That's it. I'm totally getting rich.
I was just at Starbucks on the Upper West Side where I overheard an adorable mother-daughter team speaking to a friend they'd just run into.
"We're having a beauty day," said mom. "Tomorrow is Madison's bat mitzvah."
"In case you hadn't heard," said the sweet-faced Madison.
Madison, self-consciously, looked my way. I smiled. Inside, however, I was cringing, weeping, having internal nervous breakdown. Sure, when I am back home in Los Angeles, my mother and I have been known to troll more than our share of Starbucks and Coffee Bean/Tea Leafs (we buy iced venti drinks like they're going out of style - all on mommy's dime because I'm "on vacation"), and we have also been to spas together. But there was something about the combination of the Starbucks, the beauty day, the bat mitzvah, little Madison and the Upper West Side - all while I was stealing five minutes to grab a mocha that will hopefully distract me from the drudgery that will inevitably fill my day - that was too much. I admit it, I was very, very jealous.
Maybe it's my mood lately. There is just too much rich surrounding me. I have had it with stories of stratospherically rich hedge fund managers that currently rule New York (with the exception of the one who is indirectly responsible for my paycheck - him I like). They're getting richer by making the rich richer. And I guess, technically, I am too because I write about them in magazines dedicated to making the rich richer. But while I may be getting technically "richer", I'm not getting rich. I'm just struggling to pay off a tiny amount of credit card debt and pay my tax bill. Is this a Democrat thing?
No. The problem is, I chose to be a journalist. Well, I chose to be a writer, I became a journalist because that's how writers make money. Not a lot of money, but more than your average full-time poet. In almost any other field, someone with my drive, determination, work ethic and skill would be really successful - this sounds immodest, but I've known people with very little of the above who are wildly successful. In fact, many of my friends or acquaintances have been markedly lazy or unmotivated or dumb, have taken easy way out or not tried to become successful, and today they're doing just about as well as I am, maybe even better. (Don't worry, they're proud of it.) I don't really know when or how it happened, but it did. To back up my point, I cite research from the inimitable Dr. Phil, who posits that children may develop at different rates, but at a certain point they all get to the same place. Damn straight, Dr. Phil. You know your shit.
Another problem: I don't want to be a hedge fund manager. (I hardly want to be a capitalist any more, and would try the alternative if it were available.) I do want to be a writer, but can't seem to get past my inner critic and start writing. That's why I'm nauseated when reading about the 20-something novelist/scamp Jonathan Safran Foer, his increasing paychecks, and his $6 million mansion in Park Slope. I read like 45 pages of his piece of crap first book, Everything is Illuminated, before if flew out of my hands at my brain's insistence. The second one sounds even more insipid, and yet he gets so much attention. I can't escape his press.
It has me so worked up that I've decided I should do anything and everything I can to copy him. I mean, even though I get a stomach ache when I hear about the success of Paris Hilton, it doesn't move me to action because her fame is wrapped in something inexplicable that involves being a spoiled, idiotic heiress. I have no chance of being that. (I'm spoiled, but in more of a lower-middle-class kind of way, where my mom runs up massive amounts of credit card debt to have my prom dress tailor made, and has to declare bankruptcy years later.) But I at least have some chance of being a novelist, be it a hacky faux literary type like JSF or an actual talented writer. Either way, if there is a chance that a $1 million advance could come my way, why am I not taking it? Self pity? Laziness? Desire to give up the capitalist way of life? Please. Those are luxuries for people in their 20s, not for Jesus-peak-age soon-to-be moms.
This is why the next time you see me there will be greed in my eyes. Or why you may find yourself the inspiration for a character in my soon-to-be-published mediocre masterwork. Either way, just smile and accept it. It's just business, and the new me means business. Say it with me, in the blandest drone you can muster, "That's hot" (tm).
"We're having a beauty day," said mom. "Tomorrow is Madison's bat mitzvah."
"In case you hadn't heard," said the sweet-faced Madison.
Madison, self-consciously, looked my way. I smiled. Inside, however, I was cringing, weeping, having internal nervous breakdown. Sure, when I am back home in Los Angeles, my mother and I have been known to troll more than our share of Starbucks and Coffee Bean/Tea Leafs (we buy iced venti drinks like they're going out of style - all on mommy's dime because I'm "on vacation"), and we have also been to spas together. But there was something about the combination of the Starbucks, the beauty day, the bat mitzvah, little Madison and the Upper West Side - all while I was stealing five minutes to grab a mocha that will hopefully distract me from the drudgery that will inevitably fill my day - that was too much. I admit it, I was very, very jealous.
Maybe it's my mood lately. There is just too much rich surrounding me. I have had it with stories of stratospherically rich hedge fund managers that currently rule New York (with the exception of the one who is indirectly responsible for my paycheck - him I like). They're getting richer by making the rich richer. And I guess, technically, I am too because I write about them in magazines dedicated to making the rich richer. But while I may be getting technically "richer", I'm not getting rich. I'm just struggling to pay off a tiny amount of credit card debt and pay my tax bill. Is this a Democrat thing?
No. The problem is, I chose to be a journalist. Well, I chose to be a writer, I became a journalist because that's how writers make money. Not a lot of money, but more than your average full-time poet. In almost any other field, someone with my drive, determination, work ethic and skill would be really successful - this sounds immodest, but I've known people with very little of the above who are wildly successful. In fact, many of my friends or acquaintances have been markedly lazy or unmotivated or dumb, have taken easy way out or not tried to become successful, and today they're doing just about as well as I am, maybe even better. (Don't worry, they're proud of it.) I don't really know when or how it happened, but it did. To back up my point, I cite research from the inimitable Dr. Phil, who posits that children may develop at different rates, but at a certain point they all get to the same place. Damn straight, Dr. Phil. You know your shit.
Another problem: I don't want to be a hedge fund manager. (I hardly want to be a capitalist any more, and would try the alternative if it were available.) I do want to be a writer, but can't seem to get past my inner critic and start writing. That's why I'm nauseated when reading about the 20-something novelist/scamp Jonathan Safran Foer, his increasing paychecks, and his $6 million mansion in Park Slope. I read like 45 pages of his piece of crap first book, Everything is Illuminated, before if flew out of my hands at my brain's insistence. The second one sounds even more insipid, and yet he gets so much attention. I can't escape his press.
It has me so worked up that I've decided I should do anything and everything I can to copy him. I mean, even though I get a stomach ache when I hear about the success of Paris Hilton, it doesn't move me to action because her fame is wrapped in something inexplicable that involves being a spoiled, idiotic heiress. I have no chance of being that. (I'm spoiled, but in more of a lower-middle-class kind of way, where my mom runs up massive amounts of credit card debt to have my prom dress tailor made, and has to declare bankruptcy years later.) But I at least have some chance of being a novelist, be it a hacky faux literary type like JSF or an actual talented writer. Either way, if there is a chance that a $1 million advance could come my way, why am I not taking it? Self pity? Laziness? Desire to give up the capitalist way of life? Please. Those are luxuries for people in their 20s, not for Jesus-peak-age soon-to-be moms.
This is why the next time you see me there will be greed in my eyes. Or why you may find yourself the inspiration for a character in my soon-to-be-published mediocre masterwork. Either way, just smile and accept it. It's just business, and the new me means business. Say it with me, in the blandest drone you can muster, "That's hot" (tm).
posted by j.m. at 10:48 AM
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