Just Give In.

Did you know?

• I'm turning 35 in September.
• I'm typically hopeful, positive, striving for peace and satisfaction.
• I'm also a human being. (This is stunning news to me as I typically walk around assuming I'm some sort of hyper-evolved spiritual superhuman.)

All of these things, plus a sense of futility engendered by the anticipated yet still devastating injustices around the world lately, combined last night at midnight to lay me flat on my bed, arms flopped over the side, my face pressed into the dog-hair-covered comforter, moaning to myself and Chris about how I've completed no projects of note in any of the careers I've ever attempted: acting, theatre production, filmmaking, book writing.

Nothing has come to the fruition I've hoped it would.

(Note: I am aware that this is not technically true. But when you're in the middle of a pity party, facts are irrelevant. Really, they make you feel even worse.)

I've lived long enough to know that when you're feeling this murky, you might as well give in. What you resist persists, especially pitiful feelings of failure and suckitude.

So instead of attempting false cheer, I decided to list 35 people who are better than me. One for each year of my life. It made me laugh at midnight. So let's just go with this, shall we?

LIST OF 35 PEOPLE WHO ARE BETTER THAN ME

1. Wendy Davis.
2. Leticia Van De Putte.
3. Really any of the amazing Democrats involved in fighting the omnibus abortion bill in Texas. Sylvester Turner. José Menendez. Royce West. All of those folks.
4. My son (okay, I'm fine with this one).
5. Younger people.
6. Older people.
7. Henri Cartier-Bresson.
8. Henry Ford.
9. Henry Thomas.
10. That courtesan who famously served herself as the dessert course. I forget her name.
11. People who can remember all the names ever.
12. That eleven-year-old kid who invented a rubber band device that keeps people from leaving their kids in hot cars.
13. Audre Lorde.
14. Tami Taylor. Also she's fictional but that doesn’t matter.
15. JK Rowling.
16. Bryan Adams.
17. Brian Boitano
18. Kate Winslet.
19. Casey Affleck.
20. Forest Whitaker.
21. Anderson Cooper.
22. Aloe Blacc.
23. Tori Amos.
24. Gary Clark, Jr.
25. Kaki King.
26. Glen Hansard.
27. Markéta Irglová.
28. Mark Snow.
29. Helen Grime.
30. Tina Fey.
31. Michelle Obama.
32. Amy Poehler.
33. Eiko Ishioka.
34. K.D. Lang.
35. Amanda Palmer.

There. Now I feel worse. It'll turn into feeling better soon. Maybe by the morning, after the storm passes.

Comments

[CGL]

Brian Boitano is totally better than us! I still think this is a really funny exercise. You're better than me for having come up with it.

[Suzi Banks Baum]

Since I don't even know who all these people are, let alone remember the ones I may have once known but have since, in my 54 years, forgotten, I will just rally with Tami Taylor. I will borrow her sweaty cheeked steady gaze and stand before you humbled and humored and a teensy bit worried about your lungs as you inhale dog hair and blanket fuzz. Wouldn't you be more comfortable on a sheet?

Just taking a moment from my heat stunned reverie to say, I do, so, adore ye.
xoxoo S

[Cristina]

Ahh. This is too funny. And I know just what you mean.

[Jennifer Gandin Le]

CGL - it's that amazing last name!

Suzi - I adore you too. Thanks for channeling Tami to express your concern. You are so good.

Cristina - I'm glad it amused!