Quietly Hostile

by Samantha Irby

I’d need a sociology degree to write about this in a real way, but we live in such a hilariously stupid time, where everyone is just hurling expectations of justification at each other constantly, and I’m sorry, lads, but I don’t like it.

But I get it now, your jam is always gonna sound like your jam, timeless and relevant even if the youths fail to appreciate it.

“Don’t you wish you’d had a kid?” Do I wish I could stand idly by and witness all the things I hate about myself manifested in, and mirrored back to me by, a person it’s against the law for me to kill? I absolutely do not!

People always ask if my friends are nervous to end up in a book, and the truth is, no one cares because people don’t read. (Except you. You are handsome and literate with excellent taste in reading material.) But we all love watching TV.

Wedding Guest was borne out of a “What the fuck am I gonna wear to this ceremony?” panic attack two hours before my friend’s little sister’s wedding, for which I’d purchased no new clothes in the hopes that it would force me to be chill and relaxed as I casually “threw something on” when it was time to go. As if I could ever be chill!!!!!!!! Being perceived is excruciating, especially if you can’t go person to person explaining why you look like that. I’d go to a lot more stuff if I knew I could take each person aside and explain to them why I look and dress the way I do.

I can’t run to the farmers market without standing at the foraged greens and ground cherry stall wondering what my cat Carrots is doing back at home.

Let me save you from the heartbreak caused by the withering look on your nephew’s face when you attempt to make small talk about anything invented in the last ten years: don’t.

I’m the kind of freak who’ll put twenty-seven hours’ worth of songs on a playlist, so if your party happens to go on for an entire day, you won’t have to listen to the same song twice.