Albums

5. Fauxllennium by TV Girl and George Clanton

This seven track album, right off the bat, is one that rewards multiple listens. The first time I listened to it, honestly, I wasn’t really sure I’d be listening a second time. I got into TV Girl pretty much entirely via their first two albums which, if you’re a fan of them you’ll know, are pretty different from their more recent albums. They’ve branched off into almost a more techno, less vocal, remix-based sound which I almost never enjoy listening to unless I’m drunk at a bar, and only then do I like it if I know the words and can sing along. But TV Girl has taken that sound and vibe, and made it into something entirely their own, and they did a damn good job, too. This album is a pretty stark contrast from their first, and my favorite, album French Exit, but it’s still pretty damn great. I can’t really put my finger on why, but a track like “Butterflies” for example, is a song I probably would actively dislike if it were produced and performed by any other artist. Maybe because it comes after a fantastic three track start to the album, “Summer 2000 Baby,” “Everything Blue,” and “Fauxllennium,” but I wouldn’t be surprised if that song became one of those songs that comes on while I’m drunk at a bar, and I can’t wait to sing along when it does.

4. Aghori Mhori Mei by The Smashing Pumpkins

The only reason I don’t feel like I can claim The Smashing Pumpkins as one of my all time favorite bands is because I’m not entirely familiar a number of their albums, especially some of the more recent ones. There’s actually an album of theirs that I only know from the times I’ve been at home in Michigan and my dad has played it in the car. That said, I do absolutely love The Smashing Pumpkins, a lot, and in my list of 500+ of my favorite songs in order, there are probably three or four Pumpkins songs in the top 50. I haven’t updated it in a minute, but I think upon my next update, though it may not break the top 50, I think “Who Goes There” could very well become the next Pumpkins song to break the top 100. The Smashing Pumpkins were actually the last concert I saw before Covid, which isn’t that big of a deal now, but in March of 2020 I thought that very well could’ve been the last concert I ever saw. I went with my dad, and we had GREAT seats, like fourth row, and I vividly remember watching James Iha, eyes closed, just fucking jamming on guitar. I would’ve loved to watch him perform some of the songs on this album live. I think that’s a really strong indicator of a great album: if you see a band live before the album is released, and you wish the album was on their setlist of that show. Even if I see them again, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to recreate that feeling of watching James Iha, being so close that I could actually see his facial expressions. That experience most definitely changed my views as a Pumpkins fan; before, I would’ve considered myself a fan largely due to Billy Corgan’s vocals and his distinct sound as a frontman. Now, I would consider myself a more complete fan so to speak, as much a fan because of each and every musical component (though now I’m partial to the guitar) just as much as Billy’s voice. This is probably my favorite Smashing Pumpkins album of the 2000s—I think it’s a great showcase of the talent that exists within the entire band.

3. Songs Of A Lost World by The Cure

Robert Smith has definitely still got it; this album fucking delivered. The Cure has always been one of my loose favorites; I don’t think I’d put them in my top five, but they’d for sure be a contender for my top ten. I wouldn’t say I’m intimately familiar with their entire discography, but I’ve listened to every one of their albums at least twice, and I can honestly say this record holds up with the rest of them. Every one of the eight songs on this album is great, even “A Fragile Thing,” which I didn’t love at first but has since started to grow on me. At 65, Robert Smith sounds just about as great as ever, showing off his melodic vocals especially on what might be my favorite song on the album, “And Nothing Is Forever.” I remember when my dad told me they were coming out with this album I was a little skeptical. Having been scarred from blink-182’s truly awful 2023 album, I’m now pretty skeptical about one of my favorite bands coming out with an album decades after their prime. That said, I think the consistency in quality that The Cure has shown on this album is enough to restore my faith.

2. Evergreen by Soccer Mommy

My number one artist for this year, and for good reason. I’m surprised I didn’t see more of her in Instagram stories on Spotify Wrapped day. Apologies here because I know this is a controversial statement, but Soccer Mommy deserves the spot in pop culture that Chappell Roan has taken up. I think Soccer Mommy absolutely deserves way more press and popularity, and if everyone would look away from Chappell for just a second (which she has actually implied that she wants) they would recognize that there are artists out there with similar sound, and who deserve the same amount of praise and accolades. Evergreen is her sixth studio album, and man did it deliver. “Driver” is one hell of a banger if I’ve ever heard one, and “Abigail” is a song I definitely could have used a solid ten years ago, but better late than ever. Her vocals transcend her previous ceiling, and while I still think Color Theory is an unbeatable album, I think Evergreen is a close second. I’ve been listening to this album on average once, maybe twice a week since its release in October, and I foresee it staying high up in my rotation well into 2025.

1. The Way It Goes by Ella Galvin

I’ll be honest and say my bias is showing here, but even if she wasn’t one of my best friends I’d still recommend this EP to any and every music lover I know. In fact, I have a friend whose Spotify Wrapped boasted a whopping 300 minutes of listening, and I’d recommend her EP to him, too. Ella’s sound is unique, unlike really anything that’s out there today. She draws inspiration from Amy Winehouse, Ella Fitzgerald, and Etta James, the likes of which I just simply have not seen in any other modern artist of the 2020s. Her soulful voice has depth, and she utilizes instruments and sounds which I had never been exposed to before I met her. The EP is only six songs, but they are 18 minutes of fucking magic. The opening track “Pink Shoes” features an entire verse of rap, and it’s good rap, contrasted by an acoustic ballad, “Spare Me,” on which she plays guitar—a jack of all trades, indeed. Very near to my heart is the track “Don’t Look Ahead,” which I heard Ella play live, kind of on accident, in April of last year. Apparently, after the show, I went up to her and told her that was one of my favorite originals I’d heard her play. I don’t remember this, but she told me she was actually gonna get rid of that song, it wasn’t finished and she was ready to abandon it. I told her she should absolutely not fucking do that, and here it is on the EP one year later, still one of my favorites. The EP closes out with another one of my favorites, “Passing the Time,” which features another multi-talented artist and friend of mine, Lady Di Mega Diva (check out the music video for her single “Saved You For Later”). All in all, in trying to view this as objectively as possible, I think this EP is justifiably my number one recommendation from this year.

TV Shows

*Disclaimer: I know most people would do movies here, and while I do absolutely love movies, I haven’t seen that many new movies this year and I definitely watch way more TV than I do movies

5. I Kissed a Girl

No shame, I am a sucker for good reality TV, and I am a firm believer that trashy does not equal trash. Some of my favorite reality TV shows are about as trashy as they come, and I think that just adds to their charm. I Kissed a Girl is a much needed reality show, that is actually a new, authentic, and original concept of a dating show (at least from what I’ve seen; I’ve heard it’s similar to Love Island but I wouldn’t know because I’ll never spend a minute of my time on that homophobic trash [not trashy—trash] show, but I digress). This show is the first of its kind, and I ate it the hell up. It’s a bunch of really hot British lesbians staying at an Italian Masseria for a summer, and each week they engage in a ‘kiss-off’ where they have to decide if they are going to kiss the girl that they are currently seeing, or if they’d like to kiss someone else. If both girls want to kiss each other, then they get to stay another week, but if one of them doesn’t turn around to kiss the other, then they are both at risk of leaving for the summer lest they kiss one of the remaining girls. I’m well aware that there is some bias here, too, as this is the first show of its kind and the queers are hungry for trashy reality show representation. Though I do wish this show was a little bit trashier, because as it stands it’s actually pretty wholesome—which isn’t a bad thing at all when it comes to dating shows, as I’ll get to when I discuss the #3 show—I think I Kissed a Girl certainly delivered when it comes to pioneering a new wave of queer reality TV.

4. Abbott Elementary

Aside from It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, this is the funniest sitcom on TV right now. Like there must be something about Philadelphia because Philly-based sitcoms are something else. The characters are likable, the premise is great, and it’s about time they made a workplace sitcom in an elementary school. Plus, and I won’t stay on my soap box for too long I promise, this show is the pinnacle of representation. The vast majority of the characters are Black, they’ve got a gay guy who may or may not be Jewish, and an Italian woman. I’m loosely working on a ranking of the greatest sitcoms post-Seinfeld, and having watched every single episode of over 15 sitcoms, with part of my criteria being that it had to have at least five seasons, I’ve spent a LOT of time watching. What I’ve noticed is that even in the most diverse of casts, none of them are even 50% straight and white—they’re all more than 50% straight and white. Abbott Elementary has put that ratio to shame, with only two white cast members, and one of them is gay. Now, aside from the fact that Quinta Brunson did that, this show is damn funny, and this season has been arguably the funniest season yet. What’s more, the show deals with real life problems and issues that are happening right now; it’s political without being overtly political, which I think is the greatest way to convey a message. It’s timely, it’s heartwarming, it’s relatable, and it’s bingeable. I can honestly say that when a Wednesday night rolls around and there isn’t a new episode, I get legitimately sad.

3. The Golden Bachelorette

The Bachelor and Bachelorette franchises are about as trashy as they come, and I’ll admit that that’s part of what makes them so great and why I love them so much. The Golden Bachelor and Golden Bachelorette franchises, however, couldn’t be less trashy if they tried. And that’s exactly why I love them so much. I can say with pretty much absolute certainty that there was not a single episode of The Golden Bachelorette that didn’t leave me teary-eyed at one point or another, and the finale had me fucking sobbing. As heartwarming as Abbott Elementary is, The Golden Bachelorette is about 100 times that. Watching these 60- and 70-year-old men, some of whom have endured some of the greatest tragedies that life has to offer, get first date jitters, absolutely giddy when they received a rose and fall in love, both with the golden bachelorette and with each other, was about the purest form of entertainment I’ve ever had the pleasure of watching. The thing about the Golden bachelor franchises is that they don’t need to edit and produce in order to create a villain to keep people coming back week after week; these people are in the latter stages of their life and are quite simply opening their hearts to romantic and platonic love in a way that many of them never thought possible again in their lifetimes. The two hours that this show aired every week was truly an integral part of my year. Not only as a form of entertainment, but as a lesson in hope and in life. I know this probably sounds insane to say of a reality dating show, but trust me on this one. There is a lot to be learned and a lot to be loved from this show.

2. Only Murders in the Building

I’ve been an avid watcher and fan of this show since the pilot premiered. It does require some suspension of disbelief, because it’s now heading into season five and the audience is supposed to believe that there has been a new murder in the same building every single season. But once you get passed that, it’s actually a pretty great play on a classic whodunnit. Easily the best part of this show is the star-studded cast; Martin Short, Steve Martin, Selena Gomez, Meryl Streep, and Paul Rudd, with guest appearances from Cara Delevingne, Melissa McCarthy, Tina Fey, Jane Lynch, the list goes on. It’s almost like a prolonged SNL skit written by the Coen brothers with a million cameos around every corner and how much of a clusterfuck it. Despite the premise being murder, I actually think I’d describe this show as a feel-good show. It’s a quick binge, it’s funny, and it breeds a whole host of conversation if you watch with friends. If you’re not watching this show, or at least planning on catching up before the season five premiere next year, you’re doing yourself a disservice.

1. Bad Sisters

Anyone who knows me knows I have a slight obsession with Bono (and I use the word slight intentionally because 1. It’s partially a bit, and 2. I definitely have some obsessions that are much stronger than this one). That obsession has grown beyond just Bono, and has extended to his kids, both of which are wildly talented and are both relatively close to my age. His son Elijah fronts the band Inhaler, which I absolutely love, and his daughter Eve stars in the Irish Apple TV original, Bad Sisters. And let me tell you, she is fucking awesome. This whole show is fucking awesome. I didn’t think there was gonna be a season two, given that the premise of season one didn’t really lend itself very easily to more follow up, but season two, which is still in full swing, was a very pleasant surprise. This is one of the more compelling dramas I think I’ve ever seen. People are talking a lot about Jake Gyllenhaal’s Presumed Innocent which is a miniseries on Apple TV and has a loosely similar premise, and while that show was definitely worth a watch, it doesn’t hold a candle to Bad Sisters. I always love it when I don’t recognize a single member of the cast—and I didn’t recognize Eve Hewson as Bono’s daughter until I saw her name in the credits of the intro a few episodes in—and it’s still a fucking incredible show. In contrast to Only Murders in the Building with a cast that is its biggest strength, this show is a testament to how much talent is out there even without big names.

Books

*Disclaimer: None of these were published in 2024, but it wouldn’t be a year-end recap without the best books I read this year, and books are timeless obviously.

5. Her Here by Amanda Dennis

I got this book for free at a writer’s conference in 2022, and I don’t know that I’ve ever regretted not spending money on something, especially knowing how little of said money would go towards the creator of that thing, but man do I wish Amanda Dennis got the few cents’ worth of royalties from my owning this book. Published by a small press, I do feel as though I read this with a little bit of a bias, as I desperately want to do my part to keep small presses alive, but I’ve also read a lot of books that were published by small presses, and I can’t say that all of them captured my attention and felt worthy of a recommendation quite like this one. Part of what makes small presses so great is that they recognize talent and high quality writing, and they prioritize that over commercial marketability. Don’t get me wrong, there is certainly some beautiful prose floating around the commercial book market right now, but so much of what the majority of people read nowadays is plot driven stories designed to keep the reader’s attention. There’s something to be said about pure, artistic writing, and while the plot of this book is definitely still a doozy—dualing storylines of a girl who went missing in Thailand and another girl trying to find her with nothing but her journals as a guide—it’s Amanda Dennis’ lyrical mastery of the written word which makes this book so compelling.

4. The Fiancée Farce by Alexandria Bellefleur

A cheesy romance which I probably never would have picked up if it weren’t gay, but to be fair, that’s the case with most cheesy romances that aren’t either critically acclaimed or written by Nicholas Sparks. This one, though, is honestly the dream. The main character is a little plain I’ll admit, that is until she concocts an elaborate lie that results in the most adorable fake-real-fake romance in the history of the lesbian fiction that I’ve read, and I’ve read a lot. I breezed through this book, primarily because that’s what happens when I pick up a book with a lesbian main character, but also because it’s the perfect beach read. It’s light, it’s fun, it’s cute, and it keeps you engaged the whole time. No disrespect at all to Alexandria Bellefleur (I will absolutely be buying and reading each and every one of her subsequent novels) but this book is exactly the kind of marketable fiction I’m talking about, in the best way possible.

3. Stay True by Hua Hsu

A close friend of mine recommended this book to me, and she doesn’t remember this, but she told me she was hesitant to lend it to me because it’s the kind of book that I’d want to own. As someone who does, in fact, like to own all the books they read, I simply said okay and I purchased the book myself. She wasn’t the only friend to recommend this book to me, so I went into it with pretty high expectations. I won’t say they weren’t met, because here I am saying it was the third best book I read this year, but what I will say is that I have pretty high standards when it comes to memoir, and upon finishing this book, I wasn’t entirely convinced. It was a great book; I thought that from the second I closed it for the last time. It was engaging, well-written, and reckoned with a lot of themes that touch all of us in a way that felt both personal to Hua and relatable to his broader audience. But there seemed to be something missing for me that I couldn’t quite place. Until a bunch of months went by, and I found myself still thinking about Stay True. This book is one that grew on me with time. I hardly ever re-read books, but I think this one could be one that I read a second time at some point in my life. I feel like I owe it to the author and to myself to read it again, but even still, I would highly recommend it. In the time since I read it, this book has given me a whole new perspective on my relationships, and the people in my life who are important to me. What I’ll leave you with is the fact that if you’re going to embark on the journey that is this book, make sure you’re in a stable place mentally, because it will stay with you for quite some time even after you finish it.

2. All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy

As I said, I hardly ever re-read books. But on one of my trips home this year, I made my family go to Schuler Books, a local, independent bookstore that had recently opened up in my home town. There hadn’t been a bookstore in our town since Barnes and Noble closed when I was probably in middle school, so I was pretty excited to learn of not only a new bookstore opening up, but a new independent bookstore opening up. My mom got me the second two books in the border crossing trilogy, of which All the Pretty Horses is the first. I first read All the Pretty Horses for a class in undergrad, and it was the book that introduced my to one of my favorite writers, Cormac McCarthy. I figured if I was gonna read the rest of the trilogy, a refresher couldn’t hurt, so I reread All the Pretty Horses. It held up, and in fact, I think I even liked it more the second time. McCarthy is such a wordsmith, it’s almost hard to believe that an ordinary man can produce such art with his words. One of his trademarks is a severe lack of punctuation, which is something many other writers have tried and haven’t quite mastered the way he has. It’s funny, I usually don’t like Westerns, like at all, but All the Pretty Horses (along with a couple other Western and Western-esque Cormac books) might be one of my favorite books of all time. I’m very glad I reread it, and I’d definitely recommend it to readers who do and don’t like Westerns alike.

1. Girl A by Abigail Dean

I got this book from Book of the Month a few years ago, and it’s almost made it’s way into my ‘currently reading’ on Goodreads a handful of times, but I just kept deciding on another book first. Usually the books from Book of the Month are on the lighter side, and even if they’re not (much like this one, which is dark and heavy as can be) they’re still pretty quick reads. I’d just finished The Crossing which is the second book in the Border Crossing trilogy, and it took me much longer than expected. I was falling way behind on my Goodreads goal—which I’m ashamed to say I didn’t even meet a third of this year, and I blame Atlas Shrugged for that, but irrelevant—so I needed something quick to get me back into a routine and closer to my goal of a novel a week. I decided to finally pick up Girl A, and I’m so glad I did. This book was compelling as shit. I’m not sure if the story is actually based on the Turpin family or not, but it bares an uncanny resemblance to their case, the main difference being that Girl A takes place in the UK. The story follows Lex, the second oldest of seven children born to a couple who verbally, mentally, and physically abuses their seven children until Lex, Girl A, escapes the house and finds someone to call the police, resulting in the seven kids’ freedom. It’s a raw, emotional, and riveting story that hooked me from page one. It takes place in both the past and the present, and with the way Abigail Dean tells this story, it’s truly a wonder that this book didn’t gain more commercial success.

One Direction was hands down the most influential musical act of the early 2010s, and I will quite literally fight anyone who says otherwise. I actually wrote a review of the band and why they were so influential, not only in general but specifically for the queer community and a whole generation of lesbians and queer women. With such a short stint of hardly six years, I fear they will, if they haven’t already, become one of those brief fads that you just had to be there for. SO, in order to pay homage to the greatest musical group of the 21st century, without further ado, I present to you an objectively factual ranking of One Direction’s discography.

5. Made In The A.M. (2015)

Let me be absolutely clear to start out here: One Direction never made a bad album. In fact, they never made an average album. All five of their records are fucking great. That said, this album earns the bottom spot because it was already a period of mourning by the time it was released. I will have a personal vendetta against Zayn Malik for the rest of my life, and if this were a ranking of my favorite One Direction albums, this one might be higher up for the sole reason that I’m still mad at Zayn and he isn’t on it. I really appreciate this album because of the inherent increase in Louis and Niall solos. As a self-proclaimed ‘Louis girl,’ I was always a little disappointed in the lack of solos afforded him in most of their tracks. I thought he was being insanely under utilized; he had a beautiful voice, and he deserved more. Niall, too. Without Zayn in the mix, the two of them were automatically given more solo time. The track list here, though, I thought contained more near misses than the rest of their discography. The single off of this album, “Drag Me Down,” might be the band’s only bad song in their entire repertoire. If this song came on the radio while I was driving, there was a chance, depending on my mood, that I would change the station. The other single off of this album, however, “Perfect,” was classic 1D greatness. I also think that a lot of the tracks on this album were tailored more to the bands’ musical talents. They had grown up a bit since their conception, and they started to sing about more mature topics, recognizing that a lot of their fan base had also grown up a bit right along with them. “Love You Goodbye,” and “A.M.” about a pretty serious breakup were now more relatable to One Direction fans; they weren’t kids anymore, at least not by their own definition. Real, tangible romanticism wasn’t as foreign to One Direction fans as it once was. There is also a clear shift in lyrics on this album. There were more poetic tropes, obviously not on all of the tracks (“Drag Me Down” was absolutely NOT poetry) but “Wolves,” “Olivia,” and “Walking in the Wind” absolutely are. In sum, I think had I not known who they were prior, I would listen to this album on my own for sure.

4. Take Me Home (2012)

The sophomore slump man, it’ll get you. This album while still great, sorta sounds like they’re trying to really dig in and find their sound, key word ‘trying.’ Don’t get me wrong, there are some great songs on this album. And again, I’ll reiterate, I think the only ‘bad’ One Direction song in existence is “Drag Me Down.” Compared to the rest of the band’s discography though, this album just doesn’t fully measure up. A lot of the tracks on this album sound a little too similar that they start to blend together. There isn’t really a stand out song on this record. They’re all good, but I don’t know that any of them are great. “Live While We’re Young” is a pretty strong single, as is “Kiss You,” and far and away the best song on this album is “Little Things,” but the issue is that those are the first three tracks on the album, and one of them was written by Ed Sheeran. Take Me Home is a pretty front loaded album, and I think that might be the album’s pitfall, especially compared to other One Direction albums. All of this considered, this album was definitely a satisfying sophomore record. When they released this record, I felt like my expectations were met. I was by no means disappointed, in fact, I think “Over Again” might be one of the bands strongest tracks in terms of just overall musicality. The guitar is great, and the lyrics are also fairly poetic. On top of that, “Nobody Compares” and “I Would” are pretty standard One Direction sounding tracks, as are “They Don’t Know About Us” and “Heart Attack.” It’s also worth noting that the deluxe edition tracks are fantastic on this album. “Irresistible,’ “Magic,” and “Truly Madly Deeply” are arguably the three best bonus tracks of any of their five albums. Suffice it to say, this album definitely isn’t their best, but it’s still a pretty damn good album.

3. Midnight Memories (2013)

One Direction went on tour this summer and the album came out in November, but “Best Song Ever” had already been released as a single when I went to see them. That song was an absolutely unreal song to see them play before the album was released, and then to go to camp like a week or two after seeing them and going crazy to that song in that setting was like freaking ecstasy to a newly minted 14-year-old One Direction fan. This album was also accompanied by their movie This Is Us, so “Story of My Life” also got quite a bit of press as a single. I remember when they released the music video for that song and it was nostalgic and bittersweet and featured the boys’ families, and it was just so emotional to see the growth they had exhibited since 2010. On top of that was “Don’t Forget Where You Belong,” which was just the cherry on top; if ever there was an album to cry to in 2013, this was it. The ballads on this album, not including those ones, are also beautiful and just so heartfelt. “You & I” and “Half a Heart” are songs that I still feel in my stomach when listening to. Truthfully, this album doesn’t really have a single dud on it, and I could give worthwhile mention to every single track. To say it’s only their number three album out of only five total feels like an injustice, and any combination of these top three albums would make sense to me.

2. FOUR (2014)

This was a toss up; FOUR and Midnight Memories could actually be tied for second, but that’s not satisfactory so by a HAIR, FOUR takes the cake. “Steal My Girl” was an absolute fucking banger of a single, as was “Night Changes.” The leaked track that we found (probably illegally) on Tumblr for this album was “Fireproof,” which admittedly, was disappointing at the time. I remember sitting in homeroom freshman year of high school talking about it with my friends and the general consensus was that this album might be a dud based solely on this leaked track. Looking back after a decade, though, I don’t know what the hell we were talking about. “Fireproof” is as great a track as any on this album, and I love pretty much all of the tracks on this album. “18” is the picture of nostalgia, even for 15-year-olds who couldn’t yet conceive of the very idea of being 18. “Ready to Run” has some fantastic lines, and “Act My Age” is still an anthem, a guidebook of sorts simply for how to live life. “Girl Almighty” was often playing as I whipped my way out of the school parking lot each afternoon, and “No Control” is a similarly upbeat bop. “Stockholm Syndrome” is an all around classic, and “Once in a Lifetime” is a gorgeous ballad. “Fool’s Gold” was another great guitar song, mostly because it sounded like a complicated song and I knew how to play it, because it really wasn’t that complicated of a song. This album was also the first One Direction album that was released at a time that I felt more like an angsty teenager than a confused pre-teen. I felt like I was more of an ‘adult’ when this album was released, and seeing as though their primary fan base was roughly my age at the same time, I’m sure this was a pretty common feeling among their fans.

1. Up All Night (2012)

Of course, it’s a no-brainer. This is the record. Truth be told, desert island albums—this would probably be in the conversation for me. Every single track on this album is a fucking hit, no exceptions. “Moments” is still in my top 25 favorite songs of all time, a list that is carefully curated in order via formula. I actually made my guitar teacher learn to play this song so he could teach it to me; he didn’t know the song at all, and if you’re familiar, you know the guitar is certainly on the more complicated side. The technique is called Travis picking, which as an expert, he of course knew, but specific to this song he had to learn it by ear, and the guy actually did. For his 12-year-old student with a boy band obsession. Mind you before that he was teaching me songs like “Purple Haze” and “Day Tripper” and “Beat It,” One Direction was not exactly in his curriculum. I digress. I vividly remember when the tracklist for this album was leaked in 2011, and when it was released in the UK and I had to listen to it via British Tumblr blogs. The anticipation leading up to this album was unmatched, and the expectations were met and then some. This album also feels like the most personal album to them; I remember listening to it for the first time and thinking that each of the boys had a track on the album that felt like it was their song. Notably, “Stand Up” was the Louis song, which gave it a special place in my heart. “Taken” was the Liam song, and as a closeted teenager, pretty boy Liam was second only to Louis. “Gotta Be You,” “Same Mistakes,” and “More Than This” were great ballads that perfectly complemented single tracks “What Makes You Beautiful,” “Up All Night,” and “One Thing.” “Stole My Heart,” “Everything About You,” and “Save You Tonight” showed the band’s range and their roots as a pop boy band. And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Zayn’s iconic high note in “Tell Me a Lie.” This album was the quintessential 2010s pop album—there was simply nothing better than going crazy on a Bar or Bat Mitzvah dance floor to “Up All Night” with glow sticks around your neck and cheap kb socks on your feet. Admittedly, a large part of this album’s greatness comes from the nostalgia surrounding it, but it really does stand on its own just as well.

Any comments and disagreements (within reason, and none defending Zayn. He ruined a great thing. I will never forgive him.) are more than welcome! Let me know what you think:)

*Scroll all the way down for TL:DR

15. Zooropa (1993)

This is an album that I probably won’t spend any further time with upon finishing this ranking. “Stay (Faraway, So Close!),” “Lemon,” and “The First Time” are all okay tracks, but aside from those three, I think this entire album is a flop. In all fairness, this is a pretty experimental album, and I’d be inclined to give U2 the benefit of the doubt here were it the only album of its kind, which it unfortunately is not. Even if there are some tracks that sound like they could have potential, they are effectively ruined by the sound effects and other flat out weird choices in the music that accompanies the lyrics. This album sounds like it was produced in GarageBand, and I genuinely believe that both Zooropa and Pop had a negative impact on some other U2 records, not the least of which being Achtung Baby (more on that later).

14. Pop (1997)

The second half of U2’s truly bad era. What I will say, is that to its merit, Pop is a backloaded album, with some actually decent tracks at the end. “The Playboy Mansion” is a pretty good song, “If You Wear That Velvet Dress” is alright, and “Wake Up Dead Man,” though pretty Jesus heavy—which I tend not to like at all—is a decent closer. That said, “Discotheque” might be the worst song throughout U2’s entire discography, with a sound that pairs nicely with a Nike commercial and a Nike commercial alone. “Do You Feel Loved” isn’t much better, and until you get to “The Playboy Mansion,” this album is just a disappointment. Had I been alive in 1997, I probably would have become pretty disillusioned with U2, what with their ‘93 album being just as bad—worse, even—as this one. The best thing about this album is that it highlights how lucky I am to have become a U2 fan after the release of All That You Can’t Leave Behind.

13. Songs of Surrender (2023)

Truth be told, the sole reason that this album is ranked above the last two is that the songs themselves are great. This album, though, is bad. There is no new content on this album, just new recordings of older content. There are tracks on this album that I honestly wish I had never heard at all, in fact I think I could have recorded a better version of “Where The Streets Have No Name” on my own. The songs they chose to record again for this album are all fantastic in their own right, and are all certainly better than the tracks off of Pop and Zooropa, but I could have done without this album. My biggest takeaway upon listening to Songs of Surrender, truly, is that I’m so grateful that they did not include my favorite U2 song in the tracklist. This nearly three hour long album, while harsh, is a waste of time. You’d be better off creating a playlist of each of the track’s original recordings and listening that way; there is not a single track on this album that enhances, or sounds even remotely as good as their original recordings.

12. Songs of Experience (2017)

This is probably the first album on this list that I wouldn’t classify as a ‘bad album.’ I don’t know that I’d say it’s a great album either, per se, but it’s got some good songs on it. A lot of the songs on this album are kinda annoying, but I think this is a pretty split album. The tracks are pretty much all hit or miss, but the hits are definitely good songs. “You’re The Best Thing About Me” is kind of a guilty pleasure type song; it sounds almost like a bubblegum pop boy band song, which I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for, though again, it doesn’t really sound like a U2 song. “The Showman (Little More Better)” is another pretty good track, but similarly a little too pop-ish. “The Little Things That Give You Away” is probably the best song on this album, followed by “Landlady” and “Love Is Bigger Than Anything In Its Way,” mainly because they sound more like classic U2 tracks than the rest of the album. If I were to describe this album in one word, it would probably be ‘satisfactory.’ This album is probably the best new album we’re gonna get from U2; my hopes are certainly not high that they’ll come out with an album better than this one any time soon. Songs of Experience is an album that grows on you, and if it had come out towards the beginning of the band’s reign, I can’t help but think it would have been better received than it was just three years after the infamous Songs of Innocence debacle.

11. How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb (2004)

I’ve been on my dad to add a U2 album ranking to his repertoire of rankings, and the reason he hasn’t is because he has not listened to every U2 album. While I understand where he’s coming from with some albums, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb is not one of them. I think this might be U2’s most underrated album. Obviously, given its position in this ranking, this album is not among U2’s best, but it is absolutely worth spending some time with. “Original Of The Species” is a great song musically, but the lyrics are a bit lacking, the chorus repeating “I’ll give you everything you want / Except the thing that you want.” That’s the thing holding this album back; most of the tracks are great in one aspect, but are lacking in others. “Miracle Drug” is probably the best track on this album, but I don’t think there are any expressly bad songs. Again, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb isn’t a GREAT album, but it is a pretty good one. I’m trying to remain mostly impartial to my own preferences, but if this were a ranking of my favorite U2 albums as opposed to a ranking of the best U2 albums, I think I’d actually put this one above Achtung Baby.

10. Songs of Innocence (2014)

Songs of Innocence: The album that signifies what might very well be the single greatest sellout of all time. You would be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t heard the opening track “The Miracle (Of Joey Ramone)” and probably equally hard-pressed to find someone who has heard the rest of this album in its entirety. As an avid Spotify user, this album was one of my biggest inconveniences upon connecting my headphones to my phone from the years 2014 to 2022, as it would start playing before I could even open my preferred music app. What’s a shame, though, is that this is actually a pretty good album. Don’t get me wrong, it certainly doesn’t hold a candle to some other U2 records, but with tracks like “Every Breaking Wave” and “Song For Someone,” this album is most definitely worth listening to beyond the opening track. Simply put, Songs of Innocence being one of the biggest sources of the band’s demise says less about the album than it does about the band itself. The way this album has been received, with mostly negative sentiment at a time when a full-length album for free still meant something, says, in my opinion, that most people never actually gave this album a chance, and that U2’s attempt at marketing this record in what they thought would be an innovative way, was a complete and utter flop that did the band much more harm than good.

9. Achtung Baby (1991)

This is probably the most controversial placement on the list. I think this is indisputably U2’s most overrated album. Don’t get me wrong, there are some great tracks on this record, “Who’s Gonna Ride Your Wild Horses” and “Ultra Violet (Light My Way)” chief amongst them. But many of the lyrics showcased on this record are subpar at best, and downright bad at worst. The lyrics to “Even Better Than The Real Thing” sound like something an aspiring 13-year-old songwriter could have written. No hate towards aspiring teenagers, it’s just that we’re talking about freaking Bono here. “One” is a pretty good song, but I’ve seen better when it comes to anthems for world peace, even from Bono himself. “Mysterious Ways,” also garnering some decent commercial success, would be a fun and catchy song, had it been written by a different band. I would even venture to say that I like that song. But it is not a good U2 song. Additionally, the last track on this album, “Love Is Blindness,” honestly kinda sucks. This album, I think, marks the start of U2’s sellout, it just doesn’t hold up to what came before it and it sounds like almost like a different band entirely. Were it followed directly by All That You Can’t Leave Behind, I think it would be a different story, and retrospectively, this album would be seen as just a dud. But it was followed directly by Zooropa, and thus is a clear mark of the beginning of the controversial end for U2. I know a lot of people will likely think this is a very bold and hot take, but Achtung Baby is just such an inconsistent album, that I can’t in good conscience rank it above any of the following 8 albums.

8. No Line On The Horizon (2009)

Definitely the second best U2 album of the 21st century, no question. The title track is a great opener, and I can only imagine listening to this album as a fan when it came out; fans were likely starved and desperate for another great album, and while post-2000 U2 is nowhere near as iconic as pre-2000 U2, between No Line On The Horizon and All That You Can’t Leave Behind, they definitely had a pretty good run in this new era. There are some misses on this album, including “I’ll Go Crazy If I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight” which, albeit catchy, is kind of annoying and mainstream radio-esque, and “Magnificent,” which has an intro that’s a little too close to the techno experimental vibe that ruined Zooropa and Pop. Other tracks, though, certainly make up for it. “Unknown Caller” is a great callback to the Edge’s old talents, something that had been pretty lacking since before Achtung Baby. “White As Snow” offers a taste of Bono’s older lyrics, lyrics which made him one of the most talented lyricists in rock ‘n roll history. “Stand Up Comedy” is a solid U2 anthem, complete with a classic Bono/Edge pseudo-riff-off of guitar licks and, for lack of a better word, howling from Bono. “Moment Of Surrender” and “Breathe” are also great tracks. All in all, No Line On The Horizon is a damn good album.

7. October (1981)

October is a fairly typical sophomore album. Still pretty damn good, but not quite as awesome as Boy. Some great U2 classics grace this album, though it’s a pretty front-loaded album. “Gloria,” “I Fall Down,” and “I Threw A Brick Through A Window” are about as great a three song opener as any. What comes after is all still great—“Rejoice” is still a damn good song—but as the album progresses, the songs all start to get a bit lost, and relative to the rest of U2’s discography, a little forgettable (here I’m thinking primarily of “Stranger In A Strange Land” and “Scarlet"). It seems to me that this album just sort of starts to fade, and acts as a sort of gradient from ‘Great U2 songs’ to ‘Mediocre U2 songs.’ Now, by no means does this mean that I don’t love October. I still think it’s a fantastic album overall, and I most definitely enjoy listening to it on a decently regular basis, it just doesn’t quite do it for me in the way that their other early albums do.

6. Rattle and Hum (1988)

It’s funny that this is considered a studio album when Under A Blood Red Sky isn’t, but I’ll gladly include Rattle and Hum in a ranking of U2’s studio discography. This is an interesting album, and could also be described as experimental in a way, but was actually a successful straying from U2’s typical path. This album is honestly a rollercoaster, and a damn fun one at that. Leading off with a live cover of “Helter Skelter,” and introducing it as “A song that Charles Manson stole from The Beatles, we’re stealing it back,” how could you not immediately lean way the fuck into this album? Following that cover comes a powerful ballad in “Van Diemen’s Land,” also performed live, and then leading directly into a studio recording of “Desire.” What follows from there is a rapidly jolting ride between live and studio recordings, covers and originals, including a live recording of “All Along The Watchtower,” a studio recording of “Hawkmoon 269,” and live recordings of “Pride (In The Name Of Love)” and “Bullet The Blue Sky.” Rattle and Hum is, in my mind, a perfect conclusion to the trilogy of The Unforgettable Fire, The Joshua Tree, and itself. Truth be told, this is where the ranking truly gets to be really damn difficult; from here on out, each and every one of these albums are pretty incredible. In fact, I originally had October ranked ahead of Rattle and Hum, but every time I listen to Rattle and Hum, I’m reminded of just how much of a gem this album really is.

5. All That You Can’t Leave Behind (2000)

The closest thing to a U2 Masterpiece in the 21st century, All That You Can’t Leave Behind definitely isn’t a perfect album, but there are some perfect tracks in its midst. Although “New York” is a bit of a mediocre and annoying track, and “Elevation” is a little too catchy, those two songs are clearly the exception. It’s hard to make an album without a single ‘bad,’ or even subpar, track, and I’d say this album did just as good a job as any on that front with really only those two misses. The hit “Beautiful Day” gained commercial success, but it’s a wonder to me that more tracks on this album weren’t received in that same way. “Wild Honey” is a great feel-good track, “Kite” boasts beautiful lyricism that is reminiscent of Bono’s older works, and “Peace On Earth,” though overtly religious in the chorus, is a truly therapeutic song. Though I wouldn’t recommend this be the first, second, or even third album to listen to when first getting into U2, I also wouldn’t consider that a bad choice. This is, on the whole, a beautiful album.

4. War (1983)

After a little bit of a sophomore slump with October, War is as good a comeback as any U2 fan could have hoped for. War harkens back to a lot of the styles and techniques that made Boy so unique, but it does so in a way that is still pretty different and evolutionary to the band’s sound. “Sunday Bloody Sunday” is an absolute banger of an opener, and I think it might actually be the first U2 song I ever heard; I didn’t know it was U2 for the longest time, mainly because I always liked the song and I never associated a song that I actually liked with what I had always thought was a cheesy sellout band. I was pleasantly surprised, though, when I realized it was in fact a U2 song, and that the rest of that album was pretty incredible, too. Some other notable tracks include “New Year’s Day,” “Two Hearts Beat As One,” and “The Refugee,” but this album is really all great. Probably U2’s most fun record, it’s a versatile listen that you can enjoy just about anywhere at pretty much anytime.

3. Boy (1980)

A fucking awesome debut album if I’ve ever seen one. “I Will Follow” is most definitely among the very best of the U2 tracks that had commercial success. I think some of my favorite U2 songs are the more melodic, lyrical tracks, and some of the objectively greatest hits are more on the upbeat side, but what makes Boy so unique is that it’s a perfect mix of the two. “Into The Heart” starts with a beautiful, nearly two minute intro from the Edge, and is met with some incredibly simple, yet still deeply impactful lyrics. Of course, “I Will Follow” is a pretty upbeat song, as are “Stories For Boys” and “A Day Without Me,” a song in which you can catch hints of Bono’s accent if you listen closely, an aspect of vocals that I have always loved since my One Direction days. “An Cat Dubh” is on the slower, more melodic side, but it has a more minor-keyed feel than many other U2 tracks. I think the coolest thing about Boy really is that it doesn’t sound like any other U2 album, but in the best possible way. As with albums like Pop, we can see pretty obviously that straying from their typical sound doesn’t always bode well for the band, but seeing as though this is their debut album, it has sort of a reverse effect. This being their first album, one would expect their next records to be a sort of slow-burning evolution into their newer sound, but Boy really is a special album in its own right, beyond just the band’s origin story.

2. The Unforgettable Fire (1984)

A lot of people think that this album is U2’s greatest, and I probably wouldn’t argue. I think The Joshua Tree is without a doubt their best album, but I think The Unforgettable Fire is without a doubt a very close second. “Bad” might be my favorite song ever when it comes to guitar; the way the Edge plays on that track is difficult to describe in words. “Pride (In The Name Of Love)” is a timeless track, lyrically fantastic and yet another shining example of the Edge’s greatness, and the opening track “A Sort of Homecoming” is the perfect preparation for the ride this album is about to take you on. I think there are definitely some tracks on the album which are better than others, but every song on this record is great. Yes, even “Elvis Presley And America” and “MLK,” which have faced some scrutiny in the past, but are both still beautiful songs. This album is widely regarded as a turning point for the band, but I think between this album and The Joshua Tree, U2 was at their greatest ever. The albums preceding The Unforgettable Fire were fantastic no doubt, but this album is the start of their two-record magnum opus. In fact, I bought a book at a used bookstore about this album, and I wouldn’t be surprised if after reading it, it left me conflicted about the decision to rank this album as a definitive #2.

1. The Joshua Tree (1987)

Easily in my top three favorite albums of all time. This album is such a masterpiece, there is not a single miss on it. There have only ever been three songs to which I’ve had a truly visceral, tangible reaction upon listening for the first time. One of those two songs is “Running to Stand Still.” This is, in my opinion, a perfect track. The music, the lyrics, the journey that this song takes the listener on is truly unmatched. Not to mention the fact that every other track on this album is not far off. I could do a ranking of the Joshua Tree songs and go on for pages about probably every track on this album; hear me when I say there is truly not one single miss on it. The songs from this album that gained commercial success are easily the best of U2’s hits, rivaled only by those featured on The Unforgettable Fire, Boy and War. This record does a great job of showcasing the band’s pure talent, boasting some of the greatest lyrics, nay, poetry, greatest drum beats, and greatest guitar licks I’ve ever heard. I want to shout out more individual tracks on this album, but aside from “Running to Stand Still,” to which I’m a bit biased, I honestly don’t think I can single out any other track because they are all just that good. If you haven’t listened to this album, you are honestly doing yourself a disservice.

15. Zooropa

14. Pop

13. Songs of Surrender

12. Songs of Experience

11. How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb

10. Songs of Innocence

9. Achtung Baby

8. No Line on the Horizon

7. October

6. Rattle and Hum

5. All That You Can’t Leave Behind

4. War

3. Boy

2. The Unforgettable Fire

1. The Joshua Tree

Let me know what you think! Did I get it right or did I get it right?🤔

I have mostly Spotify to thank; this year is the first year I think I really started to take the app’s suggestions based on my listening history seriously, and it’s a damn good thing I did. Thanks to Spotify, I discovered what may possibly be one of my new all time favorites, right up there with Pink Floyd, 3eb, and U2. They don’t get all the credit, but as anyone who knows me knows, I will die on the hill of Spotify > Apple Music. But, I digress; in no particular order, here are five incredible albums I discovered this year.

1. The Record by Boygenius (2023)

I don’t know that saying I ‘discovered’ this album is entirely appropriate considering how hard the supergroup took the world by storm with this one, but I’m counting it. Not only do I love Boygenius because I’m gay (which is an impossible reason to deny) but I love them even more just as a fan of rock ‘n roll. Watching Lucy Dacus, Phoebe Bridgers, and Julien Baker (if you’re reading this Julien my dms are always open) rocking out on the SNL stage last month was fucking awesome to see. I don’t know that there’s really been any iconic female rock groups in the 21st century, at least not ones that are as notable as Heart, The Go-Go’s, Fleetwood Mac, etc, and it should also be noted that a lot of these groups are not all female. Boygenius is, though, and they’re just as awesome as any of their influences. This album doesn’t have a single miss, but the track that really stands out to me is “True Blue.” For the last ten-ish years, I’ve been compiling, editing, and rearranging a comprehensive list of my favorite songs in order. It’s up to about 500 songs at this point, but the top 25 has HARDLY changed since the list’s conception. Upon hearing this album for the first time, “True Blue” instantly staked its claim as #4. I won’t say the top five on this list has never changed, but I will say that I can count the number of times it has on one hand. Simply put, if you haven’t heard this album yet, you’re seriously missing out.

2. Cuts & Bruises by Inhaler (2023)

My brother loves to make fun of me for how much I love Bono, and what I’m pretty sure he doesn’t realize, is that that isn’t the insult he thinks it is. I have, as I’m sure anyone who had an iPhone in 2014 also has, a lot of opinions about U2, but one of the most unwavering of those opinions is that Bono is a fucking legend. So it’s no surprise to me that his son Elijah is a force to be reckoned with in and of himself. Elijah is my age, only a month and a half younger than me, and he formed his band Inhaler in 2012. I wanna give you just a second to let that sink in. In 2012, we were 13 years old. When your dad is Bono, it does make sense that you would “form a band” in your early years. But Elijah Hewson didn’t “form a band,” he formed a band. Fast forward a decade and Inhaler is pumping out some pretty fantastic music. Cuts & Bruises is their most recent album, and it also does not contain a single miss. Some notable tracks are “Love Will Get You There,” “These Are The Days,” and, my favorite, “If You’re Gonna Break My Heart.” This is a band that just seems cool, and who I would honestly love to be friends with. Their sound isn’t exactly like U2’s, but you can tell Elijah—obviously—drew some inspiration from his dad, and they are definitely a unique band with a unique sound; there isn’t an artist today quite like Inhaler.

3. A Brief History of Amazing Letdowns by Lilys (1993)

The new favorite band I was referring to up there? Lilys. I’ve always been a little jealous, for lack of a better word, of the fact that my dad is Facebook friends and relatively in touch with Steve Kilby, the front man for one of his favorite bands, The Church. When I first got into Lilys, it was because I was listening to a Jesus and Mary Chain album which ended, and Spotify went in to a suggested track before I could queue up another album. Instead of turning it off like I normally would do, I listened to the track, primarily because it was titled “Ycjcyaqftj.” It’s a short track, only a minute and 41 seconds long, so the amount of time it took for me to contemplate the title was about long enough for me to finish the song. I was intrigued, to say the least, by the melodic shoegaze, so I went to the full album and put it on. And the rest was history. I listened to the album nonstop for like a week, and I tried to find the band’s social media profiles to learn a little more about them, and I couldn’t find shit. Instead, I found the personal profile of frontman (and only consistent band member) Kurt Heasley, and the guy was on private. I figured, fuck it, I’ll just request to follow him, it can’t hurt. He not only accepted my follow request, but he requested to follow me back, and when I posted my Spotify Wrapped (of which Lilys was my top artist and probably at least 40% of my top songs being Lilys’ songs) and tagged him. Long story short, he dm’ed me, we got to talking, and he made a promise to come play a show in Brooklyn at some point this coming year which I will absolutely be holding him to.

4. French Exit by TV Girl (2014)

Admittedly, I don’t know a ton about this band or album just yet; I found this album last week. That said, I’ve been listening to this album, and TV Girl’s other discography, all week. They’re not a band whose sound I would normally be drawn to, but for some reason, I am. I’m pretty sure this album was a Spotify find, too, but honestly I don’t remember. And I don’t really care. Because when a good thing falls in your lap, the reason why doesn’t particularly matter does it? The album opens with my favorite track “Pantyhose,” and closes with probably my second favorite track “Anjela,” but that’s not to discount all of the stuff in between. This album is just pure fun. If I were asked to recommend a mood-booster of an album, this would probably be the first to come to mind. The vocals aren’t exactly upbeat, and I think if you were to strip the music and isolate the vocals, mood-booster would definitely not be a term I’d use to describe this album. The vocals paired with the music, though… I don’t really know what I would categorize the album as in terms of genre, but sometimes I think that’s a hallmark of a great record. In the case of French Exit, I think it’s exactly that.

5. Tim by The Replacements (1985)

The Replacements were a band that I was vaguely familiar with, solely because of the feature of the track “Alex Chilton” in the early 2000s video game Rock Band. I naively thought they were a one hit wonder, until last year(?) when I was trying my hardest to get into podcasts. I stumbled upon the podcast “BandSplained” and I was looking for a relatively short episode just to get my feet wet, when I found one on The Replacements. I don’t think it was short, and I didn’t listen to the whole thing, but I was intrigued enough to start it, because what could possibly warrant an entire episode of a podcast devoted to a one hit wonder? That was when I discovered that The Replacements, and frontman Paul Westerberg, were far from a one hit wonder. I listened to the album Pleased to Meet Me after the podcast, but that was really it. Fast forward to this year, and I’m watching some random cartoon—I don’t even remember what—and a song came on that I genuinely had a visceral reaction to. That has only happened to me upon hearing a song for the first time two other times in my life, and those are the top two songs on my list of favorites. I Shazam’d the song, and to my serendipitous surprise, it was by The Replacements. So I decided to check out this other Replacements album, Tim. The Replacements have now found themselves a solid member of my regular band rotation. The whole album is fantastic, but “Here Comes a Regular” is the one that caused me to have a visceral reaction, and some other notable tracks include “Little Mascara,” and “Bastards of Young,” but this entire album is absolutely fantastic, and criminally underrated.

The cool thing about all of these albums are that they are all my first exposure to their respective artists, and I now consider myself a fan of all five artists. All five of these albums are seriously worth listening to, and I hope some of them can find their way into more people’s libraries, they certainly deserve to. If you do listen to any of them, I’d love to hear what you think, and if you think I got my reviews of them right!

As I’ve shifted my focus to more professional writing (including fiction—‘professional’ does not only refer to something lucrative and, typically to some degree, boring), I haven’t had the wherewithal to continue writing on personal musings and takeaways from the world on my blog. I do hope to get back to that type of writing, especially given the climate surrounding my Jewish identity, as well as the simple fact that I live in New York City, and my number of musings and thoughts on the world has multiplied exponentially since I moved here.

That said, however, I was thinking about how I could continue to make use of my domain in ways other than just to promote my published writing. My dad utilizes his domain for a number of things as well, one of which being a column entitled ‘Doug’s Music Snobbery.’ I figured I would start up with something similar, combining my love of writing and music, and lists. So while I don’t have a fun name for it like he does, I am going to start devoting this page to various lists pertaining to music! So without further ado, I am very excited to present the first installation in this new little series of mine: a ranking of blink-182’s discography!

blink-182 has gone from my absolute favorite band circa 2015, to a somewhat guilty pleasure circa 2023. Tom Delonge’s high-pitched, very memeable vocals have always been attractive to me, especially when accompanied by Mark Hoppus’s deep melodic ones. And, of course, Travis Barker’s drumming capabilities, though when he got to be all buddy buddy with Machine Gun Kelly, my love for him definitely plunged a bit. Nevertheless, love them or hate them—there really isn’t much in between—blink-182 were certainly pioneers of the emo/punk/pop-punk genre, and their music has been incredibly influential, both to other 21st century punk bands, as well as their almost cult-like deep cut fans.

The band has released a total of 10 studio albums, though there are two recent albums featuring Matt Skiba as Tom Delonge’s replacement after he left the band. Which leads us to our starting point:

10. ONE MORE TIME… (2023)

The band’s most recent album was highly anticipated, given it was the first recording of the original three (Mark, Travis, and Tom) in 12 years. Their marketing team went all out, attempting to reach a potential new wave of blink fans nearly 30 years after the band’s conception, and reel back in old fans with Tom’s resurgence. The trio headlined Coachella in April of this year, and have since announced tour dates to promote the album’s release. A family friend actually saw them at Coachella, and she gave their performance a less than glowing review. Apparently, the banter between songs consisted almost entirely of the vulgar sex and drug talk that resonated so deeply with their teenage fans of the late nineties. And that is one of the things that made blink so great—in the nineties. Fast forward thirty years, and such graphic talk is not so appealing when it comes from 50-year-old men. I attempted to listen to the album when it was released, and truth be told, I couldn’t even finish it. The lyrics were reminiscent of the same content they put out in the ‘90s, but after decades of life lived, it was disappointing, unsettling, to listen to a man who is currently in cancer remission sing about blow and blowjobs. I know that not having listened to the album in its entirety is not exactly fair when ranking it this low on the list, but given the rest of their discography, it is unfortunately a no-brainer.

9. NINE (2019)

This is the second album recorded with Matt Skiba, and, while he does get some props for his vocals on California, I’m glad this was his last album with the band. This is definitely a decent album, but it doesn’t really feel like blink to me. There are some solid tracks, Remember To Forget Me is probably my favorite, Heaven is a good one, and The First Time is definitely a pretty Travis Barker heavy track, but Travis seems to be the only thing about this album that really makes it sound even a little bit like a blink-182 album. Like I said, this isn’t a bad album per se, and compared to ONE MORE TIME… it’s a fucking masterpiece, but compared to every other album in their discography, it sits comfortably at the bottom. There isn’t much else to say about this one; the most notable thing about it is that it was probably their last album that didn’t suck—I can’t see them coming out with another decent record after ONE MORE TIME…

8. California (2016)

This was the album that they were on tour for the one time I saw them. Also a Tom-less album, and that’s probably the main reason it’s ranked this low. California is a good album. I don’t think I’d say it’s any more than good, but it is good by any standard. A lot of really good tracks on this record, and again, I don’t know that I’d say there are any GREAT tracks here, but a lot of them are really really good. Bored to Death, which was the one single released off of this album, is a good track, and I’m inclined to think if it wasn’t a blink-182 song, I’d even say it was a great track, but it doesn’t ring true to classic blink in my opinion. She’s Out of Her Mind is a pretty good song, San Diego and California are both good, too. They tried to harken back to the old days, too on this album, with Built This Pool and Brohemian Rhapsody, both one-line songs under a minute long, but it still falls just a bit short without Tom. That said, without this album I probably never would have seen them live, because hell if I’d spend money to watch them perform any of the tracks off of their newest album, so I do have a bit of a soft spot for it.

7. blink-182 (2003)

This is definitely a controversial spot for the self-titled album, especially considering the Robert Smith feature on this album. This is where it gets tough though, because aside from the above three, all of blink’s albums are fantastic; this one is no exception. The self-titled record, for a lot of bands, is their attempt at a sort of magnum opus; hence the idea of a self-title. Some of my favorite albums of all time are self-titled albums (Third Eye Blind, The 1975, The Doors, Ramones, I could go on) but there are also some self-titled albums that don’t quite hold up to the rest of the band’s repertoire, this being one of them. That said, this album is classic blink-182. When I saw them in 2016, I will never forget, they opened with the song Feeling This and behind them as they played was a massive ‘FUCK’ written in fire. That alone definitely made it one of the coolest sets I think I’ve ever seen. All of This with Robert Smith is a great track, as is Here’s Your Letter. This album does have some duds though. Easy Target is simply All of This, just slowed down and with different lyrics. And of course, who could forget, I Miss You, the track that turned them (mainly Tom) into a meme. Truthfully, an argument could be made that this album is the beginning of the end for them.

6. Neighborhoods (2011)

Here’s why the ranking of their self-titled album is controversial. Many fans would never even dream of putting this album above blink-182, but anyone who has actually given this album a thorough listen understands. This album is also how I know the band is capable of lyrics that are age-appropriate and not so risque. Snake Charmer is a great example, as are After Midnight and Natives. The musical composition is a bit of a deviation from blink’s norm, but the lyrical creativity makes it work. This album proved that the three don’t confine themselves to the raunchy, crunchy vibe that they created for themselves in decades prior, but the final track on the album, Even If She Falls pays homage to the band they have always been. This would be my album recommendation for someone who is not necessarily a fan of blink-182.

5. Cheshire Cat (1995)

This album, while great, feels a little less polished to me. There aren’t really a ton of notable tracks on this album, and the album actually opens with an alternate recording of Carousel, which is the opener of their debut album as well (along with a number of other tracks that carried over to this album). M+M’s was actually the song that got me into blink-182, back in like probably 2012; I saw a Tumblr post with the lyrics “You and I should get away for awhile, I just wanna be alone with your smile,” which, in my underdeveloped 13-year-old mind, was pure poetry. It should be noted that this is probably the most wholesome lyric on the entire album, let alone just that song, which features the lyric later on “My love life was getting so bland, there are only so many ways I can make love with my hand.” Luckily, I didn’t really realize what that meant until I was a true fan come high school. This is definitely a classic blink album, fully encapsulating the vision they so clearly had for themselves. I think Cheshire Cat is actually the album in which they figured out who they were as a band, so while there may not be many GREAT tracks, it is certainly a great album.

4. Take Off Your Pants And Jacket (2001)

This album is kind of a transitional album I’d say, between the really raunchy lyrics of the band’s early stuff and the more poetic lyrics of, say, Neighborhoods. Arguably blink-182’s most innocent teenage anthem, First Date, is a great example of that transition, drawing from aspects of both the band’s past, and their vision for the future. Stay Together For The Kids is a song that much more closely resembles the later lyricism, and the real-life content which I personally was hoping for in their most recent album. In contrast, Happy Holidays, You Bastard is perhaps the epitome of raunchy blink, with the refrain “Unless your dad will suck me off, I'll never talk to you again, Unless your mom will touch my cock, I'll never talk to you again, Ejaculate into a sock, I'll never talk to you again, I'll never talk to you again.” It really is kinda crazy that they were able to turn lyrics like that into an actually enjoyable song on an overall pretty enjoyable album. And of course, I would be remiss not to mention Anthem Part Two, a political protest of a song that has maintained its relevance for over 20 years.

3. Buddha (1994)

A debut album through and through, Buddha feels to me like a low-grade (low brow? I really don’t mean low-grade in a bad way) reckoning with the grunge movement. Another not very polished record, I can only imagine what the discourse surrounding this album was when it was released—you probably just had to be there, and I was unfortunately five years late. Reebok Commercial is one of my favorite blink songs, in part because it reminds me of the good parts of high school. This was the album that I would often play on my way home from school, and as it was timed, that was the track that usually came on as I was turning out of the parking lot after waiting fifteen minutes to navigate through the parking lot; whoever designed the Bloomfield Hills High School parking lot with only ONE entry and exit deserves jail time, but I digress. This album, of course since it was their debut, is so unique, mainly because of the spotlight on Tom’s voice. See, Tom, objectively, can’t sing. But many people say that about Bob Dylan, and that’s Bob Dylan. Tom is obviously a far cry from that level of talent (as most artists are, in my opinion) but his vocals on songs like The Girl Next Door, My Pet Sally, and Point of View bare a decent amount of responsibility in this album’s success. Not to mention the melodic contrast of Mark’s vocals to the crunchy guitar and drums in tracks like Fentoozler and Strings. There’s a reason this band became successful, and Buddha is quite a large part of that reason.

2. Enema Of The State

There is a strong case to be made that this is blink’s best album, and I wouldn’t argue. There isn’t a single dud on this album, and this is the album that many people think of when they think of blink-182. If you’re not a fan, or just a casual one, it’s the blonde nurse on the album cover that makes this album so well-known. If you are a fan, you know this album as the one with all their hits. What’s My Age Again?, Adam’s Song, All The Small Things—this album is stacked. Personally, though, my favorite song on this album is Going Away To College. For a lot of fans who were teenagers at the band’s peak, this was the track that made them feel like they could truly relate to blink. For me, who was born exactly one month after this album’s release to the day, that’s not why it’s my favorite. The reason I love this song is because I could really get it, in every stage of my life. I was in middle school when I first heard the song, and then when I got to high school, it started to become my comfort song. It was still a jam when I was in college, and now, post-grad, it bares the burden of nostalgia. Even if it happened 15 years later for me, I think that is the cycle of emotions this song created for a lot of fans. Every track on this album is fantastic, but just a few other shout outs that I think could’ve and should’ve had the same commercial success as the three hits I mentioned above: Dumpweed, Alien’s Exist, Dysentery Gary, and Mutt.

1. Dude Ranch (1997)

This album is a strong contender for my favorite album of all time. It’s right up there with U2’s The Joshua Tree, Wilco’s Yankee Hotel Foxtrot, Transmissions From the Satellite Heart by The Flaming Lips—I could go on but you get the point. This album, for me, competes with some of the absolute greatest. Yet another album without a single dud, the only song I would guess is known by the general public is Dammit (“Well I guess this is growing up” the notable lyric). It’s a shame more people haven’t heard this album, especially those who consider themselves a fan of punk or any genre with punk influence. I would describe this album as tastefully raunchy. It is not, at least I don’t think, as vulgar as some of the lyrics featured on some of their other albums, even with a track literally titled Dick Lips (which is a great track, by the way). Every time I listen to this album, I ask myself what my favorite track is, and while I’ve come to the loose conclusion that it’s Apple Shampoo, sometimes Voyeur, I think each of the tracks on this album could be justifiably ranked as the best song on the album. There are so many things I could say about each of those songs, but it would take me way too long. This album, simply put, is about the time in our lives that a lot of us spend the rest of our lives longing for. The comfort and frustration of living under your parents roof is an overarching theme of this album, and it is conveyed masterfully. As a writer, the lyrics of this album are what I strive to convey in my more poetic writing, just in a more poetic way. As a still amateur after 15 years musician, the simple chord progressions paired with the feedback and filters on an electric guitar amp, these are exactly the types of songs that I enjoy playing. If there’s anything you take away from this list, it should be that this album is a must-listen.

In summation, if you just want the ranking without justification:

10. ONE MORE TIME…

9. NINE

8. California

7. blink-182

6. Neighborhoods

5. Cheshire Cat

4. Take Off Your Pants And Jacket

3. Buddha

2. Enema Of The State

1. Dude Ranch

I welcome any and all disagreements with the sole exception that the best two albums are undoubtedly the best two, you can switch them but no album is better than those two. Objectively.

I hope you enjoyed this ranking, and rest assured, if you aren’t a fan of raunchy punk music, lucky for you this is the only band of that genre that I’ve devoted this much time to (aside from maybe Ramones, but I wouldn’t really put them in the same punk subgenre). I have a bunch of list ideas in mind already!

Beatlemania and Bieber Fever both swept their own nations, among many other nations, including ours, during the rise of their respective contagions: John, Paul, George, and Ringo of The Beatles, and Justin Bieber. That said, I don’t believe any level of exposure to Beatlemania or Bieber Fever could have prepared the world for the surge of the Directioner. In the summer of 2010, the Directioner rose to power. Directioners were categorized as a Harry Girl, a Niall Girl, a Zayn Girl, a Louis Girl, or a Liam Girl, yet these categorizations served as the Directioners’ sole difference; all five types of Directioner shared a deep bond and love for the boys of One Direction. These five Brits were thrust together by professional television talent scout Simon Cowell, and once they released their first album in 2011, there was no turning back. Over the course of the next five years, Harry Styles, Niall Horan, Zayn Malik, Louis Tomlinson, and Liam Payne became household names all across the globe. While initially very much a bubblegum pop boy band, One Direction seemingly grew up right alongside their beloved Directioners. Primarily appealing to middle- and high-school aged girls early in their career with titles such as “What Makes You Beautiful” and “Everything About You” dominating their debut album, by the time they released their fifth and final album in 2015, sex and lust driven songs such as “Love You Goodbye” and “Temporary Fix” certainly resonated with their now post-pubescent fanbase.

For many fans, One Direction served as a sexual awakening. And for many of them, that awakening was fairly straightforward; these five men had awakened something within them that rendered them hopelessly attracted to the band. For many others, however, myself included, a different kind of awakening had occurred. It was no secret to true Directioners that there were plenty of instances of homoeroticism and sexual promiscuity amongst the five boys. Many fans were entirely convinced that Harry Styles and Louis Tomlinson, despite Louis being in a committed relationship, were engaged in a passionate love affair for the duration of the band’s career. For many within the Directioner sphere, especially those who identified as Harry girls and even more so for those who identified as Louis girls, this was their first encounter with homosexuality that was welcomed, and even encouraged. While it was never confirmed that Harry and Louis were sexually involved, many held out hope. As time went on, the band announced their indefinite hiatus, and the pride movement was gaining steam, more and more true, original 2010 Directioners began emerging from the closet.

Personally, as the One Direction shrine in my bedroom at my parent’s house still stands strong, I view the band as truly integral in my own coming out process. I began to associate the girls in their love songs with the girls in my own life. “History”, along with pretty much every other track on their final album, was about my first girlfriend. My “crush” and obsession with Louis Tomlinson was deeply rooted in both the hope that he was somewhere along the LGBTQ+ spectrum, and the fact that he was a bit more effeminate than most men in 2010s popular culture, and I know that I’m not the only Louis girl for whom that is true.

Perhaps it is this instance of accidental activism for the LGBTQ+ community that sets One Direction and their fans apart from those of The Beatles or Justin Bieber. Girls who swooned over John, Paul, Ringo, George, and Justin did so because they envisioned them singing their lyrics directly to them. While that is most definitely the case with a large chunk of Directioners, many other Directioners swooned as they envisioned themselves singing One Direction’s lyrics right alongside those five boys, serenading the girl of their own dreams instead.

This lack of respect, at least that I’ve noticed, has occurred in two different spheres of life. One has been academically and/or professionally. Let me give you an example. Zoom school is overwhelming, to say the absolute least. Burn out is at an all time high, and no one is immune. One of my classes this semester, I would go as far to say, has been the primary source of my burnout. I am typically very careful of saying that I think my workload is unreasonable; I chose this schedule for myself, I chose to take 15 credits in my final semester. What I did not choose, was to have a 7-8 page paper with a cover letter, and a 250-page book all assigned with just one week to complete, with one of just two University sanctioned “wellness days” falling within that week. This, with the sole exception of organic chemistry (but that’s simply not my forte), is the most unreasonable amount of work I have been assigned for one course throughout all of my years of school. Not just college, all of school. I was feeling extremely anxious about all of this, to the point where I had to leave the class in order to take care of myself. I emailed the instructor explaining the situation, and asking for an extension. Now mind you, when I had covid, I was offered an extension by this same instructor that I did not take because I did not feel as though I needed it. When I told the instructor I was feeling incredibly anxious and had to leave class, I was met with a no, and told that for every day I went without turning in the assignments, my grade would go down one point (out of 20 points). This is problematic for a number of reasons, not the least of which being that this instructor quite literally said “mental health is nothing compared to physical health”, but the reason I’d like to address is that there was a huge lack of understanding, or in other words, respect. On top of all of that, it has now taken over two weeks for these assignments to be returned to me, showcasing that this instructor does not value mental health as much as physical health, nor my time as much as theirs.

Let me now provide you with a counterexample. I am in another course in which I, pardon my French, fucked up royally. I received a notification that I had gotten a 0 on an essay that was supposedly due two weeks prior. I had absolutely no idea that I even had an essay due two weeks prior. I emailed that instructor, relatively frustrated seeing as though that has never happened to me and I could not find any reminders about the essay in my inbox, and they immediately set up a time to meet with me outside of their regular office hours. In that meeting, they told me that they were willing to be flexible. That they understood I must be going through a lot as a student right now, and that I should just pound out this essay, that I shouldn’t spend more than a couple hours on it, and send it to them whenever I can. I ended up turning in that essay exactly one month late, and I received a very satisfactory grade on it. That is how to show respect in the zoom universe. In fact, that is how to show even more respect than ever would be necessary in the zoom universe.

The second sphere of life that I’ve noticed this lack of respect in, is the personal sphere. Since the beginning of this semester, I had a couple of friends who I considered to be incredibly close to me just start ignoring my messages out of the blue. I had no idea what was going on, or why, and it felt like I was at a complete and utter loss; when I asked what was going on, I was met with radio silence. It wasn’t until after roughly two months of silence that I found out from someone else that these couple friends had an issue with something that I was doing. I wasn’t told directly that there was an issue with me, and I wasn’t given a complete explanation either. When I reached out, I was given a bit more of an explanation, but not much. I found myself growing increasingly frustrated; it wasn’t that I was in denial of my behavior that was bothering them, it was more that I wasn’t even given the opportunity to fix it, let alone be made aware that I was even doing it. Who knows how I would have reacted had I been given that opportunity. Maybe I would have denied it. But the fact that I wasn’t even given the chance to, struck me as similarly disrespectful as those in my academic sphere who were not willing to extend courteous understanding or empathy.

This instructor was one that I’d known prior to the course, and these friends were among those whom I’d considered an integral part of my recent college experience, to say the least. I was blindsided in each of these scenarios, and let me tell you, it did NOT feel good. I’m trying my very best not to hold this display of a lack of respect against any of the players involved. I know that times are incredibly tough for everyone right now, and putting oneself first is of the utmost importance, even when, sometimes, that comes at the expense of others. That said, however, these are two situations that could have been prevented with a little more communication, and a little more understanding. All of this is to say, treat people with kindness and respect. This pandemic has been tough on just about everyone. In fact, I’d challenge you to find a single person who hasn’t struggled at some point over the course of the past year. It’s important to try to do your part in lessening that struggle for those around you, just as you would want them to do for you. We’re all human, we all have feelings, and we all break sometimes. Check in on the people you love. Do something nice for someone. Even if it’s just a “Hey, I’m thinking of you” text. A little bit goes a long way. Even a twelve hour extension would have helped. Even a text saying “Sorry, I just don’t have the mental capacity to have this conversation right now” would have helped. Put yourself first, but put the people you care about at a very close second.

In one of my English classes this semester, we’re reading Phillip Roth’s The Plot Against America (which I would highly recommend not reading as I find Roth’s style and the book itself to be incredibly mundane, but I do think it’s an important story and they did a screen adaptation on HBO so maybe try that if you’re interested?). In our Zoom breakout room discussion, my group was to discuss a government-sponsored volunteer program that is mentioned in the novel which is geared towards 12-18 year old Jewish American boys, and places them in predominantly Christian towns essentially to learn about discipline through hard work. As the book is set during the time of Nazi Germany, and it is an alternate history novel in which a Nazi sympathizer and friend of Hitler’s is elected over FDR and comes to power during the Holocaust, one can see why this is a relevant aspect of the narrative to analyze. In the breakout room, one of my classmates said that this volunteer program was just like the concentration camps, explaining that “they’re both forced labor.” Not only is this an entirely unnecessary and unproductive comparison, it is disgustingly ignorant and misinformed, as concentration camps were, in absolutely zero sense of the word, voluntary, and were not just “forced labor.” Camps that served as a death sentence for over six million Jews were not “just like” the fictional government-sponsored volunteer program in this book.

Instead of correcting this ignorance, another classmate took it a step further and began discussing how racism is much worse than antisemitism, as the economic and political policies in the US are far more discriminatory towards Black Americans than Jewish Americans. Again, this is a comparison risen from gross, full-fledged ignorance. Racism and racist events, and antisemitism and antisemitic events, are NOT comparable. To compare slavery, the greatest atrocity in the American history to the Holocaust, the greatest atrocity in European history in a “who has it worse”-natured argument is truly offensive. As a white American, I will never know the struggle of being Black in America. However just as I will never know firsthand the effects of racism, non-Jewish people will never know firsthand the effects of anti-semitism. Both are horrific prejudices that serve only to harm and uphold supremacist ideals. Neither is a struggle that can be compared to literally anything else in the history of the world. When you compare two forms of prejudice, you are actively furthering the misunderstanding of what victims of those -isms are experiencing. To compare antisemitism to racism (and vice versa) is to show that you do not understand what constitutes antisemitism and antisemitic thought, and that you aren’t willing to try to understand. Comparing struggles is never, EVER helpful.

This is unfortunately not an isolated incident. It just happened to be the incident that made me angry enough to speak on the topic. But I’ve been noticing these covert antisemitic microaggressions more and more lately, and the fact that no one is talking about them is problematic. When an insurrectionist storming the capitol is wearing a “Camp Auschwitz” sweatshirt and it is dismissed in a matter of hours, something is wrong. When I speak about antisemitism to someone who isn’t Jewish and their initial gut reaction is that Jewish people aren’t oppressed because they’re rich, or white, especially given that Judaism is not synonymous with rich or white, something is wrong. Racism is abhorrent. And while it is more culturally important in America right now to educate yourself on issues of racism and how to be a better ally if you aren’t personally affected by racism, that does not mean that antisemitism, and all other -isms for that matter, aren’t also abhorrent.

At the beginning, when we were in quarantine, I spent a lot of time on FaceTime and Zoom, drinking wine, playing “Psych”, and just fucking around on Instagram with my friends. This taught me the importance of constant communication and staying in touch with the people you care about. In high school, nearly all of my closest friends lived about a half a dozen state borders away, and I saw them twice a year if I was lucky. What that taught me about communication, doesn’t hold a candle to what I’ve learned this year. It’s so easy to lose touch with people, but in a time when that ease is amplified nearly tenfold, consciously staying in touch is so incredibly important.

When I got back to campus in the fall, my mental health took a turn, and I experienced anxiety for what was probably the first time in my life. This was when I was able to see who really cared about me, who showed up when I needed them to. A lot of my friends surprised me in that regard. Many were actively supportive, many were passively supportive, and I couldn’t be more appreciative. At the beginning of this year, I had a really bad falling out with one of my closest friends. The reason was that the relationship was negatively impacting my mental wellbeing in a way that got to be way too much for me to handle. I didn’t want this to happen with any of my other close friends, so I made as much of an effort as I could to ensure that it didn’t happen. What I didn’t realize until recently, however, was that it doesn’t have to be all or nothing. It’s okay to distance yourself from a friend who might be a little tough to be around when you’re struggling mentally, and that’s not something you have to feel guilty about. I’m not usually one to put myself first when the people close to me are going through a tough time as well; that’s why I typically feel guilty and like I’m doing something wrong when I distance myself from the people who do more to hurt than help in my time of need. This year has taught me that I really do not need to do that, it’s more important to take care of yourself first. One of my favorite sayings is that you can’t pour from an empty cup, and that’s something I really hope to carry with me into 2021.

Something I am extremely grateful for in 2020, are the friendships that I’ve made. I have grown much closer to a lot of my friends in Wolverine Support Network this year, and these are incredibly meaningful, authentic friendships that I really didn’t expect to make in my last year of college. This year I spoke out about getting outed in middle school, and how that has affected my relationship with my sexuality to this day. I didn’t realize it before, but as much as I thought I was living my life as an open book since coming out voluntarily in 2016, there has been a lot about my relationship with my sexuality that I’ve been too embarrassed, or ashamed of to ever talk about with most of my friends. These friends that I’ve made this semester, I think I owe it to them that I’ve gotten to the point of being able to talk about this experience publicly. They make me feel understood in ways that I didn’t even know I needed, and they’ve been by my side through every up and down of this semester, and I think everyone deserves at least one friend like that.

Arguably one of the best things to come out of this year was that I reconnected with an old friend. This was a friend with whom I went through a friendship-ending rough patch, but when I saw her at a small gathering this semester, we ended up talking and picking up as if we never had a stopping point in the first place. I’m not sure how deep our respective grudges ran, and while I don’t think either of us still held a grudge at this point, it still felt really nice to be able to hang out normally under the pretense of a sort of nonverbal agreement to let bygones be bygones. Since I opened up about my experience getting outed in middle school, the level of comfort I’ve felt around my friends has been proportionate to the level of discomfort I’ve had around the people who knew me at the time I was outed. It was really really nice to be able to have someone I felt comfortable around who both knew me then, and who knows me now. When I posted about that experience, the girl who outed me blocked me, and a lot of her friends followed suit. To have reconnected with this old friend at this particular point in time felt really important, and really great. No grudge is worth holding for extended periods of time, and I’m glad that I no longer have to carry the weight of this one.

While obviously when I think of 2020, my first thought is going to be how much hurt this year caused, I hope that my second thought can be the few benefits of 2020. Like how many friendships I forged, and how many I strengthened, how much grief I left behind this year, and even some direction in terms of what it is I want to do with my life. I’m hopeful for 2021. I’m hopeful that the vaccine will start to make an impact, that the new leadership of our country will help those who have been ignored by past leadership, and that people are a little more understanding, and caring. The last time there was a pandemic before a ‘21 year, the years that followed became known for their partying and shared love of happiness and relief: the roaring ‘20s. As someone who has never set foot in a club since turning 21, I feel so lucky and so excited to have two distinct, but equally fantastic, groups of friends, and a crazy family to ring in the next set of roaring ‘20s with.

I’ve always loved Barack Obama’s lists of favorites that he puts out at the end of each year, and while I almost always have enough movies to compile a substantial favorites list each December, I don’t think there’s ever been a year in which I’ve read enough novels to put together a legitimate list of my true favorites. This year, I finally have enough novels in my 2020 repertoire, and I’m excited to share with you my top 15 favorite novels that I’ve read in 2020. Disclaimer, these are all fiction novels because that is what I’m typically drawn to, but I’ll mention some nonfiction honorable mentions at the end!

15. Sabrina by Nick Drnaso - This was the first, and only, graphic novel that I’ve ever read and truly enjoyed through and through. I’m not a huge fan of graphic novels, to me they read like glorified picture books the majority of the time, and I like a book that will make me think, rather than one which will do the thinking for me. Sabrina, however, did both, and I was pleasantly surprised. Drnaso creates a world in his illustrations and narrations that feels borderline paranormal, while still being entirely realistic. This novel made me think more than most novels usually do, and part of that comes from the fact that this novel has stayed with me since I read it. It’s made me rethink some of my everyday occurrences, and view a lot of different aspects of life in ways that I hadn’t thought about before. I would certainly recommend this book to anyone, but I would recommend it especially to those who are into conspiracy theories.

14. Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl - This was a novel that was recommended to me by a visiting author in a class, as well as the professor. While I can’t say that I loved it as much as I expected based on the glowing recommendations I received, I can say it is an extremely intellectual novel that also makes the reader think, but not in the way you might expect. This novel was mysterious and even a bit confusing at times; every time I thought I had something figured out, I was either proven wrong, or I was not given confirmation or denial. This book has a certain aesthetic, and a very broad audience, it was honestly just an enjoyable (but not at all easy/fast) read.

13. The entirety of the Harry Potter series - This one I just felt like I had to include because it took up a pretty big portion of my time during the March-May quarantine. As I’ve said in previous blog posts, I was never a fan of Harry Potter growing up; I was not even indifferent towards the series, I actively refused to read it. However when I read the first novel for my a class last semester, I decided to continue on to the rest of the series. I was not at all disappointed, I breezed through these novels so quickly and efficiently, mainly because I couldn’t put them down. While JK Rowling has been under fire lately (rightfully so), and I can hardly ever separate the art from the artist in situations like hers, I honestly loved the Harry Potter series.

12. Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens - This was a novel that I was a little skeptical of, given that nearly all of my friends had read it and loved it, and had been pushing me to read it for awhile. I was worried that the book wouldn’t live up to the hype, and upon finishing it for the first time, it didn’t. That said, this is another novel that has stuck with me since reading it, and a novel that I think rewards multiple reads. I haven’t had the time to reread it just yet, and I don’t know that I’ll be able to any time soon, but I certainly plan to eventually. One other thing I’ll say about Where the Crawdads Sing, is that the aesthetics, and the writing itself is so beautifully done, the plot could have ceased to exist at all and I would have still enjoyed Owens’ writing.

11. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes by Suzanne Collins - This one, I’ll admit, is based pretty heavily in nostalgia. The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes is the prequel to The Hunger Games series, a series that I absolutely loved when it was originally published. I saw the movies in theaters, and became so attached to the characters, the plot line, and the very concept of The Hunger Games. I was so excited to hear that there was a prequel coming out, and it most definitely did NOT disappoint.

10. Marlena by Julie Buntin - Reading Marlena was really cool experience for me, because Julie had been my professor at the time that I read it. I always love to read the works of my mentors and instructors, I think it’s a really unique experience to be able to read something, and know the writer personally. That’s a big part of why I loved Marlena, but I would also recommend this novel to anyone, particularly anyone who grew up in the midwest. It was an enjoyable read that keeps the reader on their toes and wanting more, and it isn’t easy to put down.

9. Such a Fun Age by Kiley Reid - I loved this novel for it’s complex simplicity. What I mean by that is, the entire narrative centers around one video taken on a phone at a grocery store, but from that video stems a completely unexpected interconnectivity between characters, and conflicts that wrestle with a lot of things that go unnoticed in our daily lives. The novel portrays race relations and racial prejudice in a way that was different from any other story that I’ve ever read or seen. It’s a novel that also kept me on my toes, and also made me think deeply about our internal biases and the way we perceive others in our day to day lives. Such a Fun Age is by no means simple, but it is much more complex than one would expect from what unfolds in the first couple of chapters. This novel was undeniably socially relevant, and I think it’s a book that could benefit any reader.

8. The Lost Family by Jenna Blum - The Lost Family is a novel that tackles so many different issues at once, and I think Blum does that flawlessly. I found myself getting pretty attached to the characters, so much so that I really wanted to know what their lives looked like after the story ends, and I wanted to unread the book so that I could go back and read it for the first time all over again. I would recommend this book to just about anyone. The world building is so intriguing, and I got this book as a gift from my Grandma who also loved it, and she is very critical of the books she reads, so if you can’t take my word for it, hers is as good as it gets.

7. Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng - I got this book based purely on the hype, and it did not disappoint. I genuinely loved Little Fires Everywhere, I thought the story was incredible and there wasn’t a dull moment throughout the entire novel. The only reason this book isn’t higher up on the list is because I don’t believe in making ordered lists and leaving two or three tied for a spot in the list. If you haven’t already, please do yourself a favor and read this book. The hype is literally all justified.

6. Normal People by Sally Rooney - This novel also received a fair amount of hype, and I had actually just finished Sally Rooney’s other novel Conversations With Friends not long before reading this one. I thought Normal People was uniquely routine and excitingly mundane. Stripped down, it really is just a novel detailing the course of two people’s relationship. But it is so nuanced, every scene fleshed out to the extent that I thought possible, I was left wondering for sure, but not out of dissatisfaction or unanswered questions. Rooney is simply a talented writer, and this is a truly entertaining read.

5. The Knockout Queen by Rufi Thorpe - I’m honestly surprised that this book hasn’t received the same amount of hype as some of the other books on this list. I truly loved this book, and I thought it was one of the most interesting coming-of-age-esque stories I’ve read in a long time. The narrator, Michael, establishes such an intimacy with the reader that it’s hard not to come away from this book loving it. I’m not sure if this was Thorpe’s intention or not, I have to believe it was at least a part of it, but this novel really made me think deeply about identity and agency.

4. The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead - When I say that I found this to be an immaculate story, I don’t know if that even does Whitehead’s novel justice. This book was chilling, and honestly difficult to read at times, but it’s a novel that I think everyone should read, if not out of want then out of necessity. I think it’s pretty common for white people to genuinely believe that because they’ve learned about slavery and segregation and are against both of those things, that they simply cannot be racist. And that is so incredibly untrue. I’ve been trying to educate myself, unlearn and relearn, and really do my part to be a better ally. Personally, I think I’ve learned more from this novel, and The Vanishing Half , than I ever did in school. As a white person, I recognize that this issue is not about me. But it is a responsibility of mine, and of every other white person, to listen, educate themselves, and act. For the white people who say they’re “too tired of having to deal with racism”, read this book. It’s entertaining, and if you can’t realize that your privilege means you don’t get to be too tired, then this book is a part ofyour solution, and there’s no excuse not to read it.

3. Beyond the Point by Claire Gibson - The military has become somewhat of a point of contention in 2020. At the end of the day, though, disrespecting the military is unacceptable. This novel shows the hardships that soldiers face, that are unique to them and help them forge bonds that are truly unexplainable to those who never experienced the things they did. Beyond the Point tells the story of three girls who enroll at West Point, and how their lives remain connected over time. It really is a touching story, and one that forges bonds not only between the characters, but between the characters and the readers as well. Incredibly well written, I was shocked to find out that this was Gibson’s debut novel.

2. The Friend by Sigrid Nuñez - This was a novel that I had to read for a class, and when I finished it, I texted a friend who was in the same class that I had only been so touched by a novel one other time, and that was when I read my favorite novel of all time, The Chosen. This book had such a profound effect on me; it was so eloquently written, and my heart swelled even more with every page. It was a relatively short novel, and when it was finished I desperately wanted more. I adored every aspect of this novel, and I would recommend it to anyone and everyone.

1. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett - It’s funny that Barack Obama inspired me to compile this list, and my number one also appears on his 2020 list. What can I say, great minds think alike! In all seriousness, this book was flawlessly written. I did not have a single qualm or critique of this novel, and this is another one that I wish I could unread and read all over again for the first time. While the effect of this novel on me was not as profound as The Friend, per se, it left a different kind of impression on me. There isn’t much I can say about The Vanishing Half, simply because no words of mine could do this story justice. If you haven’t read this novel yet, please do, you’re doing yourself a major disservice not to.

And honorable mention nonfiction: How ‘Bout That For a Crack Baby by Shawn Blanchard, Talking to Strangers by Malcolm Gladwell, Untamed by Glennon Doyle

Due to COVID, I made the difficult decision to stay on campus for the high holidays this year. This is the first time in my 21 years that I have not spent the high holidays with my family. Additionally, none of my roommates are Jewish. While I felt the weight of these two things as I recited the Shabbos and Rosh Hashanah prayers completely by myself, I also felt the weight of those who surrounded me anyway. I felt an immense gratitude being surrounded by people who I love, and who ensured I did not celebrate the holiday alone. It was as I was taking in this gratitude that I was informed of Justice Ginsburg’s passing.

My heart broke with this news. Instantly my mind went to the political repercussions, how a new appointment by Trump would mean a 6-3 split in the Supreme Court, and what that could mean for women’s rights, LGBTQ+ rights, and the rights of so many other minority groups that are now much more likely to be compromised. But then I thought of the Ginsburg family. I thought of my own Rosh Hashanah dinner, and I thought of their Rosh Hashanah dinner. I thought of the pain her family must be experiencing, during what is supposed to be a joyous time, the start to a sweet new year. Myself, and COUNTLESS others are grieving the loss of a trailblazing, passionate, fierce, incredibly strong woman and role model. I can only imagine that our pain is truly unmatched by that of her family.

Not even four hours after Justice Ginsburg’s passing, Mitch McConnell came out with a statement saying he is ready to move forward with a new appointment immediately. Not even four hours after she took her last breath, and noted that her dying wish was not to be replaced prior to the election, this man decided that Justice Ginsburg’s family, and the rest of the country, didn’t need time to mourn. There was business to be done. I am personally so devoid of hope, so confused as to how our country reached this point. So many people in power, refusing to celebrate the life of a woman who changed a great deal of lives, but instead pushing forth their political agenda, no less on the holiest day of the Jewish calendar.

Today should not be about politics. Today should not be about a new Supreme Court appointment. Today should be about recognizing the change created by Justice Ginsburg, and all of the amazing things she did in her time on this planet. And today should be about ringing in the new year, and willing this year to be better, brighter, more filled with love than the last. L’Shana Tovah Umetukah, may this year be truly sweet.

Being that almost my entire social circle is filled with heterosexual people, I have been the token gay friend since October 11th, 2016. But, as harmful as tokenization can sometimes be, I’ve reveled in it. I love being the token gay friend, I love the attention it brings me, I love that it makes me unique amongst my friends, I love that I can completely make something up having to do with sexuality and none of them will know it’s untrue. That said, though, it can be hard at times having no one to relate to. It can be hard to express certain things that I know won’t be understood, but are killing me to keep bottled up. My friends are some of the most accepting people I’ve ever known, and I know that I can always go to them to talk if something comes up, but sometimes it just isn’t the same.

Since being back on campus, I’ve been spending a lot of time with the people who are in my social circle, but that I wouldn’t always consider my social friends; not that they aren’t social people, just that our social paths don’t normally cross. In this group, I’m not the token. In fact, this group is so far advanced in their understanding of sexuality, I don’t feel as though I need to hide a single thing. Not that I feel the need to hide from my other friends, but there are certain things I just wouldn’t feel necessary to bring up in my normal social settings. In the last week or so, I have felt more comfortable in my own skin than I ever have before. I feel heard, I feel seen, I feel valid, and I don’t feel the least bit different. And it’s really nice to be able to feel that after years of subconsciously feeling, for lack of a better word, alone.

All of this is to say, surround yourself with the people who make you feel like it’s okay to be unapologetically yourself. Surround yourself with people who you can relate to, people who make you feel good about who you are. Not everyone in your life needs to be relatable, in fact, as I’ve seen for the last four years, it’s sometimes better to surround yourself with people who are entirely different from you. But ideally, everyone should have both.

The ages of 13-18 are among some of the most formative, if not THE most formative years of someone’s life. The people who are there for you, encourage you, listen to you, believe in you, and bring out the best in you at those ages—there simply aren’t words to express how important those people are. There are people who go out of their way to be mentors, and there are people who have the opportunity to be a mentor due to the hand they’ve been dealt (or have made for themselves; the contrast here is simply mentorship by circumstance). These are the teachers, clergy members, camp counselors, advisors, and youth group staff members of the world. They are employed by some sort of organization, and given the task of teaching, or supervising. On paper, that is their responsibility. But those who are both passionate about, and good at their jobs know that the more important responsibility of their position is to inspire.

I was fairly involved in my youth group in high school. I chose to participate in Jewish leadership programs outside of school over virtually every other school sponsored activity I could have chosen to invest my time in. I spent the formative years of 14 to 17 completely immersed in an organization called bbyo. Their mission statement was “more Jewish teens, more meaningful Jewish experiences”, and man did I have some meaningful Jewish experiences. I met some of the greatest friends, many of whom I still talk to today, and I had some of the greatest times. Something that I didn’t notice then, however, that I have been noticing more and more since graduating high school, is the portion of the statement that says “more Jewish teens”. At the time, I never thought of this organization as a numbers game. And why would I? This organization provided me with my first trip to Israel, a developed personal connection to my Judaism, a trip to Bulgaria (and how many people can say they’ve been to Bulgaria?), and, again, some of the greatest friendships I’ve ever had. Now, however, I am beginning to realize that the root of this multi-national organization is deeply affected by numbers, and a misunderstanding of what makes a mentor.

One of my mentors that I mentioned above is Katie Vieder. Katie was the Michigan Regional Director all four years that I spent in bbyo, and she was the staff member with whom I worked the most closely my senior year when I served as the regional president. Katie did everything a mentor should do; she inspired me, she worked hard for me, she believed in me, and she pushed me. Katie is the true model of what one would think every staff member of an organization like this should, and would, be like. The summer before my junior year, I attended a program where I was able to meet the International version of Katie, we’ll call him Michael. When I met Michael, I expected him to be like Katie on steroids. A guy like that, with the opportunity to touch the lives of tens of thousands of Jewish high schoolers, I was beyond excited to meet him. I hadn’t heard all that much about him before meeting him, mainly because of this sort of unspoken rule that freshmen and sophomores don’t need to know about the politics of the organization (and believe me, this organization was filled to the brim with politics [and not always in a bad way! I owe a lot of my confidence to the political aspect of bbyo]). When I met Michael, I wasn’t as impressed as I expected to be, and when I actually got to know Michael, I was incredibly saddened and disappointed.

Michael had a sort of gang of kids who were more or less his gold star leaders. If you weren’t one of those, you were no more than a number to Michael. And worse, if you noticed this “gold star system”, you were deprived of financial resources and leadership resources by Michael. Unfortunately, the entire Michigan region made the mistake of noticing Michael’s system. After that summer, I decided I wanted to make a larger difference in whatever way that I could; I decided I wanted to run for the international executive board. Everyone in Michigan was supportive as can be. Katie and the other Michigan staff members did anything and everything to ensure that I was prepared when the election came, and that I was confident in myself. On the night before the election, Michael had a meeting with all of the candidates, both for the boy’s executive board, and the girl’s. I had never been in a room so filled with nerves before. Every single 16-year old kid in the room was anxious about the next day, and I’m pretty sure I can speak for all of us when I say we were in need of some words of encouragement. Instead, the first thing that Michael said to us was “A lot of you have absolutely no business being in this room right now”. When I’ve spoken to people who were in that meeting in the years before me, or after me, they have all been able to confirm that Michael told them the same thing.

I lost that election, and I was absolutely devastated. I wallowed for quite some time, and then when the time came, I ran for Michigan regional president, and won. Again, I was deeply inspired by my peers, by Katie, and by my new co-president Jacob, who is still one of my closest friends. By this time, going into my senior year, I was fully aware of the political drama encompassing frankly the entire international organization. The August before our term started, we gathered in DC with the international boards, and all of the other regional presidents from across the country. Jacob and I couldn’t have been more excited for our terms, and we were determined to make our region known, and taken seriously by the rest of the leaders in the room. One of the ways we wanted to do so was to sit down with Michael, and have an honest conversation about Michigan’s relationship with the international leadership and staff. When we asked Michael why our relationship had become so sour, he replied by saying “a lot of the kids from Michigan are weird. They need bbyo to survive - they wouldn’t have social lives without it. They’re just weird.” He then proceeded to name specific names of teens who weren’t weird by his standards, and told us that those are the kids that should be in charge. He also named specific names of past Michigan leaders who should not have been in charge, due to them being “weird”. I was a little uneasy at the time for sure, but now, I’m appalled. I just wanna take a second and digest here: this is a roughly 30-year-old man, sitting with two 17-year-old kids, telling them that their friends (and passively they themselves) are weird, and unfit to be leaders. And that is why he won’t grant them the resources they are asking for.

I didn’t really say anything to anyone then, partially because he was ultimately in charge of the entire organization. But now that I’m four years removed, and I really value the importance of a true mentor, I realize how horribly wrong this is. I think of the staff members at Michigan Hillel, and I know that none of them would ever dream of discouraging a student the way Michael did. He had the opportunity to help so many kids grow, personally, professionally, as leaders, and he squandered that opportunity. He decided to inspire a select few, at the incredibly vast expense of the majority.

My purpose in telling this story is not only to speak out, but to use Michael as an example. My younger cousin has been hosting socially distant cooking camps this summer to give kids something to do when they would have otherwise been at sleep away camp. I watch him, at just 16 years old, inspire the absolute sh*t out of these kids. He encourages them, even when they’re doing the opposite of the instructions he gave them. He’s only 16, but he gets it.

It doesn’t matter the capacity in which you’re mentoring someone, it could be a day long workshop, what you say to the people you’re mentoring matters. The way you treat them, the way you act around them, the way you act towards them, it all matters. People don’t remember everything, but they remember the bad stuff, and they remember the good stuff. I vividly remember those two instances in which Michael made me feel so crappy about myself, my ability to lead, my peers’ ability to lead, even the very character of so many people I loved. I also remember, just as vividly, the moment that Katie told me she believed in me, and she would be endorsing my candidacy for international board. When you’re in a position of mentorship, it’s crucial to take into account the impact you want to make, because it will be remembered.

Title quote in full: “I've learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” - Maya Angelou

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I’ve always hated the phrase “distance makes the heart grow fonder”. In high school, probably 90% of my closest friends lived across state lines. I often think about the fact that the collective amount of time I’ve spent in person with one of my very best friends is less than a month. While distance likely helped make the heart grow fonder in high school, distance is also what caused the fall out of so many of my high school relationships ever since. While my heart absolutely bursts in the presence of my college friends whom I go months without seeing, I am terrified that this heart-strengthening distance will have an expiration date, and while the days until that date tick by, I am spending them amidst a routine that involves almost no one but myself.

All of this in mind, I was recently having a conversation with a friend about how much quarantine has changed us in such a short amount of time. For example, I’ve always loved to read, naturally, as writing has been the truest love of my life. But after having read roughly a novel a week when I would have otherwise been in class full time, I realized that literature is what I love most, and what I know I am supposed to be doing with my life. In the time I spent diligently reading during the months of March, April, and May, I simultaneously came to the decision that I want to get my MFA in creative writing after undergrad.

My mental health took a pretty hard hit as a result of COVID-19, as well as all of the seemingly unrelated tragedies that have occurred in 2020. I have never before longed so deeply to go back in time to before everything, for lack of better phrasing, essentially went to shit. Day after day, it’s like there is always something going wrong. And if a day gets skipped, the next day makes up for it with double the worldwide negativity. I’ve tried new ways of coping, and I’ve found that peace and quiet is an often overlooked, but SO unbelievably crucial coping mechanism. Some people enjoy running, some enjoy writing, some enjoy listening to music, some enjoy making their own music. The one thing that I believe everyone, regardless of their preferred coping strategy, could benefit from, is an attentive period of peace and quiet.

If you’re religious, silent prayer works. If not, meditation does wonders. And if neither of those work for you, yoga is a pretty good alternative. Many people feel uncomfortable with quiet, but that is a curable discomfort. With practice, quiet can become your best friend. Quiet has been my saving grace since mid-March, and without quiet prayer, or quiet meditation, or time spent quietly reading, I would not have grown into my own the way that I believe I have during this dreadful time.

That said, I’ve been seeing a lot of posts on social media shaming people who are utilizing social media to actually be social right now. I’ve seen posts that accuse people who are simply posting Snapchat stories, or Instagram and Facebook posts of their daily walks with their friends, or their day at the pool, of being a part of the problem. Since when did it become a crime to use social media for what it was meant to be used for…? Yes, if an individual is posting about their social life on their public accounts while also blatantly disregarding their responsibility as a person of privilege, that is completely problematic. However, to incriminate someone as being a part of the problem for posting a photo of their beer from their pool side, placing them on the same level as white supremacists who refuse to acknowledge this problem, is far from helpful.

I think that recently, specifically in the last few weeks, even days, a large percentage of our American society has seemingly forgotten that we are in the middle of a worldwide pandemic. While the COVID curve may have been flattened, the pandemic is most certainly still in effect. And in turn, the mental health pandemic is still at one of the worst points it has been at in a long, long time. Restaurants, bars, movie theaters, you name it; they are all still closed, at least in the state of Michigan. Social media was created for the purpose of connecting people. In a time where physical connection can quite literally be dangerous, socializing on social media is not problematic, nor is it representative of complicity in the current state of the racial climate in America; instead, it is actually crucial. I would be lying if I said I was okay with the way mental health has been treated over the course of 2020 so far. In fact, I would be lying if I left it at “I’m frustrated”. In actuality, I am enraged by how mental health is being treated during this pandemic, similarly to how I am enraged by the racial injustices and horrors taking place in our country, decades after the issue should have been eradicated in its entirety.

With all of the negativity going on in the world right now, what with Coronavirus, the rise in mental illness among all demographic populations, and the truly disgusting murders of black people at the hands of their supposed protectors, the light at the end of the tunnel seems almost inexistent. But we need to come together, not point fingers at individuals who are hardly the problem. The problem is white supremacy, the problem is a government that does not validate mental illness in its healthcare system, the problem is your neighbor who refuses to wear a mask or follow their local or state government’s to stay home. The problem is NOT the kid who lived in your dorm freshman year posting pictures of them and their family up north. Stop creating problems that don’t exist. This is called scapegoating, and that is what the problem is. It draws attention away from the real issues, and when there are this many real issues, we simply cannot afford lost attention.

Martin Luther King Jr. has been known to promote Jewish black solidarity due to our seemingly parallel histories. For the sake of tying back my original point, all white people should recognize their privilege and therefore their social responsibility. Beyond that, all Jews need to recognize the similarities between what is going on now with the black population, and what has gone on in the past for our population. If you get nothing else from this post, please just take away the fact that if you are white, you need to speak out. If you are Jewish and you get nothing else from this post, take away the fact that the black population is being exterminated at the hands of racist white authority; something we should be all too familiar with, and motivated to fight against.

"First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me." - Martin Niemöller

That said, I have found some solace. I’ve been able to push through two books that were not assigned to me academically, and am now reading my third. When I was younger, I was pretty much actively against the Harry Potter series. I thought it was for weird kids who were into weird sci-fi things, while I was more into books that told stories that were realistic. At least, that’s what I said—in actuality, my favorite series were Twilight, The Hunger Games, and a series called Cirque Du Freak that was more or less about vampires. However, this semester I took a class about coming-of-age literature, and much to my dismay, one of the titles we were assigned was Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. This came as such a bummer, I had actually read this first book in the series when I was younger and I remember thinking it sucked. On top of that, the rest of the titles for this course pretty much all excited me, with the second exception of Great Expectations. In high school, it wasn’t often that I actually read a book that was assigned to me. I’d say I read maybe 25% of the books I was supposed to, and I sparknotes’d the other 75%. Since I got to Michigan, I have made a point of reading pretty much every book I’ve been assigned (it definitely helped that I had to pay for these books with my own money). So, begrudgingly mind you, I read the first Harry Potter book. I am now in the middle of reading the fourth Harry Potter book. Rowling’s world building abilities are unmatched in my opinion, and it’s been nice to immerse myself in a world that isn’t falling apart…

This quarantine has also given me the excuse to catch up with some really important people who I haven’t gotten the chance to talk to in years. A couple weeks ago, my friend Josh and I set up a Zoom reunion for the summer program we attended in 2014. Six years later, it felt like we were right back at that same camp in Wisconsin, as if the six years that had passed since some of us saw each other never even happened. We stayed on the Zoom call from roughly 8:30 PM to about 2 in the morning. I left that call with such a full heart; these people had been the most important people in the world to me, not even that long ago, and to be able to catch up all together like that was so unbelievably special.

About a week later, I FaceTimed a friend who I had roomed with for six weeks the summer of 2015, and had gone to Israel with in the summer of 2016. I hadn’t seen or spoken to her in probably three years. We talked for a little over two hours, and again, it felt like nothing had changed. We picked up right where we left off the last time we saw each other.

I’ve also started a 21-day meditation challenge with my mom, and while I’m only on the second day, that is already proving to be really great. I think in the state of the world we’re in, it’s easy to get caught up in all of the shitty things that are going on; I honestly may even venture to say that it’s justified. It seems like just last month there was a new bad development every day, and now it feels like there’s a new bad development five times a day. While I know it is increasingly difficult to think about the positive, especially because for many, the positive is so limited, it can still be fairly therapeutic. The idea of mindfulness, and paying attention to the present moment and the present moment only, has had such an incredible impact on the days when I choose to meditate.

While I know this blog post is simply a life update in a time when there isn’t even much to update on, it’s still just to say that, contrary to what many seem to believe, there are still ways to make the most of such an awful situation. Read a book, call a friend who you haven’t spoken to in awhile, meditate. This has forced us out of our social routines, true, but this has also forced us to pause and take a step back. We as a people living in such a technologically dominated and advanced age forget to just take care of ourselves far, far too often.

Amidst all this chaos, I think the country has definitely taken a pause when it comes to politics and the upcoming election. But the hostile and divisive sentiment has continued on, strong as ever. I recently posted a status on Facebook expressing how I was upset by my University’s decision to cancel classes. After all, this is a multifaceted issue, that affects everyone in at least one way. As someone who is endlessly passionate about mental health, this decision shook me to my core. The mass panic causes anxiety, the social distancing and isolation can perpetuate depression, etc. In my post, I did say that I believed this decision to be a little much, and I thought it was getting blown out of proportion. Never once did I say anything at the expense of the people who are vulnerable to COVID-19, and never once did I downplay my privilege in this situation. However with some of the responses I received, one could think that I said something closer to “those at a higher risk of suffering from coronavirus aren’t as important as those who aren’t at risk, and I don’t care that I’m privileged my problems are still the most important”. Obviously that would be a—pardon my language—fucking ridiculous thing to say. I am so grateful for my physical health, and I am so grateful that I do not need to worry about contracting coronavirus as some others may need to. I would never take that privilege for granted, nor would I ever use my privilege to purposefully put anyone else at any sort of disadvantage.

I knew when I posted that status that it was going to be controversial; I opened the post with the words “I know there are varying opinions on this topic”. I had hoped that by saying that, people would understand that I am not trying to invalidate any opinion that isn’t my own. Unfortunately, there were still people who read my post and interpreted what I was saying was that my opinion was the end all be all. People were so unbelievably quick to call me out in the comment section, many of whom were respectful in disagreeing with me, but a number of whom were fairly disrespectful. I am all for respectful disagreement. I think that’s what makes free speech so great. Debating important topics such as this is stimulating intellectually, socially, and in so many other ways. In knowing that people were going to disagree with me, I almost wanted them to vocalize that to me. But there is a difference between respectfully disagreeing with someone, and telling them that they are essentially a privileged asshole whose opinion is objectively wrong and doesn’t matter. I saw a post by someone I really admire regarding this pandemic, and in their post they expressed that they believed this to be our generation’s world war. But the most important distinguishing factor of this war, is that the entire world is fighting against a common enemy. You would think that people would understand that, and refrain from attacking each other because of that. I’m afraid that a good portion of my generation has grown so accustomed to the hostility that it has become second nature to disagree with someone by attacking their character.

Just before spring break, my class had a guest lecturer with the most remarkable story I have ever heard. Austin Hatch graduated from the University of Michigan, but before that, had survived two plane crashes which collectively took the lives of his entire family. When he spoke to our class, he spoke about overcoming adversity, and living life with a purpose. But the thing he spoke about for most of our class period was marriage. He spoke about his wife of only a few years as though she crafted the entire world by hand. It was incredibly touching, and brought me to tears on two separate occasions throughout the class period. I’ve been thinking about his words since, and I’ve been thinking about what it means to invest in a relationship with someone. He told us that his marriage was like a team, his wife was not only his wife, she was his teammate and his best friend. In the marriages that I see the most often, my parents, my grandparents, aunts and uncles, etc. I know that this is what it is supposed to be like; this is what love is supposed to look like.

The people who I know love me are the ones who disagree with me in a way that is productive, and comes from a place of understanding. That is what love is supposed to be like. At a time like this, when the world is seemingly changing in an unprecedented manner every single day, why anyone would want to put anything aside from love out into the world is beyond me. We should see this pandemic as a reminder that we are all on the same side. We are all just trying to live in a way that is best for ourselves. Hostility, hatred, disrespect, all of these negative entities that are clearly pretty tempting, are just adding fuel to the fire.

By definition, a bully is someone who repeatedly seeks to harm or intimidate individuals they perceive as vulnerable, usually in order to make themselves feel bigger, superior. To me, that is a really strong definition for a really strong word. Disclaimer: I know I’m not a bully. I know that I have been a bully in the past (I’m talking distant past, like middle school past), and I know that I am not a bully now. I have done things and said things that I know have probably upset people in the past, but I know that I am not the type of person to repeatedly seek out ways to harm or intimidate others. If I perceive someone in my life to be vulnerable, and I don’t really care for them, I try to limit my contact as much as possible; I do not go out of my way to put them down.

Regardless, to hear someone call me a bully, and then to hear they are telling other people that I am a bully, not only made my blood boil and my skin crawl, it made me think. I started to really think about the energy I put out into the world, and how it could be perceived by others; after all, perception is reality. For my famous Wellness class, we were assigned a self-improvement project, in which we are able to do just about anything we want to strengthen any sphere of wellness in our lives that we choose. I chose to give myself four specific tasks a week in order to strengthen and really focus on my relationships. Last semester, I went through a pretty rough patch, and I know that I was not focusing on my relationships as much as I usually do, let alone as much as I strive to. Only 2 weeks into the project, I have really been feeling the effects.

This project, in tandem with recent events, and the thought of someone referring to me as a bully, has really made my recent introspection differ from what it normally looks like. I have really given a lot of thought to my actions and interactions with others since getting to Michigan, and I've decided that it’s just as important to mend broken or misperceived relationships as it is to strengthen existing relationships. I had a longstanding conflict that lasted pretty much the entirety of my sophomore year, and up until this point, I had always seen it as a one-sided conflict. I never once gave any thought to how I may have contributed to the hostility. So, this morning, I reached out, acknowledged that it was a two-sided conflict, and apologized for the part that I played in said conflict. Many times, an act like that is seen and described as difficult, and most of the time it is. To swallow your pride, and admit to your own wrongdoing can be incredibly difficult, oftentimes impossible, which is why it doesn’t always happen. It’s why it took me so long to reach out. But after I did, I felt great. This wasn’t a looming conflict that was still weighing on me by any means, but it still felt great to know that there is no longer any tension or hostility with that person.

I don’t foresee myself reaching that point with this broken relationship. Not that I foresee myself holding a grudge per se, but to be told that I don’t understand the very thing that I am more passionate about than just about anything else, and to be labeled a bully, is way too hurtful to bounce back from in my opinion. But the point I’m trying to make is that I still gained from it. I’m not perfect, there are times when I am entirely in the wrong even though I may not realize it until much later. But it is never too late to acknowledge that wrongdoing, both to yourself and to others. Being aware of one’s own actions is a tough thing to do, and while perception is reality, sometimes it can be the farthest thing from it. It’s important to focus on what you put out into the world and the way you make other people feel, but it’s okay to mess up, too. Take care of yourself in those situations. If you do mess up, know that it’s okay. It won’t do you (or anyone for that matter) any good to repeatedly beat yourself up over it.

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This course features a number of guest lecturers, all of whom are experts in their specific field of wellness. Right now, we are in the mental/psychological wellness unit. We had our first guest lecturer last week, Dr. Harry Cohen, a psychologist and author of the book “Be The Sun, Not The Salt”. He gave our instructor enough copies of his book for each student in the class to have one, and read before he came to speak to our class. It was a quick read, only about 70 pages with not a lot of density, but it was absolutely fraught with insight. Dr. Cohen preaches a heliotropic model of living, essentially meaning that positive energy will attract people towards you (like the sun), and negative energy is detrimental, and he likens that to pouring salt on other people’s roots.

I have been primarily interested in this mental/psychological/emotional/social aspect of wellness, and throughout this course, while it’s hardly been a month, I have been doing a lot of thinking about what it means to live heliotropically, and conversely, how to be aware of when I am pouring salt on other people’s roots. Dr. Cohen talked to us about how salt is a hell of a lot stronger than sunlight; plants can never seem to get enough sunlight, but even just a little bit of salt on their roots can be enough to cause the plant to wilt. The same is true of people. Last week could have been going absolutely wonderfully for you, but the news of Kobe Bryant passing away in a helicopter accident could have also been enough to make you forget all of the good that happened before. When something happens on a large scale that we deem as bad or even tragic, everything else in the world can somehow cease to exist. It’s usually impossible to go back to the point in time when that bad thing hadn’t happened yet, and accepting that can be so difficult. But it is at these points when sunlight is the most important. When a plant has had salt poured on its roots, that is the time when it needs sunlight the most in order to come back and survive, and eventually thrive.

Oftentimes we can be blind to the salty things in our lives, and our subconscious can mask them as sunny things instead. I think the most common instance of this mistake comes in the form of our relationships. Yes, I’m talking about romantic relationships, but I’m also talking about friendships, classmate relations, coworker relations, even familial relationships. As hard as it is to break up with a significant other, when you think about it in the grand scheme of things, it isn’t always as hard as it is to break up with a friend, or a family member. But that doesn’t mean that those kinds of break ups are any less important. Relationships are the parts of life that make it worth living, but only if they are enriching relationships. If you have a relationship with someone, and they radiate negativity instead of positively energizing you, it may be time for you two to break up. Life is way too short to waste your precious time on relationships that are salt on your roots.

I ordered carry out from Domino’s on Super Bowl Sunday. I had enough points to redeem them for a free pizza, so I figured that would be a perfect Super Bowl meal, and I ordered one pineapple pizza for pick up. The tracking app told me my pizza would be ready at 6:00, so I left my apartment at around 5:50, and arrived at Domino’s at 5:56, knowing I would probably have to wait a few minutes because I was early. They were extremely backed up, and I ended up having to wait until 6:20. There was a decent crowd waiting, and I could tell that the employees were moving as fast as they could. There was a group of boys who had been waiting a little longer than I had, and they continued to pester the employees, each time getting more and more irritable. I don’t blame them, I wasn’t too happy having to wait either. But when I went up to the counter after having waited 10, 15, 20 minutes, I decided to be polite, and thank them multiple times. As it got later, I started to get nervous that I was going to miss kick off, and I, too grew irritable, and I couldn’t even rationalize the wait by saying it wasn’t their fault, because it was! But I thought to myself, what good would it do me or them to complain, be nasty, point out their shitty service, etc.? When my pizza was ready, I took it with a smile, thanked the woman who handed it to me, and told her to have a good night. I could tell that those simple acts made a difference.

Obviously I don’t have any sort of relationship with the workers at my local Domino’s, but that’s besides the point. If you have the ability to radiate even the slightest bit of sunlight, choose to do that over dumping a single grain of salt. The people around you will be much better for it, and you will be MUCH better for it.

Photo: Dr. Harry Cohen's "Be the Sun, Not the Salt"

Typically, I’m not one for the whole ‘year reflection’ thing. Even when I saw posts on Facebook about the decade in review, I was still pretty averse to it. Being born at the back end of the ‘90s, I kept thinking how could these people possibly have so much to reflect on from the 2010s; most of them hardly even started puberty at the beginning of the decade. Personally, I can hardly distinguish my 2010 memories from my 2007 memories, I just kind of clump them all together as my childhood. But these girls made me think, and the more thought I’ve given to the idea of reflection, the more appealing it’s become to me. At the beginning of this past decade, I wasn’t too far off from contemplating the logistics of where to put my tooth in order for the tooth fairy to receive it. I think I’d probably lost most if not all of my baby teeth by 2010, but the sentiment and the innocence remains the same. Although I obviously don’t have much to compare it to, I think the 2010s have been the years of the most growth I’ve seen in myself, and likely the most growth I’ll see in quite some time. Not to say that I don’t foresee anymore growth in the future, but there are some things I’d like to touch upon that I think are incredibly notable in my growth as an individual throughout these last 10 years.

First, and perhaps the most important, I’ve become extremely comfortable in my own skin. Towards the beginning of the 2010s (and here I’m mostly referring to ~2012), I was not at all content with a lot of different parts of myself. The most obvious part being my sexuality, but more than that, I remember spending a lot of time in my early teenage years being so concerned by what others thought of me. Being liked by everyone seemed like the most important thing in the world, and if someone thought lesser of me, regardless of who that person was, that was the end of said world. I alienated people because that’s what my peers did, I put people down because that made me and my friends feel better, I prioritized spending time with people who did not at all enrich my life over the things that actually did matter, and I referred to people who held the most disingenuous values and engaged in behaviors that I vehemently disagreed with as my closest friends. Now, I could not possibly care less what others think of me. I choose to spend my time with only the people who raise me up, not the ones who hold me back. I speak up about the things I believe in, and only engage in behaviors that I deem beneficial to my own well-being. Throughout the 2010s, I cut the toxic people out, and welcomed the stimulating people with open arms. I can confidently say I don’t think I’ll ever put up a front to get people to like me again.

Building off of that, I have since brought arguably the two most important aspects of my identity to the forefront of my persona. At the beginning of the decade, I remember vividly how prominent homophobia was throughout every medium of culture. The word ‘faggot’ was nowhere near censored; I remember some of the people I used to call my friends using that word well into high school circa 2014. As an adolescent struggling heavily with their sexuality, I’m sure you can see why this is so troubling. There was not a lot of queer representation in the media, at least not the mainstream media, and I remember when Macklemore’s “Same Love” came out how groundbreaking that release was. I came out publicly in the fall of 2016, which still sounds crazy to me. In 2010, the thought of willingly coming out absolutely repulsed me. And that was still true in 2011, 2012, probably through 2015. To think that I’ve been so open about this aspect of myself for almost four years now, and how much queer representation has changed in such a short amount of time absolutely blows my mind.

I remember, like it was yesterday, how angry I would be every Sunday morning when my parents would come into my room and wake me up for Sunday school. After my Bat Mitzvah, there was going to be absolutely no more Jewishness for me. After all, the religion considered me a woman by then, and to me, that meant I would make my own choices and no one could stop me, especially not my parents. I remember giving them what I thought was an ultimatum, but they obviously saw right through: I would become involved in a Jewish youth group if that meant I didn’t have to go to Hebrew school anymore. Well, I did become involved in a Jewish youth group, and I did stop going to Hebrew school, but to say there is no more Jewishness for me is extremely false. In the latter half of this decade, I have become more in touch with my Jewish identity than ever, and a highlighted cause of that change was my trip to Israel in 2016. Since the very first day of that trip, I have been absolutely dying to go back.

Finally, over the course of the 2010s, I rode the wildest rollercoaster ever - my mental health. I first began the struggle with my mental health in middle school, roughly 2011-2012. That was a time when mental illness was still pretty frowned upon. The notion of “just stop feeling sad” was alive and well, and you definitely could not speak openly about mental illness without judgment. Thankfully, when I got to high school, I got to be much healthier mentally. I deeply immersed myself in activities that gave me a purpose, and I began to build a much, much stronger support system for myself. By the time I got to college, I was of the belief that I was, for the most part, cured of any mental struggles. I am now of the belief that no one is ever 100% mentally healthy, and that’s okay. For the better part of my sophomore year, and through last semester, I was really struggling. And when I speak about that struggle, I often find that people’s initial reaction is to ask me what caused it. Truthfully, I don’t know what caused that struggle. In middle school, high school, honestly until recently, I thought I needed to justify my mental hardships with a reason. But when you come down with, say, strep throat, or a UTI, or appendicitis (perhaps the best example), can you really, confidently, without a doubt pinpoint what caused that? Why should depression, anxiety, any illness that lays in the mind be any different than one that lays anywhere else in the body? I have no shame in speaking about mental illness now, and that is definitely something that has evolved within me over the course of the last decade.

When I look back on all of these changes, I realize that a lot of them have to do with the advancement of acceptance within society. While our society still has a very long way to go, I think it’s okay to still recognize and celebrate how far we’ve already come. I am proud of my Jewish identity, I am proud to be a part of such a resilient queer community, and while I may not be proud of the struggles I’ve faced with my mental health, I am definitely proud to speak openly about them. I would not have been able to grow such a strong sense of pride in all of these aspects of my life had it not been for the people around me and in the media being so openly proud. I think everyone should live their lives with pride, both for themselves and for others. You never know who you might be helping.

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