TEXARKANA MAGAZINE
My second hot take is along these same lines but comes with a little more nuance: Free Britney! But is she even free?! When the Free Britney movement gained traction, I was obviously rooting for her freedom. But over time, I grew frustrated accepting the sad reality that we may never know the full story. I think we’ve gotten pieces of information, but it’s bigger than anything we can wrap our minds around. Britney today is not the same Britney I grew up idolizing, and while it’s easy for the internet to turn her into a meme, behind all of it is a real person who has clearly endured things we can’t fully understand. I pray for her healing. She always seemed kind and pure-hearted, and while I miss seeing her joyful and confident, more than anything, I hope she finds peace. Hot take number three and probably more controversial in a completely different way is: fast food is good food. Before anyone comes for me, let me explain. When my mom used to say, “We’re going to get dinner,” my siblings and I didn’t think of grilled chicken and vegetables. We thought McDonald’s happy meals and KFC country fried steak dinners. “Let’s get dinner” meant car rides with the windows down and the smell of fries filling the air. Now as an adult, my palate still lives there: Raising Cane’s, Chick-fil-A, and Little Caesars pizza. I don’t mind it. I don’t fight it. I enjoy it. Is it healthy? No. Will it add years to my life? It won’t. It may be unhealthy, but it still tastes good. I’ve tried kale. I don’t like it. My fourth hot take is that going to the movies is still elite entertainment and wildly underrated. If my friends and I are bored, the first thing we do is open the Cinemark app to see what’s playing. We’ve seen musicals, rom-coms, and thrillers, and every time it feels like an experience, because it is. Yes, it’s ridiculously expensive, but you best believe I’m still getting my medium popcorn, the chocolate, the gummy worms, the ICEE, maybe even a pizza and a hotdog if I’m feeling financially reckless. I miss when movie premieres felt like national events. I remember Pirates of the Caribbean when people were dressed as Jack Sparrow, lines wrapping around the building. It felt magical. It was my childhood. That magic still exists when I go with my friends. Film is one of the most beautiful forms of storytelling we have, and sitting in a dark theater laughing or crying with strangers is human connection in its purest form. My final hot take is the one that probably says the most about me: humor is a healthy coping mechanism. My therapist tells me regularly I use humor to deflect. Yeah, yeah. She’s not wrong. But humor has gotten me through some of my hardest days. It’s helped me process pain without being consumed by it. It makes heavy things feel lighter. Yes, humor can be used in untactful or avoidant ways, but it can also be healing. It reminds us not to take this floating-rock experience so seriously. That joy can exist alongside grief. At the end of the day, God is in control and everything can change overnight. If I can find a reason to laugh in the middle of it all, I will every single time. I have a million more hot takes where these came from, but these are the ones that live loudest in my brain. You may agree or disagree, and you may be judging me for defending Little Caesars as fine dining, but if nothing else, this column encourages you to stand on your own hot takes. They are the opinions that make you, you. Life is better when you’re passionate about things. Passion drives us. And my passion, unashamedly, drives me straight to McDonald’s.
GOOD EVENING TXK COLUMN BY BAILEY GRAVITT
M y entire life, I have been told I see the world a little differently than others. Not wrong, not right, just different. I have ADHD, and by default, I see things in very extreme ways, not making much room for middle ground. I tend to experience life in black and white, which means I can be very opinionated. That’s what this month’s column is about: my Hot Takes. These are my “bad” opinions, the ones that make my friends roll their eyes or text in group chats. But underneath all of my silliness, every hot take connects back to nostalgia or the way I cope with being human. My first hot take is one I will defend until my last breath: pop music is high art. I grew up on Britney Spears, Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Justin Timberlake, and Sean Kingston. They were the architects of my childhood’s emotional landscape. Britney Spears was my musical awakening. I didn’t just listen to her. I had her music videos on repeat and at the ripe old age of 10, her interviews memorized. I turned the choreography of “Piece of Me” into a performance for my mom and her friends in our living room. Pop music raised me. But I’ve found through experience that people tend to scoff at pop music. In my opinion, they dismiss it because it’s the “fast food” of music. “Last Friday Night” by Katy Perry is my favorite song, and when people hear me admit that, I’m sure they think I’m strange or have the worst taste in music. But when other people hear that song, most just hear a party anthem. I hear a time capsule. It takes me back to middle school mission trips, blaring that song through my headphones on the bus. I think of youth that felt like it would never end and the kind of fun you don’t realize is fleeting until you’re older. Pop music IS freedom. It’s escapism when life feels heavy. It makes life brighter and easier to dance through. That’s art to me, high art.
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