Embarrassing Things We Shared While the World Watched Trump

As a child, I had a fear of kites. (Yes, kites.)

I once called my elementary-school teacher mom, then pretended I didn't. 

I haven't seen The Wire.

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I—gulp, please don't come after me—don't dislike Hamilton, but I also have little desire to go see it on Broadway.

Now I've told you these things. Well, maybe not you specifically, but I've put them out in the world. Why? In mid-May, I had a realization. It was in the wake of President Donald Trump firing former FBI Director James Comey, and the revelation that the president reportedly mentioned to Russian officials that easing pressure over the Russia investigation was a part of the firing, that I had this realization: Nobody was paying attention to anything but Trump.

When a major Trump controversy breaks (especially one of the Russian variety), everything is pulled into its vortex—like the latest bits of incremental news about the president is some sort of godforsaken Dyson that vacuums up attention and eyeballs as everything else floats into nothingness. The world is Trump and nothing else matters.

So, that day in May, I took to Twitter and shared some embarrassing facts about my life (like my former kite fear), since, what the hell, nobody cared at the moment anyway. 

I naturally thought of my dumb but fun Twitter experiment when the news broke Tuesday that Donald Trump Jr. had released emails from during the 2016 campaign revealing he had set up a meeting with a person he believed represented the Russian government in an attempt to land damaging information about Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. (If you want to read about it, here's a quick primer.)

But rather than tweeting more embarrassing things about my life—such as: I don't have an Instagram and, OK, I know, I know, I know, but at this point it feels too late to start—I instead decided to open the floor to Twitter, promising the good folks who got back to me an embed in a Newsweek article. I thought of it as a collective release: a chance to air those things you think about late at night and, despite everything generally speaking being fine, you still shake your head at, as if to rattle the embarrassment out of your head. 

A mix of my co-workers, friends, Twitter acquaintances and random folks responded. Enjoy the stories below, and if you read this and want to share, go ahead and shoot me a tweet @timmarcin (you might not get into Newsweek, but, hey, it's good to get things off your chest while you can). And to all those who responded, you wonderful, precious little angels, remember—you're fine, and you're now free from your burdens.

But pie is good and atoms are confusing

It's OK to be curious about dairy

RIP fish: He was a good fish, and it was an honest accident

It's not falling, it's descending with style

Descending with style, redux

Descending With Style Part 3: This Time It's Personal

Do not fret, the Sim is in a better place now, and I don't know, it probably had it coming

Got milk? Yeah, but also 98 percent other stuff

This is mean of the kids, but also kind of makes you a badass, so don't sweat it

Honestly, if you haven't done this, you're in the minority and I don't trust you

It's a good album and I wrote this post listening to it, Jero, so I don't know, maybe you're on to something

It's OK, you're OK, we're all OK.... Just maybe don't get into, like, international bank robbery, where leaving behind fingerprints is a much bigger issue

Every generation needs a trend-setter

Map-makers are trash, we all know this (here in the U.S. we've been distorting our maps to make our country bigger forever) 

Personally a bit hurtful, but I get it and everything is going to be alright

What happens in Vegas...can be shared with readers at Newsweek.com for a dose of catharsis

This just sounds super smooth, nothing to be embarassed about here, batman is dope and we all know it