i cannot stop thinking about true detective: cold lesbians

plus some other stuff to sit and look at, and a humiliating glimpse inside my OCD

i’ve been working with my incredible psychiatrist for a couple of years to navigate the recently-diagnosed OCD that has held me hostage a while now, which i didn’t know because i wasn’t seeing a psychiatrist before and because, in my mind, and in a lot of other people’s minds i’m sure, i thought OCD was about washing your hands too much or touching doorknobs a certain number of times or whatever limited way it’s portrayed on TV. and i figured that was all there was to it because TV is my boss and i believe everything it tells me!
one of the (many, excruciating) ways my obsessive compulsive disorder manifests is in an overwhelming need to control things, behaviors i didn’t even recognize as controlling until my doctor pointed them out to me. i don’t try to control other people, because i am painfully aware that that is not possible, so this is not that. my method of ~control~ is basically this intense urgency to ensure, to the extent that it’s feasible, that every situation i might encounter will feel “safe” for me. and i don’t mean the kind of safety that, say, a seatbelt or guardrail might provide; in my brain, true “safety” means that nothing i haven’t fully anticipated and braced myself for will ever happen to me. oh, that’s all????????
it makes me laugh to see it written out on my computer screen, because i am a rational person who knows nothing is predictable and almost everything on earth is out of my personal control. it feels deeply stupid to think i could protect myself or anyone else from anything. and let’s be honest, while theoretically this includes the big shit like mass shootings and weather catastrophes, those kinds of things are at the periphery of my deepest concerns. like, i can peacefully surrender to the idea that if a tornado were to uproot my house with me in it i would just keep lying in bed like “lol ok i guess.” when the zombies come i will offer myself up for their first bite! that’s not a problem for me!! i long to be swept out to sea by a tide i can’t control!!!
the kind of thing that vexes me, that has made me a prisoner in my own brain, are the little things. “what if i take the usual route to drop the dog off at school and a road is blocked and there’s traffic and i can’t decide quickly enough which alternate route to take and some impatient asshole behind me lays on his horn for an embarrassingly long time?” this is the kind of sentence that will start quietly, slowly increase in volume to a dull roar, then play on an infinite loop in a gooey crevice of my brain, driving me crazy in slow motion while paralyzing my bones and muscles. “what if i go to this concert, wearing this thing that looks bad, and i see someone i know and they see me looking bad in this bad thing and know that i don’t ever try to put myself together and i’m gross all the time for real, not as a joke?” WHAT IF?????
the best treatment for OCD is exposure therapy, and one of the methods i’ve been lovingly forced to use is answering the WHAT IF to situations like the ones above (that i understand are very low stakes, yet they feel life-or-death to me in the moment) in agonizing detail, imagining the worst case scenario possible. i have written paragraphs and paragraphs of the worst imaginary ways going to the grocery store or getting a haircut or seeing a concert could end up for me, then i have to read (aloud!) that scary shit over and over like a sicko mantra until it feels like a normal thing i could deal with if it really happened. again, i have written painstaking enactments of horrifying things happening publicly to me ostensibly to…………….heal my broken brain. it feels counterintuitive, i have not yet been cured, but at least now i have a valid reason to spend so much time crawling up my own asshole.
what is the point of this? well, connection and deepening the codependency i have with all the people i don’t know who made the mistake of opening this email, but also to tell you that every time i try to write a not judge mathis-related email i get hamstrung by two things: bugging myself the fuck out wondering “what do people want?” and “how do they want it?” (and how do i guarantee they like it and will anyone notice if they’re all formatted differently because i can’t decide on a format i like and how frequently is too frequent i hate being annoying also i’m not an expert in anything does anyone give a shit what movies i watched or which books i think are good? and and and…) and that’s the control of it all, the thing i’ll never be in charge of that tortures me half to death. HOW CAN I MAKE SURE EVERYONE IS HAPPY WITH ME AND SATISFIED WITH WHAT I GIVE THEM EVERY SINGLE TIME?
it’s a real question, one that i often (obsessively) think about as a person who makes things every fucking day that i vulnerably thrust out into the world: how can i be the most delightful and make sure no one is ever mad at me, especially people i don’t know who probably have a detached fondness for me, at best, when i force these words upon them that maybe they don’t really want??? because i really do care, and because the kind of thing that will keep me awake at night is “will anyone notice that this month i wrote a listicle but last month i wrote paragraphs?”
and, trust me, i know that no one actually cares (or if someone does care, i shouldn’t!) but the part of my brain that hates the rest of it doesn’t really acknowledge that and instead prefers to taunt me. why i incessantly worry that i might get in actual, real-life trouble for a dumb thing full of jokes i give away for free on the internet (although god bless those of you who pay for it) is the reason (okay, one among many) i continue to max out my credit card on a head shrinker.
so when there’s a big lapse between these missives, please know it is because i am fully insane. i’m over here scribbling down all the bad things that could happen if i go to the car wash (i drop my credit card when trying to tap it to pay and have to call the guy over to help me, the card helping guy judges me for not getting the most expensive wash, i don’t do a good job getting guided into the track and fuck up my car and/or the entire carwash, water leaks in/glass shatters/the car explodes, the carwash malfunctions while i am stuck in the middle of it and i have to be rescued, the carwash malfunctions while i am stuck in the middle of it and i have to be rescued and i’m about to have diarrhea, the carwash malfunctions while i am stuck in the middle of it and i have to be rescued and i’m about to have diarrhea and i have to work in ten minutes and this will sound like a lie when i tell my boss, i take my car out of neutral too soon, i don’t take my car out of neutral soon enough, someone/thing takes a big shit on my clean car as i’m turning onto the street and since i was lucky enough for all that other stuff not to happen i can’t tempt fate and drive thru again) in the little notebook i reserve for this, while also worrying that someone on earth is pissed that they’ve wasted $5 on me. don’t worry, i’m on prozac now, so i’m sure this will all be better soon. someone should publish this notebook when one of the outlandish situations i’m terrified of actually does kill me. I HOPE YOU LIKE IT!!!!!!

i will watch jodie foster do literally anything so when the trailer for true detective: cold lesbians (a million thank yous to lindseybobby for this brilliant parlance) came out i was all the way in, despite somehow never having watched any previous iteration of the show??? this is what happens when you’re waist-deep in the bravoverse or whatever weird shit i was watching on youtube when the earlier seasons came out. (don’t worry, i went back and watched season one and wow wow!) i was hooked from the jump; kali reis is mesmerizing, jodie is jodie-ing, and it’s so atmospheric and spooky and creepy and i live for that shit. at the end of every episode i just sit and think about what i just watched, and i know i’m into it for real because i haven’t read a single article about the show. no podcasts, no thinkpieces: if i really like something i refuse to let internet cretins ruin it for me!!!!!!! i am also totally enraptured by/obsessed with/enamored of mr and mrs smith, the donald glover version. i went in without knowing a damn thing, i haven’t even seen the original movie, just my friend lucas screaming at me for days that it was so good and i needed to watch it. i’m halfway through the last episode (a crime, i know, but i was falling asleep and couldn’t hang!) and it’s early but maybe it’s already my favorite show of this year? it’s basically about two spies that have to work together to complete various dangerous tasks while also pretending to be married to one another, but it’s about so much more than that? in particular, it’s a sexy show about relationships (that isn’t all relationshippy) that is filled with unbridled violence. there is literally nothing better than that? especially because the violence is devoid of morality; you don’t know if they’re the good guys or who’s bad or what they’ve done (the missions in each episode aren’t connected, at least not in a way i could connect them), it’s just will they or won’t they fail, and that’s refreshing. plus the show is funny and stylish and gorgeous to look at.

i’ve been a jessamyn stanley devotee for some time now and the other day on her instagram she made this soup that i thought looked pretty easy and delicious. but what was most intriguing to me was that she said she eats it for breakfast every morning which i would never do (unless you poured an ice-cold diet coke into a bowl and made me eat it with a spoon) but you know who would? MY LADY. our freezer is full of these pre-made smoothie packs that she puts together for herself, which i admire, except they’re full of kale and celery and apple slices and shit. i’m not doing that, idc how many bananas you mix it with. so i made jessamyn’s soup but of course i had to put some extra shit in it and it turned out pretty tasty so here you go.
green breakfast soup i made for my wife:
4 cloves crushed garlic, a quart of vegetable broth
1 tsp turmeric, 1 tsp chili flakes, salt, pepper, +/- cholula
12 oz chopped broccoli
12 oz baby spinach
4 celery stalks, chopped
a juicy lemon, hot water, labneh
1 i sautéed four cloves of crushed garlic (i got the frozen ones you pop out of the container at target, but honestly do whatever) in a tbsp? (i didn’t measure) of hot oil for a minute while stirring, then added the turmeric and broth and let it come to a boil.
2 i dumped in the broccoli and celery and let them boil for five minutes while i sat in a different room to avoid the farty steam. i took it off the heat and stirred in the spinach until it wilted and a few shakes of cholula.
3 THE FUN PART. i used an immersion blender to blend it until smooth and, when most of the chunks were less chunky, added a cup of hot water and the juice of half a lemon, then blended it until it was silky. i season with salt, pepper, and chili flakes then turned on a low heat and brought it back up to a simmer, then ate it (IN THE AFTERNOON) with lemon wedges and a couple huge dollops of labneh (add whatever yogurt or sour cream you got) and it was a jam. kirsten saved the leftovers to eat for breakfast this week, and godspeed to her!

books/snacks/softcore
i’m listening to my friend emily farris’ book i’ll just be five more minutes and yes there is a blurb from me on the cover because i read an early copy and am contractually bound by our friendships to say nice things about my friends’ work, BUT: whenever someone does personal/autobiographical writing i like to listen to it, even if i already have the book. there’s just something so nice about a person reading their work about their life to you, like a really long podcast about a lady you kinda know telling you stuff about her real life. the book is good and emily has a very melodic speaking voice, especially if you love a midwestern twang. i just read the latest stephen king novel and while he always delivers solid, impeccable storytelling, there was something about this one that nagged at me. alas, i am hopelessly devoted to him, so i will patiently what for whatever’s next. i am almost done with emily ruth verona’s midnight on beacon street and even though it’s short as hell it is so tense that i keep putting it down because it’s a mistake for me to read scary books in the middle of the night, AND YET. i’ve been reading more romance lately for ~research~ and i gobbled up party of two by jasmine guillory and romantic comedy by curtis sittenfeld in, like, a day? and one thing i love about a romance novel is that it kinda feels like a thriller when you’re reading it??? you know you are barreling toward a potentially catastrophic ending, be it “will they find that kidnapped baby???” or “whose penis is gonna end up where???” a couple months ago i read everything’s fine by cecilia rabess and it’s a romance despite not having a cupcake cover, and it’s fucked up and complicated and i felt very weird (not in a bad way) when it was over. maybe i’ll become a romance girly after all? here’s what i have out from the library right now:
alice sadie celine sarah blakley-cartwright
sing her down ivy pochoda
the fortune seller rachel kapelke-dale
midnight is the darkest hour ashley winstead
loved and missed susie boyt

vulture wrote about dwayne kennedy and that prompted me to dig up my copy of one of the greatest comedy albums of all time, who the hell is dwayne kennedy? lindy and i were living in LA when it was recorded in 2018 and, because her husband aham produced it, we got to listen to an early cut and when i tell you i criiiiiiiied laughing??? i mean it! check him out!!!! i’ve been listening to a lot of uk rap these days, mostly because i became obsessed with this gorgeous central cee and dave song and fell down a rabbit hole from there. pretty sure i’m in love with them both and that’s probably because i am a basic american who will listen to anything said with a british accent. i’m too old to know american slang, babe i have no fucking idea what these little brothers are on about???????? they could be rapping about disemboweling people and i’m over here sighing, “yeah bruv, sounds sooving to me nerves, mate.” these dudes talking about being in the trap and i’m like………….selling crumpets??? the new little simz album bangs, and the track i have on repeat is “far away.” i got tired of listening to funeral music in the car because it makes me want to drive off the road (still dirges-only at the house, tho), so i’ve been bumping throwback shit that makes me feel good like “dance with me” by 112 and the “heartbreaker” remix by mariah carey. catch me at a red light headbanging while singing the “i need someone to give me some real love” bridge. my 44th birthday was last tuesday, and kirsten got us tickets to see rachael & vilray at st cecilia, which is an extremely 44-year-old thing to do. the concert started at 7 and they told us before it even started that we would be in our cars on the way home by 9, and good thing i saw the renaissance tour already because i will never be attending a latenight concert ever again!!! r&v put on an incredible (and short) show that is gorgeous (and also short), and i’ve been listening to “nosotros” on repeat all week. also in constant rotation: NEW BETH GIBBONS?????? when i tell you my skeleton almost jumped out of my body!!!!!!!!!!

if you love snacks and there is a farm and fleet near you, i am begging you to go there. put your phone down, put an old yellow lab in the bed of your pickup truck, and drive on down to the only store around that carries potato chips that taste like baby back ribs. IT’S MAGICAL. they have all the best shit, all the shit you want, it’s always on sale, and if you also happen to need an 80-lb bucket of cat litter or some tractor tires, they got you!!!! i won’t bore you with the obsessive lunacy that drove me there, but once i discovered it i haven’t stopped, especially since you can order your stuff online then drive through the airplane hangar where they keep the hay bales and a fresh-faced farmer teen will run your juju coins and spicy ginger beer right on out to your backseat. my newest farm and fleet jam are dot’s homestyle pretzels which, i am ashamed to admit, i heard about on a new york times podcast?? i’m sure the bags are $20 apiece in manhattan but here in the heartland you can get these bitches for $5.99 and they are just flat-out obnoxious. so good you might get mad. the other snack innovation i’m into rn is aura bora mango chili sparkling water which, yes, sounds disgusting but i promise you is great. i started drinking spicy hot water a few months ago and liked it so much that i thought spicy cold water might be delicious too, plus i am a sucker for an unnecessary, novelty gimmick foodstuff. i don’t even know if it really quenches thirst but it tastes interesting and isn’t soda so i don’t have to worry about my holey teeth screaming as i chug it. WIN WIN.

the crohn’s and colitis foundation put my face on their website and gave me my own link to raise money for them, so i’m gonna include it every time i send an email because i want them to think i’m a valuable member of the butt disease community. the money isn’t for my specific bad butt, but(t) for anyone who needs it. don’t fucking embarrass me, i told them my people would be good for at least one hundred collective dollars. i’m never gonna ask them what i raise because i am humiliated enough by everything else already, please make me proud. donate here for buttholes!