Early Thirties: A Novel

by Josh Duboff

It was hard to explain what it was about the specific moment, but I wanted to capture it and place it in a glass jar, to be able to return to it whenever I wanted, at all times.

She didn’t like to “make herself at home” in professional settings; in fact, she thought people who did suffered from some kind of personality disorder.

you have to appreciate the good things when they happen.

I missed being home, and missed being with my mom, though I’d learned that this was just sort of my resting state in New York, and that when I was actually back home in Chicago, I felt uncomfortable, unlike myself, a sea creature out of water.

We all hide so much, keep so many demented thoughts closed off and obscured from the outside world—why wasn’t it more obvious to us, factored into the equations of our daily interactions, that everyone else was the exact same?

I increasingly felt… a nagging sense of existential dread during all waking hours? It just sort of ran present in the background, like that scrolling “BREAKING NEWS” banner that runs on the bottom of CNN.

“We all want explanations for the major, transformative events that happen in life. Sometimes there aren’t any.”

I was the manufacturer of my own distress.

if you get pricked enough times—and know that all replying will do is allow for more pricks—you eventually decide it isn’t worth the effort. It’s easier to bleed and not let anyone see it.

“You know yourself,” Perri said. “You’re present when it matters—you know when it matters. And you leave when it’s time to leave. What’s crucial is that you don’t linger.”

My early thirties seemed increasingly characterized by this stuff: empty offers, kind phony gestures, polite smiles. In the end, we all did what was best for ourselves and rationalized it later.