A Quarantine Love Letter to 'Glee'

Starting the first day of isolation, Miller began creating hilarious puppet videos (50 to date) featuring pop songs from stars like Sam Smith and Ariana Grande, who both shared his performances on their Instagrams.

For PAPER's month-long comedy series, It's Nice to Laugh, we've asked Miller to write love letters to all the things getting him through quarantine. The first installment of With Love is an ode to Glee.

My darling Glee,

As I wake in the morning on yet another day of this moment called quarantine, I breathe in regretting the 11 mint Oreos I had just before falling asleep, but I breathe out, thinking of you. I fumble out of bed where I then stumble to the kitchen and pour myself a cup of, if you can believe it, ambition. (In this analogy ambition is coffee.) I sit curled up on the couch, like a small tuft of Mr. Schue's hair, and look past the hours ahead just waiting for the celebratory moment when we can be together. I long to hold you, to embrace you with my eyes and feel you close with my achy, breaky heart.

The days without you are long. Longer than church when you're 5 or my hair in 6th grade when I let it get long because my mom said it was "gorgeous." With each passing minute, nay second, I can feel you getting closer, getting louder, like Rachel Berry at the end of literally any song. I contemplate productivity, but quickly brush it away as if I was Santana and the thought itself was Artie. Before I know it, it is time for lunch, but who can think of lunch with a heart as heavy as mine? I guess I can actually. Eventually my hunger outweighs my heart and I decide to indulge in a small snack. A tub and a half of hummus will do. The tub? Garlic. The and a half? Pine nut.

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The afternoon becomes an afterthought compared to you. "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" Yeah, I fucking shall. You, Glee, are a soft, August breeze that tickles my heart first and vocal cords second. You, Glee, (Mercedes) shine brighter than the sun herself on July 31st, assuming it was really sunny that day. And you, Glee, hold me close, like a cheap cooler holds 23 white claws as my hand holds the 24th. "So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, so long lives this, and this gives life to Glee." I'm pretty sure Shakespeare said that and she was right.

Finally the clock strikes 6 PM and I relinquish the made up responsibilities of my day. There is dinner to be had and mothers to be called, but my mind is stuck on you, woah-oh, woah-oh, stuck like glue. The time for us to be together has arrived at last and I am elated, happier than Tina Cohen-Chang getting a solo. Which, in all honesty, shouldn't really happen. She just doesn't have the vocal stamina. Now, finally, it is just you and it is just me. May you forever be the new to my directions, the Sue to my Sylvester, and the Trouty to my mouth.

With love,
Marty

Follow Marty Miller on Instagram (@itsmartymiller).

Photo courtesy of Marty Miller