The Letting Go B-Side

An illustration of a drawer with earbuds, a CD, a pencil, a chess piece, and a paper clip sitting in it. Letter beads spell out “THE LETTING GO B-SIDE.”

The year is 2025. I’m putting on Glossier liquid blush, and yeah, it kinda makes my face burn a little. That’s probably because I got this blush for my birthday — my 16th birthday, that is. Which was almost six years ago, in 2019. Maybe this is gross, or even borderline unsafe, but I can’t help it. I’m a sentimental person, and I can’t let go of anything. 

Letting go can be really difficult. But it can be rewarding and refreshing at the same time. Cutting off hair, moving to a new place — or throwing away your six-year-old liquid blush — are possibilities for new beginnings as much as they are departures from a well-known past. 

In this B-Side, these writers explored what letting go means to them — and who knows, maybe they’ll also inspire you to let go of something that’s been weighing you down, even if it’s scary. After all, as Imogen Heap sings in the Frou Frou song “Let Go” — “there’s beauty in the breakdown.”

Senior Arts Editor Cecilia Dore can be reached at cecedore@umich.edu.

An illustration of an old mirror in a drawer.
On gender identity and letting go of expectations
An illustration of an old video game controller in a junk drawer.
‘Come Along with Me’: how an ‘Adventure Time’ song helped me say goodbye
An illustration of a Moonstruck DVD in a junk drawer.
‘Moonstruck’ and the beauty of losing control
An illustration of an old book in a junk drawer.
Letting go of a literary nostalgia
An illustration of a Nirvana CD in a junk drawer.
Letting go of gatekeeping
An illustration of five chess pieces in a junk drawer.
‘Intermezzo’ and letting go of the world
An illustration of the Tower of Pisa postcard that reads “Saluti da Pisa” and “Italia” in a junk drawer.
A love that lingers
An illustration of a photo of the car scene from “The Kissing Booth” in a drawer.
Let go and stop ‘doing it for the plot’