The May 21 Round-Up, Millennial Edition
Jordan teaches us some Spanish and Patrick teaches us some Chinese.
Hi Friends,
Apologies for the one-day delay in sending out our links round-up. Our editrix was by laid up by her second Moderna vaccine and her advanced Millennial age.
As some members of this in-between generation, we think we should put it to a vote before we settle on geriatric millennial. Just, no. You can call me that after you pry my avocado toast out of my cold, dead hands.
Speaking of geriatric millennials, apparently we can be grandparents now? Regardless, we’re still a generation not following the regular adult milestones, either by choice or by circumstances.
And as the first generation to be somewhat formed by Microsoft and its wingdings and ClipArt (what happened to Word Perfect, amirite?), we’re following this weirdly developing story about Bill Gates. Billionaire, bad.
Finally, it’s time to break out your velour jogging suits, chunky highlights, and aviator shades because Bennifer, back? It’s like 2002 all over again.
All this J.Lo talk is making us hum “I’m Real.” But are you…Wheel? If you are, tell your friends!
On the blog this week…
Death in a Call Center
In Colombia, where I live, one of the worst words you can call someone is a malparido, which literally means “miscarried” or aborted. It’s a disgusting word and like most words we use to curse each other, it draws its power from misogyny and hatred. Here are the two times I’ve used it.
On a Friday evening I was waiting for a phone call from the real estate agency to confirm that I would be able to move into my new apartment on Monday. I received the call while I was in a meeting and told them to call later. I didn’t hear back for several hours so I called the number for the agency which took me to a call center. The first time I spoke to a representative, they told me to expect a call within the hour. The second time I called an hour later, they told me that they’d flag me as a priority. The third and fourth times I called, two hours apart, they told me to expect a call within the hour. Then I received two phone calls from the agency, both of which I picked up and both of which were dropped. The fifth and sixth time I called, a machine informed me that working hours were Monday through Friday from 8 until 5:30. It was 5:45.
2019 June 26
A day in the country
I’m in the backseat, riding through the winding countryside of northern Hubei, pressing my forehead up against the cold, tinted window. The sun glimmers in its mid-summer perch. Browned peaches from crooked trees nearby squelch beneath our tires. Beyond the gravelly half-paved road, out in the rolling fields, bamboo culms crowd around sesame sprouts. Grapevines creep over melon patches. This doesn’t look like farmland.
There are no clean lines or straight paths, no phalanxes of uniform crops or tracks of heavy machinery; the land here is vast and lush but pre-industrial, remote in distance and decades. And unlike the last few weeks of our jaunt through the Middle Kingdom, there are no tourists in these parts. There are no storefronts, no traffic signs. The only visitors here are family.
For years, my mother would tell my sister and me about how she lived out in the country; how she would wake up before dawn and walk three hours to school; how she used to read and do her homework by candlelight. The peasant girl she paints is a far cry from the woman I know now—a pathologist and bible study leader who lounges in a leather recliner by the fireplace, scrolling on her iPad. Now though, she is in my uncle’s scraggly van ahead of us, sputtering through hills that she hasn’t stalked in a long time.
Welp, we’ve got to go—gotta figure out whether to ford the river or caulk the wagon! Have a great weekend and get ready for some more great reads on Monday.