mirror

by: justice taddeo Yesterday, I couldn't stand to look at myself in the mirror. I couldn’t tell if things had always been this way or if I was having a dysphoric episode. I thought about it, though, lying in bed, in the 35-degree heat, wet with sweat and my fan blowing hot air at me.

I found myself filled with all this anger and no one to direct it at except hot people on TikTok.

In an effort to get myself out of this never-ending loop, I took some selfies. I thought I might post a good one online, get a little bit of attention and get over it. But it wasn’t working.

Instead, I texted a friend asking if he’d like to go for a drink, so I could do some real boots-on-the-ground journalism. 

Discussing it over a very mid espresso martini at a bar that had no business making espresso martinis but did have a lovely view overlooking the Eiffel Tower, we concluded that surely there were more worthwhile things to worry about.

I made a point to mention that I did in fact care about other things like war, the climate crisis or the fact that AI data centres are poisoning the waters, before continuing.

“But anyways,” I proclaimed semi-convincingly to my audience of one, “all my idols weren’t exactly known for their looks, you know? Lots of them were even sort of considered to be ugly in a way that I think forces you to dig deep inside, forces you to actually have to have a personality which ultimately made them who they are today… right?” 

The next morning, I wake up late and slightly hungover. I'm feeling a little too hot and a little too lonely. On my way to the bathroom, I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. The disdain for my own reflection is gone and is instead replaced with a million other little thoughts that I can't quite yet put my finger on.

I think to myself that I'll leave those for my morning pages, a habit I've picked up recently as some sort of pathetic attempt to find some structure in my mostly unstructured life.

I take a piss. I make a pot of coffee for my roommate and me. He's playing Lana Del Rey demos in the kitchen, and I pull out my pen and notebook and write down:

Thought it over. Fuck it. All I want to be is hot.

And then I go to the gym.