flâneur

#102: No worries if not - by Haley Nahman - Maybe Baby

haleynahman.substack.com · 1,469 words · saved by 4 readers

A couple months ago I learned something from a random internet thread that I’ve recounted to several people since. Today I finally decided to write about it! Last week I advised my sister to remove two exclamation points from a text message she was crafting. They made her seem happy that someone was flaking on her, I told her, and I thought it was okay if she seemed disappointed, which she was. This made her sweat. “But I don’t want him to think I’m upset,” she said. But you are, I replied. “But I don’t know if I have the right to be,” she said. “Maybe I wasn’t clear enough with him last week when we started the conversation.” We went on like this for a while, before compromising on one exclamation point and one period. We were laughing by then, because the entire exchange—ours, theirs—was overwrought and ridiculous. This is communication when you’re neurotic: icebergs of meaning lurking beneath quick turns of phrase or single exclamation points. My sister is a dyed-in-the-wool non-con

Good morning! A couple months ago I learned something from a random internet thread that I’ve recounted to several people since. Today I finally decided to write about it! Last week I advised my sister to remove two exclamation points from a text message she was crafting. They made her seem happy that someone was flaking on her, I told her, and I thought it was okay if she seemed disappointed, which she was. This made her sweat. “But I don’t want him to think I’m upset,” she said. But you are, I replied. “But I don’t know if I have the right to be,” she said. “Maybe I wasn’t clear enough…

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