Brandon Stanton's Blog, page 62

“I’m trying to start a company while raising a four year old...

“I’m trying to start a company while raising a four year old child.  But my business partner is a mother too, so we’re very supportive of each other. It’s a nice departure from the corporate world, where I think a lot of new mothers are made to feel like they’re laying their foot off the gas.  A lot of it is nonverbal: having work taken away, or not being included on important projects.  But I also remember being told that I ‘wasn’t being present’ at work.  And that ‘my husband needed to step up.’  My behavior did change when my child was born.  But for the better.  I became more efficient.  For the first time I was able to set limits, and have people recognize them.  My limits never seemed valid before.  Exhaustion wasn’t valid.  Mental health wasn’t valid. But having a child gave me a firm reason to say ‘no.’  It’s not ‘no’ to working harder.  It’s ‘no’ to excess.  To not redoing something twenty times when you have it on the first try.  Or creating thirty proposals because the boss would love to see ‘just one more,’ ‘just one more.’  It’s excess.  And it’s almost as bad as doing nothing.  Because what is good gets lost in the excess.  I don’t have time for it anymore.  I have to recognize what’s most important.  I don’t have time for endless debate.  I have to go straight to the source of the problem, or my kid is going to pee her pants.”

“It was a really toxic relationship. I think she’d agree with...

“It was a really toxic relationship.  I think she’d agree with that.  We allowed each other to be depressed.  We encouraged it, actually- just to increase the dependency.  We were together 24/7.  Instead of pushing each other to be better, or get help, we just stayed in bed all day long.  We skipped our classes.  I failed out of school.  Occasionally she’d break up with me, and I’d be a mess, then a month later she’d be knocking on my door.  And I hate saying it out loud, because she was suffering too, and I don’t want to make her seem like a bad person.  But she knew how to pick apart my insecurities.  She made me feel manipulative for needing help.  She made me feel like a terrible person.  Like I just wanted attention.  Since I thought she was the only one who really knew me, I figured it must be true.  It got to the point where I didn’t feel worthy of being around people who cared about me.  So I kept away from my family. Then I took their absence as proof they didn’t care.  Eventually I convinced myself that everyone would be better off without me.  One night I locked the door of my bedroom, and swallowed an entire bottle of Ambien.  A few days later I woke up in the ICU.  My whole family was there.  My mom told me that if I’d died, she’d never have been able to live with herself.  My dad told me that he’d dropped to his knees when he’d learned.  I guess that’s what it took to make it finally click.  I’d spent so much time convincing myself that nobody cared.  If I’d have only stepped out of that relationship, and leaned on those people, I’d have learned how much they did.”

“I used to seek out vulnerable people. It takes one to know...

“I used to seek out vulnerable people.  It takes one to know one.  I’d harp on them for minuscule things.  Just to make them feel more ostracized.  I bullied them in the same way I was being bullied.  I guess that’s why I want to be a filmmaker.  As an atonement of sorts.  To sort of explore the fear and bad feelings that I had as a kid.  But if I’m ever going to make the art I want to make, I need to be less scared of people.  I still have insane social anxiety.  If anyone looks at me, I’m convinced that they hate me.  I was just sitting on this bench, having a panic attack, because I thought everyone was judging my shirt. The whole reason I came into the city was to attend a protest meeting.  If I’m ever going to write a screenplay, I need to talk to people, and learn from them, and understand what they’re about. But I’m afraid I’ll just go to IFC Center instead, and watch Parasite for the fifth time, then go back to Jersey and lie to everyone about it.  So I’m trying to talk myself out of that.  I need to get to a place where I can trust that people are kind and loving.  And that the whole world isn’t judging me for minuscule things.  And that nobody hates me because of my shirt.”

“I’m going to be watching my nineteen-month-old daughter later....

“I’m going to be watching my nineteen-month-old daughter later.  But I just smoked a joint so all I can think about is the buffalo dip in my fridge.  She’s going to want to eat it.  I’ll have to keep it in the kitchen and run back and forth.  I’m just hoping I can stay awake.  I discovered an album where Charlie Brown sings classic rock, so for awhile we were listening to Grateful Dead and Queen.  But that era’s over.  Because she discovered Mom’s pop crap.  We’re probably just going to build some sick block castles.  Actually I’ll build them, and she’ll knock them over because she loves to watch me freak out.  Then I’m praying she’ll take a nap so I can watch the football game.  Honestly I don’t even care about the game.  It’s just an excuse to eat my buffalo dip.”

(2/2) “My mother died on July 6th, 2005. One day toward the...

(2/2)  “My mother died on July 6th, 2005.  One day toward the end of her life, we were in the subway together, carrying heavy packages, and I could see she was exhausted.  She turned to me and said: ‘A ganzeh leben is a schlep.’  Which means: ‘All of life is a schlep.’  And for a moment I felt her pain.  I realized I could still love her.  She couldn’t love me, but I could love her.  Despite all the abuse she’d given me, I could feel her pain.  I resurrected this old photo after her death.  She’s with her first husband.  It was weeks before he was taken away. She’s only twenty years old in this picture.  That gorgeous face.  That youth.  How could I possibly hate her the same way?  It’s unfathomable.  Not that she was right to be cruel, but it’s unfathomable what she went through.  I once helped her type a memoir to get reparations from the Germans. At the end of her story, she wrote: ‘It was a life of horror.  Having lost everything and everyone, I’d given up my struggle to live.  And at that time, it would have been easier if they had killed me.  But they didn’t.  So on I went, living in hell.‘”

(½) “My childhood was dominated by her stories: living in...

(½) “My childhood was dominated by her stories: living in the ghetto for two years, surviving off potato peels, running like an animal from the Nazis.  She was the only one who survived.  I have no grandparents.  No aunts or uncles.  Her entire family was killed.  We rose up from the ashes.  And my mother became a monster.  She deprived us like she was deprived.  My brother and I were always made to feel like a burden.  Like we were leeching from her.  There were no special occasions.  No birthdays.  No cake.  Everything was counted.  Everything was calculated.  Whenever I asked for something, I was made to feel responsible for World War II.  She’d say: ‘I didn’t survive Hitler to get you a bag of potato chips.’  She never let me feel like we were in America.  I felt like I was the one wearing stripes.  I’ve dreamed about Hitler since I was child.  He tells me I’m a mistake.  And that I should have been killed.  I remember when I grew older and started visiting the houses of friends.  I saw how their parents treated them.  How they were given gifts.  And how they were loved.  It felt like I was crawling out of the sewer, after the war, and learning that this entire time, some people had been living normal lives.“

“When people are trying to be refined, they disapprove of a lot...

“When people are trying to be refined, they disapprove of a lot of things.  It’s the only way to differentiate yourself from the known and the popular.  That’s why I’m glad I’m not in art school anymore.  It’s finally OK to like things again.”

“I thought we were being careful, so he wasn’t expected. And I...

“I thought we were being careful, so he wasn’t expected.  And I tried to convince her not to have the baby.  I regret that now, but it was a difficult situation.  There were a lot of arguments.  I ended up walking away from the relationship.  I didn’t walk away from her.  Or the baby.  Just the relationship.  As soon as I knew we were having the child, I showed up.  But there were a lot of hurt feelings.  I had to go to court to fight for joint custody.  It was a long process, but the judge gave me every other weekend and some weekdays.  He’s 2.5 now.  Things are much better between me and his mom.  There’s good vibes.  We laugh, and joke, and play with him together.  She’s an excellent mother in every way.  And she actually thanks me now for taking her to court.  She knows that he really needed a father figure in his life.  And I needed that for him too, because I never had that.  I try to give him my best whenever we’re together.  And he misses me when he doesn’t see me.  Sometimes his mother will call because he’s asking for me.  He wants his daddy.  It’s just something natural that comes out of him.  It’s really amazing.  He knows that I’m his dad.  And I’m the only one.”

“Only time I’m unhappy is when I have a toothache. And I rarely...

“Only time I’m unhappy is when I have a toothache.  And I rarely have a toothache.  I just love people and it gets reflected back to me.  I’m always smiling.  So when people see me, they be smiling.  Even the mean people get cheered up.  If someone says: ‘What you looking at?’  I just say: ‘God loves you.’  Then the Holy Ghost touches them.  They think, ‘Darn it, I’m being mean to a nice guy.’  Then they get nice.“

“One of my best friends is getting engaged, and I think she’s...

“One of my best friends is getting engaged, and I think she’s making a mistake.  I brought it up the other night.  We were both a little drunk.  And she didn’t get angry, but she told our other friends that I seemed disappointed in her.  Maybe I overstepped my bounds.  I’ve asked myself if I’m just jealous.  Or if I’m trying to bring us back to the place we were: two roommates, watching movies, exploring New York.  But I really think my only concern is her happiness.  I just don’t think her fiancé ‘gets’ her.  He’s a really nice guy.  He’s not asking her to change or anything.  She’s just not herself when she’s around him.  She always seems like she’s about to say one thing, then she’ll pause, and say something else.  Like she’s searching for the words that will make her who she needs to be for the relationship to work.”