I could die without regretting that I never did the following things

Tweet

Own a gun

Listen to a Joe Rogan podcast

TikTok

Go camping

Listen to a Taylor Swift album

Engage with anyone in the Kardashian or Jenner families at any level, in any capacity, or devote more than a stray, involuntary thought to any of them

Invest in cryptocurrency

Knowingly be influenced by an influencer

Eat cauliflower cleverly disguised as or substituted for a much better food

Take Libertarian ideas seriously

Go to a Billie Eilish concert

Get baited or taunted into eating excessively hot food

Get baited or taunted into competing to win something I don’t care about

Sit through Joker

Eat a stuffed pepper

Read any more Charles Dickens

Feel actual guilt when indulging in a guilty pleasure

Eat an insect

Lead a conga line

Care what people think of my weight

Run with the bulls in Spain

Go ice fishing

Visit the reptile house

 

Excuse Me

Hey, I’m just going to push my way in here for a second while you’re busy doing something. Doesn’t matter what that “something” is. You could be making dinner or folding laundry or having your purchases rung up by a cashier or reaching for an item on a shelf or fixing something. I’m just going to insert myself between you and the thing you were already working on. Will only take a second.

 

And I’m just going to do it again a few more times while you’re busy with the same thing. I’m going to reach in front of you, walk across your path, grab something in front of your face, interrupt you when you’re doing something. Just a few more times and I’ll be out of your hair. It’s because I forgot something/dropped something/lost something/just can’t wait my turn. You can accommodate my lack of preparation/patience/consideration.

 

Not that I need to explain anything. Because I’ll just be a second. I’m just going to barge into your space and grasp and push and usurp and do whatever I need. Don’t mind me! I certainly don’t mind you.

 

Hey, just let me force my way in here again. I’m technically asking but you’ll notice the tone of my question is rhetorical, because I’m already pushing in before I finish asking. So we’ll never know whether or not you’d agree. I’m just going to use my too-big-to-fail personality to dominate your space in small but insidious ways; to steamroll people who are less assertive than me, then act like they’re “just being stubborn” when they’re only standing up for themselves like I stand up for myself. I’ll just be disruptive for a few seconds, then leave you alone until the next time I disrupt you.

 

… What do you mean, “no”? Oh, lighten up. Life’s too short for you to get all huffy about people who push themselves in front of you, and it’s certainly too short for me to pass up an opportunity to push my way in front of people without asking.

But we're in love

So, you see, it would not be fair or reasonable to ask us to stop holding hands for a few seconds and walk single file so someone approaching us can share this sidewalk and not have to step off and walk in the busy street beside it. We are in love, and we’re just going to continue in our blissful reverie, side by side and taking up the width of this sidewalk.

 

I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to step out onto the very narrow shoulder and risk getting hit by a car. There is nothing we can do for you.

 

For how could we be separated even for a moment as we walk hand in hand? We love each other. See how as we walk, we are sort of folding into one another? It’s almost as if we were one person. Asking us to break formation to walk single file—even for a moment—would be a crime against Love.

 

Maybe you don’t understand that if you’re just walking down the sidewalk alone, without anyone to share the experience with. You’ll just have to step aside when couples come along. Walk through the dirty water that runs into the gutter and let us pass. 

 

As we walk, we talk in hushed, intimate tones. I cannot miss a moment of my lover’s conversation. For we are planning a future of love together. To ask us to detach to accommodate the needs of someone who isn’t us would break the spell of love. It would risk our gossamer dream tearing in two. Even if we were to detach and reform our positions milliseconds later, it would never be the same. Something in us would have died.

 

So don’t even try to be bold enough to walk down the right side of the sidewalk without stepping completely out of our way. You will only be met with our perplexed and outraged stares as we absorb your unmitigated gall and look at you like you have three heads. Our love is big enough to take up two lanes and we cannot be expected to make the sacrifice of walking in momentary single file.

 

You’re just going to have to clear the way and take your chances in traffic. For we are in love, and all those little examples of common courtesy and consideration suddenly seem very far away, drowned out by the perfection of our reverie.