I Gave Up Everything to Live a Quiet Life in the Utopia My Niece Created

Rejected on January 19, 2021

Last week, upon waking up one morning to an endless stream of incessant and disturbing news notifications, I decided to quit my job, delete the news and give up technology to live a quieter life in The Utopia of Sugar Plum: the world my niece created that’s a cross between Arendelle, Candyland and Central Park. Since moving to Sugar Plum, my life has become noticeably stress-free. I used to worry about things like my nudes being stored in the cloud and the state of our democracy, but in Sugar Plum my only worry is whether we’ll have enough sour gummy worms to last us the entire winter. 

Call me ignorant, but living in The Utopia of Sugar Plum has given me a reason to look forward to waking up every morning. Why worry about poverty when in the USP, sparkling magical fairies come out at night and leave money under your pillow, even if no teeth are to be found. 

And while yes, maybe I do only hear echoes and snippets of news from the real world. “Capitol!” “Vaccine!” “Kim Kardashian!” Guess what? I don’t care! My serotonin levels are spiking! In the USP, there is no Capitol; there is no real government. It’s a Utopia where sparkly tigers have the power to roam freely. They’re nice tigers too, ones that don’t enforce a bedtime. And Anna from Frozen comes to my room at night and braids my hair. It’s a weird amenity, I know, but hey, my hair looks great!  

Say what you want about me, but I no longer turn to Twitter to see what people are saying. I simply check-in with the Rainbow Birdies of Sugar Plum, who tweet in harmonious song. It’s quite lovely waking up to a stream of their melodic tweets while perched on my windowsill. 

Think of me as out-of-touch but quarantining in the USP is so much nicer than in my tiny apartment. There are no apartments but spacious tents that are a pillow fort and yurt hybrid. Fluffy puppies roam the sprawling hilltops upon which our pillow yurts stand and where colorful butterflies that poop chocolate soar. 

And maybe I do miss Instagram a little but the feeling of freeing yourself from societal standards of perfection is liberating! I don’t worry about what I’m wearing or what I look like anymore because in The Utopia of Sugar Plum everyone walks around in training diapers without a care in the world. 

In The Utopia of Sugar Plum, you don’t have to conceal and carry because everyone carries fairy princess wands. People and animals coexist in peace and everyone works to harvest an endless supply of sugar and carrot sticks. No one worries about what they’ll hear when they turn on the radio because “Let It Go” plays on repeat. It’s been 7 years of “Let It Go” playing but hey, I’d take that over this hell any day.