Confessions on the 7:45

by Lisa Unger

Everyone was on broadcast these days, thrusting out versions of themselves, cropped and filtered for public consumption. Everyone putting on the “show of me.” It was when people were alone, unobserved, that the mask came off.

Sometimes didn’t it seem like people didn’t see anymore? They didn’t look out. They looked down, at that device in their hands. Or in, mesmerized by the movie of past and future, desires and fears, always playing on the screen in their minds.

See what I’m saying, kitten? A tiger can’t change her stripes.

People didn’t fall in love with other people. They fell in love with how other people made them feel about themselves. And so, it was easy to get someone to love you—if you knew how they wanted to feel.

What a bunch of liars everyone in the world had become with their inane social media feeds;

What do we all want? We want to love and be loved. We want to belong.

your education was what you made of it. You could learn what you needed to learn anywhere. Fancy degrees from fancy schools, that was just another con—selling you the illusion of status.