My Two-Cents: Gateway Things

You’ve heard of gateway drugs. Drugs that put you at a predilection for liking other drugs. Now get ready for a whole bunch of other gateway things – stuff that parlays your current investment into more. Door-opening stuff. Can-of-worms cracking shit. So many worms. Yuck. Sometimes these cans are filled with gross, dirty, deposit-covered worms; sometimes they're full of yummy Trolli gummy worms. I present to you: things I think are inherently slutty and successful at being a gateway.

1. Gateway Books: Sometimes, you read a really good book and it opens you to the plethora of reading. A book that makes you realize, reading can be fun! Such as a really good series, like Harry Potter. Sometimes, however, you read a really bad book that makes you never want to read again. My Anit-Gateway book was The Catcher and the Rye. I finished that book and threw it against a wall and then tried to run it over with my car. Then I crushed it up into little pieces and tried to beer-bong it. The entire time I was reading that book, I just kept thinking to myself, Shut the fuck up and go to School Hayden Caulfield! Or maybe his name was Holden. Don’t know don’t care. Stupid little punk. Maybe the Anit-drugs programs should look into seeing if there’s a drug that’s like The Catcher and the Rye – some pill you pop that makes you think wow, I really don’t think drugs are for me anymore. I’m going to try something else. 
2. Gateway Idioms: Once you start noticing/using a couple idioms, they begin to seep in and poison every aspect of your life. In a fun way though, because idioms spice up your colloquialism. At the cost of sounding like your grandma when you speak. Everyone remembers the day they discovered their first idiom.
3. Gateway Caffeine: It starts with one cup of coffee, probably something with a shit ton of creamer, but it gradually turns into 200+ mg of straight black coffee in order to get you out of bed and get over your pure hatred of the world each morning. Only two things keep me going nowadays: Columbia’s Second-Finest Export and the Wordle. Both of which I need to consume/do within one hour of waking up or I will implode. 
4. Gateway Retirement: I feel like once you start retiring, you realize how fun it is and want to do it over, and over, and over. Exhibit A: Tom Brady. Exhibit B: Idk I think my grandpa? I remember going to a few different parties. And then after he retired the last time I’m pretty sure he got a retirement job. Seems counterintuitive if you ask me. But can you really blame him, or Tom Brady? Every time you retire you get a party! And if you're Tom Brady, you get a bunch of news coverage too. He gets to be Mr. Popular for a week or two. Plus, Tommy-boy makes a more-than-a-couple million every extra season he steps on the field. If I were in his shoes, and all I had to do was go out there and throw a couple passes, you bet your bottom dollar my ass would be playing till I was sitting on my death bed. We should stop asking him when he’s going to retire and instead ask if he plans on getting with Kim K anytime soon because I just have this inkling it’s in the works.
5. Gateway White Shoes: I don’t know when I started buying only white shoes, but once it started it basically never stopped. White shoes are so unethical if you really think about it; it’s the last color you would want for something that you wear on your FEET and have to touch the ground over, and over, and over. It’s insane, really. But I’ve scarcely bought any other color of foot garment since I started. I’m on a continuous morphine drip of White. Fucking. Shoes. 
6. Gateway Chip and Dip: Once you discover this Delicacy, you crave it all the time. I am a slut for a good chip and dip.

If you’re going to do any sort of gateway thing, it probably shouldn’t be drugs. If I’ve learned anything in life, it’s don’t do heroin and don’t sleep with strippers. Every time someone’s ever done that in a movie, it’s gone horribly. Except for maybe in Pretty Woman. So be careful with the addictions you dabble in. Tread carefully in Gateway-water. You don't want to accidentally take a Gateway to Hell. Or a highway for that matter. Leave that to ACDC.

Kate