Some questions for the nosy and misguided, in case you, too, want to feel like a reporter for a shittier version of Us Weekly…
- Is her Juicy tracksuit real or an Aliexpress dupe that spells “juicy” as juucY with an uppercase Y?
- Does she wear the same $70 Costco frames my mom wears because our feral little white dog has chewed through three insurance pairs already?
- Are at least four of her acrylics broken at any given point?
- See further: does she work for a local landscaping company on the weekends?
- Did she once seriously say she’d vote for Nikki Haley? Does she really hate unions? (Two different and related problems.)
- Does she carry her books in a Longchamp bag that looks like it’s been through three world wars and the
BeatnicBaja’s dishwasher? - While locked in one of the Granoff classrooms/gray boxes/projection labs to work on whatever third grade art project is happening in Lindemann this week, have you seen her walk into Heng Thai more than three times in as many days?
- Does she sell her clothes on the Main Green when the weather is over 45 degrees and try to charge you fifty dollars, like you can just refinance a mortgage for a cable sweater that probably came from her mother’s closet?
- Did she go to a boarding school in the New Hampshire with a name that sounds like it could be a Confederate monument somewhere in Jacksonville, Florida?
- Did Mystery Seminar Girl (who’s name I don’t know, even though it’s a ten person class, and now it’s been too long for me to ask without it being awkward) find those sneakers in one of those midwestern Goodwill x Costco Warehouse outlets where Instagram thrifters try on clothes without washing them first? The ones with the massive bins and funeral home lighting?
- Did she inherit them from a sibling who has since left home for the Big City to pursue a nonexistent career in cable commercial acting?
- Are my attempts at class extrapolation an unhealthy reflection of the bullying I endured throughout middle school for wearing the wrong brand of jeans to Ms. Giaconne’s seventh grade pre-algebra class?
- Again, see further: when did American Eagle Jeans stop being cool? And when did Abercrombie become business casual?
You still can’t figure it out? Neither can I. And maybe that’s the way it will always be, because it’s October already and at this point it’s my fault. When will the IRS start putting out public data sheets? That would be helpful.
(Also where do I find these Goodwill bins? I want 2008 Jordans now.)
Graphic by Lucinda Drake