Brandon Stanton's Blog, page 44

(6/8) “Vicky completely disappeared from my life. Along with my...

(6/8) “Vicky completely disappeared from my life. Along with my daughter. And the mystery of the whole thing nearly drove me crazy. I racked my brain for anything I could have said, or anything I could have done, that might have caused Vicky to turn on me. But I couldn’t figure it out. Over the years I invented all kinds of theories. At one point I decided it must have been Vicky’s grandmother, that damn stuck up WASP who never tasted a slice of pizza. Maybe she pulled Vicky aside one night, and told her: ‘If you marry this Jew actor, you’ll be cut off from the family.’ There was no other explanation. So for the longest time that’s what I believed. But what about Blanche? Why would she participate? That’s what really kept me awake at night. But I had to give up. I had to move on with my life. I found a good therapist. I fell in love with a wonderful woman named Nancy, and we got married. Five years later we were pregnant with twins. I still thought about my daughter all the time, but things were going good for me. Then one day I heard through the grapevine that Blanche had passed away. By this time I’m in my early thirties. Twelve years have passed since my daughter’s birth. I’m working in the city selling advertisements for the teen version of Elle Magazine. It’s just another Friday afternoon. I’m about to log off my computer for the weekend, when I come across one of those internet advertisements: ‘Find anyone for $9.99.’ So I decide to go for it. I enter my credit card number. I type in Vicky’s name, and it comes back with a phone number. I write it down on a sticky note and tape it to the top of my computer. That night I go home and say to my wife: ‘I’m not scared anymore, I’m a grown man. I’m calling that number first thing Monday morning.’ Then we packed all our stuff in the car, and headed to our country house in The Catskills. We’d been planning this trip for weeks. It wasn’t anything out of the ordinary. It was the same trip we’d taken a million times before. Only this time we decided to stop for lunch at a place off the interstate. Just a random, greasy spoon diner called Twiggy’s. On some random mountain. In the middle of fucking nowhere.”

(5/8) “I fought for my child. I really did. I talked to two...

(5/8) “I fought for my child. I really did. I talked to two different lawyers. The first one seemed excited about extorting Vicky’s family. ‘They’re going to pay a lot of money for you to sign away your rights,’ he told me. Fucking sleazebag. But the other lawyer was even more depressing: ‘You can spend $50,000,’ he said. ‘And you might still lose the case, never see your child, and still have to pay child support.’ At the time I was working at the deli. I couldn’t take the risk, so I said ‘fuck it.’ I punted on everything. I stopped chasing Vicky. I never spoke to Blanche again. These women had hurt me to the core of my being. Especially Blanche. She’d known me since I was a child. For years she’d been teaching me about karma, and love, and moral justice. Only to rip out my heart in the most sadistic way. How did any of it make sense?  But I did my best to move on with my life. I focused on my acting. I got promoted to manager at the deli. And several months later I’m working my shift, and we get a call from Mt. Sinai hospital. They want to order some sandwiches. A shit load of sandwiches. Apparently they have a big meeting every two weeks, with all the doctors, and they want us to cater the thing. Now remember, I’m not a delivery guy. I’m the manager. But this is such a big piece of business, I decide to make the first delivery myself. I’ve never even been to Mt. Sinai before. But I drive over there with the food. I introduce myself, shake a few hands, and say: ‘We are so grateful to have your business.’ It was 3 pm exactly. Why do I remember the exact time? Because that night Blanche got really drunk and called my mother. ‘I’ve got some news for you,’ she said. ‘Vicky gave birth to Brett’s daughter today at 3 pm. At Mt. Sinai hospital.’ So it turns out I was there when my daughter was born. I’ve got goosebumps on my arm just talking about it. But OK, OK, weirder things have happened. Maybe just a crazy coincidence. But when you think of everything that happened later, it’s like: ‘Holy fucking shit.’”

(4/8) “A few weeks after the Wyoming trip, Vicky comes to me and...

(4/8) “A few weeks after the Wyoming trip, Vicky comes to me and says: ‘I have some news.’ She tells me that she took a pregnancy test that morning and it came back positive. ‘But there’s nothing to worry about,’ she says. ‘You can stay in school. You can still be an actor. My family has more money than God, so everything will be taken care of.’ I’m thinking: ‘This is amazing!’ I’m having a child with the woman I love. And this isn’t some eighteen year old girl down the street. This is blue blooded, monopoly money Vicky. We’d have nothing to worry about. Blanche took us out to dinner to celebrate, and everyone was excited. At least that’s what it seemed like to me. Those were the vibes I was picking up. But a few weeks later I’m hanging out with Vicky at her grandmother’s apartment on Park Avenue. We’d just finished fooling around. I haven’t even gotten my pants on yet, when Vicky says: ‘I found out yesterday that we lost the baby.’ It was like a bomb had been dropped on me. And before I had a chance to recover, she follows it up with: ‘I don’t think we should stay together.’ I was devastated, broken, ripped to shreds. I couldn’t even process what was happening. I’d just lost a child. I’d just lost the woman I love. I started crying like a baby in the cab ride back to Queens. But I’m thinking: ‘She just had a miscarriage. She needs some space. I’ll just leave her alone and wait for the storm to pass.’ Then a few days later I’m picking up a sack of weed from our mutual friend Keegan, and he tells me: ‘Listen. I’m not supposed to tell you this, but Vicky didn’t lose the baby. The miscarriage story is fake. She made it all up with Blanche to get you out of her life.’ I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. There had to be some kind of misunderstanding. Both of these women loved me. They would never do something like that. Right away I call Vicky, and she denies everything. But I said: ‘Vicky, I know. I know you’re still pregnant.’ That’s when she got real quiet. Like she was thinking. Then she says: ‘My dad is on the board of Nabisco. His lawyers will bleed you dry. But even if you win, which you won’t, I’ll disappear. And you’ll never see this baby.’”

(3/8) “Later that night Vicky and I go to see a play at the...

(3/8) “Later that night Vicky and I go to see a play at the Irish Theater, and right away I’m in love. But I’m too scared to tell her that. So we end up becoming best friends, no benefits. We’re hanging out all the time. Vicky has her own apartment. She’s taking me to plays and restaurants. She even took me to a symphony. I live next to the housing projects, and suddenly I’m going to symphonies. It was a whole different world. Vicky’s great, great grandfather had been a Rockefeller lieutenant, and her family had money like I’d never seen before. We went out to Long Island to meet her parents. They belonged to a country club called Piping Rock: no Jews, no blacks, nothing but WASPs. All the sudden I’ve got a cloth napkin in my lap and grown men in tuxedos are serving me Eggs Benedict. I couldn’t believe my luck. Vicky’s grandmother lived on this insane estate out in Westbury. It was a Great Gatsby kind of thing. Thirty acres. A whole wing for the help. This woman was so rich she’d never had a pizza before. Think about it, not a single slice of pizza. That’s the kind of money we’re talking about. I found out later that Vicky was raised by nannies while her parents toyed around in Europe. She was sorta the black sheep of the family. She never wanted to play the bourgeois game, so she ran off to the Lower East side and started living this bohemian lifestyle. That’s how she ended up meeting Blanche, who becomes like her surrogate mother. So that’s the set up. Vicky loves Blanche. Blanche loves Vicky. I love them both. It all seems too good to be true. Then one week Vicky invites me to her family’s ranch in Wyoming. They had 165 acres right on the edge of a national park. It was Ted Turner kind of shit. They gave me my own cabin and a horse named Indian. We’re riding all day through the mountains. We went to a rodeo. Then one night after everyone went to sleep, Vicky comes sneaking into my cabin. I can’t remember exactly what happened. Was I on the bed? Was I on the chair? Did she start touching my leg? All I remember is there was a candle on the nightstand. And suddenly I’m having the best sex I’ve ever had in my short Jewish life.”

(2/8) “My mom taught me to roll a joint when I was ten years...

(2/8) “My mom taught me to roll a joint when I was ten years old. Which is super fucked up, I know. But I’m only saying that so you’ll understand she’s a huge hippie freak. And she ends up becoming best friends with Blanche. We spend so much time over there that Blanche becomes like an aunt to me. She’s a nice old lady. Bit of a drinking problem, but a super nice lady. She takes an interest in my life. She’s asking me about my feelings. She’s teaching me about karma, and reincarnation, and all these other things. And I keep seeing her do supernatural shit. She’s healing people left and right. One time she tells my mother: ‘Dorothy, you have lung cancer. It hasn’t spread yet, but you need to get it out.’ So my mom goes to the hospital for a scan, and wouldn’t you know, there’s something there. Just a clump of cells. Barely detectable. The doctor is convinced it’s nothing. But he sends off a sample, and sure enough, it’s cancer. Absolute craziness. But I’m seeing this kind of shit over and over. Blanche remains a big part of my life all through my teenage years. I’m over at her apartment all the time. And one day this smoking hot girl comes in for a healing session. This isn’t even a girl,  it’s a woman. Late twenties. Hippie sophisticate. Jeans and a t-shirt. Totally my type. Right when I saw her, I excused myself to the restroom. Now I hadn’t spoken to Jesus since the age of twelve when I was betting on racehorses with my cousin Kenny. But I closed the door behind me, folded my hands, and said: ‘Jesus, please. Let me have this girl and I will never ask you for anything else again.’ Then I walked back out, cool as a cucumber, and shook her hand. ‘I’m Vicky,’ she said. And that was it. I was like hypnotized. But I fucked it all up. I was too scared to make a move. But that’s when the supernatural shit kicks in again. Because the very next day, I’m coming out of my acting class. I’m standing right here in this spot. Nowhere near Blanche’s apartment. And here comes Vicky walking down the street. She says ‘hello.’ She asks me what I’m doing. And I tell her I’m studying to be an actor. That’s when she says: ‘Oh! We should see a play together.’”

(1/8) “Everyone I tell is like holy fucking shit. Because...

(1/8) “Everyone I tell is like holy fucking shit. Because there’s an insane psychic angle to all of this. And I’m not a supernatural freak or anything. I didn’t believe in Santa Clause growing up. We weren’t religious or anything. I went to Hebrew school for awhile, but that’s because I wanted a Bar Mitzvah so I could get some weed money. So let’s be clear on that, I’m not exactly a believer. But my mom has always been a little bit of a freak. She believes in magical thinking. Not so much spiritual, but magical. Like things are just going to magically happen. You don’t have to sacrifice, or struggle, or strive. You just have to believe and ‘poof’, everything will work out in the best possible way. One time she convinced her boyfriend to ‘invest’ all his money in paintings made of butterfly wings. He flew all the way to Africa. He rented out a warehouse. But they never sold a single painting. We called that man Butterfly Bill for the rest of his life. But that’s not the story. It’s not even the beginning of the story. The story begins when my mom hurts her back, like really bad. The doctors are convinced she needs surgery, but Mom decides to visit some healer on 34th Street named Blanche. Blanche doesn’t do any Jesus shit, nothing like that. It was more energy stuff. There were photos on her wall showing electrical currents coming out of her fingertips. Which sounds crazy, I know. Maybe the photos were doctored. I’ll give you that. But Blanche lays my mom down on a table, does these little choppy motions all over her body, and lo-and-behold, my mom is fucking fine. Has to be placebo effect, right? I thought the same thing. But then Blanche does her ‘hand thing’ on my shoulder injury from karate. It had gotten so bad that I couldn’t even lift my arm, but the next morning I wake up, and it’s gone. I’m completely healed. So at this point I start to think, just maybe, there’s some shit going on in this world that I don’t understand.  But let’s put some doubt in there. I was young and stupid. I was a dumb kid living with his mommy in Astoria. Maybe it was all a con game. But anyway, this isn’t the story. It’s just the beginning.”

“The football coach at my college opened his training program to...

“The football coach at my college opened his training program to any athlete who wanted to join, even women. I was captain of the volleyball team, so I decided to give it a try. The program was military style. We woke up at 5 AM. And Coach Brooks himself was a very intimidating man. He’d been an All-American lineman in college, and he was still massive. Everyone called him ‘sir.’ And he didn’t tolerate misbehavior. But I’ve always loved structure, so I could keep up. Within weeks Coach Brooks had elevated me to program captain. He stood me in front of seventy athletes, almost entirely male. He watched me break the woman’s deadlift record. And when the quarterback made a comment about ‘lifting girl weight,’ Coach Brooks heard about it. And the quarterback apologized the next day. That kind of advocacy gave me a lot of confidence. After graduation I decided to attend a women’s tackle football game. And as I flipped through the program, reading the bios of the players, I realized that none of them had trained with a male college team. So I emailed the team’s owner and asked about tryouts. I ended up playing professionally for six years. And Coach Brooks followed my entire career. He loved that I was a lineman, just like him. He’d go to our website and check my stats. He hung our team shirt in his gym, and asked for another to give his goddaughter. Unfortunately his life was cut short at the age of 47. It was a routine surgery gone wrong. When I heard the news, I was so devastated that I had to leave work early. Only then did I realize the impact he’d had on me. He didn’t have to give a damn. He didn’t have to let women in his program. That wasn’t his job. But if he hadn’t, I’d never have had the confidence to play football. It’s too much sacrifice. I have seventeen pieces of metal in my leg. And I’m not paid to do this. Almost no women are paid to play any freaking sport. So when I had to dig deep, and find a reason to go on, I thought back to my time with Coach Brooks. After his death, I called his old college to find some pictures of him on the field. And that year, when we won the world championship, it was his number I was wearing on my chest.”

“It was the worst thing you could be called as a high school...

“It was the worst thing you could be called as a high school boy. It was interchangeable with stupid, or ‘things we don’t like.’ Math homework was ‘gay.’ Gym class was ‘gay.’ So I grew up feeling that if people knew who I really was, they would find me disgusting and unlovable. And that extended to my own family. My parents never spoke about sexuality at home. The few questions they did ask would project straightness onto me, like: ‘Do you have a crush on any girls in your class?’ But for the most part there was silence. And in some ways the silence was worse. Because it suggested the subject was too taboo, too tainted, to even bring up at the dinner table. My parents were liberal. They’d let me read whatever I wanted. They took me to R-rated movies. We could talk about murderers and terrorists, but we couldn’t talk about that. So I kept it a secret. Until the age of seventeen when my sister read my diary, and told my mother what she’d found. I felt powerless. Caught. I pleaded with them to let me tell my father. He was the one who coached my little league teams, and encouraged me to watch action movies, and showed me pages from the Victoria’s Secret catalogue. So I was most afraid of his reaction. I walked into his bedroom at 3 AM, and shook him awake. I couldn’t even bring myself to say the words. ‘Remember my friend Sean?’ I asked. ‘He doesn’t come over anymore because I told him I have feelings for him.’ What happened next is kind of a blur. But I remember my father holding me, and telling me that he loved me as I was. It was a nice moment, but the next morning I couldn’t even look him in the eye. I tried to sneak out the garage door, but he called me from the top of the stairs. ‘What I told you last night stands,’ he said. I’d always thought that coming out would be the end of the work. From the little you see in movies, and how it’s spoken about, it’s supposed to be the ‘happily ever after’ part of a gay person’s life. But for me it’s when the hard part really started. I had to look in the mirror, and ask: ‘What did all this conditioning do to me?’ My father had just looked at me and said: ‘I love you unconditionally.’ Why couldn’t I say that to myself?”

“The technician quickly told us that it was a girl. But then she...

“The technician quickly told us that it was a girl. But then she started taking longer, and finally she asked us to step into another room. Our doctor delivered the news gently. But then she sent us to a specialist who wasn’t so gentle. ‘The measurements are all off,’ they told us. ‘We need to know how you’d like to manage the pregnancy.’ It was surreal. I was firm in my decision, but I can empathize with women who feel like they have no choice. Because in that moment I doubted that I would ever be able to meet the needs of my child. She had a condition called ‘skeletal dysplasia.’ Her bones weren’t growing like they should, and she might not even survive. I’m usually a fairly private person, but this time was different. I didn’t care how many people knew. There were prayer chains and Facebook groups. My friends got together without me knowing, and they prayed over us. We received letters from so many people: family overseas, people we’d lost touch with, people we’d never met. We hung them all in the bathroom until the entire wall was filled. But a few weeks before our due date, we received the worst possible news: Elliana’s chest cavity hadn’t grown enough, and there wasn’t room for her lungs. I asked the doctor to give me the odds, but he just shook his head. We began to plan for her funeral. I could feel Elliana kicking inside me as we chose her urn and filled out the paperwork. I remember wanting to stay pregnant forever so that she’d always be safe. On the day of her birth, the waiting room was filled with people who loved us. They prayed from 10 AM to 5 AM the next day. I still keep a picture of that waiting room hanging in our hallway. And it’s my favorite picture, because it reminds me of all the people who petitioned for Elliana’s life. And we got our miracle. I struggle with it sometimes, because I know so many people lose their babies. But Elliana came out breathing on her own, and the doctors were in awe. Eight years later, they’re still in awe. Our story has a happy ending. But even when it seemed like a tragedy, I never felt alone. I never felt like the story was my own. Because in my darkest moments, a community of people chose to share my burden.”

When you build your home on social media, there’s a feeling of...

When you build your home on social media, there’s a feeling of impermanence. An awareness that things can end at any moment. An algorithm might change. Or people might move on to newer, or brighter, or shinier things. So I’ve tried to prepare myself for that. With every story that hits just right, and reaches millions of people, and causes them to feel something, I try to remind myself that all of this is a massive privilege. And I should never take it for granted, because it can disappear at any moment. But I’ve been telling myself that for ten years. And for ten years you’ve kept showing up: for the stories, the series, the fundraisers, and the events. You’ve had patience with my failed artistic experiments, and you’ve supported my successful ones. And in the middle of a pandemic, and an election, and a hundred other things, you’ve once again helped a HONY book become a #1 NYT Bestseller. So thank you for that. And thank you for everything.

If you haven’t already, you can order a copy of ‘Humans’ here: https://bit.ly/OrderHumans