Déjà Vu Déjà Vu

Do you ever feel like you’ve run out of things to say? Every day I talk to the same people. We talk about generally the same things. With my co-workers, we talk about work and the people there. With family, we talk about sad or funny things that happened before and people we all know. We give and get unsolicited advice on how to run our lives. With mere acquaintances, we chat about the weather or other meaningless topics that are neutral. We try to find a common thing to complain about.

I feel like I’ve done it all before. Like my conversations are on an endless loop. You know when you’re in a waiting room of an apartment complex so long that you know the pool picture is next, then the gym, then the master suite? That loop. I’m in it. But I don’t get to leave once I put down the security deposit: it just keeps happening over and over again. Life is the movie Groundhog Day, except for the whole killing yourself and waking up the next morning part.

I read something by Sloane Crosley about when she locked herself out of the apartment she was moving out of and had to call a locksmith. Twelve hours later, she locked herself out of the apartment she was moving into and had to call a locksmith again. The same guy with the ponytail from that morning shows up. He changes the lock and points down with his pen at her doormat which reads, “Déjà Vu Déjà Vu,” frontward and backward. “That’s a funny doormat,” he says.

That’s how I feel, but like no one else is in on the joke.