SHORT:
I do not know how the Pixar lamp doesn’t have arthritis of the knee. He has been jumping up and down for years now. Maybe he does have it and just doesn’t talk about it. I respect that. Keep the personal personal. I could learn a thing or two from that little lamp...
MEDIUM:
In 2018, my friend’s dad took me and some of my college friends to Iceland. It was awesome. We had a tour guide named Olaf who took us on a glacier and my friend’s boyfriend farted so badly we thought the glacier was going to melt. We also went snowmobiling and I flipped the snowmobile over and my friend Sarah went flying down the mountain. It was sort of like Game Of Thrones in that it was freezing and chaotic and we drank a lot. It was also not at all like Game Of Thrones because none of us had sex with our cousins and it ended well.
Also at the airport Sarah bought a smoothie and then a man with a full-blown didgeridoo ran into her and the smoothie went everywhere.
This is the only time I’ve seen a didgeridoo in real life.
LONG:
Something absolutely incredible about nets is that they have holes but still catch you. When I was younger, I went to trapeze camp where there was a huge net. There was also a huge ladder that we had to climb. I waited in line for the ladder with fellow campers and this kid (let’s call him Scott) who liked to unhook girl’s bras through the back of their shirts while we were waiting. Everyone was in love with Scott. I was not. I was in love with trapeze and Harry Potter.
When it came to trapeze, there was nothing quite like a “pullover shoot” or “straddle whip” to get the blood pumping. I’d wrap my legs around the bars, and at the “hep!” of my instructor, I’d let go and catch the hands of a giant muscly man on the adjacent bar. I was like Zendaya in The Greatest Showman but nowhere near as hot.
I also wasn’t actually that good or graceful (there’s a reason I won “most inspirational athlete” later that year at the swim banquet… “most inspirational” is basically the “you suck but are nice” award/ the “you are an uncoordinated Jew with the determination of 10 uncoordinated Jews” award).
I no longer do circus stuff, but, as Céline Sciamma once said: "a successful love story should not be about eternal possession... it should be about emancipation” and I really do think both trapeze and Harry Potter set me free in a way that I have yet to re-discover.
J.K. Rowling is a fucker, but she wrote some thick-ass books that I was able to shove my face into for long periods of time. For that I am thankful. Why’d she have to go and be a TERF? Ugh. As my girlfriend said the other day (about Anne Frank), “it’s so cruel how the lord giveth and the lord taken away.”
Also huge shoutout to one of my gf’s friends who didn’t know that Anne Frank died <3 Sort of a beautiful gap in knowledge <3
(Hey, we all have them, don’t ask me anything about the economy or like… math)
Is now a good time to mention that I googled Scott and he is currently married and used to work at The National Bobblehead Hall of Fame? I’m sure he still has a wonderful time unhooking bras through shirts (hopefully just his wife’s unless they’re in an open relationship).
Anyway. At the moment, I’m too twisted up in my own thoughts to metaphorically fling myself through the air or curl up with a wizard book and read for hours. A thrilling part of getting twisted up in your own thoughts is you start to think about how nothing is real. How even your own thoughts are constructed. And then you’re like ok if everything is constructed and fabricated and flimsy and full of holes, then what can I trust? Nothing, right?
I am trying to remind myself that even though nothing is certain, sometimes I gotta let thoughts and concepts be hole-y safety nets otherwise I’ll fall off my little brain-trapeze and die.
Did you like this? Did you hate this? How’s your 2021 going so far? I got drunk at midnight on NYE and posted two IGs of me and my girlfriend. Do I look MAGA in the photo at the top of this thing? Is it sort of powerfully subversive? Or bad? Respond and let me know.
-Meg
Social- @megspope@mpopetweets
Venmo- @mpope-venmo-26
Website- meganpopework.com
Donate to The Audre Lorde Project
Scandal Of The Week: I found out that Davina from Selling Sunset blocked me because of this photo.
Movie Of The Week: Never Rarely Sometimes Always
Obsession Of The Week: Veep. Over the course of the last week I have watched Veep Seasons 4/5/6 as well as every press interview they’ve ever done.
Thought Of The Week: Tony Hale best thing to happen to the world.
Conundrum Of The Week: I watched Drag Race for the first time in my life because there’s a trans boy on this season. Then I found out he’s friends with James Charles so not sure what to do with that info.
Meme Of The Week:
You thought you weren’t gonna get the trapeze pics but you were wrong:
Look at me and that net.
Definition of amore.
And last but not least…
here’s a picture of me and my siblings the year I won “most inspirational athlete” aka the You Suck award:
… at least I was jacked.