Thursday, March 15, 2018

Book Review: 'We Are Never Meeting in Real Life' by Samantha Irby

This was singlehandedly one of the funniest and most relatable books I've ever read.

We Are Never Meeting in Real Life
is an essay collection by humorist, writer and blogger Samantha Irby where she covers everything from her rough upbringing, to dating and relationships, to her general dislike of the general population (RELATABLE) and, to quote the back cover, "sometimes you just have to laugh, even when your life is a dumpster fire" (YUP. AGREED.)

To demonstrate how much I related to this book, I thought I would quote some of the many passages where I found myself thinking, "Holy Mother of God, YESSS SAME."

1) "I prefer to admit my inadequacies to assholes who can relate." YES. EXACTLY. I'm not going to have a conversation about how much of a failure I am at adulthood with someone who's going to sit there and judge me. Fuck that.

2) "It turns out that I am not very good at making friends unless I am already trapped in an insufferable hellscape with someone who doesn't mind my cracking a few inappropriate jokes as we circle life's drain." This is literally my life, you don't even understand. Literally.

3) She literally has a chapter called "A Case For Remaining Indoors" which coincidentally happens to be the title of my forthcoming autobiography. We share the same views on fall and winter being the best seasons because summer sucks ("Wouldn't you rather be dead than hot? I am 100 percent over people pretending that open-mouth breathing in 1,000 percent humidity while being burned to a crisp by the sun is the jam." COULDN'T HAVE SAID IT BETTER MYSELF), and we also share the same views on a list of things you can do inside: "My boyfriend, the TV, is inside (YUP), food just tastes better inside, you can daydream about things in catalogues you are never going to buy, your space, your rules."

4) "I am a negative person by nature, and I typically shy away from anything that requires me to be having visible fun. I like to do stuff that I can sit quietly in the back and enjoy, and I have spent my entire adult life perfecting a bored-yet-slightly-amused-and-entertained facade. And I just don't understand being excited about exercise. It's like doing a cartwheel on your way to have a root canal; my face just doesn't light up at the prospect of abdominal isolations." I have honestly never related to something more in my entire life. I'm not exaggerating one little bit. I have struggled to put a feeling exactly like this into words for most of my life.

5) "This is why the Internet is a miracle. I mean, I don't care about watching real-life murders on the dark Web or angrily tweeting at CNN anchors, but it is a magical thing that I can just open up my computer and cultivate superficial relationships with people who may or may not have stolen their profile picture from an Instagram model without having to pluck my mustache hairs first." Also. Literally. My. Life.

6) "Boredom is a fallacy in my tiny life. I have a fancy phone with lots of apps on it and relatively decent LTE coverage, I haven't been truly 'bored' since 2007." LMAO SO TRUE.

7) "I will never be snappy with a waitress or lose my mind on the phone with customer service or make small talk with someone else's kid, because, honest to God, I would rather eat my own teeth than suffer any more humiliating human contact [...] Joanna, who owns the indie bookstore down the street from our crib, asked me the other day to give her the name of a good book I'd read recently, and because I value her opinion, I stood in front of her for, like, three real minutes cycling through every book I've rated on Goodreads in the last three months trying to determine which one would be the most impressive." Do you even understand how much this is literally my life?

I hope my crazy rambling and quotes from We Are Never Meeting in Real Life inspires you to check out this awesomely hilarious book, because I couldn't stop reading it until I ran out of pages. 5/5 stars.

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