| "I laughed, I cried, I even learned some things about myself." |
Book Excerpts:
1
The Audacity
I’m supposed to be doing something really brilliant with my life.
That’s a standalone sentence. I feel sad when I read it because,
obviously, as it must be apparent, I’m not doing anything particularly
brilliant at all. In fact, I’m just sitting here. I’m struggling to write this. It’s a
book, you see. This is the seventh sentence in my book. And now, this is
the eighth.
I’ve decided to write a book because I’ve got to do something. I’ve always
felt like there was something very important I am supposed to do, but I’ve
never fully understood what that something is. I’ve been waiting for a long
time for a hoard of angels to come down, blow their little horns and give
me the terms of my lifetime agreement, but it’s becoming painfully
apparent that they are not coming. Nobody is going to spell it out for me.
Worst of all, these blessed beings are not going to give me unlimited
resources of energy with which to perform my life’s miracle.
So, here I sit.
Who am I to have such audacity to write a book, especially a book about
suffering through normal life? I’ve struggled so long to become normal
that I may have become overnormal and may have killed whatever it was
that made me such a unique character in the cartoonish way I used to be.
I talked to Oprah about this (in my head), and it all came out much more
eloquently than it’s coming out now. She knew just the right questions to
ask me about this book, which, at the time of my imaginary appearance
on her show has already been published and doing brilliantly well, and I,
of course, knew just the right answers. We even laughed at the irony of
how writing a book about being unsuccessful has made such a success
out of me.
The reality is that I live a considerable amount of time in my head with
people I admire admiring me.
I suspect I am not the only one.
And there it is. The audacity. That is where I get the audacity to write this
book, because, surely, I cannot be the only person in this world who is
crippled by the need to be special. It’s too bad that the one special
something I have to offer people involves baring my naked soul and
admitting how insecure I feel.
Some people are happy to live their lives helping their fellow man in small,
quiet and miraculous ways. These are the people that should be admired,
though they most likely are not. I try to be that holy, but I fall painfully
short. I take that back. I don’t try. I’m actually very wrapped up in my own
concern for my own self. It’s not that I don’t want to help people. It’s just
that I want to do it in a way that’s right for me. I want to do it selfishly. And
that means doing it through my insecurities and self-doubt – through my
writing.
I’m good at a lot of things. I would say that I am a pretty darn proficient
person. I can remodel a house, fixing anything from a tacky paint job to a
leaky pipe. I can lay flooring. I can even design pretty cool floor plans. I
can write well. I take really good photographs. I like psychology, and I
understand people. I suck at math, but that’s what calculators are for. The
point is that it’s been hard to choose what one thing to focus on. The
more I do around the house and the yard, the more I see that I am not
doing anything really important to me. That’s been okay for a long time
because I needed the boost in confidence I got from planting a plant. Hey,
I can do that! The problem is that the more time I spend piddling around
the house, the less time I spend on something that people might actually
find value in, like this book. I hope.
So, here I am. Sentence number 52.
Life Lesson: Sometimes a person needs a little audacity.
2
If Not Now, When?
I’m supposed to be fixing up the house right now getting it ready to sell.
My husband is already in Texas, having started his new job two days ago.
I don’t really have time to write a book. But that’s the funny thing. I never
really have the time.
I have a lot of creative projects running rampant in my head: screenplays,
novels, children’s stories, cartoons, T-shirts. You name it, and there it is
in my head. I’ve squeaked out a very minute couple of things that have
not been sold or published or even seen by anyone who might want to
sell or publish them. The thing is, there is always something else that
needs to be done with my time. There is always something very urgent
that needs my attention, which I must attend to immediately, such as the
dishes or TV, for example. Or, God forbid, the cat is on my lap and must
not be disturbed. Then this morning I woke up and realized that
somewhere back in November, I’d turned 35. It reminds me of one of
those great Pink Floyd songs about all the time that passes, and pretty
soon you’re dead, and something about a rabbit. The song has a
melodious way of saying, “Wake up, you’re dying.”
And so I am.
One day at a time, I am withering away, as each of us is. I find it so
comforting to get lost in the dishes or the TV because I know how to do
them. I know how to fix up the house to sell it. I can prove it. I wrote out a
list! I just begin with varnishing the trim on the stairs and end with
decorating the master bathroom. I even know my color scheme. But the
things that feel urgently important to me, like writing a book, escape me.
They slip through the cracks in the parquet where the little squares don’t
line up just right.
So, I ask myself, “If not now, when?” When are the details of life not so
pressing that I have time to write this book?
I have two choices. Do it or don’t.
Where are you, angels?
Life Lesson: Sometimes you've got to bite the bullet and do it.
3
Wannabes
American Idol Strikes Fear into the Heart of One American, not an Idol.
I’m sitting in my living room watching the preliminary eliminations on
American Idol, which should be funny, except I am mortified, and I’m
thinking to myself two things. The first is, How can some people think they
even remotely, vaguely, sort of, kind of have talent? And the second
thought is, What if that’s me? What if I am a talentless, pimplehead of a
writer and have to suffer throngs of humiliation at the hands of a cruel
public in order to find out? And then I think, Don’t ask questions you really
don’t want the answer to, knock on wood. And then I knock on my head,
because that’s my OCD’s MO.
Then I think of things on a much grander scale, as always, and I wonder
why it is that so many people have such unrealistic ideas about how they
are, what they look like, what they sound like, what they act like. It seems
so epidemic. And after all of these thoughts, I pray I fall into the
exceptionally talented, yet self-effacing, category.
After thinking all of these thoughts, I have yet another thought, which is,
What are these poor people going to do with their lives who really do
believe they are meant to be big famous singers, but who have the
singing ability of my bunghole after a bowl of chili? And then I think, Well,
you are living that life as a wannabe writer, so you should know! And then
I think, Oh my God, is that true? And then I think, Yes, that IS true, and
look how depressed you are! For God’s sake, you’re talking to yourself
again! Get a hold of yourself! And then I think, Oh my God, why does my
inner voice sound like a drag queen?
Have people always been so deep in denial of who they are, or did we
lose our way along the way? Men used to learn trades from their father or
some other mentor. Women were trained in the art of marriage and
darning socks. Many of our teachers are no longer real people but are
images projected onto our television screens. But they’re not teaching us
any real skills. Just because singers and actors make it look easy, it
doesn’t mean that it is. When Julia Roberts throws herself around a hotel
room in Pretty Woman, she’s getting paid to act. If I tried to emulate her, I’
d be acting, too. Acting like a big fraud.
Many of us humble little Earthlings are forgetting how to survive life one
mediocre moment at a time. We are soulless souls, us dipshits who are
buying into the whole television farce. Do we really want our role models
to be a bunch of pixels on a screen?
Life Lesson: Sometimes we really do suck.
1
The Audacity
I’m supposed to be doing something really brilliant with my life.
That’s a standalone sentence. I feel sad when I read it because,
obviously, as it must be apparent, I’m not doing anything particularly
brilliant at all. In fact, I’m just sitting here. I’m struggling to write this. It’s a
book, you see. This is the seventh sentence in my book. And now, this is
the eighth.
I’ve decided to write a book because I’ve got to do something. I’ve always
felt like there was something very important I am supposed to do, but I’ve
never fully understood what that something is. I’ve been waiting for a long
time for a hoard of angels to come down, blow their little horns and give
me the terms of my lifetime agreement, but it’s becoming painfully
apparent that they are not coming. Nobody is going to spell it out for me.
Worst of all, these blessed beings are not going to give me unlimited
resources of energy with which to perform my life’s miracle.
So, here I sit.
Who am I to have such audacity to write a book, especially a book about
suffering through normal life? I’ve struggled so long to become normal
that I may have become overnormal and may have killed whatever it was
that made me such a unique character in the cartoonish way I used to be.
I talked to Oprah about this (in my head), and it all came out much more
eloquently than it’s coming out now. She knew just the right questions to
ask me about this book, which, at the time of my imaginary appearance
on her show has already been published and doing brilliantly well, and I,
of course, knew just the right answers. We even laughed at the irony of
how writing a book about being unsuccessful has made such a success
out of me.
The reality is that I live a considerable amount of time in my head with
people I admire admiring me.
I suspect I am not the only one.
And there it is. The audacity. That is where I get the audacity to write this
book, because, surely, I cannot be the only person in this world who is
crippled by the need to be special. It’s too bad that the one special
something I have to offer people involves baring my naked soul and
admitting how insecure I feel.
Some people are happy to live their lives helping their fellow man in small,
quiet and miraculous ways. These are the people that should be admired,
though they most likely are not. I try to be that holy, but I fall painfully
short. I take that back. I don’t try. I’m actually very wrapped up in my own
concern for my own self. It’s not that I don’t want to help people. It’s just
that I want to do it in a way that’s right for me. I want to do it selfishly. And
that means doing it through my insecurities and self-doubt – through my
writing.
I’m good at a lot of things. I would say that I am a pretty darn proficient
person. I can remodel a house, fixing anything from a tacky paint job to a
leaky pipe. I can lay flooring. I can even design pretty cool floor plans. I
can write well. I take really good photographs. I like psychology, and I
understand people. I suck at math, but that’s what calculators are for. The
point is that it’s been hard to choose what one thing to focus on. The
more I do around the house and the yard, the more I see that I am not
doing anything really important to me. That’s been okay for a long time
because I needed the boost in confidence I got from planting a plant. Hey,
I can do that! The problem is that the more time I spend piddling around
the house, the less time I spend on something that people might actually
find value in, like this book. I hope.
So, here I am. Sentence number 52.
Life Lesson: Sometimes a person needs a little audacity.
2
If Not Now, When?
I’m supposed to be fixing up the house right now getting it ready to sell.
My husband is already in Texas, having started his new job two days ago.
I don’t really have time to write a book. But that’s the funny thing. I never
really have the time.
I have a lot of creative projects running rampant in my head: screenplays,
novels, children’s stories, cartoons, T-shirts. You name it, and there it is
in my head. I’ve squeaked out a very minute couple of things that have
not been sold or published or even seen by anyone who might want to
sell or publish them. The thing is, there is always something else that
needs to be done with my time. There is always something very urgent
that needs my attention, which I must attend to immediately, such as the
dishes or TV, for example. Or, God forbid, the cat is on my lap and must
not be disturbed. Then this morning I woke up and realized that
somewhere back in November, I’d turned 35. It reminds me of one of
those great Pink Floyd songs about all the time that passes, and pretty
soon you’re dead, and something about a rabbit. The song has a
melodious way of saying, “Wake up, you’re dying.”
And so I am.
One day at a time, I am withering away, as each of us is. I find it so
comforting to get lost in the dishes or the TV because I know how to do
them. I know how to fix up the house to sell it. I can prove it. I wrote out a
list! I just begin with varnishing the trim on the stairs and end with
decorating the master bathroom. I even know my color scheme. But the
things that feel urgently important to me, like writing a book, escape me.
They slip through the cracks in the parquet where the little squares don’t
line up just right.
So, I ask myself, “If not now, when?” When are the details of life not so
pressing that I have time to write this book?
I have two choices. Do it or don’t.
Where are you, angels?
Life Lesson: Sometimes you've got to bite the bullet and do it.
3
Wannabes
American Idol Strikes Fear into the Heart of One American, not an Idol.
I’m sitting in my living room watching the preliminary eliminations on
American Idol, which should be funny, except I am mortified, and I’m
thinking to myself two things. The first is, How can some people think they
even remotely, vaguely, sort of, kind of have talent? And the second
thought is, What if that’s me? What if I am a talentless, pimplehead of a
writer and have to suffer throngs of humiliation at the hands of a cruel
public in order to find out? And then I think, Don’t ask questions you really
don’t want the answer to, knock on wood. And then I knock on my head,
because that’s my OCD’s MO.
Then I think of things on a much grander scale, as always, and I wonder
why it is that so many people have such unrealistic ideas about how they
are, what they look like, what they sound like, what they act like. It seems
so epidemic. And after all of these thoughts, I pray I fall into the
exceptionally talented, yet self-effacing, category.
After thinking all of these thoughts, I have yet another thought, which is,
What are these poor people going to do with their lives who really do
believe they are meant to be big famous singers, but who have the
singing ability of my bunghole after a bowl of chili? And then I think, Well,
you are living that life as a wannabe writer, so you should know! And then
I think, Oh my God, is that true? And then I think, Yes, that IS true, and
look how depressed you are! For God’s sake, you’re talking to yourself
again! Get a hold of yourself! And then I think, Oh my God, why does my
inner voice sound like a drag queen?
Have people always been so deep in denial of who they are, or did we
lose our way along the way? Men used to learn trades from their father or
some other mentor. Women were trained in the art of marriage and
darning socks. Many of our teachers are no longer real people but are
images projected onto our television screens. But they’re not teaching us
any real skills. Just because singers and actors make it look easy, it
doesn’t mean that it is. When Julia Roberts throws herself around a hotel
room in Pretty Woman, she’s getting paid to act. If I tried to emulate her, I’
d be acting, too. Acting like a big fraud.
Many of us humble little Earthlings are forgetting how to survive life one
mediocre moment at a time. We are soulless souls, us dipshits who are
buying into the whole television farce. Do we really want our role models
to be a bunch of pixels on a screen?
Life Lesson: Sometimes we really do suck.
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