REID #75

Mar 08, 2022

SHORT:

no actually YOU r looking at pictures of ur lover on the train home during the one night ur apart

MEDIUM:

Sometimes I hear my plays out loud and I’m like oh god this is just everyone just listening to Reid sad little thoughts, Reid therapy-time… how humiliating…

But then my friends remind me that first drafts are first drafts and earnest / honest/ straightforward writing is my superpower and that you can obscure on-the-nose writing, but you can’t reverse engineer that and add truth to obscurity.

Also, what’s so bad about things being therapy or on the nose, huh? I love noses and therapy.

LONG:

I’m typing this on the subway again, so sorry if it’s OFF THE RAILS. I guess it would be more on-the-rails if it’s emulative of this train that I’m on (thank god).

There’s a guy sitting next to me who is moannnnning and groannnnning. If there’s something dudes r gunna do, it’s loudly complain about how slow the train is going to everyone else who is also on the slow train.

He seems very sad. Like, spiritually. His hair is very short and he is wearing Asics and sitting like a slumped-duck but dressed like a hypebeast from the torso up.

He looks 30. Which I think is too old to be dressing like a hype-best but also do whatever you want. It's a free country.

Perhaps he’s grieving something. His youth, maybe. Or suppressing that grief. Should I tell him “grief crushes when it’s crushed”? My therapist spat that out the other day, so of course I’ve made it my whole personality.

Speaking of grief, I miss the unhinged 60-year-olds I used to do adult diving with.

Have I talked about them in this newsletter before?

One summer when I came home from college I was scared of getting bullied by the junior olympic diving teens, so I decided to train with the adult divers.

Best idea of my life.

They’d show up to the pool everyday in their fun little workout pants covered in dinosaurs or blackjack cards and chat SO loudly as they stretched about like… their kids and how their kids suck. Then they’d get in the pool and proudly flip around in tiny speedos with their bodies on full display.

They also all hated each other for no reason and told me “not to take the advice” of whichever one of them they heard giving me advice that day.

Every time one of them would fling themself off the 7-meter platform I would say a prayer that they’d land and surface safely (as much as I like talking about death and existential shit, I really don’t know how I would handle seeing a retired P.E. teacher die/drown after doing a gorgeous swan dive in the hot California sun).

Anyway, despite being crotchety, the adult divers had a zest for life that was inspiring.

When they’d mess up a dive, they’d shoot out of the water and yell “I’M OKAY!” which made me laugh (and was relieving).

I feel like I am always trying to broadcast that. On the phone with family. Via text after sending out this newsletter lol. “I’M OKAY”.

I am okay! I got an awesome gasoline-style latte from Starbucks this morning which made me feel atrocious but like a million bucks at the same time and then I went to class and thought about how I can’t wait to make my hit movie called Twizzler Lasagna starring the third Billie Eilish sibling (I know there’s one hiding).

I also thought about how, instead of writing a script, I should just I wait til Simon Cowell is asleep at night and then I go 2 the field and tip him over and he moos angrily at me but then applauds me for taking a risk and makes me an international sensation (hilarious joke that hinges on the fact that the word cow is in Simon Cowell’s name).

Then I thought about quitting the biz (which I have yet to work in) altogether so that I can focus on inventing a testosterone that’s actually soooo good for your skin and not bad.

And then I cried becuz some people are so trans and they’ll never kno becuz their defenses r up so high (I am an empath).

Now I’m scrolling through Instagram. Sometimes i c pictures of cis str8 gf and bfs and they have such a gay little look in their eyes... :)

But if they try to claim that gayness? I’ll get mad! And that’s on cognitive dissonance :)

I really don’t have much else to say this week.

I had a collective 100+ pages due today for school. Next week I’ll be back with incredibly wise and hilarious advice or thoughts…

Happy(?) Ash Wednesday to those who celebrated… I don’t know a lot about Catholics, but I do know (based on attending family events on my dad’s side) that they love making slideshows with the song “what a wonderful word” playing bhind them.

Imagine looking around and thinking to urself “what a wonderful world”… couldn’t be me :)

C u next Tuesday!!!!!!