Calypso

by David Sedaris

“It used to be that whenever I passed a mirror, I’d look at my face,” Gretchen said, blowing out a mouthful of cigarette smoke. “Now I just check to see if my nipples line up.”

Honestly, though, does choice even come into it? Is it my fault that the good times fade to nothing while the bad ones burn forever bright?

Happiness is harder to put into words. It’s also harder to source, much more mysterious than anger or sorrow, which come to me promptly, whenever I summon them, and remain long after I’ve begged them to leave.

With me, people aren’t thinking What did you say? so much as Why are you saying that?

the chuckle that means “Wouldn’t it be funny if what I just said was funny?”

“People like it.” “Yes,” I always want to say, “but they’re the wrong people.”

“Goddamn it,” I said. “You are going to marry me whether you like it or not.”

The villain at three in the afternoon might be the hero by sunset. It was all just storytelling.

He’s always operated on the assumption that I don’t know anything, can’t know anything, really.