X is not real life, but its tentacles slither into the increasingly online landscape that defines real life. It’s not X’s fault; it has merely become an incubator of a trend launched years ago by the 24-hour news cycle. Really, then, much of our modern malaise is the fault of Ted Turner, a man so wise he saw fit to marry Jane Fonda in 1991, well after she had publicly aired her crazy in myriad ways. 

And while information is good, there’s only so much of it that comes out in a day, which leaves lots of hours left to fill. Hence, the terrain quickly shifted from constant news to constant hysteria. Which is fine, if toting a fainting couch around with you is your thing, but there’s really no need to live this way. Take, for example, the latest outrage to animate us all: President Trump’s tariffs. 

Whether the tariffs are good, bad, or somewhere in between is immaterial. At the very least, they provide comedic relief in the form of a 10 percent tariff on the Heard and McDonald Islands, an Australian territory occupied primarily by penguins. It also has active volcanoes, which is not something we should want imported, though, so perhaps the tariffs are good. On the other hand, maybe we do need more penguins and the tariff will hinder the supply. In either case, I’m withholding umbrage. 

In this scenario, more people should be like me. It is unhealthy to spend so much time worrying about the daily stories that percolate on X before dripping out into the mainstream, making people panic about world war, their 401(k), or the manufactured stories that provide outrage on slower news days. This is where the concept of touching grass, a meme that remains important even as its popularity has waned, was borne. It is wholly unnecessary to be bothered by every gyration of the world.