Category Archives: Notes & Scraps

When I was in high school, I just jabbered, jabbered, jabbered all the time to my grandmother, who tolerated the incessant talking and preaching.

Even at seventeen, when other girls were hanging out with their boyfriends, I would go talk to my group of girlfriends and then go bother my grandmother with stories about what had happened at our school, in our hometown, and in the news. (I didn’t spread gossip to my grandma, unless it was well-known/established gossip. Pregnancy speculation? No. Pregnancy confirmation? Yes.)

I didn’t bother any boys because I didn’t like any of the boys I went to high school with, even though many of them have grown up to be wonderful men and fathers.

It feels funny to say that – so often, men say things like wonderful women and mothers – so I’ll say it like that, for laughs.

Even now, I feel guilty. I wish I’d done more listening than talking — especially when it came to chatting with my grandmother, who had so many interesting stories to tell.

I’ll always wish I could do more listening.

I had a dream that an Internet celebrity of sorts — a hot guy from a reality show who subsequently gained a massive online following — went on Twitter and posted a screenshot of a text message exchange with his girlfriend.

None of these words were in the Bible. “I” and “dream,” maybe — but the rest of it is so … Chronically-Online American English. Yeeesh.

The hot celebrity posted screenshots of their little chat, where the girlfriend left a note inside the fridge that said something like, “If you eat the last of my barbecue, then you’ll need to buy me more by the end of the day! I don’t forget or forgive!”

I can’t remember his text in response, but he sent her something — and then she wrote two extremely funny, extremely witty replies. She was fast on her feet. She was funnier than he is.

Because this was a dream, I can’t remember what her messages said. I just remember that she sent two of them back-to-back, and that the second one built off of the first, and that she was actually pretty hilarious.

It made me wonder if, in real life, a dude who’s a celebrity — who earns his living by trying to be funny and entertaining— would feel threatened by dating a woman even funnier than he is.

Not to be all Carrie Bradshaw about it, but — I had to wonder. Men like to laugh at us, but do they like to laugh with us? Can a man appreciate a funny girl without getting jealous?

I’m the kind of person who’s had my senses dulled by the pandemic. I used to be fairly funny — and I feel like I honed my skills on Twitter. But between the pandemic and the decline/fall of the Twitter Empire, I feel like I never practice being funny anymore.

The only time I very intentionally try to be funny is when I submit a one-liner for the New Yorker caption contest. And even that has a (lame) element of forcing yourself to be a little more …

Not highbrow, but a little more witty than your fellow competitors. You don’t want to make an obvious joke, you know? You don’t go for the low-hanging fruit. You go for something with a little more wordplay.

Although, lately, I’ve been less than impressed with a lot of the finalists. Each week, it seems like there’s (at least) one cringe-y finalist.

But maybe I’m just bitter because I haven’t won.

I just … I remember a time when I was more funny. There was a time when my own posts made me laugh, a time when I wrote things so funny that I couldn’t believe that I wrote them. When I write posts on Bluesky or Threads, I feel like … well, like I’m being cringey. I try to write things to make the leftists on Bluesky laugh, to make the just-left-of-neoliberal Cool Moms on Threads laugh.

Occasionally, I’m rewarded with a like or a new follower. But I just haven’t rebounded — I haven’t found my sense of humor in a post-Twitter world.

By far, I’ve had more success making observational videos on TikTok and by writing observational-style “messays” (memoir essays that are only quasi-messy) over on Medium. I receive very kind and very sincere feedback on the things I post, and I appreciate all of the kindness people have shown to me.

But I sometimes worry that I will never write anything funny again. I feel like — even though I was never able to be quick-witted in person, verbally, etc., I could always post something funny online.

In 2024, I feel so … so slowhanded with my humor. I have to let a joke cook sous-vide style. So maybe I’m nervous that — should a man ever stoop to acknowledge me again — I won’t be a witty conversationalist. Maybe I’m scared than no man will ever laugh at our text exchanges, or ever feel moved to share them online.

Maybe that’s why I dreamed about this.

In the dream, I feel like the celebrity fella posted the texts because the girlfriend was extremely funny in that particular instance. She isn’t forced to perform all the time for him — I hope! — but she said something so funny that he knew he had to share it. He wasn’t jealous. He was thrilled.

I still felt a twinge of jealousy — not over him or her, but jealousy over the idea that I’ll probably never have a boyfriend who posts the hysterical things I write for him. It’s obviously just a me issue. I just need to try to practice being funny again.

And not for a random dude on the Internet. For me.

I need to tickle my own funny bone.

Here are some notes I took while I was listening to a podcast. The hosts talked about feeling unlikable, and it inspired me to process some of my own feelings.

• Most people like you more than you think they do, unless you’re truly atrociously-behaved. People might not love you, but they don’t actively think negative thoughts about you and/or despise you.

• I think people do talk about and judge some of us behind our backs — especially eccentric folks, like me. But that still doesn’t mean they hate your guts.

• I think just because they’re talking about you, it doesn’t mean that they hate you.

• In today’s world, where there are so many (open and avowed) racists, misogynists, transphobes, etc. — that there are so many people out there who are worse than your average, awkward-but-kindhearted twenty-something. So please don’t feel like you’re a despicable person if your biggest crime is being only a little bit socially awkward.

One night, I was feeling so upset — and so hopeless — that I asked to be sent back next time as someone different. I wanted to be a different person, in a different body, in a different life.

And then I realized that — given the choice — I just want to come back as me. The same person, the same body, the same life — but with more resources and a bigger safety net.

I’m happy with me, but I’m not happy with the world we live in.

I just want another chance to live my life in the exact same body — because it’s what I know. Because it’s what I’m used to. Because it’s a body I genuinely like. But I want to get a chance to live somewhere else — in a more comfortable place.

If that comfortable place is out there, I want to find it.