coolest self
We meet at a cafe, my favorite in Seoul, our laptops set up diagonally from each other, under the pretense of working together but taking breaks frequently to chat and share a plate of fries. Books and records line the walls alongside grainy portraits of Korean and European thinkers. It's messy in a way that I like; unconscious of its aesthetic. After both clocking out after a reasonable amount of time, we decide to take a taxi back to mine. I had tidied recently and gone grocery shopping. While I do a sink full of dishes, she examines the contents of my fridge and starts making pasta. With a rare perfectly ripe avocado and the luxurious head of butter lettuce I had picked up on a whim, we have a side salad.
Our conversation veers into my singleness and the wedding she is planning for next year. Her one lament is not dating more women before marrying the love of her life, a man. "...because my coolest self has a wife," she says. This makes me laugh. I want to know more about her Coolest Self, her self more realized, unbound by fear or resources, a few years into the future. She mentions her music she would tour around the world—even more than she does now with her band. Home is a farm, where she looks after animals and rides horses. She continues describing herself, someone familiar to me coming into focus.
I write full time. I toggle between whether I live in an apartment in a major city like I have for most of my life or a one-story ranch by the sea. If not both, the latter probably, because since before I had a driver's license I've imagined myself driving a red Jeep Wrangler with a trunk full of running and camping gear, ready to run off somewhere, anytime. Or maybe a Subaru Outback? At this, she laughs and says: I totally see that. She says I look particularly gay tonight in my ribbed tank top, which pleases me. I don't think I am partnered, I continue, but my life is full of romance.
My Coolest Self takes after my mom's favorite aunt, who visited us in Michigan when I was 13 and gifted me a set of panties from Victoria's Secret (two glittery thongs and mesh briefs that my mom kept in her care until I was halfway through high school) and advice I found thrilling at the time but wouldn't understand until later: have a lot of lovers. Have a boyfriend in Rome, have one in Brazil, and visit them whenever you want, she told me. (Later, she admitted she had thought I was older than I was.)
I visit my lovers. I go on holiday with my friends and stay at their homes in Sydney, New York, and Kilifi. I send them chapters of my book to read while I help fund their films and attend their photo exhibits and concerts. I am always making up my guest bedroom (I have a guest room). I have reduced as much as possible friction between my politics and my lifestyle. I am a friend to my parents and an attentive aunt to my niece—an adult-woman she considers fun and wise at the same time. I exclusively wear linen.
Our coolest selves aren't so unattainable, we conclude. They are people we would like to meet. Since this conversation, I've been noticing the ways in which I already embody this person and have taken deliberate steps to further actualize her. I FaceTimed my almost-four-year old niece who remembered that we watched Moana together at my apartment last summer. I bought a ticket to A's next show. I finished a novel which is now one of my favorites and became a paying subscriber to the author's newsletter. In two weeks, my childhood best friend will be in Seoul. I extended next month's work trip to spend three nights in Paris and sent a message to R to meet me. This morning, I received an email that S's crowdfund to produce his first feature film surpassed 100%. Tomorrow, I will meet my parents for lunch and a movie. Right now, I am back at my favorite cafe writing this blog.
My order of fries just arrived. The setting sun is turning the whole room golden. Life, the one I yearn for, is happening.
