You must believe me when I say I’m trying to lean into the autumn glee. I’m trying my hardest to marvel at the conkers and sigh at the sweaters, I promise. Clicking into the wholesome memes, Meryl Streep in a coat, George Costanza shifting into soup mode, I’m doing it, I’m doing my best, but truly my heart just isn’t in it. This year everything feels colder, somehow.
One of the targeted ads that I see online, slipping in between the aesthetic diet of seasonal coffees and cats in bed, is a competition to win a house. A whole house. There’s a picture of it, too, a gleaming new-build in a very green field, and every time it scrolls past I have a brief daydream about winning the raffle and moving in, and then it inevitably collapsing under the weight of my first footstep, or disappearing like smoke. I suppose it was this house, this idea that instead of a meet-and-greet with Britney Spears or ride in a helicopter, the fantasy prize in 2022 is a home, something equally far off and unlikely, that meant I wasn’t shocked when last month This Morning’s “Spin to Win” wheel gave viewers the chance to pay off four months of energy bills.
