Chelsea Fagan

When we think about long-distance relationships, what do we think of? Probably two lovers who’ve been separated by school, work, or some other inconvenience and breathlessly await the few visits they’re granted every now and again.

It would be nice if we praised people for their ugliness — and called it what it was — because to slap some makeup on them for a photoshoot and make them passably attractive in order to celebrate their other accomplishments is ridiculous.

You want to be able to look back on it fondly and visit it often, but at least at this point in your life, you don’t want it to define you — and it does. The fact that you’re still there means you missed out on something, and no one knows that better than you do.

Similar to the Taylor Swift school of “you’re only as good as your totally awesome virginity,” there exists this theory in rom coms that women are essentially passive ducks waiting to be tossed a few decent-sized bread crumbs (in the form of romantic attention).

From dawn until dusk, the kids of that show just ran around what appeared to be Harlem, or one of Brooklyn’s less artisan cheese shop-filled neighborhoods, with complete impunity.

Tumblr is the black hole of all things socialization, and there is no such thing as “recreational use.” You will be blessed with all the Dr. Who and Supernatural screenshots you could ever dream of, but you will pay with your soul.

There is OCD-Riddled Parental Figure/Full-Time Party Pooper, who will basically spend all of his/her time telling you to turn music down, yelling at you to clean up after yourself, asking that you not invite people over, reminding you that it is a weeknight, and cleaning up around you while making exasperated sighs.

I’m like the emotional equivalent of the homeless man leering at breasts in the corner of the bus while swigging from a bottle of whiskey. “Yeah, that’s right, I bet you’re goal-oriented but caring. I bet you’d make a great father. Oh, yeah.”

If you can poke a pointy thing through a soft thing a few times in a row (heh), you already know how to use a needle and thread. Watch an instructional video, read a guidebook, find any old lady on the street — learning how couldn’t be easier.

“It’s me,” we think, “if I lived in 60’s Manhattan and had limitless access to workplace booze and bored housewife panties.” But what does your favorite character actually say about you — the real you, living in boring old 2012?

In order to bag a Princess/live happily ever after/be a hero, princes have to be: ripped, two weeks away from coming into their inheritance, live in a castle, and have a face like looking directly at an orgasm.

But let’s be honest — it’s kind of weird. Most ASMR-ers are in the closet about this, because how in the world would you interject it into a conversation?

Getting a beer with someone after work hours is something you propose because it seems appropriate, because it’s simply what you do. So what if the conversation’s tedious? So what if you have nothing in common? This is what adults do, right?

There are few things worse than realizing, the second it’s too late to go back and change, that your outfit looks like something your grandmother would have dressed you in as a child, shortly after her cataract surgery.

I mean, let’s be honest, out of a hundred hipsters that refer to themselves as “photographers” and have Tumblrs full of pictures of homeless peoples’ shoes, a maximum of three of them have ever actually sold a piece, let alone at a decent price.

Here, in no particular order, the wordsmiths and their craft that should probably not get their rapper license renewed this year.

Going out to dinner and having everything and nothing to talk about, never running out of something to add (but perfectly comfortable with shutting up and pigging out when the food comes), that is love. What we have — what we have always had — that is love.

This weekend, when one of your friends texts you with promises of glory, of true love, and the possibility of dollar domestics — you say no. You say no, you gather up the scraps of your dignity, and you order a pizza.