So Happy for You

by Celia Laskey

Happiness was not good for capitalism or the patriarchy or white supremacy, i.e., business as usual.

It was strange to me that people correlated marriage with romance, when a state-sanctioned partnership seemed like the least romantic kind. People who didn’t get married but stayed together simply because they wanted to always seemed so much happier.

I was pretty mean, back then. It was a way to feel briefly powerful in a world where I felt powerless, but of course, I wasn’t fully aware of this. I just knew it felt good. The thrill some people got from shopping or exercise or driving fast, I got from being mean.

It seemed like boys could sense my indifference toward them the way dogs can smell cancer.

“Ah, so you see your opinions as an extension of yourself?” “Doesn’t everyone?” I asked. “What are we, other than our opinions?”

What they found was that the part of the brain that responds to a physical threat responds to an ideological threat in the same way. So information that challenges a belief is essentially a predator. To keep ourselves safe, we have to shut it out.”

If you see your opinions as the most important part of yourself, then when someone rejects your opinion, they’re de facto rejecting you.”

“I guess because I wanted to fit in.” “Why?” “I don’t know. Doesn’t everybody?”

“I don’t think I do,” I said. Beth tilted her head, considering. “That sounds lonely.”

The cycle of fighting and making up with a sister has an almost circadian rhythm to it, a comforting predictability. I never had a reason to think it would stop.

“Totally,” said Jack. “But sometimes I do worry that we’re like, one step away from starting a separatist commune where we all exclusively wear tie-dye and live in houses made out of recycled cans and worship a cardboard cutout of Laura Dern.”

Blair came around and refilled our vodka Red Bulls. I passed out waters and reminded everyone to stay hydrated.

“Being an outcast comes with a lot of bad shit, like having to protest in the streets for basic human rights or getting fired from your job, but it sure as hell forces you to question the status quo.”

I know people think I’m just a slut or whatever, but what if a ‘slut’ is just a woman who’s really committed to finding lasting love? Who hasn’t given up on the idea that her person is out there even though sometimes giving up would seem like the very logical thing to do? So she dates a lot and tests out the sexual chemistry even though ninety-seven percent of guys end up being jerks who don’t understand the clitoris, but she wouldn’t know that if she didn’t go on the dates and try. It’s a shitty, necessary pathway to the end goal.”

“Everyone has their ways of keeping control. For you, it’s your opinions. For me, it was climbing the ladder, as you call it.