (Food and Wine)
Anderson Cooper giggling always brings me so much joy. (Digg)