This month, we asked our writers

What is it time for you to let go of?

Shawn Roske

For me, it is time I let go of my personal poverty. I've kept up an image of myself as a frugal man since high school. It's connected with other low self-images, too-a key to it is self-pity. It is time I let go of self-pity. Does it seem to you that self-pity could be a foundation for war? At least, internal war. It begins in me as this subtle sad feeling, and I consent to it. It seems harmless enough, doesn't it? Just a little bit of feeling unappreciated, or, maybe, a little unfairness. It can start with any small thing, even the weather can trigger it. Oh, it's cold today, isn't that unpleasant? Yet, this starts a rotting inside me, and it builds all day long, sometimes all week long, and in the end I am exhausted from the battle against all the things I'm unhappy about. This internal poverty feeds my external poverty all around me. Despite my internal and external riches, so long as I'm supporting this upside-down way towards myself and the world, I will never enjoy any wealth that is in me or around me. So, I'm letting go of Mr. Poor Me. Amazingly, I feel richer already, even as I complete this paragraph.

April Yorke

It's been a while since I finally learned to let go of shows that no longer hold any entertainment value for me, but I still struggle to stop reading about them. If a show is zeitgeisty or if a writer I really like finds value in a show I've given up on, I have a nagging doubt that everyone else knows something I don't, and I'm going to miss out if I don't stay caught up. So for an entire season after I stopped watch Weeds I read Jacob's recaplets on TWoP. I haven't watched a single episode of Glee this season, but I spent months keeping up with Todd VanDerWerff's recaps over on the AV Club. Hilariously, I do this reading over and above the hundreds of well-written recaps of several of my most beloved shows (Drunken Bee's Friday Night Lights recaps, I hardly knew ye). But NO MORE. Not only am I not going to watch Season 2 of The Killing (DIAF, show), but I am going to try really hard not to read what anyone writes about it, either. I mean, I might take a peek just to see what's up with the whole conspiracy . . . GAH.

Emily Goodacre

I'm going to let go of watching shows until the bitter end. I've already written about TV show break-ups in this lovely publication, which have generally happened when something so brutal and awful happens that it takes me right out of the fictional world and I have to abruptly quit watching. But what happens when a show you used to love just steadily declines in quality until you realize that watching it has become a chore instead of a joy? That's why I didn't watch this last season of Chuck (boring, repetitive), and why this will be my last season of Gossip Girl (has cycled through every romantic combination of characters, keeps introducing new Cousins Charlie). And finally (sob!), I have decided not to watch the next season of my once-beloved Supernatural. The show used to be so fun but has become burdened with so much angst and sadness that it's clear that even the people making it aren't enjoying it anymore. They went and killed off the only 2 characters that brought any laughs to the screen, and I always finish an episode just a little more depressed than I began it. It's not me, Supernatural. It's you.

Taryn Cheal

I am going to fully let go of America's Next Top Model. For a long time I have found it fascinating and slightly interesting and have always tuned in for the trainwreck that is Tyra Banks. The previous All Stars season, pardon me, cycle was a huge disappointment and made me realize how far the show has fallen, and that it really has nothing new and interesting to say. The judges have also changed fairly drastically from what they used to be, in cast and in demeanor, and honestly, I don't care what André Leon Talley has to say. Ever. The photo shoots have also become absurd (there was one where the girls had to lie in a big bowl of Greek Salad, because, you know, they were in Greece, oh, and when I say bowl, I mean kiddie pool). As far as I'm concerned, these ridiculous shoots do not produce anything I want to see in a magazine. The prizes also are the same to worse than ever, and there seems to be no incentive for anyone to be involved in this show anymore. Also, the best make-up artist left a while back to be an amazing and winning contestant on RuPaul's Drag Race, so I don't even have that anymore. Speaking of which, although I am leaving one drag queen-helmed show behind, I have RuPaul's Drag Race which actually is an amazing show, that surpasses America's Next Top Model in everything it does, and it has drag queens. So, sayonara Tyra. Hello RuPaul.

Mike Cullen

First off, Taryn, love, love, love RuPaul's Drag Race! As you've alluded to, RuPaul does that fashion/glam contest far better than Tyra Banks could ever dream of!

As for what I need to let go: physical media (but not comic books!). I've written about how I've got completely digital with my music collection. I haven't purchased a CD in years, and I plan on keeping that trend. I recently purchased a Kobo, and love it, so it's not unrealistic to think I could go all digital for books. Magazines never get fully read, and most of the publications I read (The New Yorker, Spin, and The New Republic) are providing sufficient online content for my needs.

My hold-outs are going to be comic books and movies. While there's no logical reason for sticking to these two physical mediums (well, certainly DVD/Blu-Rays), I can't seem to make the switch. For me, while it's cool to read a digital comic book, that's a tangible link to my childhood that I want to maintain. I want the joy of going to the comic book store every week, and picking up the latest issues of my favourite series. As for DVDs, I really should just go digital, but I'm not ready to let it go, yet I don't really have a reason for continuing the way I am.

Lauren Cheal

It is time for me to let go of my anger at Mad Men's Pete Campbell. Oh Pete. You were the worst to Peggy Olsen (impregnating her on a couch after-hours at the old Sterling Cooper office), and then giving her the brush off because you had to marry for money. You were also the poor man's Ken Cosgrove and we know why Lane picked him over you as the go-to account man at the merger. But then SCDP came along, and (though I am loathe to admit it), you began to win me over. You became team-player Pete, a man who was committed to the company he helped created, and a (decently, for the time) committed husband. Now in season 5 you are married to Annie bleeping Edison of Community (of course the actress who plays Trudy has stayed the same, Allison Brie, but now I know her as Annie Edison and it is too much). I greatly look forward to the moments when Trudy lights up the screen, and quite often Pete is right next to her. All this has culminated in my understanding that it is time for the anger I once felt towards Pete to melt away. Perhaps it will be re-directed at Roger Sterling. I do not forgive a man who breaks Joanie's heart.

Comments (1)

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Liam.T

April 03, 2012

Votes: +0

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It seems that we all have things that we need to let go of. In fact, if all of us writers were to let go of something then we may have more time for writing. I recently let go of social media for 21 days and I must say it was very liberating. It is really interesting how we can all become a slave to something that really shouldn't be that big of a part of our lives.

When we hold on to things like basic rules we let them live rent free in our heads but when we learn to let go of them then we can move on to a better life.

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