This was a difficult week. I started packing, initiating the process of leaving the house I have shared with Sophia for so many years. Sure, it’s only taken me six years to get this point of taking action, but I like to take my time.
Holy crap, I didn’t realize that I had accumulated so many books since college. I ended up with twenty boxes of books. And as for the question that V-grrrl snarkily asked me on Twitter, “Have you actually READ them all?” my answer is, “Have you worn ALL of the shoes in your closet?”
I recently bought a Kindle, and proudly announced to the world the end of the physical book. Who needs the physical book anymore? Let’s save the trees! Words are words, whether on paper or e-ink. But as I went through my books this week, in an attempt to weed out those that I wanted to give away, I reconnected with so many of these books, some which I haven’t looked at since college, as if they were old friends I just rediscovered on Facebook.
For me, the relationship of man and book has less to do with the content of the book, or even whether I bothered to read it. It is the living and breathing book itself. The physical book could light a memory that has nothing to do with the story, but about carrying the book in the subway in 1988, and the nodding agreement of the older gentleman carrying the same tome, and feeling as if I was in a private club.
As I prepared my moving boxes, my aim was to give away half of my old books, but after sorting through them, one by one, chatting to each about “old times,” I reduced my giveaway to only three boxes. There was no reason to hold on to “Tasty Oriental Dishes in Five Minutes? After really, after twelve years of owning SQL for Dummies, shouldn’t I just accept that I will always be a DUMMY with SQL?
As a self-diagnosed co-dependent, it didn’t surprise me to discover that many of the books in my collection, even the most unlikely of the bunch, are connected to different women from the past, imaginary and real girlfriends, unrequited love, lucky nights, and utter disasters.
The Whole PC Family Encyclopedia
Amy showed me how to use Compuserve, and then promptly flirted with me online. I was as slow to warming up to this modern form of sexual relationship as was my dial-up modem to connecting to the Internet. She soon found another guy to message, and we lost touch.
History and Class Consciousness: Studies in Marxist Dialectics
Do I remember anything about this book from college? No. Do I remember this Marxism course or the pretentious professor’s name? No. Do I remember my first experience with getting oral sex during that study session with Hannah after we talked about Marxist Dialectics? Yes. Will I ever read this book again? No. Will I ever give it away? Absolutely not. Never.
To Be a Jew
Michaela was religious. Because of her, I went bonkers and immediately decided to become a rabbi. I ended up going to film school in Los Angeles instead. Â Mistake.
Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party
I wrote a play that was performed at a small theater. The play was awful, a ripoff of Harold Pinter’s style. Â No one sleeps with the writer in Hollywood. Except Margaret.
Mad Libs
Shari was crazy, but her dirty word suggestions when we played Mad Libs made our short-lived friendship oh-so-worthwhile. I think she is now a Scientologist.
Selling Your Screenplay
Writing Class. Nothing ever happened with Karen. I just fantasized about her all the time in class and never wrote anything. Â She is now very successful, married to a woman.
Erotic Arts
This is a very boring book about sexuality in the arts, but when Jamie came to visit for the weekend, I placed this book (along with some cheesy “Book of the Month Club” selection titled “Sensual Massage”) in the center of my bookcase, hoping that she would notice them while checking out my books (something I always do when I go visit someone) and say to me, “Ooh, what interesting books you have, Neil. How would you like to give me a sensual massage and then we fuck like wild beasts?” Sadly, we spent the night sitting on the couch, fully clothed, eating Pop Tarts, and watching a Twilight Zone marathon on TV.
Curious George
I met Sophia online. Our first conversation online was about our favorite books. She said hers was “The Little Prince.” I said, half-jokingly, that it was “Curious George.” This became a personal running gag for years. We even had a large Curious George doll sitting nearby at our wedding. Oddly, someone stole it during the reception.
Books are not about reading. They are about women.
Wikipedia definition: Self-acceptance is defined as affirmation or acceptance of self in spite of weaknesses or deficiencies.
The power of this concept is striking, but how does this affect the way we thing about our hopes and dreams? Â And if we do have certain weaknesses and deficiencies, does this there are some things we can do and some that we cannot do. Â Â If we know we are terrified of snakes, should we try to conquer the fear and become a zookeeper, or just say no to that trip to the Amazon? Â We tell our children that they can do anything if they dream hard enough, but at what point do we stop telling ourselves the same thing, and accept our position in society? Â Do we give ourselves to a certain age, say 35, to achieve all of our dreams, and if not, should we just accept our lot, and be happy be with it.
It amused me that the first thought to came to mind when thinking about self-acceptance was my own childhood dream — to become an astronaut. You know the story — child of the 1970’s, Apollo, Star Wars, Star Trek, Ray Bradbury’s “The Martian Chronicles.”  Who is the most important Neil in world history? No, not Neil Sedaka.  It’s Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon. When I would hear his name in elementary school, I would feel a tinge of pride.
My Facebook update this morning: What do people think of the term “self-acceptance? New Age BS or the key to it all? Does it mean accepting your limitations? Don’t we live in a culture that says we can do it and have it ALL if we believe in it?
After receiving a number of intelligent (and not so intelligent) comments, I wrote:
Should I give up my dream of ever being an astronaut, considering my allergies?
I think that sounds like a plan, but allergies don’t factor into it – unless you majored in aeronautical engineering and became a pilot recently.
She was right. Â Tough love. Â I will never become an astronaut.
Did this realization make me make me sad?
Not really. Â To the adult-self, being an astronaut seems boring. Â My interest in space has lessened over the years. Â I ignored last week’s Venus passing the sun for the last time in our lifetime so I could watch “The Bachelorette” on TV instead. Â Our interests change over time.
Before I sat down to write this post, I create two lists on my laptop:
List #1 –Dreams and Follies that I Still Hope to Achieve
List #2 — Accepting the Limitations of Who I Am and What I Should Give Up as a Dream
LIST #1 was easy.
1) I can write a best-selling book. Didn’t Jenny Lawson just do that? Why not me?
2) I can run a marathon. If I wanted to, I could train hard enough. Â Of course I am lazy and unmotivated. Â But if I WANTED TO —
3) Â I can have a three-some with two hot babes. Why not?
The list of  possible dreams came flowing from my brain right to the keyboard –from being a father to ringing the bell at NASDAQ.
And then it was time for the list of my limitations. Â What are my faults? Â What will I never be able to do? Â Can I still be happy accepting myself as an imperfect person who is just not good enough in so many ways? Â Does accepting my foibles mean not trying to change them?
This is where the trouble began. Â It was impossible to write this list.
1) Because of my physical and educational and emotional limitations, I will never be an…
I wanted to write… astronaut, but I just couldn’t do it. Maybe Ray Bradbury, RIP, would understand how I felt. Â If I wrote it out, it would become a reality, and that would mean killing some childish fantasy, one that I don’t even want to achieve anymore. The “I CAN DO ANYTHING” mentality of American culture is so ingrained in my blood, that making a list of my limitations seemed almost… well, anti-American!
“Why can’t I be an astronaut?” I asked myself.
I immediately came up with several ways that I could become an astronaut. Â I could buckle down and get a Masters in Astrophysics. I could move to Houston and get a job with SpaceCamp. I could become a traitor to my country and become Iran’s first astronaut, pissing on the American flag from space as a publicity stunt in support of the Iranian regime. I could focus on making A LOT of money for the next twenty years — I would need BILLIONS of $$$ — so I could buy my way into one of those Russian space trips for hire. Â These scenarios are unlikely, but they are POSSIBLE. Â There was no reason to kill my dream.
Will I ever become an astronaut, the Rocket Man of my childhood, the second most famous Neil in space history?! Probably not. Â Perhaps my biggest limitation, the area of self-acceptance that I need the most work in, is about my own lack of self-acceptance.
If I were smarter, I would remember my first trip to Denver, Colorado — the Mile High city, and how I ended up spending all day in an “oxygen bar” because of my inability to deal with the high altitude.
Do I really want to go into Space? Â Do I want to pee in my suit and drink that awful Tang?
Perhaps I am still a child at heart, not ready for adult self-acceptance.
I still believe that one day I will be an astronaut.
The last time you heard from me I went face to face against a serial litterer outside a Starbucks, and won, inspired to action after hearing Kelly Clarkson’s popular hit, “What Doesn’t Kill You” on my car radio.
The story does not end there.
A day after my moral victory, I went to my friend’s house near Pasadena to hole up and focus on meeting a writing deadline. Â To help me accomplish this, I deleted all twenty of my Twitter apps from my iPhone. Â I worked and worked, my white beard growing each day. Â I know understand the prevalence of beards on both wise powerful wizards AND learned rabbis. Â The beard brings wisdom.
After a week and a half of living like a hermit, my friend suggested we go to Norm’s for pancakes.
“Fine,” I said.
As we drove down a busy street en route to our breakfast, we noticed a little black dog scrambling down the street, against traffic. We drove past him, leaving him to his fate.
“That dog is going to get killed,” I said.
“Maybe we should save him,” my friend suggested.
“Like how?”
“We can catch him and bring him to his owners.”
“How do we know the dog doesn’t have rabies. Â We should just call the ASPCA.”
“He’ll be dead by then,” said my friend.
Please notice that at this point, my friend is acting very caring to the dog and I’m like a wimpy little jerk who doesn’t want to get involved. Â But before you attack me, and call me an animal hater, remember that I have never had a dog before. Also be reminded that there is a long tradition of reluctant heroes, from Luke Skywalker to Moses to Rick in Casablanca. Â Do we hate them because of their initial reluctance to help others, or admire them for stepping up to the plate when necessary?
I had no interest in helping this black dog. Â It was an ugly pug. Â If it was run over on the street by a Hyundai SUV, no one would care. The world would continue on, as usual. People would continue to make love, kill each other, and pimp their blog posts on Facebook.
But then, a song came on the radio. It was Kelly Clarkson singing.
“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn’t mean I’m lonely when I’m alone
What doesn’t kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn’t mean I’m over cause you’re gone
What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and Iâ€
It was at that moment that I spoke up, the lyrics energizing my very soul.
“We need to save that dog! Â He deserves to live!”
My friend, who was driving, did a quick u-turn, and we raced in pursuit.
I’m not going to lie. Â It was my friend who grabbed the dog and delivered him to safety. Â I mean, I WOULD say I did it all during the dramatic rescue, but that’s not the type of man I want to be. Â I do believe my cry to “let’s do it!” started the ball rolling. Â And even though my friend did the heavy lifting, I did my best to distract the dog, jumping up and down and coaxing him, Â while by friend captured him.
After we placed the frightened (and frankly stupid dog) in the car, I entertained him with impressions while my friend drove to the address we found on the dog tag.
We ended up at the address of a very wealthy woman, who barely noticed the dog missing, and who didn’t even offer us a dog biscuit as a thank you.
But it didn’t matter. The reward was the rescue. Â The ugly black dog made it home alive.
End of story? Â No. Â Kelly Clarkson, like a muse from a Greek myth, continued to push me to greatness.
After my two weeks away, I returned to Redondo Beach. Â Sophia and I are still waiting for our divorce to be final, and we have done everything in our power to avoid the issue of me moving out my stuff. Â Â The inertia has taken a toll on both of us.
There are some days that I don’t want to get up in the morning. Â Please, no lectures. I know what I have to do.
On Wednesday, I was at my nadir. Â So, I did what any intelligent person does when depressed — go on Facebook and ask for advice.
“What do you do when you are feeling low?” I asked my Facebook friends.
One woman said she is a big fan of retail therapy. She buys herself a pair of shoes and she immediately feels better.
I’m not a big consumer, but I decided to try this approach. Â But shoes would not do it for me.
For a long time now, I’ve wanted a Kindle. Â Do I need it? Â Probably not. Â But just like I don’t need an iPhone or a flatscreen TV, a man of the 21st Century should own a Kindle.
But which Kindle? Â The Kindle Touch? The Kindle Fire? Â That’s when, by sheer accident, I saw the front page of the Walmart circular shoved into the Sunday Los Angeles Times. For Mother’s Day, they were offering the least expensive Kindle (with the buttons) for $79, but it included a $30 Walmart gift card. Â That meant the Kindle ended up being only $49, and I could use the other $30 to buy a whole lot of toilet paper.
I decided to drive over to the Walmart and go for the deal.
Walmart is not that convenient from where I live, and I rarely go to the mega-chain store. In my whole life, I have only been to Walmart a handful of times. I read a lot of jokes and negative comments online about Walmart, and I usually find them sexist, racist, and snooty. Â How much worse can Walmart be than Kmart or Target?
I arrived in this new Walmart. It was enormous, and crowded.
I made a beeline straight to the electronics department. Â At the counter, was a young Walmart employee. I hate to say this, because I wish it wasn’t true, but sometimes you can look at someone for one second, even before the person opens his mouth, and you know he’s not the brightest one in the room.
“I’m interested in this special you are running,” I said to the sales guy, picking up the weekly circular that was on the table in front of him and pointing at the splashy advertisement for the Mother’s Day Kindle special, which prominently showed a Kindle displaying the title page of the Hunger Games.
The salesguy looked at the circular.
“You want the Hunger Games? What’s that?”
“No, no. I want THIS. The Kindle.”
“The Kindle?”
“The Kindle. It is a e-book reader.”
Directly behind him is a display of the Kindles and the Nooks. I can see the Kindle Touch and the Kindle Fire both sitting in the glass cabinet, but not the Kindle that I want — the one on sale.
The salesguy looks into the display.
“We don’t have that one anymore.”
“The circular just came out two days ago. You’re already out of them?”
“I suppose so.”
I shrugged. I went on Facebook and wrote “Walmart sucks,” as if my status update was an effective act of revenge. Â That will show them!
I took my walk of shame out of the superstore, empty handed, sans Kindle.
As I passed the McDonald’s that was inside the Walmart, I rationalized the experience to myself.
“I didn’t really need the Kindle. It’s better this way.” I said to myself.
“At least I got out of the house and got some fresh air,” I said to myself.
“What would I do with that $30 Walmart card anyway? I would have lost it,” I said to myself.
Near the front entrance was the customer service center. There was a long line of customers returning their purchases. Â I was about to exit the store when my eye caught a glimpse of a large sign behind the customer service woman titled “Shopping Policies.”
It read:
Our firm intention is to have every advertised item in stock. Occasionally, however, an advertised item may not be available for purchase due to unforseen difficulties. If this happens, Walmart will:
Sell you a similar item for a comparable price (or reduction in price if the item is on sale). Or if you prefer, we will give you a Rain Check at your request so you may purchase the item (including One Time offer) at the advertised price when it becomes available.
Now THIS is why Walmart is famous! Â It isn’t the cheap prices. Â It is because the company does CARE about the customer.
I stood on line to ask for my rain check for my Kindle. Â Who knows? — maybe Walmart customer service is so helpful they will even sell me the Kindle Fire for $79 as an apology for my wasted time!
I waited in line for twenty minutes. The couple in front of me took forever. They were returning a TV, a microwave, AND a toaster! Â I wondered if they had just bought the items for the weekend to impress their visiting relatives.
I was next.
“Hello there,” I said, trying to win the customer service woman over with my cheerfulness. I showed her the Kindle ad on the front page of their circular.
“I really wanted to buy this for my mother for mother’s day…”
This was a lie, but I thought it presented me a decent guy.
“…Â but you seem to be already out of stock, just two days after the circular came out. Would I be able to get a rain check for the Kindle when you restock?”
“We don’t do any rain checks in this store,” she said.
“What about giving me a comparable discount on another e-reader?”
“We don’t do that in this store.  We don’t give comparable discounts or rain checks in this store.”
I smile politely. Â Maybe she was new.
“There is a huge sign directly behind which says that Walmart with help a customer with an advertised special with a comparable discount or a rain check.”
“We don’t do that in THIS STORE.”
“But they do this in OTHER stores?”
“I don’t know about other stores. Â We don’t do that in this store.”
“So why do you have the sign on the wall?”
“Because it is a Walmart policy.”
“It is a Walmart policy to have the sign on the wall? Â Or to do what it says on the sign?”
“We don’t do it in this store.”
“And so isn’t this Walmart?”
“Yes, but THIS STORE does not give comparable discounts or rain checks. Â I don’t know about other stores.”
“So, this store doesn’t follow Walmart’s own policy?”
“I don’t know what Walmart’s policy is.”
“If you turn around you will see it on the wall behind you.”
“I only know about THIS STORE.”
“Is there anyone else to talk to?”
“No.”
I took out my iPhone and started taking photos of the sign. The customer behind me, a mother with two children, was impatient with my questions.
“Enough already! It’s my turn,” she screamed. Â “Go shop somewhere else!”
I left. Â I couldn’t find my car in the mega-parking lot. Â Finally, I took refuge in my car, looking myself inside so I could finally breathe.
“I really didn’t need that Kindle,” I said to myself.
“I did my best,” Â I said to myself.
“I’ll post the photos of the signs. Â It will make a good blog post,” I said to myself.
I turned on the ignition, ready to return back to my bed, more depressed now then when arrived.
But then, a song came on the radio. It was Kelly Clarkson singing.
“What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger
Stand a little taller
Doesn’t mean I’m lonely when I’m alone
What doesn’t kill you makes a fighter
Footsteps even lighter
Doesn’t mean I’m over cause you’re gone
What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger, stronger
Just me, myself and Iâ€
I waited for the song to finish, left the car, and walked straight back into the fire — back into Walmart. I passed the useless customer service and returned to ground zero, the electronics department. My battle plan had changed; I would find someone who understood my language. The dopey electronic sales guy was still at the counter.
“Hello again,” I said. “Do you have a manager here?”
He pointed to Maria, a well-coiffed woman in a blue jacket.
I went to Maria, the infamous circular in my hand.
“Hi there,” I said to Maria. “I wanted to buy the $79 Kindle, but you seem to be out. Is there any way you can help me, like giving me a rain check for when you restock?”
I spoke clearly, confidently, and without any anger.
“Hmmm,” she said. “Let me see if we have any more in the back.”
A few minutes later, she came back with a Kindle. Â I left Walmart with a Kindle.
I may never use it, but it will forever be a symbol of not giving up, of staying focused, and the power of Kelly Clarkson’s voice.
Next hurdle. Â I want to finally move my stuff out of the house. Â Tomorrow I want to find a storage center and start the process. Â Â This will be painful.
If this is your first time reading this post, start at the bottom and go up. It is in reverse chronological order just to make you work harder.
Sunday 4/12/12 – night:
The end of project. Â It was too emotionally demanding, and not much said. Â Â But I liked experimenting. Â Good to fail.
Saturday 4/11/12 – morning:
I can’t wait for this experiment to end, although I will miss it on monday. Final question to myself about online life – is this all for writing or friendship?
Thursday 4/11/12 – morning:
My online experience has helped me become a better person. More human. Less superficial. I have become more in touch with my emotions. I feel love and affection more strongly. I allow myself to express sadness and yearning. I even have a nostalgic for my frequent conversations with my penis in 2005-2007. What is more authentic than a man’s relationship with his own cock?! I realize we live in a very politically correct media world, but I have enjoyed looking within without my reason controlling the ship. That said, I’m not sure all this focus on emotion and feeling and sexual yearning has done much for my writing. Writing requires logic and the artistry of specific word choice. Letting it all hang out, this post for instance, is not writing. It is verbal blah. It might be good for me to express myself this way, it only makes me lazier and farther from my goals. Maybe that is why people are abandoning their personal blogs. There are no goals. The smarter ones are focusing more on writing, using their personal as art. The goal is art. The goal is not expression of emotion. No one cares about you. They care about a well constructed sentence or clever metaphor. When people say they “love you” online, they mean they love your vocabulary and adjectives, or way you present ideas in an informational or humorous manner. How you feel is irrelevant. I was a more focused and competent writer before I started blogging, and started to focus too much on myself.
Wednesday 4/11/12 – afternoon:
There is a thread forming in this post, at least in my own mind, which makes this ongoing blogpost a worthwhile experiment. Even though I haven’t consciously been trying to connect each entry, and writing them stream of consciousness, without editing, at theme has developed, one about me discovering the “me” in relation to others.
My divorce with Sophia has been super-slow because I am having a difficult time transforming into a “me” after so many years as a “we.” Even now, I worry as much about how she is dealing with all of this, doing this that only add to my discomfort, as if I need to always put her first.
My mass unfollowing on Twitter is about the same theme — me vs. you. I like following people online and caring about your lives, but at what point is the whole project one of distraction and procrastination. How many real friends have I gotten out of all this? I certainly haven’t chosen people based on networking or career. Where is the “me” in all this? What is my plan?
Some of the most beloved people online interact with zero “non-superstars” and are still loved, mostly because their work speaks for itself. Why do I feel that if I quit social media, and didn’t say hello to you every day, you would forget my name by Friday? I think I know the answer. I don’t think my work would stand up on its own. That once I just go back to writing, no one would care. But does it matter? What do I even need you for? Shouldn’t this be about “me?”
Even the Instagram sale to Facebook was transformed into a me vs. you theme. The big sale made me feel like a cog in the wheel. I know it is silly, but I was beginning to think of myself as a cool iphonographer. But now I see the truth. I am a widget in a box. The box sells for a billion dollars. The widgets are interchangeable. We are just data. The more widgets in the box, the more money for the makers of the box. We willingly enter these boxes so we can connect, almost as if we too afraid to connect with each other outside of the box. Instagram is not about “me,” or photography, but the box.
I used to be such an advocate for community online. But maybe this was all a facade. Sure, community is important. But it dangerous to lose “me.”
Are these posts getting to be too much of a downer? Maybe I should stop and go back to regular posts. Or maybe I should just write my romantic comedy script and forget about this space for a while. What’s the point? I am so envious of those who make good money on the blogs, not because I want that type of blog, but because the money gives them a reason to continue. I find myself going to BlogHer just to hug people, not to network. I need to start to network more than socialize.
I need to put up advertising. And only use social media sparingly. Write more on this blog. But good stuff. So, it will enhance my brand.
My blogging friend Bon suggested I write more about screenwriting and “Hollywood” because it would be interesting to her, and it would also help me create a niche. Perhaps it would also make me focus on career stuff in my writing, rather than being so navel-gazing. I saw Sweetney writing about something similar today.
I actually have some skills in writing, editing, story development, filmmaking, theater — stuff I never write about because I was under the illusion that a personal blog was supposed to be about the emotional life. But maybe it doesn’t have to be that way. Mocha Momma writes opinion pieces on race all the time. PhD in Parenting is all about issues related to mothers. But they are still considered “personal blogs.” My favorite blogs are about the personal — the home, the heart, the soul — but too much of thinking about yourself can also drown you in a deep ocean of your own making.
Jeez, I am going to read this back later and be utterly embarrassed. But it will probably give you a glimpse of what is on my mind when I sit down for twenty minutes and just write. Nothing about the news. Or earthquakes. Or the election. But about… I don’t know. Nothing.
You know what. I think I am going to continue to just spit all this stuff out, and use this week to expurge it all, and then next week start fresh. Like Citizen of the Month 2.0. And try to limit some of this lame, angsty stuff. And try to write with confidence. Like I believe in myself and my words. That’s not going to be easy. But I think I can do it.
I think I also miss New York. I felt more rooted there.
Wednesday 4/11/12 – morning:
Why does everyone respond more positively towards me the more I seem confident about matters? Readers like my posts better. Well-established writers follow me on Twitter. Women have orgasms. It leads me to believe that my natural disposition is ineffective, even wrong. What is everyone so confident about? The sky could fall at any moment!
Tuesday 4/10/12 – night:
Why is it so easy for me to write dozens of quips and updates on Facebook and Twitter every day, but painful for me to do the same here on this space? It’s as if I treat social media as a playground and my blog post as a sacred church with commandments from God that need to be followed:
1) Thou shall be interesting.
2) Thou shall be honest.
3) Thou shall dig deep to uncover some spiritual truth.
Why am I choosing to torment myself? The tortured artist shtick is so old. I’m not talented enough as a writer to express what is inside. I don’t have the language.
I envy the writers who live in nature, who can look at the sky and the trees and find insights into their own lives. Or discover metaphors in God’s creation.
You can’t see the stars in Los Angeles. There is the ocean here, of course, the vast Pacific Ocean. It just doesn’t speak to me. I am a Pisces who doesn’t like to swim.
Why don’t I just write something funny? I’m good at that. I Just don’t feel funny.
Tuesday 4/10/12 – morning:
I’m never quite show how I am perceived by others, which is probably not the best method of branding myself. I consider myself a positive person, but I suppose I don’t always show that side. Perhaps I am misinterpreting the idea behind personal blogging. I never kept a diary, but I assume it is all about writing down your deep, dark secrets. You don’t promote yourself to yourself.
When I write on this space, I focus on something that went wrong, and then convey it in a serious or humorous way, just like I would a short story or screenplay. Who is the main character and what kind of rocks can I throw at him? It doesn’t interest me to focus only on what goes right, because what is the point?
I sometimes wonder what is in the minds of those who only write about the joys in their lives. What is their motivation for writing? People also say they want to “help” others, wouldn’t it be better to go feed the homeless if you really wanted to help humanity? I’ve always felt that sharing your humanity, good and bad, helps others more than presenting a glossy version.
I would hate to think that people actually enjoy producing envy in others. When I first started blogging, I thought it was cool that I could make others envious, especially when I went to a conference. Look at me, I am FRIENDS with those you admire! But then it just seemed rather silly. No one writes a blog post just because they shared some fish tacos with their cousin Billy from Bakersfield. Our mentions of each other (and the photos from conferences) were moving away from reality and into PR, like those photos from the red carpet at the Oscars. For all I know, only six people go to BlogHer, Blissdom, and SWSX, because I only see the same faces on my Twitter stream several times a year? Doesn’t anyone every take a photo with someone else?
That said, we all make friends online, and we like to show off our friends. And how can you NOT be a little jealous that I had dinner with Jenn Mattern from Breed Em’ And Weep last week (even if she was with her new beau, Ed. Sigh.)
Talking about beautiful, smart women — here is a photo of Suzanne from Twenty Four at Heart, with her camera, of course.
Always with a camera. She got picked to go on an exclusive behind the scenes photography shoot at Knotts Berry Farm, along with a few other big names in Orange County/Los Angeles. It was an impressive gig. I begged her to take me along as her “assistant.” I carried her bag, poured her coffee, and said “Yes, Ma’am” a lot, like I was working for Annie Lebovitz. My secret plan was to take my own photos for Instagram with my iphone. I don’t want to sound cocky, but I think one or two of my shots came out better than got with her fancy camera.
On the other hand, Suzanne actually knows what she is doing. Oh, and yeah, Suzanne, I apologize for forgetting to re-follow you on Twitter until this morning! Whoops.
To top off my week of socializing, I met Danielle and her friends in a hip bar in Culver City, where we drank mojitos and kvetched about relationships and marriage. I do have photos but it was so dark in this bar that you can barely make anything out other than our drunk zombie eyes.
Monday 4/9/12 – night:
It is 1AM. Keeping what I am thinking about to myself.
Monday 4/9/12 – afternoon:
Started following back everyone on Twitter. And I am realizing something. Part of the reason for unfollowing everyone on Twitter in the first place was that I wanted to start cutting myself off from the mommyblogging community. But as I start following again, I see that most everyone I know online IS a mommyblogger, so my new list is looking almost identical to my last list. If we are friends and I haven’t followed you back, please just tell me.
In other social media news, there was an announcement today that Facebook bought Instagram, the photo-sharing community that I have loved so much over the last year, more than my own blog. The price tag — one billion dollars. While I should be happy for their success, the news made me feel like a bit of a loser. I wonder if social media outlets like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are digital Ponzi schemes where we convince each other to join in order that the few make all the money. Sure, we willingly enter and enjoy these outlets, but we are using our creative energies to fill a box, where all of the money goes to the owners of the box? Perhaps this realization could help revitalize our hapless blogs. Why don’t we put our photos up right on our own blogs? Why don’t we write our status updates right here, so we can build our own audiences? Look at this post, for instance. I am using my blog like Facebook, updating it three times a day. At first, I was wary of doing this, feeling like I was using my blog in the “wrong way,” but maybe this will inspire me to spend more time on my own space than giving away my content to others just to be “social.”
As you can tell, I spent my morning thinking about silly internet stuff, rather than dealing with real emotions, which can be good.
Monday 4/9/12 – morning:
I submitted the divorce papers on Passover and the Red Sea opened. I unfollowed everyone on Twitter on Easter and I felt resurrected. I woke up on Monday and felt the urge to write poorly-conceived metaphors for my mental state. But it is 5AM , and I am awake, and feeling a little randy, and that’s good. I feel like writing.
I feel as if I’m in a constant state of yearning for more. Or connection. But it is a passive waiting. And I am patient enough to wait until I’m dead. So the buzz word for the day is action. Which is not easy for someone like me.
Sunday 4/8/12 – night:
Unfollowed everyone on Twitter today. It’s not as dramatic as it sounds. Tomorrow I will start following people again. Why did I do it? Perhaps it’s just a symbolic gesture to reclaim my own space. Social media isn’t doing it for me in the same way anymore, and I wanted to make some changes, or at least re-think what I use it for on a daily basis.
Sunday 4/8/12- morning:
I wasn’t in the mood to celebrate Passover, my favorite holiday. So, I didn’t attend any seders. I ate toast for dinner. Why the “pity me” fest? On Friday, I handed in the final paperwork into the court for the divorce, which is a story in itself. Many of you thought I had did that already, say — a year ago — when I wrote a post about it, but like I said, there is a story there. Sophia and I are involved in the slowest moving divorce in human history. I want to use the word “depressed,” but I don’t want to steal it from those who are truly depressed as a medical condition. I’m basically OK, but I can certainly see what it feels like to want to stay in bed all day. Luckily, I have to go pee, so I am forced to get up.
Sunday 4/8/12 – afternoon:
I’m already feeling embarrassed by this lazy blog post. But since I started it, I’m going to continue, although I feel the need to come up with an intellectual reason for it’s existence, something that will make you go, “Oh, I get it now. How clever!” rather than “That dude is going crazy.” The following is complete bullshit, but since I wrote it out a few minutes ago, I might as well publish it.
“One of the reasons personal blogging is a dying art is because we now expect our writing to have the traditional beginning, middle, and end of a good story. To have a point. An opinion. A punch line if it is a humor piece. None of these literary techniques reflect real life, which is constant flux, funny one moment and sad the next. Most of our lives are the second act. The beginnings and ends of life are mere blips. We are born and we die. Everything else is the middle. We impose beginning and ends to our stories to capture the minds of our readers, but the more we are honest with ourselves, we see that our real lives have one very long middle, which makes it difficult to write about without embellishment. Or just dropping the personal completely to write tales of vampires.”
Intro:
Some people drink. Others have sex with strangers. My way of dealing with emotional turmoil is to do experiments on my blog. It’s is cheaper and I don’t have to shave.
No one is going to like this post because there will be no beginning and no end. It will just be an ongoing story about the middle that will take a week to finish, a diary of sorts.
I don’t have a clue on how you should read this. Probably you should just wait until next Sunday when I will move on. This is a weird experiment destined for failure, which only makes me love it more.
When I was a child, I wore a cardboad box on my head. I was blind to the world.
It wasn’t until I attended an expensive college and read the great books of Western Civilization that my mind was opened, and I replaced my immature cardboad box on my head with a newer, fancier cardboard box, one with a ribbon on top.
When I got married, my beloved and I combined our cardboard boxes into one, and we shared our view of the darkness together.
For my recent birthday, a friend send me a gift card. I will be using it to shop for another cardboard box.
So many decisions! What color and size? It’s time to hide from the world in style!
Yesterday, I was the David against a villainous Goliath, and I lost. But sometimes you need to be pushed around a little so you can awaken you from your own passivity. And this is what happened today.
It all started when Time Warner, a company that controls my cable, internet, and phone service, didn’t show up for their service call after I waited around all morning yesterday. They said they had to reschedule their arrival until the next day.
“Tomorrow is my birthday.” I said. “I’m not sitting around all day waiting for Time Warner on my birthday!”
The duel had begun.
“OK, then we will come on Thursday.”
“At what time.”
“Between 9AM and noon.”
“Can you be any more specific?” I asked.
“No.”
“OK.”
I hung up the phone dissatisfied. I lost the battle. This defeat felt symbolic, and it came at the wrong time. Today is my birthday. It is also the seventh anniversary of my blog. I had been waiting for this day for weeks, because I had hoped to write an inspiring blog post for you. I wanted to wow you with my confidence, to share with you my hopes and dreams that I was going to realize this year.
But based on my timid response yesterday to Time Warner, I lost my mojo. It seemed as if this new year of my life was going to be pretty much the same as the year before. I had been knocked down in the ring too many times, and my once youthful cockiness had faded.
I’d become superstitious, fearful, like my great-grandmother who grew up in a shtetl in Eastern Europe. I was looking at events as if the Universe was sending me messages about my life, and the world was saying that I was a speck of dust compared to the iron fist of Time Warner.
This made me sad. Once upon a time, I was the type of man that spit in the face of superstition. If there was a ladder on the street, I walked under it, gleefully, just to tempt the fates.
“Don’t open your umbrella inside the house,” my great-grandmother use to say, and I would open up my umbrella like an indoors Mary Poppins, just to be contrary.
I would chase the black cat, would say God’s name in vein, and would laugh when a mirror would crack during an earthquake. Sophia and I got married on October 13th. I was not afraid of lightening or thunder, tarot cards or palm readers.
“Come on, death,” I would yell at the guy in the robe with the sickle. “Challenge me to a game of chess, you bony loser.”
I believed in science and reason, not old wives’ tales.
But as the years passed by and I became older, I met the real enemy, and his name was Time.
Time is not a metaphor or a superstition. It is real, like a river that will never run dry, or a heavy grey cloud that descends, slowly, until the mist embraces you like a shroud, and you cannot see anymore.
You can not ignore Time. You hear the clock and see the scrolling numbers on the screen as the seconds tick away. You feel it in your bones as you try to run to catch the bus but your feet drag. Time deserves respect. Time flies. And it’s scary.
Naturally, when fear arises, so does a belief in superstition. My great-grandmother believed in “knocking on wood” and wearing amulets. The smart pray and follow the rules, and are rewarded. The foolish walk under the ladder, snubbing the Gods, and get what they deserve.
The flow of time makes us desperate to control it, even when we know that no amount of make-up or plastic surgery can stop it. I, too, embraced superstition. I folded up my umbrellas and said “God Bless You,” at every sneeze. I avoided ladders. I bowed in the synagogue, kneeled at the mosque, and crossed myself at church. I wondered if my marital problems were all based on our decision to get married on the 13th of October.
But after I lost to Time Warner, it was enough. It is not worth living at all if you are going to be fearful of your own shadow. I was done being a welcome mat to the Goliath. I would believe in myself, not superstition, or authority. That would be my birthday present to myself.
I decided to take a walk and announce this important piece of personal news to the world. My body was eager to move, my shoulders pulled back, my back stretched. I wanted to send my positive energy into the air, lighting up the city.
I left my house. It was a beautiful Southern California day, with temperatures in the upper 70s. I headed for the nearby dog park, taking a shortcut through the alleyway. I always enjoyed watching the energetic dogs running wild in the park, off their leashes, without a care in the world.
As I opened the back gate, I found my path blocked. A bunch of scavenger birds on the garbage bin, munching on the crumbs on some leftover pizza boxes. The birds were all black crows, and they were shrieking in some Devil’s language, staring at me with their glassy dead eyes.
I think they were crows. They could have also been ravens. I don’t know my birds very well. All I know is that my great-grandmother would not cross their black magic path. I’ve read enough books as an English Major in college to know the literary symbolism of crows and ravens. Evil. Death. Misery. Bad luck. Not the type of sign you want to see before your birthday.
A month ago, I might have turned and gone the other way. But I had already been screwed once today by a Goliath — by Time Warner — and it was not going to happen again. These were just birds. I was a man. Any meaning these birds had came from my weak, frightened human mind, not reality.
Edgar Allen Poe once wrote:
“Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,” I said, “art sure no craven,
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!”
Quoth the Raven, “Nevermore.”
Nevermore. Indeed.
“Get the fuck out of here, you fucking raven/crows,” I yelled at the group of filthy birds. “I don’t believe in your symbolism and I don’t want you eating any leftover pizza in my fucking alley.”
I bent down, grabbed some pebbles and tossed it at them. The leader of the birds, the one darkest and bulkiest, glared at me with his freaky eyes, saliva dripping down from his mouth, but I didn’t look away. Not for a second.
I put up my middle finger at showed the bird MY BIRD.
“Eat shit, you winged pussy” I said.
The Queen of the ravens/crows let out an ear-piercing yelp, then flitted away in shame. The bird had lost to a man.
And like the hunter who mounts the deer head over his fireplace, I took at instagram photo of the defeated raven/crow. It was my prize. My birthday card.
Today is my birthday. Today is the seventh anniversary of my blog. Today is a new day. Today I live without superstition or fear. Today I write with confidence. Today I have a voice. Watch out, Time Warner. I am not David to your Goliath anymore.
Happy Birthday to Me
Happy Birthday to Me
Happy Birthday…
(the rest of this song has been deleted due to a cease and desist letter).
This song, written by two sisters from Kentucky, Mildred J. Hill and Patty Smith Hill, was copyrighted for 75 years in 1935 by the Chicago music publisher Clayton F. Summy Company, which later became Summy-Birchard Music, which is now owned by TIME WARNER!!!
Fuck you, Time Warner! But this battle doesn’t end here. Your media empire is no match for one man’s voice. This blog continues now for an eighth year, longer than some of your TV shows. So, YOU better watch out.
Have you noticed how infrequently I have been blogging? I’m afraid the competition in the blogosphere market is getting to me. Â There are so many other others out there with something to say — celebrities, comedians, professional authors, journalists, individuals who have overcome incredible obstacles — that I just don’t think my voice matters anymore. Â My life is not that interesting. Â Some of have lives worthy of memoirs. Â The rest of us live small, forgettable existences.
Luckily, I have friends who have lives worth caring about, like my long-time friends, Noel and Joy, who recently had a beautiful baby girl in New York. Â I was lucky to visit them at their Upper West Side apartment a few days before my flight to Los Angeles. Â Their baby was only two weeks old, so small, but so cute. Â As I admired their new member of the family, the remaining piece of her umbilical cord few off. Â I found this disturbing since I assumed the doctors already finished the job at the hospital. After all, my health insurance rates are so high, I assume the money pays for something. Â Leaving part of the umbilical cord on is something you might expect in Canada, but not in the good ol USA!
Joy explained that this was quite normal. Â This did little to calm my nerves. I decided to take a cab to my next destination, an Italian restaurant in Harlem, to meet friends for dinner. I bought a bottle of wine for the occasion.
When the cab reached the restaurant, the fare on the meter was seven dollars. I gave the cabbie a ten dollar bill. Â He was under the wrongful assumption that I was giving him a three dollar tip. Â I explained that I wanted change, and he started cursing at me in Arabic. The combo of the earlier umbilical cord and the angry cabbie was too much for me to deal with in one afternoon. Â I rushed out, leaving my bottle of wine inside the cab as it sped off.
At dinner, I joked with the others about the lost bottle of wine, but we toasted each other nonetheless with a new bottle. Â At the end of a delicious meal, the waiter came with the check. Â I reached in my back pocket, and the wallet was not there. Â I didn’t only leave the bottle of wine in the cab. Â I also left my wallet.
Talk about a pain in the ass. Â I didn’t care about the money; there was only $50 inside. Â But what about the credit cards and my driver’s license? Â My library cards?!
My mother reminded me that I was flying to Los Angeles in three days. Â Could I fly without identification? Â Luckily, I remembered that I brought my passport to Queens, just in case I met a Parisian model in my local Flushing McDonald’s, and she wanted to bring me to France to meet her parents.
A week after I returned to Los Angeles, I received a phone call from some woman in Manhattan named “Katie.” She found my wallet in the back of a cab, and since she worked in TV news, she asked her research department to track me down in California and return it to me.
The envelope arrived with no return address. Â I wondered, just like you — was this Katie Couric? Â All my cards were in the wallet, but the fifty dollars were missing, so I seriously doubt it was Katie Couric. Â She would not swipe my fifty bucks.
That’s the end of that story. Â Other bloggers give advice on how you can find happiness. I give you a half-baked tale of an umbilical cord, an angry cabbie, and lost wallet.
I still wonder what happened to that bottle of wine.
I had hoped to find some good blogging material once I came to California, but no. Â I’ve been in Los Angeles a couple of weeks now, and while there are moments of humor and pathos, things have been pretty uninspiring. Â On Twitter, everyone who lives in Los Angeles is always having lunch with important people. My only celebrity encounter is that I almost rammed into the automobile of one of Clint Eastwood’s producers in the Warner Brothers lot. Â But I doubt you have not interest in that incident. Â There is nothing sexy about it. Â Didn’t even see Clint Eastwood.
Since arriving in Los Angeles, I have continued to enjoy my new hobby of taking heavily filtered Istagram photos. Â Unfortunately, the consensus is that my friends enjoy the photos I took in New York City far better than the ones I’m shooting in Los Angeles. There are a number of reasons for that, the most important being is that it is difficult to do street photography when you are stuck in your car 90% of the time!
One day, I became so desperate to find some “action” to shoot, that I took a walk in a residential area in the San Gabriel Valley, a neighborhood where I was staying with a friend. Â Across the street from my friend, I encountered three adjacent mailboxes. Â For some reason, maybe because I never owned a stand-alone mailbox myself, the mailboxes captured my attention. Â I took a quick photo with my iPhone.
A half hour later, there was a knock on my friend’s door. It was the POLICE! Â The owner of the house with the mailboxes saw me take the photo. Â She was worried that I was casing the joint and called the cops.
I explained to the police officers that I was not a criminal, only a online photographer intrigued by the visual symmetry of the three mailboxes, and they seemed to buy my story. Â Thank God I wear glasses and I’m not African-American. Â I gave the officers some Christmas cookies, and they left. In NYC, I took photos of gang members on subway platforms without incident. Â In the LA suburbs, I was almost arrested for taking a photo of mailboxes.
Another lame story. Â I apologize. Â You want to hear about successes, not failures. Â That I’m a keynote speaker somewhere. Â But sadly, no. Â I have nothing to say.
It’s embarrassing to say, but I’m miserable. I returned to Los Angeles because it was time to finally move out of house I shared with Sophia, finalize the divorce, and get my own apartment (and also not live with my mother anymore!)
Should I live in Los Angeles or New York? I torture myself with that question, but I’m sure you have your own problems and don’t want to hear me kvetching.
When I first arrived in Los Angeles, I thought it was better to stay over at a friend’s house. So I did, Â in the neighborhood where I was almost arrested during the infamous “mailbox incident.” I felt a little self-conscious staying in the house during the holidays, especially when he was working and his parents were visiting from Japan.
One day, I got bored writing my screenplay. I was also feeling lonely, like many others during the holiday season. Â I called up Nicole. Â Nicole is this woman from Brooklyn who I had a one-night fling over the summer. Â It’s a long story, and you would be falling asleep if I told you the details.
It was nice to talk to Nicole over the phone. I told here that I was feeling isolated being in the suburbs where I was deemed a dangerous criminal for my iPhone activities.
“I like your iPhone photos,” she said, and then suggested that I make believe that she is riding me in the bed. I said, “OK.”
A little while later, as the tension built during this phone exchange —
“Uh, I think I have to…” I said.
“Go ahead.”
I looked around the room.
“Jeez. There are no tissues or napkins in this guest room.”
“Nothing? That’s not very hospitable for visitors.”
“I don’t think they expect visitors to be doing this.”
“Go the the bathroom and get tissues there.”
I peeked through a slit in the door and saw my friend’s parents watching a Japanese soap opera in the living room. There was no way to reach the bathroom without walking past them.
“I can’t leave the room,” I said.
“There must be something else. Â Use your sock,” she suggested.
“I’m not going to come into my sock. I just bought these socks!”
“You must have something made of paper in that room.”
I looked on the bed and saw my unbound first draft of the screenplay.
Anyway, I’m not sure I should continue with this story. It’s that whole branding thing. I hate that about blogging nowadays. Everything you write suddenly become part of your “brand.” It’s like you can’t say “I hate gay people” or “fat people suck” anymore without someone unfollowing you. Â I want to be judged on what I do, not what I say.
I am a good man. In fact, I am so good, that I when Sophia called me a few days, saying she tripped on her laptop cord and broke a toe, I immediately went back to Redondo Beach to help care for her, even though we are on the verge of finalizing our divorce.
Of course, things went quickly downhill when we drove to Trader Joe’s and I offered to wheel her around in her mother’s old wheelchair so she wouldn’t have to put pressure on her foot.
As I wheeled around, danger around every corner, we argued over which direction I should go and how fast I should be wheeling her, and it all seemed like a very very bad movie, and I started acting like an asshole, and by the time we reached the frozen food section of the store, we remembered why we were divorcing. It probably didn’t help that Nicole called while I was wheeling Sophia around, pissed at me for something I’m not going to tell you about, and promptly told me that she didn’t want to talk to me ever again.
That night Sophia and I both slept twelve hours. Â She slept in the bedroom. Â I slept on the couch. Â The next day, we felt calmer, and we laughed a little about our adventure in Trader Joe’s. Â But it was laughter tinged with pain.
Perhaps now you can understand why I have been avoiding writing on this blog. Â I have nothing to say.
On the morning I flew from JFK to Los Angeles, I noticed city workers up early in my neighborhood in Queens, drinking their coffee, already at work. Â They were removing the coin-operated parking meters from the sidewalk, rooting them out from the heavy cement as if they were tiny metallic trees, both ancient and sturdy. Â It was the end of an era. Â The city was installing the electronic parking meters that I had seen in newer cities like Seattle and Denver. Â It was a makeover I didn’t want to happen in New York, something like Robert DeNiro getting plastic surgery to look more like Justin Bieber.
A child born today will probably never see a working coin-operated parking meter, or experience the frantic search for the dropped quarter under the car seat, while the meter hungrily cries for her food like a voracious Venus flytrap.
The typewriter. The telephone booth. Â And now, the coin-operated parking meter. Â All gone.
It’s not as if anyone LIKED the coin-operated parking meter. Â We cursed her. Â We said she was a whore who demanded money for her time. Â We despised her pimp, the man in the snazzy uniform who cycled around the block, waiting to trap us as we enjoyed our relaxing coffee in a cafe.
We hated the coin-operated parking meter. Â We wished it dead. Â And soon it will be dead. Only to be replaced by a soulless machine that spits out a wafer-thin paper ticket. Â And we will miss the coin-operated parking meter
Tomorrow starts 2012. Â It is a time to start fresh. Â The writing staff at “Citizen of the Month” wishes every reader of this blog good health, happiness, and success.
But let’s also take a second to remember those who faltered during the past year, like the once mighty coin-operated parking meter. Â If only we had said “I love you” to her when she was still alive.
My friend, Veronica, is trying to single-handedly save the United States Postal Service by participating in Etsy’s 52 Weeks of Mail.
Each week she sends a handwritten note to a friend of family member.
Do you remember the last time you received a letter? Do you remember how exciting it was when personal mail arrived in the pre-e-mail days, before the arrival of the mailman just meant gas bills and fliers for Bed, Bath, and Beyond?
Veronica is the ideal person to be part of this project because she also designs beautiful handmade cards, such as this one —
Her interest in the postal service helped us discover a common childhood passion — stamp collecting! Although it now sounds like a dorky hobby, I was very passionate about my stamps.
I collected first day covers, new issues, and Christmas stamps. I was fascinated by international stamps. I learned much of my geography by connecting my foreign stamps to the home of origin on a world map. Every winter, I would go with my socialist-leaning, horse-race betting, stamp collecting-loving Aunt Ruthie to the big New York Stamp Expo at a hotel near Madison Square Garden.
I stopped stamp collecting when I reached puberty. I was surprised to hear that Veronica still kept up with the old-fashioned hobby.
“Sure, I go to the post office every week to see all the new stamps that are issued.”
I have been out of the stamp-collecting scene for so long that I didn’t realize they still issued new stamps. I figured everyone bought the boring “Forever” stamps that you can pick up at the supermarket — stamps so forgettable that I cannot recall the picture on the stamp, and I have used this one for years!
Despite the new stamps, Veronica told me that much of the old spirit had left the stamp-collecting world. And it wasn’t just the fault of technology. Much like blogging, the Post Office has gone corporate. Rather than issuing stamps that honor America’s great leaders, the Post Office has sold out to the highest bidder.
“Now they make stamps honoring crap, from cartoon characters to ketchup brands” said Veronica. “No one wants a stamp of Benjamin Franklin anymore.”
After hearing this, I am glad that I left stamp-collecting at it’s peak, like Jerry Seinfeld leaving his sitcom before it got stale.
But nothing prepared me for what happened a week later, when my mother called me on the phone. I had received a letter from Veronica in the mail. That I expected. I was anxious to see her handmade card, and the personal note.
“Is it a nice envelope?” I asked.
“Oh, very nice.” said my mother. “Very pretty blue. But just one thing. Unless I’m wrong… I think she put a Hitler stamp on the envelope.”
“A Hitler stamp? You must be wrong.”
“It looks just like Hitler. The mustache and everything.”
Had our Postal Service fallen so desperate that they were now producing new stamps honoring Hitler?!
I have so many goals that I want to push through (money! writing! hot babes!), but I lack the confidence to get what I want.
This weekend, I was fascinated watching this kid climb up this fake rock at a street fair. He has confidence.
Should I climb a mountain?
What gives you your confidence?
(I know this post seems like one of those self-help inspirational posts that I usually mock, so you should understand that it took a bit of confidence to publish this).
Neil Kramer has been writing about his life online since 2005. He has worked for Disney and HBO. Neil lives in NYC. You can contact him at neilochka on yahoo.
