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Short EssayS
Establishing a Ritual
How I water my plants
I can’t seem to water my plants correctly. There’s a small garden in the apartment where I live yet it seems to grow with no help of my own. The ones who survived the winter drought caused by my seasonal depression and general absentminded behavior were recently rewarded with repotting and soil zhuzhing as their prize for continuing to flourish without much more than the occasional leftovers of my forgotten nightly water.
This greenhouse that holds my bed has incredible light but some ladies get too crispy in direct sun and need to be shuffled around to discrete corners and shady nooks. This sudoku puzzle of getting all girls in the correct spot is an ongoing challenge and I can’t seem to get to the next level…
Restaurant Gossip
86'D
The best gossip is shocking, juicy, and has receipts. As a restaurant employee, I’ve seen and heard some wild stories but the tale I choose for today is a recent scandal and one that I felt could remain the most anonymous while providing accurate details.
I could talk about the time we all watched a jealous female chef lock the new hot hostess in the walkin after she unknowingly flirted with her boyfriend, who was another chef. (Don’t worry, we were all glued to the camera monitors, so were able to get her out of there pretty fast.) She did leave and never come back though…
Just Married: A Wedding Amongst Friends
A denim-on-denim event
Last weekend I attended a wedding of the times. Two of my best friends and pillars of love in this ever chaotic city got married and hosted a tasteful ceremony in the park. It was an all-denim wedding (yes, you read that correctly) with family and close friends. Catered by Taqueria 24th from the Mission, there was tequila, carnitas, and alfajores for dessert.
The bride wore a pastel yellow denim dress from ASOS with white Converse; the groom wore a patchwork blue jean jacket and matching bucket hat, white khakis, fitted black tank, and thrifted denim sandals. The mother of the groom officiated the wedding and the father of the bride cried…
My friend and I look Nothing A like
A case of false mistaken identity
A skater at the back of a bar started talking to me amongst the neon lights as if we’ve met before. I knew he didn’t know me because he was notorious in the scene and I would have remembered this type of chance encounter.
How did he know who I was? Was he dehydrated from a day of bombing hills and refueling with Bud Light?
Half way through a confusing conversation I realized he did know me. Rather, he knew the person he thought he was talking to, which was my friend Jane. She was a few feet away ordering our drinks. She did know him and also knew he didn’t know me. She walked over and he asked if we were sisters.
A surprising question since we look nothing a like…
A literary analysis of porn
Porn Carnival by Rachel Rabbit White is a debut anthology published in 2019 by Wonder Press. White’s public persona mirrors her poetry; it’s decadent, refreshing, and open. Her aesthetic lies somewhere between Lana Del Rey’s Ultraviolence period, 70’s porn, Marylin, and vintage Playboy glamour. Emerging onto the literati scene with new work and a growing social media presence of 13K Twitter followers and 15K Instagram followers as of March 2021, White is a former sex worker and self-described “poet & pious bride / formerly known as the ‘hooker laureate of the dirtbag left’.” The pious groom of this couple is Cherry novelist Nico Walker, who White claims to have married as “part of a bit.”
I can't help but wonder
I can't help but wonder
“I Can’t Help But Wonder” is an essay series inspired by Sex and the City to answer all
92 questions Carrie Bradshaw presents throughout the show. The dated cult classic first aired in 1998 and the advice and conversation around these questions has (hopefully) changed a bit since the inception of the show.
Using the knowledge of today, let’s reinterpret these questions and answer them with a more modern perspective.
The Adventures of Cliff and WY
A play about Cliff and Wy, two lovers who live together and steel together.
Fiction
Garette and Henery
A Pop Princess and her Boy Band Bad Boy
Garette woke up hungover on the couch from the night before. Her album debut party last night was one of the few times a year she allowed herself to overindulge in public. Ever since the paparazzi scandal two years ago, which happened to be perfect fodder for a few songs off the new record, she swore never to do it again. Now she just drinks in bed alone. Problem solved.
Her hair matted to the side of her face, her once flowing dress now wrinkled into angular oblivion, make-up crusted over her lashes, shoes still on—she surveyed the room.
Henry was asleep on a chair across from her. Her agent Amilia invited him to the party without asking and somehow he managed to make it back to her house. She forgot to tell Amilia that they actually broke up for real this time. Frankly, she was surprised he even accepted the invitation, but then again, he didn’t need to be convinced to show up anywhere with cameras.
Looking at him now, she could hear a new melody forming around his perfectly fitted suit and soft lips as he dozed on. Garette grabbed her phone and wrote down a few lines in her notes. Not half bad. Why is it so much easier to perform your feelings to a million strangers than to tell the person who needs to hear them the most?
Henry stirred and she walked into the other room to not wake him. Amilia had called about eight times already and it was barely 9:30 am.
Photos were up and apparently journalists had nothing better to do than write endless articles about her recent surgeries, Henry’s fights with the other bandmates, their separation, the star-studded guest list from last night, and the general chaos of their lives. Yet, there wasn’t much talk about the actual substance of the album, only that it existed and it was was another pop record. People would buy it, but just to learn about her deepest secrets to use them as kindling for their gossip blogs—not as true fans of music bothering to look into the complexities of her compositions. Henry’s recent single had flopped on the charts, but fans came out by the thousands to protest the industry trying to cover up his great artistic abilities—or so they say. He sells nothing and is labeled genius, while her masterpieces get platinum plaques. Yet they’re seen as a sideshow to the real attraction: the dismantling of her personal life….
The Perfect Date
Not too hot and not too cold
It’s April 25th and all I need is a light jacket. A breeze plays at the hem of my dress while I wait outside my apartment for you to pick me up. Our hands intertwine as you drive us to nowhere. There’s a bottle of Barolo in the back that you fumble with when opening. We sip and discuss our childhoods, tell jokes, and debate the best and worst authors. My nose turns up at the mention of David Foster Wallace. Why must I keep fucking people who worship this pseudo tennis professional? Laid out in a field, you remove my boots so our soles can touch and feel the earth. Irises prelude action as we inch closer in anticipation. Only the eyes of trees and the music of birds watch us give in. The grass beneath us presses deeper and deeper into the dirt until it can’t take it anymore and crumbles under the weight of us. Back at your apartment, I beg for something juicy to really sink my teeth into so you sear pork chops and saute potatoes to satisfy me. Joints are smoked, wine is drank, food is deliciously consumed. After, we bathe in the moonlight pooling in from your bedroom window. I lay in your lap as though it is the only home I know. You read poetry out loud and stroke my hair, caressing the wave of my body. We both fall asleep hoping this lasts forever, knowing it probably won’t…
What holds you tight
Grasping anything
Anxiety is pretty up there. Clutching me so tight I used to think it was a hug.
A small margin of pressure makes a categorical difference between an embrace and restraint.
People who didn’t know my name, jobs that didn’t value my work, fear that lived in my head; all held me too tight.
Replaying wrong words, faults and mistakes, bad choices got cozy; all held me too tight.
Money, or lack there of, keeps a grip on me like a parent holding their toddler near a busy intersection. Movement making me more paralyzed. Fearing an unsynchronized moment.
Like a bee snoozed by smoke, cigarettes hold me tight. The grip rubs the worst because it’s self-inflicted.
I buy the pack, I pull one out, I tap it on the counter, I find the lighter, I put the flame to its tip, I take a deep inhale, I puff two times, I exhale through taut lips, and I do it all over again until I stomp it out.
Self-sufficient self-inflicted self-indulgence.
Maybe I’d feel less guilty if I could blame this nasty ritual on someone else but I have the control to stop and I don’t.
I’ve paused a few times but always seem to pick it back up.
Recently, finally, I have seemed to kick them away for now.
Holding myself tight to the identity of a smoker. It gives me something to do with my hands and my mouth.
Idle but not ideal.
Held tight to this cycle of wanting better and doing the same. Insanity some call it.
Or maybe the saying is doing the same and expecting something different. Insanity defined.
I know what will happen but I hope it doesn’t. I know I’ll crave that stupid compressed roll of chopped leaves wrapped in paper but I hope I won’t. I’ll smoke another and hope it tastes bad but it doesn’t. Holding onto the bliss before seeing my stained teeth and feeling that pinching headache. How good it feels before I actually feel it.
The idea of it. So comforting. Like a hug, holding you tight.