Ten Little Missions

A friend sent a list at 2am. Ten little missions. Not serious, or not entirely. It was the thing people text when they’ve run out of actual advice—so you list impossible things instead, half-joking, half-genuine.

Darken the room, open wine, watch Skins until you cry. Watch it again. There’s always something new the second time, not because you missed it before but because you’ve changed. The show stays the same. You don’t.

The rest got wilder. Beyblades. Berlin, then away from Berlin. Yuksek. Street Boners and TV Carnage. A liter of milk. Jesus returning as a super zombie. Most of it was a joke. Except the last one: write three rules for yourself, then break them all that night. Not because the rules were bad or breaking them was good. Just because remembering you could choose mattered more than whatever the choice was.

I did maybe two of them. The list went into a notebook and stayed there. But something about having it—about someone taking the time at 2am to reframe paralysis as a set of options instead of a wall—that shifted something. Permission dressed as a joke. The only way some things get said.