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The Innermost Self
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The Innermost Self

Setting up a big party

Ivan
Jul 25, 2021
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“Me and the boys having our last supper”, Leonardo, the ninja turtle

A plan was to invite all of them, set a table and waste an evening in rants and ramblings on our past, present and future. But I could not get my head around the process. I had never hosted a party and had no idea how to invite people, how to seat them, how many pizzas I need to order and how to run the dinner party itself. Should I send e-mails? Postcards? SMS? What century is it? Perhaps, just a phone call would do the job? No, I forgot they are all millennials. Millennials hate unexpected phone calls, at least the ones from my bubble, at least me. Maybe we can meet in person and I tell them about the party, one by one? That would take an enormous amount of time. And again, it's not a millennial thing to do, meeting people in real life. Millennials don't have time. We are busy. Always.

I should reach anyone in the best suitable way but for that, I need a list of invitees. Millennials like lists. Especially, Schindler's List, the film is really good. What's great about lists is they are easy to comprehend. They are convenient because you don't need to think about the order (sometimes you need) and links between individual points, unlike paragraphs that should flow (this place is reserved for a dumb river metaphor). The absence of these subtle connections doesn't mean lists are puzzling. Not at all. They are rather a deconstruction of something heavy into interchangeable building blocks. Instead of a seamless river of ideas, you create a series of lakes connected with canals. You can jump into your boat, go to one lake, explore, find a canal, move to another lake, and another, and another, and another, and another, and…

I hate marine analogies. And I hate lists. But I use both. What does it say about me?

Anyway, how should I call it? Top 10 guests to invite to a dinner party? Will I stop at ten? How many of them I can invite and how many of them will eventually show up? The inexact haziness of my memory tells me “Not many”.

But the least I can do is to try.

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H. R. Howell
Writes She's My Rushmore ·Aug 6, 2021Liked by Ivan

Don’t worry, Grumpy. You’re invited to my party.

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