Who wore it best?
Passing Strangers: An influencer is influenced
Hi Friends,
It feels strange and tone-def to be publishing short fiction at this moment in light of all the real suffering that’s happening in the world as a result of totalitarianism and violence. To be honest, I’ve found it challenging to just get through the day, much less write anything at all. If you believe in love and the innate goodness of humanity, it’s really hard to be alive right now. By all indications, it feels like we are escalating ever closer to a global conflict that could tear us all apart even more than we already are.
If it’s true that violence is the product of fear, and fear is fueled by a lack of understanding, of misinterpreting what we perceive is different from us and therefore lesser, then perhaps this series has some modicum of utility. My generation is responsible for bringing a technology into the world that has both connected and completely isolated humanity. We’ve raised our children and fed ourselves a digital diet of cheap dopamine hits and lived much of our lives in a vacuous expanse of escape into a world that simulates reality but is so far from it. If we tumble into the next world war, it will be one fought from computer consoles in air conditioned rooms and observed in 30-second clips curated by corporate algorithms.
The only way I see us making it through this is if we can all begin to encounter each other in the real world where consequences can’t be deep-faked, and the pain we inflict can be felt, not just observed.
Thank you for being here and for reading. Hold your loved ones close, unplug, and shift your attention to the people right in front of you— especially the ones who don’t look like you or agree with you.
Peace & music,
Ben
Passing Strangers is a weekly series of fictional portraits— keyhole views into the lives and inner worlds of other humans. These are standalone pieces but if you look carefully, you might begin to see a how they’re all brush strokes in a broader landscape. Visit the table of contents to find all the portraits.
The fit check she posted this morning hadn’t smashed like the one on Wednesday. That little red string top had made her look low-key broke and bloated. She shouldn’t have indulged the night before but it was her dad’s birthday and she only saw him a few times a year. She still felt bloated. Likes on that post were 10K below her average. If it wasn’t for her loyal creepers, the comments would’ve been a graveyard.
It was so hot and gross in the park. Everyone looked sweaty and mid like an IRL Old Navy ad. She shot a couple of clips, almost captioned them “who wore it better?” but decided that was giving mean-girl and Kelseyxxo’s brand wasn’t to punch down. She thought of trying to capture some candid selfies, discreetly of course, but it wasn’t worth it. The hours she’d have to spend editing out the randos and background noise would have been actual torture. Plus the light was shit – too much direct sun. It made the pores on her face look like craters.
She needed to lock in and stay on vibe. Her brand was all about good energy. A couple of lame sad-girl posts could tank everything she’d worked for the past 18 months. Tonight she was going to post a story set about the concert. She’d never heard of the band, but they had like 2.6 million streams on Spotify so the potential audience capture would be totally worth it.
She noticed the two Chads in front of her were sniggering and one of them was pointing at a tall woman walking ahead of them. When the woman turned her head, it was so obvious she wasn’t a woman. Her nose and jawline were dead giveaways plus she was wearing this sad looking frock that looked like it belonged to someone’s mom. But this trans woman didn’t seem to care. She was laughing and talking with the woman beside her. She was drinking a beer straight out of the can, her black nails glinting in the sun like she didn’t give a single fuck. It was impossible to stop looking at her and Kelseyxxo wanted to follow her, to know everything about her. She hadn’t felt such a deep, hollow longing since high school in the months after she quit playing volleyball and stopped eating whatever she wanted. She wanted to raise her phone and take a picture or better yet, a slo-mo video so she could study it later, frame by frame, but she didn’t.
Not everyone wanted to be seen, needed to be seen the way she did.
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I’d love to know how what you think of this series of portraits. The magic in anything I post here usually happens when you lean in. How do you encounter strangers?
The life of an influencer is such a heartbreaking hall of mirrors. Ben, you help us imagine how it feels to be Kelsey. I think those of us who grew up with relatively few pictures of ourselves were given a gift. Not a total disinterest--but a tendency, to see a person's appearance as one of the least interesting things about them. I'm not sure how to even explain it, but I almost never notice someone's clothing, or hair, or shoes, etc. And I can usually remember, verbatim, something they said or how I felt being in their presence. It will be so interesting to see your characters start to overlap and interact.
On point, Ben. I feel like you really got inside this character's head. The prose is spot on, the feel, the vibes.
Also, I really dig the artstyle and profile of the character are.
As Kate says, your art, and art in general, is an antidote to the world's issues.