Etiquette

by Joey Truman

Life is really complicated at the moment. And for good reason. On one hand we are all connected, and everybody finally has a voice. On the other hand bigotry and systematic oppression is louder than ever. Have you ever asked yourself the question/s: Is this Racist? Is this Sexist? Is this Homophobic? Transphobic? Islamophobic? [FYI, this email server, AOL, doesn’t recognize that Transphobic is a word, but Homophobic and Islamophobic is, whatever that means. I know I should get off of this email, and the Publisher thinks that AOL has crappy security, but I don’t think it really matters. AOL is right leaning, politically, which is as good as any reason to get off of it, but so what? So is Google and Gmail, how is that any better? Not only that, but AOL has a lot more skin in the game, the people on this shitty site are old, and really have no desire to move into a new and faster world, like Google Mail. I mean, I am not that fucking old, but I hate Gmail. Electronic mail is antiquated. Why do I need to have some fancy system that makes me change all my setting all the time because they did some stupid upgrade? I don’t care! I give emails maybe, Maybe! two more years before they don’t exist anymore. But maybe I am wrong. I was wrong about Twitter. Well, not really completely wrong. Had the Orange Douche not been elected, Twitter would have died a natural death and we would all be the better for it, but guess what? Same with facebook. You pop that one boner for that girl you had a crush on in high school, and the next thing you know you find her vacation photos where she is wearing a bikini and suddenly the whole world has to suffer because you can’t control your dick for two fucking seconds. Anyway, my point is that AOL has to keep the old geezers on the sight, which means that they have to worry about security, and everyone knows that the elderly are confused by modern technology, so my theory is that AOL has better security than Gmail because they have hold on tightly to the people that still use them. So, suck it, Publisher. Go tell it to TikTok.] The answer is yes. If you have to ask, yes.

145 pages, Paperback

Published December 15, 2020

Reviews

[Dave Fitzgerald · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you told me that the original draft of Etiquette was a single typewriter scroll delivered in a shoebox along with some scribbled-on diner napkins, bodega receipts, and NYC subway maps (I haven't been to NYC in a while. Do they still have paper subway maps?), I'd absolutely believe you. Joey Truman's terse, incisive prose reads unfakably off the cuff (likely of a thrift store corduroy jacket), and yet still feels as lived-in as a Lower East Side squat. In this loosely organized catalogue of personal anecdotes and common social situations - each appended with numbered directions for, yes, proper etiquette in same - he nimbly identifies the cracks in our foundations - the infrastructural niceties that we're letting crumble in the name of technological advancement and capitalism run amok - and sets about duct-taping, and plastering, and slapdash painting over them as fast as he can manage. Indeed, this slim volume had me laughing out loud with both its seemingly simple observations about 21st century humanity, and its palpable impatience at having to explain such seemingly simple observations to anyone.

Covering everything from waiting rooms to crowded bars; cohabitating to co-parenting; dinner parties to book events (in between many, many screeds on common subway courtesy) Truman possesses a lowkey, DFW-esque gift for breaking down monolithic, macro ideas about modern society into their most basic, component parts, such that they look so quaint and manageable that you'll find yourself scratching your head in disbelief that no one's ever quite addressed them in this way before. And more than that even, it feels as though he's almost doing it by accident; like he's not "writing" so much as just thinking on the page, and allowing us to watch as he dissects his daily routines - those of a proudly working-class small fish making his way in a big pond life - with a charmingly grumpy sincerity, and more honest-to-goodness heart than I've found in just about anything else I've read this year. With short, punchy chapters full of humor and ideas, Etiquette is a great book to read in those in-between moments, because every time you look up, you'll see some way to apply its lessons right in front of you. It could just as easily be titled Don't Be an Asshole: And Here's How! Maybe take it on the subway.

[Aina Hunter · Rating 5 out of 5]

A book on etiquette by Joey Truman? I will read this.