Dear Jen,
Hope you are well! Great job with the fitness! I wish you the best. Now, please read the rest of this letter aloud, to your butt.
Jen's Butt,
Wow, okay. I've never communicated with a butt before (except for a single disastrous consultation with a specialized psychic) so cut me slack if I faux pas. It's just that I have so many questions, not just because you're a butt, but you're an accomplished butt to boot(y). A notable butt. The eyes of the world are upon you, Jen Selter's Butt.
I don't even know where to start. What is it to be a butt? Am I even speaking to a single entity? Our brains are two hemispheres working in tandem, creating a singular "self," but there's not much linking your cheeks but nearness and similarity and peak fitness. Are you "Lefty" and "Righto"? "Louie" and "Reggie"? JSB, who are you?
What's your perspective on the world, JSB? Do you ever get motion sick, bobbing from side to side? Can you feel that primal prickling when you're being stared at, or are you numb to it by now? Do you long to express yourself? Do you have no mouth but must scream? Or are you content in your silence, letting slip the occasional toot of satisfaction? Do you get more pleasure out of breathable or sweat-wicking fabrics, or is there a swaddling peace in the constriction of denim? Is leather a nightmare of sensory deprivation or a cosmic dream tunnel? Are thongs a violation or a thrill? Both?
Are you more at peace with excretion than we are, or does your proximity to the whole sordid affair only intensify the revulsion? Do you ever catch yourself longing for your wipe-and-powder youth? When you're perched above the bowl, are you confronted with or delighted by your reflection? Quilted Northern or Charmin?
Any tips on building a brand? My own butt looks like nothing so much as a loose pile of uncooked Pillsbury biscuits; ballpark, how many followers you think I could leverage that into? Hundo thousand? Two hundo thousand? I'm not looking to put in a lot of work here.
Do you like Jen? Does she appreciate you? Does she hold you to standards to which you wish you could hold yourself, or work you like a beast of burden? Is she a good co-worker? Who would you compare your relationship to? Riggs and Murtaugh? Turner and Hooch? Are you #TrueDetectiveSeason2? She seems maybe a little bland, personality-wise (you know how fitness people can be); how's the conversation? In the still of the night, does she whisper to you? Weird!
How do you feel about sex stuff? Does a firm, open-hand smack give you the right cocktail of damage and delight, or is it all pain for you in the service of a pleasure you'll never know?
Do you feel personal pride in your achievement as a Butt Of Note? Do you feel an affinity for the all-time greats: Lopez, Knowles, Kardashian? Are you Salieri to their Amadeus, forever toiling, never divine? Can you twerk? Do you suffer for Jen's fame, or is it striving? Would you feel content as anything less than you are now? In your heart of butts, do you crave a little flab to call your own? A little bit of softness, that you might relate to your fellow butt? A little bit of sweet surrender to the cool hands of time and gravity?
Wait, JSB: is Jen as we understand her just an extension of you? Or are you "Jen" most fully embodied, her essence sculpted in taut buttstuff? Given the choice, would you detach yourself? Do you crave autonomy or relish your symbiosis? Are you a totem? A horcrux? Are you flesh or image? Does worship suit or disgust you? Are you sick of these binaries, or do you embrace them in your dividedness?
Do you like being a butt? Would you rather be, say, a dog wearing a bandana? I think I would. Maybe that's what draws me to you, JSB: you are yourself, exemplified. I struggle every day to justify the absurd fact of my presence, but you? You are your greatest self. Even in repose, you are powerful. You are magnetic. The overbutt. Do I revolve around you? Do we all? Am I here to observe you, and you, simply, to be? What a blessing that would be, JSB, to be absolved of all striving. Is that release what love is? All-encompassing, divine love? Christ died in misery and pain to save us all, but all Jen had to do was a bunch of lunges. JSB, are you... God?
Anyways, lemme know.
Hang tight, and all the very best,
Daniel Joseph Abromowitz
(Follow Dan Abromowitz on Twitter)