the new yorker

i just bought my first ever issue of The New Yorker. i was at the drugstore, and i wanted to pick up some light reading (as in, physically light) for the subway rides. i had planned to get a new celebrity gossip magazine, but i didn't see any that particularly appealed to me.

The New Yorker has always seemed sort of sexy and nerdy and fascinating, but also intimidating and possibly boring. i always thought of it as something that grown-ups - like, other people's parents - read. but a few of my law school friends read it regularly, and even subscribed. and they can't be that much more intelligent or sophisticated than i. (can they?)

as i stood scanning the magazine racks at the drugstore today, looking hopelessly at the pathetic offerings, the dec. 18 issue was staring me in the face, haranguing me silently (don't i want to improve my meager knowledge about the proposal from the iraq study group? don't i want to understand the anthropology of jihad?). so i finally decided to cross that intimidating threshold. and it was easy! i read about five pages on the subway ride home from work, and they weren't boring at all. yet.

so, basically, i'm a real grown-up now. a sophisticate. an intellectual. soon i'll be throwing dinner parties and sharing my views on foreign policy with diplomats and historians, debating the merits of contemporary american fiction with book editors and poets. but i promise i'll never forget my humble origins as a reality-tv-obsessed street urchin.