Ins & Outs

Goodbye to the old, in with the new.

Hello Folks,

Jumping on here with a surprise Saturday post on the last day of the year as I have seen many other newsletters putting forth their 2023 Ins and Outs and I simply must contribute to this discourse.

Without any further ado, here are the Good Folk Ins and Outs of 2022-2023.

IN:

• Local news

• College radio stations

• Buying books from small/indy/academic presses

• Solo road trips

• Flirting with everybody, everywhere

• Funky eyeliner for all genders

• Learning to identify plants

• Starting a newsletter

• 80s synth music

• Befriending everyone in your local coffee shop

• Going to concerts alone

• Getting lost in the woods

• Bathing in rivers/lakes

• Making breakfast for friends

• Trying a new sport (bonus points if it’s as an adult)

• Pottery classes

• Wearing your wildest fits to the grocery store

• Appreciating your hometown

• Dressing like a medieval poet

• Dressing like a 70s rockstar

• Non-alcoholic apéritifs

• Reading poetry every day

• Birkenstocks

• Supporting artists, especially local

• Mead

• Homemade wine

• Learning local history

• Hanging art from friends in your home

• Communal living situations

• Years-long flirtatious friendships with no expectations

• Dying your hair

• Listening exclusively to live versions of your favorite songs

• Learning to sew

• Making art

• Making love

• Realizing that you would not be who you are if it were not for the places that raised you

One of the many places that raised me.

OUT:

• Influencers making more money than artists

• Feeling bad for spending time alone

• Instagram

• Hating on rural places

• Assuming cool people only live in cities

• Talking badly about people behind their back

• Being afraid of love because you’re afraid of being hurt

• Fast fashion

• Romanticizing the grind

• Romanticizing small-town life

• Buying stuff you don’t need for validation

• Not going to things because you have no one to go with

• Brewery culture taking over entire towns

• Thinking a relationship will complete you

• Being afraid to tell someone you think they’re cool

• Hating on the South

• Horse carriages

• Apathy as a symbol of coolness

• Reality TV

• Not dressing how you want

• Not texting people back

• Stereotyping Appalachia

• Hating your hometown

• Being afraid of being cringe

• Not telling people how you feel

• Modern country music

• The “clean girl” aesthetic

• Placing expectations of hyper-masculinity on men

• Assuming gender and/or sexuality

• Never leaving the big city

• Not appreciating every moment of this weird & beautiful life

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“For last year’s words belong to last year’s language. / And next year’s words await another voice. / And to make an end is to make a beginning.”

— T.S. Eliot

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Love you. See you next year.