Read Online The History of Great Things by Elizabeth Crane - Free Book Online
Authors: Elizabeth Crane
love, honor, and obey, and hope the future takes care of itself.
To New Friends
Y ouâre at college for all of three weeks before you meet the guy you decide is the one to give it up for. Itâs the fall of 1979, just pre-AIDS. Or, well, not pre-AIDS, preâpeople knowing about AIDS. Christ, I hope you donât have AIDS.
âMom, I think you would have known if I had AIDS.
âWell, I wouldnât have wanted to.
âI donât think I even know what that means.
âOkay, whatever, you donât have AIDS, itâs fine.
The point is, no one is thinking thing one about condoms at this point. Or youâre not. Getting pregnant and/or contracting herpes are the worst possible outcomes you personally can imagine, but after four or five spritzers you are not thinking about either of these things, much less a fatal disease that hasnât yet been discovered.
âSpritzers? You think I drank spritzers?
âNo?
âSpritzers kind of make me sick just to think about.
âOkay, Scotch neat.
â . . .
âSo let me get this right, youâre worried about me getting your drink of choice right, but not so much about getting pregnant, herpes, or AIDS.
â . . .
Once youâve had enough tequila shots, you start flirting with Steven, the guy down the hall youâve got a crush on. These tequila shots also go a long way toward helping you forget that heâs recently been dating one of your roommates, or at least move you in the direction of convincing yourself heâs fair game at this point. Heâs cute, much cuter than the boys back home, longish wavy brown hair, twinkly eyes, like a Jewish Warren Beatty, and heâs maybe a little bit funny: he asks you if heaven is missing an angel and youâre about to say to him Seriously? but then he says Just wondering, I mean, if an angel goes missing, would anyone even notice? You giggle, but maybe thatâs only because youâve had the necessary number of additional tequila shots for this to seem like it means something even though itâs really just absurd. Either way. Tonight, your dreams of romance are elsewhere. Youâre going to get this out of the way. Youâre already too drunk to notice that his jeans are ironed with a crease in the front, because this could otherwise be a problem. (Any time a manâs jeans are overthought is justifiable pause for consideration as far as youâre concerned, which is the opposite of what makes sense to most people, but you will stand by this in perpetuity.) Time has a way of morphing when you drink, so that your seven-and-a-half-minute conversation (covering the half block from Whatâs your major to Where are you from to Do you know so-and-so ) becomes sufficient even though most of these questionslead to conversational dead ends. ( English to marketing nearly puts the kibosh on the whole operation right there. You have no idea what marketing even is.)
You overlook: That everyone you know sees you leaving the bar together. That you can see them whispering to each other. Not cool . That you hadnât planned for the steady and rapid loss of your buzz on the six-block walk back. That thereâs not much more to say on the way back to the dorm than there was after heâd said marketing . After a long block of silence, you say So, marketing, what is that, exactly? I guess the easiest way to say it is that itâs about how to sell things. Itâs not that interesting. So why are you majoring in it? I dunno, what else would I major in? Something that does interest you? Iâm not really interested in anything. This is a sentence youâre sure youâve never heard before. Where does the conversation go from here? Who isnât interested in something? What could that even mean? What goes on in the head of a person who isnât interested in something? Nothing? You may not know what matters to you, but at least you know what interests
To New Friends
Y ouâre at college for all of three weeks before you meet the guy you decide is the one to give it up for. Itâs the fall of 1979, just pre-AIDS. Or, well, not pre-AIDS, preâpeople knowing about AIDS. Christ, I hope you donât have AIDS.
âMom, I think you would have known if I had AIDS.
âWell, I wouldnât have wanted to.
âI donât think I even know what that means.
âOkay, whatever, you donât have AIDS, itâs fine.
The point is, no one is thinking thing one about condoms at this point. Or youâre not. Getting pregnant and/or contracting herpes are the worst possible outcomes you personally can imagine, but after four or five spritzers you are not thinking about either of these things, much less a fatal disease that hasnât yet been discovered.
âSpritzers? You think I drank spritzers?
âNo?
âSpritzers kind of make me sick just to think about.
âOkay, Scotch neat.
â . . .
âSo let me get this right, youâre worried about me getting your drink of choice right, but not so much about getting pregnant, herpes, or AIDS.
â . . .
Once youâve had enough tequila shots, you start flirting with Steven, the guy down the hall youâve got a crush on. These tequila shots also go a long way toward helping you forget that heâs recently been dating one of your roommates, or at least move you in the direction of convincing yourself heâs fair game at this point. Heâs cute, much cuter than the boys back home, longish wavy brown hair, twinkly eyes, like a Jewish Warren Beatty, and heâs maybe a little bit funny: he asks you if heaven is missing an angel and youâre about to say to him Seriously? but then he says Just wondering, I mean, if an angel goes missing, would anyone even notice? You giggle, but maybe thatâs only because youâve had the necessary number of additional tequila shots for this to seem like it means something even though itâs really just absurd. Either way. Tonight, your dreams of romance are elsewhere. Youâre going to get this out of the way. Youâre already too drunk to notice that his jeans are ironed with a crease in the front, because this could otherwise be a problem. (Any time a manâs jeans are overthought is justifiable pause for consideration as far as youâre concerned, which is the opposite of what makes sense to most people, but you will stand by this in perpetuity.) Time has a way of morphing when you drink, so that your seven-and-a-half-minute conversation (covering the half block from Whatâs your major to Where are you from to Do you know so-and-so ) becomes sufficient even though most of these questionslead to conversational dead ends. ( English to marketing nearly puts the kibosh on the whole operation right there. You have no idea what marketing even is.)
You overlook: That everyone you know sees you leaving the bar together. That you can see them whispering to each other. Not cool . That you hadnât planned for the steady and rapid loss of your buzz on the six-block walk back. That thereâs not much more to say on the way back to the dorm than there was after heâd said marketing . After a long block of silence, you say So, marketing, what is that, exactly? I guess the easiest way to say it is that itâs about how to sell things. Itâs not that interesting. So why are you majoring in it? I dunno, what else would I major in? Something that does interest you? Iâm not really interested in anything. This is a sentence youâre sure youâve never heard before. Where does the conversation go from here? Who isnât interested in something? What could that even mean? What goes on in the head of a person who isnât interested in something? Nothing? You may not know what matters to you, but at least you know what interests
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