Broken (in the best possible way)

by Jenny Lawson

Will it be worth it? No damn idea. But I can’t stop, because writers write always. Not well, necessarily. But they write. And you are a reader. So you read.

What we really want is to know we’re not alone in our terribleness. We want to appreciate the failure that makes us perfectly us and wonderfully relatable to every other person out there who is also pretending that they have their shit together and didn’t just eat that onion ring that fell on the floor. Human foibles are what make us us, and the art of mortification is what brings us all together.

But we don’t get to pick who we are. I am still as broken as I was before, but with better stories and a little more insight into just how fucked up I am.

Fuck the people who make you feel bad for glorifying the odd behavior and questionable decisions that make you who you are. Those things are perfectly acceptable. Be good. Be kind. Love each other. Fuck everything else. The only thing that matters is how you feel and how you’ve made others feel. And I feel okay (for the moment), and I make others feel okay by being a barometer of awkwardness and self-doubt.

Basically the secret to a long-lasting marriage is memory loss and well-meaning lies and beach margaritas.

maybe just my brain becoming as lazy as the rest of me.

I have a hole in my head where I fall through. It’s all in that hole, I suspect. It’s real. It’s true. It’s locked away in a treasure box. Just because I don’t remember, it doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. And if one day I look at you and don’t remember who you are or how much you mean to me, know that your importance is still as real then as it is now. Know that you are locked away someplace safe. Know that the me who loved you is still sitting on that beach, forever feeling the sunlight. And know that I’m okay with not having that memory right now, because the me that holds it tight is keeping it safe and uncorrupted and glorious. And she loves you. And I do too. Remember that. For me.

I suggested that they sell finger/dog condoms because they could offer them much cheaper than the pet store and he looked baffled, which I get because finger/dog condoms are probably something better marketed on Etsy. Then I decided to stop talking because this was the same drugstore I picked up my drugs from and I thought it was better to perhaps not give them another reason to not fill my mental health meds. (Although possibly this all might make them fill them quicker. Hard to say really.)

Then she said, “I’m giving y’all some medicated wipes. You’ll need to clean your dog’s vagina four times a day,” which seems excessive because frankly I don’t even clean my vagina that often.

This has never entirely gone away. Therapy and medication helped, but still, I had weeks or months where I was stuck.

I considered it a sign that perhaps there is a path I’m supposed to be on. It’s not the same path that everyone else takes, and that can be hard and lonely, but I was reminded that there are amazing things I would never see with normal eyes and other paths.

maybe, just maybe, you’re in exactly the place you’re supposed to be after all.

That’s why one-night stands with bats are generally a bad idea and also why I sleep in footie pajamas. Sure, it’s not sexy, but you know what’s even less sexy? Getting your toes sucked like they’re a crazy straw by diseased winged rodents with foot fetishes.

the order of the alphabet is completely random. It’s not in alphabetical order because that was invented after the randomness of the alphabet, so how did we decide that this was the order of the alphabet?

There are about twice as many human nipples in the world as there are people, but there are about as many human testicles in the world as there are people. Like, it averages out to one testicle per person. That’s a weird story problem.

I can’t even decide who it’s worse for, the drones who just watched their friend get his nuts popped to death or the queen, who is like, “WHY DOES THIS KEEP HAPPENING?”

I wonder if Neil Armstrong ever gets tired of people constantly asking him about a place he vacationed in for less than a day sixty years ago. The moon is basically a rock with no air and I have to imagine that Mexico is just as interesting.

I already have proof that I have a baby and their name is Hailey and they live here.

Loving the inclusivity

Yesterday I sent a text to Victor saying, “You are the wind beneath my wings,” and then he wrote back, “What?” because turns out I’d accidentally typed, “You are the wind beneath my legs,” and then he was all, “Like a fart?” Yeah, Victor. Like a fart.

Considering all the famous people who’ve been cremated and dumped into the wind, I’ve probably breathed some of them in. Which is sort of rock and roll if you look at them like cocaine, but they’re not cocaine, they’re corpses who shouldn’t be inhaled. It’s more like a famous person entering your body without your permission, and I think that means I’ve had unprotected sex with famous people through my nose holes, which are the worst holes to have sex in. Plus, what if it’s someone who was really promiscuous? Now I’ve been with everyone they’ve been with. Unless you start over again after cremation? But even so, if they’re all invading everyone’s nose holes, then it’s like I not only had nostril intercourse with a famous person, but I also had nostril intercourse with everyone else who breathed them in. Unless they ended up in a Kleenex. I wonder how many ashes just end up in Kleenexes. Probably lots. They should advertise that. Kleenex, I mean. Not cremation. “You’ll end up in a nose hole” is a terrible tagline. But maybe: “Kleenex: Now with aloe to cradle the corpses you exorcise from your nose.” (Needs work maybe.)

I was looking for new cups but there was a note on the top shelf of the store that said, “Please do not touch yourself. A staff member is happy to assist you,” and I laughed a bit too loud and the clerk totally didn’t understand why and I said, “Oh … you know … masturbation?” There may have been a communication problem because she asked me to leave.

I should exercise more, but why should I trust these magazines since they have a vested interest in making me buy them? I don’t buy them though. I steal them from my shrink’s office, because these magazines make you feel bad about yourself and most of us don’t need any help with that, so technically I’m saving people from articles like the one I just read about kegeling. Apparently, I’m supposed to be kegeling all the time to “lift my pelvic floor,” and that’s ridiculous because now I’m supposed to be exercising a part of me that people don’t even see? This is an obvious scam. Next they’ll be telling you to make your pituitary gland do squats or flex your testicles. Honestly, I’m not even sure why you would want to lift your pelvic floor, because if your pelvis gets higher the only place it could go is up into your stomach, so basically you just shrunk your torso, which makes you look even thicker, and now you start to buy the magazines out of desperation because your tough new vagina accidentally made you look fat.

we’re turning ourselves into compressed accordions with terribly muscular vaginas.

Hailey asked if they could be an astronaut when they grow up and Victor was like, “The sky’s the limit,” and I pointed out that if the sky was the limit then he’d just grounded them from being an astronaut, because space comes after the sky. Then he said that he couldn’t have grounded them if he’d said the sky was the limit because if you ground a plane it means they can’t go into the sky, and I was like, “Touché.” And I’m not sure we ever clarified to Hailey that it was all semantics, so it’s possible my kid thinks they can’t be an astronaut because of Victor’s poor grammar.

I wonder if crabs think humans walk weird.

My dog is ten times as fast as me even though she’s tiny, and I’m guessing it’s because she has twice as many legs as me, so does that mean that centipedes are a billion times faster than dogs? Because I’ve seen them before and they don’t seem fast. Unless I’m only seeing them when they’re really tired. Like maybe they’re so fast you can’t even see them, and that’s why you never see fast centipedes, because we only see them when they’re totally winded. Maybe that’s why they’re so creepy. Because deep down we know that they’re faster than the speed of light. Maybe the sound of thunder is just the noise of centipedes creating sonic booms. I’d ask a scientist but I’m afraid they’ll steal my theory for a grant. We’re going halfsies, scientists.

sometimes I’ll say these ridiculous things and someone else will be like, “I, TOO, AM FASCINATED BY PUBIC WIGS AND REAL-LIFE CANNIBALS,” and suddenly you have a new best friend.

“What can I eat? Ground-up glass? Because that’s the only thing missing from this list,” and my doctor was like, “Meat. You need more meat. Meat is healthy for you,” but I don’t think so, because I’m made of meat and I’m inadvertently trying to kill myself

There can be a lot of reasons why I’m so anemic and exhausted and sick. Some of those reasons are simple, and some are scary, but personally I’m leaning toward attic vampires. It would explain the blood loss and also the rustling I sometimes hear upstairs late at night. Victor says it’s squirrels on the roof but what would squirrels want with all my blood, Victor? He is the worst detective ever. Also, it would make sense that vampires are after me, because I may have offended them when I refused to pay them off a few months ago.

The problem is that depression is my forever side dish to any period of convalescence and illness, and depression lies. It tells you that you are worthless. That life was never good. That you are a drain on the world and that it will only get worse.

Which is probably what I will say to the doctor during my shish-kebabbing, because apparently I’ll be in a twilight state and last time I was in one of those I thought leprechauns were trying to get me, so God knows what I’ll say. Maybe I’ll live-tweet it.

I could be dead. I could be dead. I wrote that twice because I’m saying it with two different emotions. One where I’m so grateful to be alive and another sneakier, terrible thought where I realize that if I do die I’ll get some rest. That’s fucked up. I know it. And as soon as it hits my mind I shoo it away because I know it’s the depression, but this is a place for honesty, so there it is.

Before we walked back inside Victor hugged me and calmed me and made me laugh. “I am a bad risk,” I said, sighing with acceptance. He was silent for a minute. “You are a bad risk,” he agreed, nodding as he looked up at the stars. “But one I’m happy to take.” And as I breathed in the night air I thought of the struggle and the glory and the sadness and celebration and mystery that still lay ahead of me. And I said, “Me too.” And it was the truth.

Were you there when I accidentally smashed a snail in my pocket at Granny’s and it smelled so bad I threw up in the bushes and I had to wash my dress out in her sink and then the indigo dye in the dress bled all over me and I looked like I’d murdered a Smurf?

you’d have hot buttered cat pee everywhere.

Wikipedia says the bearcat is “curious and very intelligent but highly irritable.” It’s like if Victor was an animal.

Update: Victor says he doesn’t care how many bearcats Jeff Goldblum has and also he won’t let me smell his pee.

Me: Victor hates Jesus and bearcats and happiness. Lisa: Nothing new there. Me: Ooh! But that might be a great name for my next book. Lisa: I doubt you’ll do very well with the Christian audience but stranger things have happened. Me: I’ve already offended the uptight Christians. The cool Christians are still fine with me. I mean, they’re praying for me, but they’re also entertained.

I’m not letting some bearcat hussy seduce my husband with her delicious urine.

PoMoRoPorno. That’s a hard tongue twister for you. Lisa: That’s a Hard Tongue Twister is the name of the first PoMoRoPorno.

Like live as if it’s Saturday even when it’s Wednesday afternoon.

DO WHAT YOU LOVE EVEN IF IT MEANS YOU’RE BROKE … Exceptions: gambling, heroin, prostitutes, alcohol, and most other fun things.

THE WORLD IS YOUR OYSTER … It’s tough to get into and it will cut you if you don’t use the right knife. Also, it’s slimier than expected but sometimes you get jewelry. Unless this truism means that you are the pearl and the world is the oyster that you live in? Which would kind of make sense because pearls are technically just natural irritants and that’s a pretty good description of human beings in the world.

DON’T LOOK BACK … Unless you’re changing lanes. Then it’s really important to look back. Maybe this should be changed to “Don’t be the asshole who just changes lanes without checking behind you.” Also, use your blinker.

IF THE WIND WILL NOT SERVE, TAKE TO THE OARS … Nothing like a good oar to get your kite in the air.

It’s disappointing and infuriating, but that’s not the worst part. The worst part is how cunningly your words echo the terrible lies my mental illness tells me. “You don’t really need that medication.” “It’s all in your head.” “It’s too expensive.” “It won’t work.” “It’s a waste of money.” Those lies are difficult to fight when you’re dealing with depression. It’s even more difficult when your insurance company seems to speak the same words.

I will speak for them.

I will stoke the anger you breed in me and use it to speak out to others so that they know that you cannot be trusted. Because someone has to look out for the sick people in the world. And you certainly aren’t doing it.

into a stream of words I can’t put back in my mouth. “Why would they call it a cock chafer if it rolls over and moves by doing crunches on its back? If anything it’s totally doing the opposite of cock chafing. I mean, regular bugs who drag their undercarriage over the ground are probably always chafing their nuggets, but this guy is intentionally crawling upside down to keep his downstairs business off the sidewalk,” I said, and the neighbor stared at me like I was crazy so I was like, “Unless his penis is on his back? Is that what you’re saying? Does this bug have a back penis? Or are you saying that the whole thing is a penis because it’s penis shaped? Because I don’t think that’s how science works. Although I’ve been surprised before. OH MY GOD, IS THIS BUG ALL PENIS?”

“Start again. Make more sense,”