Sure, I'll Join Your Cult: A Memoir of Mental Illness and the Quest to Belong Anywhere

by Maria Bamford

If you have any mentals, you probably know what I mean. I’m not suicidal, but I’m also not particularly psyched.

I am like the pathetic stump the grown-up boy sits on at the end of The Giving Tree. But instead of a quiet place to rest, I provide you with my splintered, discomfiting need to reveal all my thoughts and flaws—which is either radical honesty or narcissistic showboating.

Everybody’s “okay” with Subway. But no one is ever really glad you brought it (unless they are on a twelve-hour nonunion commercial shoot or under the age of eighteen).

Even bitches who live on pickles and cocaine have their limits.

And then there’s bipolar II, which is some light mania, no psychosis, and mixed states of depression/obsession, plus the chutzpah to do something about it.