An open letter to Going Out on a Weeknight.

Dear Going Out On a Weeknight,

Most evenings, I think of you as a vestige, still to be grasped at fleetingly, of my slightly younger, not yet quite fully fatigued self. That is, when you present yourself, Going Out On a Weeknight, in your cute clothes and high-heeled shoes, an opportunity, a possibility, a proposition, I feel I should take you up on the offer, just on principle. Because if I don't, I must face the probability that life is passing me by. That I am an old-timer, sitting on my porch in a rocking chair, shaking my fist at the young 'uns and spitting my chew into a tobacky can whilst reminiscing about the good old days, when I used to go out on a weeknight regularly.

I don't like feeling like that, Going Out On a Weeknight. I don't like feeling elderly and crotchety. I don't like feeling like horizontality is the most I can hope for, once I slump home from work. What about being vibrant? How about seizing the day, dammit? Going Out On a Weeknight, it's kind of paradoxical, but while you shimmer and pizzazz out there on my calendar, acting all fancy-free and having not even a whiff of the "but it's a school night" about you, really you just make me feel kind of fancy-fail and TOTALLY "but it's a school night." How do you do that, exactly?

What I would like most, Going Out On a Weeknight, is for you to pose your invitations more sparingly. What with the once a week poetry readings, the once a month jazz concerts, the end of the semester events, the thises and the thats, I find myself facing you pretty much at every turn. It's not nice to do that, Going Out On a Weeknight. It's not nice to flash your sassy smile at me almost every night, as if to say, "Hey! How's abouts we go out tonight? A weeknight! Won't that be shiny?" You have to know that all those invitations are going to make me wilt. But I'm starting to think you kind of enjoy that. And--I think this goes without saying--I'm starting to resent it a little.

I get it, Going Out On a Weeknight. You're young. You're full of zip and razzmatazz. Whereas I am full of "let's put on the slippers and call it a night." I believe you've made your point, Going Out On a Weeknight: now give it a rest.

Sincerely,

htms