Public Writing

just femme & dandy

When I enter a new city, I begin a ritual. I try to find a garment made there. The ritual is political, oriented toward history and survival. The wool suits and fur coats of a not-so-distant past in New Orleans and Baltimore offer vernacular affirmation to the evidence of a changing climate. The “Made in Memphis” and “Made in New York” tags offer ephemeral monuments to the unheralded laborer, migrant and immigrant alike.

Walking among us are people who have never been hurt; they are confident that they remain unhurt because they have taken care. (“Be careful!” they say, when we leave their company.) Meanwhile, many of us live hurt, live unprepared for future hurt. I am confident that I am living because no one wants me dead. And I call this optimism. 

Liberties

Perhaps it was not the “paranoid style” of the political right, but the “hermeneutic of suspicion” practiced by the academic left, that seized American tongues. The desire to flush out the enemy of concealed meaning generates martial language in scholarly writing.

Nine months before the election, my brother died what political scientists call “a death of despair” on the floor of a restaurant in Upstate South Carolina. On the six-month anniversary, Hurricane Helene devastated the region, and I found myself praying — for a reason I cannot articulate — that the restaurant, at least, would be spared the force of the wind and water. 

The Point

Academics are people who give land acknowledgments before driving home to gated communities, so they are evidently immune to embarrassment. 

Avidly

On big days, I reward myself. No more liquor; I’m not allergic to spirits, but an addict knows “how narrow is the margin between being lost and being saved.” Milestones include the final day of the semester. Birthdays. Landing in Beijing. The second dose of Pfizer. Enchanting conversations with beautiful men. Near my campus or on my afternoon walk, I am sure to find my guilty pleasure at CVS or a gas station. It is a stark white cake with black stripes I’ll elevate by calling “ganache.” It is neither chocolate nor vanilla. It is a Zebra Cake and, for all I know from reading the ingredients, made from zebra meat.