Chelsea Fagan

Ladies, we all know men are hard to figure out. They are a constantly shifting puzzle, 10,000 pieces, all sky. Perpetually finding new ways to obfuscate their thoughts and subvert their emotions into complicated interpretive dance–it is left to us to pick up the scraps and rearrange them in a pattern we can understand.

We live in a fast time. Things stop being cool or relevant the second you finish typing them and hit “enter,” and grown-ass adults dedicate entire careers to keeping up with what is cool by doggedly sifting through social media websites. Trends have the shelf-life of egg salad at a summer picnic, and it’s hard to even tell what the kids are doing these days…

It should be established, first and foremost, that I believe in marriage. The religious aspect of it (obviously) means nothing to me or my loved ones, but I believe in the concept and the beautifully hopeful idea of it. I want more than just a long-term relationship; I want the joining of families and the carrying of last names and the ring-groove on my third finger that will never go away.

Hearing snippets of anecdotes about beer-bonging jungle juice or sleeping with two girls in the same night, one unbeknown to the other, confirmed to me that the American Pie-style high school experience did, in fact, exist – just not for me or anyone I knew. There was fun to be had here, I just wasn’t invited to it.

I know it may not seem that way, because you are tapping letters on an electronic typewriter into a buzzing screen that has so many words on it, but you are actually communicating with people. Just like all of those people you no doubt keep in touch with on your WWE and Paula Deen forums, your Facebook friends can actually read what you write, as well.

I was sitting in a cafe today and was about to order a coffee, and I saw these two girls a few tables over, laughing and smiling and touching each other’s shoulders when they said something particularly witty. I thought of you, and I ordered a tea instead.

He’s revealed himself as some sort of sexual demigod, capable of being modest, funny, charming and face-meltingly handsome at the same time, all while speaking French while we had our backs turned. You could practically feel the internet become a little… humid… as women (and gay men) passed the video fervently amongst each other, sharing the glory.

And please, please avoid taking photobooth pictures of yourself and captioning them with some variation on how unfortunate you look. That picture had 84 outtakes, you chose the most casually flattering, you know you look good.

People see me, see my veiny, pulsing forehead, almost bursting at the seams with knowledge and cunning that they will never possess and they immediately do everything in their limited power to make me suffer for my gifts.

Translated into countless languages, their songs are perhaps the most effective at getting their points across. Catchy, easy to remember, beautifully crafted–they are the perfect vehicle for any feel-good mantra.

And it’s so gently unsettling that now, for the first time in human history, we have this funny, innocent little peephole into the lives of others. An acquaintance, an old flame, in any other period of history, would have faded away just as quickly as they came–now, they are here indefinitely. They linger on the bottom of our screens, they pop up in our news feeds, they are still here.

Thank you for letting the zoosexual who called in have a good thirty minutes to honestly explain his situation, and not allowing your producer and phone screener to come in and verbally abuse him. Thank you for getting what he had to say out there, even if we don’t like to hear it. Thank you for making Loveline a place where people could have an honest discussion about things, where everyone gets a voice.

For the fourth time in my life last night, I was present for an extremely public, ornately orchestrated marriage proposal. It was sickeningly sweet, like a Peep covered in powdered sugar and rolled in Pop Rocks. Something about it was so…forced.

Food, especially in conversations like this, is often compared with sex–and rightfully so. Like sex, it is something that ties us together as humans and is a collective itch we all must scratch. We take immense pleasure from these things because, if done right, they not only fill their base requirements but stimulate the very colors of life itself.

Either way, I’ve enjoyed my single life here and never really felt any overwhelming pressure to find a boyfriend. It wasn’t until a few solid weeks of encouragement and guarantees that this guy was Prince Charming incarnate that I agreed to the date. My friend assured me many times that I met this guy once at a house party, something I still contest (much more vigorously after having met him).

And this is it, you think, in much the way someone feels when they solve for X in a particularly difficult equation–this is infatuation. That satisfying, fulfilling locking into place of an answer that is so simple and yet somehow takes so long to reach.

If nothing refreshes Europeans more on a humid, 85-degree day than a flat, lukewarm glass of Coke, by all means, they should drink it. We differ on many things, and I don’t begrudge them Peugeots, why would I take issue with their soft drink temperature?

1. Chloe Sevigny – First things first, hats off to anyone willing to give Vincent Gallo a beej in an already terrible movie. That girl is a trooper of the highest order, and deserves that respect. That being said, I’ve always been perplexed at the amount of undying respect and love she seems to get from the “artsy” crowd for being, at best, a mediocre actress.