A ROUND THE one-year mark of the pandemic, my mother and sister and I began litigating who was missing out on more, from an important life-experience perspective. My sister was 24 when the whole thing started, so I nominated her. She didn't yet have a proper friend group set up in her city, and she hadn't had a chance to establish herself at work-neither of which seemed likely to happen from the living room. My mom was missing 57, which didn't seem horrible, but, as she said, every year counts.
We agreed I probably was faring the best. I was 27. I'd lived with my boyfriend for more than a year in an apartment beneath a close friend's. We didn't have children. In fact, I'd often sit on Zoom from my kitchen and watch my parent-colleagues less and less gently herd their toddlers offscreen and think, God, if there ever was the right time in my life for a global pandemic to strike, this would be it.
Three years and more than half a dozen variants later, I began to reconsider. Reemerged, I found strangers and friends alike were exceedingly curious about various new topics like, Did I happen to know a wedding venue in Brooklyn suitable for 150? And did I think I'd ever consider moving outside the city? Seven times in a two-month period, I was asked if I'd be freezing my eggs. All of which seemed strange, because-well, I hadn't yet realized I'd turned 30.
That COVID warped our perception of time is well established studies show that stressful experiences tend to make it feel unclear how much time is passing, especially when one is confined to one's home for months on end. It felt fast, it felt slow, it's now hard to remember at all. With some time and space from that urgent, panicked period (did that happen yesterday or the day before? How long has it been since I've seen another person?), some new questions have started to come up. Like, if we slept through three years of normal life development, how old are we exactly?
Denne historien er fra September 11 - 24, 2023-utgaven av New York magazine.
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Denne historien er fra September 11 - 24, 2023-utgaven av New York magazine.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Early and Often: David Freedlander - Momentum vs. Machine The Trump and Harris campaigns battle it out for every last vote.
WIth two weeks left to go, the contours of the 2024 presidential election are clear: Both campaigns need voters who usually don’t vote, and Kamala Harris needs to bring the Democratic coalition, including its Trump-curious members, back home.While the Republican side plans to spend the remaining days of the contest trying to lure low-propensity voters to the polls, the Harris team will attempt to persuade voters of color to return to its side and will try to increase numbers among white voters in previously red suburbs.
Drowning in Slop - A thriving underground economy is clogging the internet with AI garbage-and it's only going to get worse.
SLOP started seeping into Neil Clarke's life in late 2022. Something strange was happening at Clarkesworld, the magazine. Clarke had founded in 2006 and built into a pillar of the world of speculative fiction. Submissions were increasing rapidly, but “there was something off about them,” he told me recently. He summarized a typical example: “Usually, it begins with the phrase ‘In the year 2250-something’ and then it goes on to say the Earth’s environment is in collapse and there are only three scientists who can save us. Then it describes them in great detail, each one with its own paragraph. And then—they’ve solved it! You know, it skips a major plot element, and the final scene is a celebration out of the ending of Star Wars.” Clarke said he had received “dozens of this story in various incarnations.”
The City Politic- The Other Eric Adams Scandal The NYPD shot a fare evader, a cop, and two bystanders. He defends it.
On Sunday, September 15, Derell Mickles hopped a turnstile, got asked to leave by cops, then entered the subway again ten minutes later through an emergency exit. This was at the Sutter Avenue L station, out by his mother's house, five stops from the end of the line. Police said they noticed he was holding a folded knife. They followed him up the stairs to the elevated train, asking him 38 times to drop the weapon.
Can the Media Survive?
BIG TECH, Feckless Owners, CORD-CUTTERS, RESTIVE STAFF, Smaller Audiences ... and the Return of PRINT?
Status Update
Hannah Gadsby's fascinatingly untidy tour through life after fame and death.
A Matter of Perspective
A Matter of Perspective Steve McQueen's worst film is still a solid WWII drama.
Creator, Destroyer
A retrospective reveals an architect's vision, optimism, and supreme arrogance.
In Praise of Bad Readers
In a time of war, there is a danger in surveying the world as if it were a novel.
Trust the Kieran Culkin Process
First, he nearly dropped out of Oscar hopeful A Real Pain. Then he convinced Jesse Eisenberg to change the way he directs.
The Funniest Vampires on TV
What We Do in the Shadows is coming to an end. Its idiosyncratic brand of comedy may be too.
