Brandon Stanton's Blog, page 89

“I was twenty-one when my son was born. I was working at...

“I was twenty-one when my son was born.  I was working at McDonald’s.  And it was nothing but horse farms and cabbage patches in our town.  His mother and I tried to work it out, but eventually I moved to Philadelphia.  Could I have been more present?  Yes.  But it’s not as easy as: ‘Hey, I’m going to be there no matter what.’  A lot of sacrifices are required to be present in someone’s life: unhappy relationships, no name towns, low-paying jobs.  I didn’t want to work at a mill or a warehouse my entire life.  I wanted to do something in music.  Or work in a high rise with executives.  Or form my own company.  Incremental changes weren’t going to get me there.  I had to make a big jump.  I had to leave.  And I thought he’d be OK.  There was a lot of support around him.  I’d call on the phone to check on school.  I’d come back once a month, pick him up, and go out for the day.  And the decision certainly allowed me to provide more, especially later in life.  I work in television now.  I’ve introduced him to celebrities.  I’ve brought him to award shows.  I paid for his expensive music school.  But there are definitely some resentment and abandonment issues.  He has trouble making friends. He’d rather be playing piano than going to parties.  He’s a bit like a hermit in the mountains.  And recently he’s made some pretty deliberate comments that seem aimed at me.  Like: ‘I haven’t seen this person in awhile, so they don’t care.’  Or ‘Nobody’s going to come to my recital, so it doesn’t matter.’  These are issues that I have to resolve.  And I’m trying.  But I still can’t say I regret my decision to leave.  I think it was the correct choice.  But I also have to own that the choice probably changed him for life.”

“Things started getting really rough when I was about seven....

“Things started getting really rough when I was about seven.  One of my mother’s friends beat her up really bad one night.  I mean really, really bad.  So bad that she was trying to jump out the window just to get away.  That’s how bad he was going in on her.  I was screaming, and crying, and trying to get him to stop.  And so many people heard.  We lived on the second floor.  Our window faced the street.  It was summertime.  So I know they heard.  And nobody did a thing.  We lived in a community.  Everyone knew us.  I thought people liked my mom.  But nobody called the police.  I had to call the ambulance myself.  That’s when I learned that no matter how hard you cry, some people don’t care.  Poverty creates a lot of sociopaths.  I never became one, but I can understand it.  Because when nobody cares about your pain, it’s easy to ignore the pain of others.”

“I want to be a musical theater actor. I have six auditions...

“I want to be a musical theater actor.  I have six auditions tomorrow.  Five the next day.  Everyone says this, but you really do hear ‘no’ everyday.  It’s not even a ‘no,’ actually.  It’s just silence.  They never tell you that you didn’t get a part.  You just hear nothing at all.  There’s a website called Audition Update where people post if they’ve gotten a job offer or callback.  It’s a way to let everyone else know that they haven’t been chosen.  I used to be on the site all the time.  I kept refreshing the page for each of my auditions, waiting for someone to post about a callback.  Then I’d check my email to see if I’d gotten one.  All I ever wanted was to finally be the person who was able to post.  It was pretty toxic.  It made me feel inept.  I could actually see the people who were getting all the jobs I wanted, and rejection became this tangible thing.  I’ve stopped going on the site.  I’m trying to focus more on the process and less on the outcome.  I’m taking all the energy that I put into my phone, and putting it into my journal instead.  I write things that I love about myself.  I write everything I can remember about each audition: who was in the room, what was said, things I did well, things I could have done differently.  But once it’s on the paper, I let go of it.  It helps me stay in the moment.  And it helps remind me that the whole reason I’m acting is because I love it.“

“My great, great grandmother was a vaudeville dancer. Her...

“My great, great grandmother was a vaudeville dancer.  Her husband would do the backstage work.  And that’s what every man in my family has done since.  My grandfather was the head of the NBC electric shop.  My father was a carpenter for Ed Sullivan.  My uncle was lead carpenter for All My Children.  And anything you see on CNN, me and my team put together.  It’s something different every day.  My favorite part of the job is the emails I get from producers and directors, thanking me for a job well done.  Recently they were doing a story on the chicken tax for CNN Money, so I brought in my chickens from home.  That earned me an email with the subject line: ‘You’re the fucking man.’  Once I know somebody’s happy, I move on to the next show.  If the audience doesn’t think about my work, then I’ve done my job correctly.  Years ago I was working at the opera and we were putting on a performance of Figaro.  One of the buildings collapsed during the storm scene.  Wasn’t supposed to happen.  The whole thing came down right as the curtain was closing.  Almost hit the lead singer.  Luckily the audience thought it was planned.  The critic for the New York Times said it was the best storm scene he’s ever seen on stage.”

“I remember everything because I’ve obsessively thought about...

“I remember everything because I’ve obsessively thought about it.  She was my roommate’s girlfriend.  We were alone in the house. There were vibes between us. We’d been flirting.  We sat on the edge of the bed for half an hour before anything happened. Smiling.  Giggling.  I kissed her, then we stopped.  She kissed me, then we stopped. Then she put the condom on me.  Afterward we cuddled. We joked. We discussed whether we should tell my roommate. And I thought that was it.  Then a few weeks later, a mutual friend showed me a text message where someone referred to me as a rapist.  When I confronted the girl about it, she claimed the sex hadn’t been consensual, and her willingness had just been a defense mechanism.  That’s when the bottom fell out of my life.  It felt like my reputation was ruined.  It seemed like everyone knew.  I got on antidepressants.  I went to therapy.  I felt hated, not lovable, not welcome in polite society.  Nothing I did seemed to matter anymore.  Certain pathways in my life seemed completely closed off. I could never be famous. Never a public figure. Never a CEO. The rumor would certainly come out. I had these constant, obsessive thoughts about what I’d do if it ever went public. Would I sue her?  Release every communication we’d ever had? Get statements from all my ex-girlfriends? Would I post a long note on Facebook where I admitted to every sin I’ve ever committed?  Maybe that would convince people that I’d never lie about this.  Would any of these things even matter?  Or would it just matter what she said?”

“I was a teller at a bank. I was working the front and couldn’t...

“I was a teller at a bank.  I was working the front and couldn’t talk on the phone, so she sent me a text.  She sent two texts actually.  The first one said ‘I’m pregnant.’  And the second one said: ‘It’s twins.’  We weren’t even living together at that point.  I was only making $28,000 a year.  I wasn’t ready.  They were born three months premature.  But if my wife was scared, she never showed it.  She went from nothing to Mom in no time.  She told me exactly what to do.  It was never domineering.  She just knew.  The first months were terrible.  We were sleeping two hours a night.  I was waking up for work at seven.  It felt like I was living in a dream state.  And I kept thinking: ‘I don’t think I can do this.’  And that feeling stayed for a long time.  Things are a bit easier now.  But it never feels like I’m done.  I go to work, then come home, then it’s homework, then it’s bed.  I’m dead tired at the end of the day.  I don’t know if I’m doing a good job.  I never felt like Dad.  I just felt like some figure they called ‘Dad.’  It somehow felt like my wife was their mom, and I was just there for support.  I felt like a babysitter.  Like I was watching someone else’s kids.  I never knew what a dad was supposed to be like.  It wasn’t in me.  I didn’t know how to show it.  I took care of them.  I loved them.  But I didn’t really hug or kiss them.  I wasn’t comfortable with it.  Probably because it was never done to me.  But I’m different now.  I hug and kiss them every night.  But that’s because they taught me.  They’d come up to me and say ‘Daddy, I love you.’  And they’d hug me and kiss me.  So that’s what I do now.  But it didn’t come from me.  Everything came from them.”

“I’m from a town with one traffic light. It’s mostly antique...

“I’m from a town with one traffic light.  It’s mostly antique shops.  There aren’t really any bars and all the restaurants close by eight.  So there’s not much opportunity socially or professionally.  I thought I’d have a house by now.  And a wife.  And kids.  But I’m still living in my parent’s basement.  Mostly it’s to save money and pay off loans, but it’s also comfortable.  My family is Italian.  We eat dinner together every Sunday.  My sisters bring their families over, and I get to see my nieces and nephews.  Everyone I love is there.  It’s really important to me.  A couple years back I had an opportunity to work in Chicago, but I turned it down.  I told them my family needs me, which is the perfect excuse. Because who’s going to question it?  But I don’t think it was the real reason.  I think I’m leaning on my family to avoid taking risks.  Every night when I come home, my dinner is waiting for me.  I don’t have to struggle.  I don’t have to progress and grow and get past problems.  I’m beginning to feel stagnant.  So I already told my boss: once an opportunity comes to move to the west coast, I’m taking it.”

“My mother ruled the house. Everything had to be in its place...

“My mother ruled the house.  Everything had to be in its place and orderly.  There were plastic coverings on the sofa and armchairs.   She cleaned every day and I had to help her.  She was like a drill sergeant.  She told me when to wake up.  She told me when to go to sleep.  I don’t remember having interactions with her that weren’t her telling me what to do.  And if I resisted, she’d lash out physically.  She’d push me around.  She’d hit me in the face.  My only escape was reading.  After school I’d explore the stacks in the library, pick random books off the shelf, and choose anything that I found interesting.  I’d check out as many books as I could carry.  Back then you were allowed to keep them out for four weeks.  I’d read in my bedroom, in the bathroom, at the dinner table.  Books removed me from that toxic environment.  They exposed me to different worlds, different ways of thinking, different points of view.  I began to do really well in school.  I skipped grades.  On the citywide tests, I scored in the 99th percentile for vocabulary and reading comprehension.  My mother resented it all.  She’d call me an ‘educated moron.’  I went to City College at sixteen.  Graduated at nineteen.  Then after graduation, I used all my savings to travel to Paris for a month.  I explored the city.  I visited museums.  I met so many people from so many countries.  And by the time I came home, I had everything planned out: I found a job, found an apartment, and waited for my parents to visit their country home.  Then I packed up my things and left.“

“We’d get in these blowout fights whenever she asked me to stop...

“We’d get in these blowout fights whenever she asked me to stop drinking.  She’d try to tell me to slow down. Or that my behavior was ridiculous.  Or that she loved me and she wanted me to be healthy.  But it just seemed like she was trying to interfere with my life.  Your own selfishness becomes completely invisible when you’re that addicted.  And the more a person cares, the more they become an obstacle.  It’s horrible because you start hating them for loving you.  It would be so much easier to escape if nobody cared.  But somehow she stayed.  It’s hard to imagine why because she had every reason to go.  But this summer we’re getting married.  And I’ll be three years sober this April.”

“You can do things when you’re six that you can’t do when you’re...

“You can do things when you’re six that you can’t do when you’re three like my little sister is.  One thing is ice skate I guess, which I’ve done like maybe two times.  I fell down a lot and it felt kinda frustrating because it’s kinda frustrating when you keep falling but you have to keep your eyes open even if you’re scared.  On the fifth or seventh time around I didn’t even fall and I even did a fancy twirl jump but not in real life just in my imagination.”