The very definition of self-indulgence
One of the top five things that everybody did in 2011 was concoct lists. People went crazy picking their best, their worst, or simply inflicting list threads on other people to pick up and carry on.
I’m sort of doing that, too. I decided, since 2011 was an oddly unsettling year (never liked that number “11” myself), that I would start listing down my personal Things That Make Life Better, in purely random order. In fact, the more random the better. And as specific as possible. It might be a good way to look at the New Year by focusing your bead on those things you want to keep, and the stuff you may want to toss away. So here’s my (partial, ever-expanding) list.
(Wait: before you begin, don’t forget to insert the names of your loved ones at the top of the list. Good. Now you’re covered. Now begin.)
Denim
French coffee
Billy Wilder movies
Stratocasters
Bodysurfing
Bill Evans
Flip-flops
Van Gogh
The ability to love
Love itself
Uncontrolled laughter
“The Goldberg Variations”
Smell of fresh pine
Truffles
Practical jokes
J.D. Salinger
Skin
Blade Runner
Eggs Benedict
French doors
Roller coasters
Flipbooks
Children playing
New York Times crossword
Pistachio ice cream
John Coltrane
Sweaters
Frisbee
Giverny
Hunter S. Thompson
Kubrick
Boracay sunsets
Treehouses
Crack of a baseball bat
William Faulkner
Jaco Pastorius
Smell of wood fire
Birdsong
“Moonlight Sonata”
Ice skating
Cycling
Rembrandt
Hitchcock’s Rear Window
Gram Parsons
Pedal steel guitar
The Good, The Bad and the Ugly
Peter Sellers
Fountain pens
Goldfish
Nina Simone
The female navel
Thelonious Monk
Custard pie
The smell of fresh hay
The Sun Also Rises
Haiku
Refrigerator magnets
Flying a kite
The gift of memory
Altman movies
Frank Zappa
Cap Ferrat
Moscow’s subways
Klimt
Trench coats
Francis Bacon
Olives
Hot showers
Lemonade
Burt Bacharach
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “May Day”
Pinball
Beatles
Coldness of marble
Afternoon naps
Vegetable gardens
Jimi Hendrix’s fingers
A good hamburger
Dancing
Singing
Smell of bread baking
Marlon Brando
Nick Drake
Film Noir
Thick-crust pizza
Godfather I and II
Erik Satie
Velvet Underground
Woody Allen
T. Rex
Birds in train stations
Stained glass
Catch 22
Raymond Carver’s “Cathedral”
Garlic bread
The Last Waltz
The apartment in Last Tango in Paris
Monty Python’s Flying Circus
KC and the Sunshine Band
The iPod
‘60s girl groups
“Pet Sounds”
Haircuts
Swimming
A full toolbox
Dance scene in Pulp Fiction
Truman Capote
Graham Greene
The Stories of John Cheever
Marilyn Monroe, actress
The piano solo in Bennie and the Jets
The Marx Brothers
Groundhog Day
A well-told joke
Truffaut movies
Leonard Cohen’s Famous Blue Raincoat.
* * *
No, it doesn’t end there, of course. It’s meant to go on. Otherwise, what’s the point? So feel free to cook up your own list of Things That Make Life Better and post it. Somewhere.
