The thing I love about Rooney is she never fails to showcase every interaction in such a way that communicates the absolute tragedy of, often everyday exchanges. How most of us are socialized in such a way as to never acknowledge or notice the connective tissue of our lives dwelling there. If we approached these moments with more intention and focus, there’s a real beauty and affirmation waiting to be seized.

Instead we’re often trains on a collision course and we don’t know how to fix it. We usually just let it happen. Those moments haunt us. But we do nothing to make restitution or try to make sure those things don’t reoccur. Probably because acknowledging that inadequacy feels like it would be somehow worse than constant destruction. Undeniably, I think, Rooney paints those moments as very human and impartial. It feels like every story is a lamentation, to be honest. Nothing else to do but the characters to live with it.

I wonder if she’s so polarizing because people recognize themselves in interactions and either feel seen or hate that fact. With the people not connecting not noticing or not caring to see the primary preoccupying force in everything she writes.