2025 – MY YEAR OF FOOLISHNESS

“Nothing could be worse than this, Eleanor thought; I have been a fool” – The Haunting of Hill House (Shirley Jackson)

In that moment of impact – when the constructs of hope were finally undone by reality, I knew it was all because of my own foolishness. The spectacle I had imagined was now fully realized as a quiet conversation of goodbyes and a long wait for the elevator door. My 2025 has been marked by folly. Time and time again.

I remember the careful choice of words. The pauses in which I hoped for him to change his mind. The internal scramble to grasp any shrapnel, to piece together what had already broken. 

And still, I clung to hope that maybe, just maybe, he’d come for me. But alas, the elevator door opened with a ding, punctuating an end I didn’t want but always knew would come. As I rushed past doormen and residents, I hid red eyes, knowing that time and time again, I had been a fool. 

But as much as I dissected my own actions, I found myself returning to the same question: For what – for reasons of overindulgent introspection – is a Fool?

My own descent into foolishness was far from original. From Shakespeare and through Chaplin, we can find a concern with foolery and fools, serving as a two-dimensional side character or the main protagonist alike, in their exploration of foolishness and the men who fall to it.

It is not a new question for me, just one I never set out to definitively answer. The Fool has been a subject of my quiet study for years, born, albeit, out of insult. I have known the worst thing to be is to be a fool. The more I knew of the pitfalls of The Fool, the more I resisted. However, in my learning this year, you cannot prevent yourself from falling. Times of foolishness and being drunk on hope come for us all. Time and time again.

To answer myself simply, a fool knows better and yet acts against his own judgment, tricked by their own hope, love, or another dangerous consumption. 

Shakespeare situated his fools as truth-seers. And Chaplin’s, the contrary. I guess I have become both. See, I should have known it would not have worked. One night, I recall, a call for advice, but I had lived too little and had no guidance to impart. And while I helped how I could, with juvenile distractions, I should have known then that it was foolish to imagine.

And while you may evaluate my actions and blame my imprudence or naivety. Please know imprudence implies a rush decision; mine were methodical, calculated – setting my own trap. I had believed the reality that my hope rewrote.

When I began to write this, I guess I intended for voyeurs and loved ones to afford me a fraction of their screen time and skim how I feel. Perhaps, maybe even my once-beloved would tap the link and pay me half a sympathy. If I had been a fool, I might as well be a fool with an audience to perform for.

However, in writing, what I have realized is that this is all just a case I present to myself. For I already know a fool is the worst thing I can be. 

Yet I defend myself because I had good reason.

For a blissful moment, there was laughter, and joy, and lots of cookie dough. And ultimately, love. And what I must ask myself is to forgive for simply being a fool in love.

Accompanying Playlist: https://music.apple.com/us/playlist/the-fool/pl.u-BNA664XuAerlqJ