The Vibes Were Weird This Week and I Dreamed About Puking Twice
Also, I watched Anatomy of Lies, and boy howdy...
It was a disconcerting week, and it rendered me totally unproductive. There's a lot going on, plus we're in the middle of the most demoralizing and insane election cycle that I need to cover for work. (If you, like I, want Harris-Walz to win, I strongly encourage you to read and subscribe to Wonkette if you need to have a laugh and maybe get some perspective.) One of my freelance contacts didn't contact me with new work, and it felt like there was something cosmically off. I have something else going on professionally that I don't want to talk about, but the latest developments have left me feeling overwhelmed by the uncertainty, leaning toward a negative outcome because lately, it just doesn't feel like anything will ever go right again.
I ended up having two bad dreams -- wouldn't quite classify them as nightmares -- in which I could not stop puking. In the dreams, I was mortified and uncomfortable as well as being pretty scared, but more disturbed than anything. I know what it means, especially as someone who used to have a genuine phobia of puking (emetophobia -- it's real!). It's all about control and how awful it feels to not have any. There are a number of things that have made me feel like I have zero control and, like I said before, overwhelmed by the uncertainty of it all. It feels like there's no future, or a doomed future.
The election is just one thing, though it's dominant. I've also had a pinched nerve in my neck for about a month now, and it's sending every sensation from electric fizz to lightning-hot pain from my neck down my entire left arm all the way to my fingertips. I haven't been able to work out at all because every kind of movement exacerbates it. So I'm feeling a little "backed up" when it comes to endorphins. I'm endorphinally constipated? Also -- nearly constant pain that can't really be relieved by painkillers since it's coming from nerves.
Another thing is my dog. Her name is Peggy, and she is an angel. She's about ten years old, so she's a cranky old biddy like her mom, and she is in desperate need of a dental cleaning. We have pet insurance, but even with that, this is going to cost a lot of money that I don't have, so I had to resort to parental help. (Which I'm fortunate to have, unfortunately for my parents.) But this got so bad she was bleeding from her gums, so there was no more putting this off. Her age plus a heart murmur also make putting her under anesthesia risky, so I am freaking out over the possibility of complications. I'm literally taking in every moment with her wondering if I'm counting down to her final one. It sucks. It really sucks. I am 83 percent sure I'm overreacting.
But one thing I am grateful for is being mediocre and unknown and finally okay with that. Substack has given me and many others the blessing of having a platform to write for the sheer love of writing without the pressure of marketing or trying to build an audience. I mean, sure, you can do that if you want. But since joining Substack, there are so many of us who are just happy to be here. We can post at will, at random, and if people want to read, then that's cool. And if not, that's also cool. And to the people who do read, comment, and/or share, my wish for you is to somehow experience my gratitude in the form of something that doesn't creep you out. Because I'm truly very grateful and appreciative, you really have no idea.
There was a time when I was desperate to be seen, and watching the new Peacock docuseries Anatomy of Lies about the TV writing career of Elisabeth Finch that was built on lies and scamming people and betraying the trust of everyone for the sake of attention, it seems, it's made me glad that I never reached any real level of success. It's an appalling three hours of television, especially for anyone who has always wanted to be a TV writer. And the most frustrating part about Elisabeth Finch is that she clearly could write, she clearly had ideas and creativity. But for some reason, that wasn't enough for her. She resorted to lying about -- in no particular order -- having a rare bone cancer, losing a kidney (and having a new one donated by Anna Paquin because that's something you tell people), becoming pregnant and having an abortion during cancer treatment, losing a friend in the Tree of Life synagogue shooting and developing PTSD from the aftermath, being sexually harassed by a director on The Vampire Diaries (whom she never named), being abused by her brother who later died by suicide (he is alive) … and that's just what they told us about. I'm guessing there's probably more, because when you're the real-life version of Penelope from Saturday Night Live, you can come up with a lot of bullshit as easily as you breathe.
But the worst part was that she piggybacked off other people's stories, exactly like Penelope did. And she used those stories to write stories for Grey's Anatomy. But she didn't just steal other people's stories for those storylines. In a few cases, she stole them for herself first, and then turned it into a fictional storyline based on "her experience." That's just such a dick thing to do, especially because she did it with people she worked with on the show.
So, in her case, it wasn’t like she was lying as easily as breathing. More like she farted lies, because she first had to digest other people’s stories so she could turn them into lies about herself.
I mean, clearly there's a pathology here. Something is very, very wrong with Elisabeth Finch. She issued a statement on Instagram when the doc was released that included an apology, because the woman who fabricated stories about herself for attention knew she was going to be getting some attention when this thing came out. (She's also, according to one of the doc's directors, shopping around a project based on her life story BUT WHICH ONE AND WHOSE LIFE STORY remains a question.)
Seeing the havoc this woman wreaked because of her years-long, high-profile Hollywood con made me grateful that I never had the stomach to fuck people over. I've had my share of bad moments. Unprofessional behavior, a loss of patience while under pressure, a weak moment, being unprepared… I have such remorse for all of those moments that every once in a while, one of them will keep me awake at night. We all do. We're human, and we fuck up. And we learn how to be better.
But that's not the same as knowingly stealing, deceiving, and manipulating for the sake of success and attention. That's not worth it. But I suppose when you don't have a soul, nothing is really worth anything unless it benefits you. And to people like that, hurting people and stepping on them and lying to them is worth it.
I'm glad I never had it in me to do anything like what Elisabeth Finch did, and if that means I never achieved success, I am fine with that. Watching Anatomy of Lies made me happy for my quiet place in life. I'm free to goof off and post things for fun, and if three people like it, then that's great. No one suffered for my garbage. So I'm breathing easy, even while things feel so unhinged and terrible that I have dreams where I can't stop barfing in front of people.
And needless to say, that West Wing fanfic where Sam is being held hostage I keep talking about? I went back and started making it so much worse for him. I might even start a new one where he gets stabbed, because, friends, I do not drink alcohol anymore and I can't exercise. And I’m still toying with maybe posting the second part of Sam and Ainsley’s date, and I will tell you right now, it is not great news for Sam. That sweet, blue-eyed, not-real man is going to have to be the fictional male proxy for all my inner turmoil for a while longer, at least until something turns around.