**Photo was taken from AP***

Life. Life sucks sometimes, man. But, if you happened to scroll through your Instagram feed, between the pictures of acai bowls from that new trendy shop downtown to the countless narcissistic–albeit sometimes decent–selfies, you might be surprised to learn that some of those people trying to navigate good lighting, ripped muscles, and appropriate cleavage are also fucking miserable. Now before you start shoving a gluten-free biscotti down my throat (for those with celiac disease, gluten is no joke), I’m not trying to rain on anyone’s parade. In fact, these posts are meant to help those who deal with social media FOMO (fear of missing out) or those who feel inadequate because they’re not “experiencing” the same amount of happiness as their peers. Well, I’m here to tell you that although, as the old adage goes “perception is reality,” I hope you also know that it’s not the full story, either.

What do people who only talk about things like their”great” new promotion, moving in with the love of their who they’ve only known for 6 months and now can’t imagine life without (eye roll), and nature hikes that transform people into socially aware, MUCH wiser beings all have in common?! They make me gag. And also, they’re LIARS. Now, that’s not to diminish the happiness that they do feel–I’m sure that their Venti Iced Mocha was life changing for all of about 2.5 seconds on their early Monday commute last week. But the truth is that people like to bullshit others into thinking that their lives are fantastic, when in reality they’re probably dying a slow, painful death inside. Ok, so maybe that last part is just me, but the bullshit part isn’t. I get that it’s not “attractive” or “cute” to put everything on social media, but when you only put the good and none of the bad, you’re essentially lying by omission.

Now, I’m going to be honest here, because that’s the nature of my blog–to cut the crap and be REAL. I’m letting you know right off the bat that I’m probably not the most reliable narrator myself. I have tried to live the social media lifestyle that so many do, only showing the good and never getting down to the nitty gritty. But after a series of unfortunate, and utterly unexpected events in my life, I decided I couldn’t deal with the bullshit anymore. So here I am, in all my naked and raw glory (figuratively of course) letting you know that you’re ok. We’re ok. And we’re going to siphon through the bull together.

XOXO,

Gossip Girl

JK. The name’s Pons. Elle B. Pons