the habit of being

Today I read “Envy” by Kathryn Chetkovich. I was supposed to be doing other things, like studying, writing, laundry, but I haven’t gotten around to those things yet.

Last night I dreamt I went to hear Jonathan Franzen read and wound up sleeping with him. It turned out he had some sort of deformity, but in the end I was still begging him to autograph my copy of The Corrections. I’m sure this means something.

Before that, I was in a black livery cab on the way back to Manhattan from Westport, Connecticut, talking about Joan Didion with an older woman who is more successful that I can ever imagine being. Before that, I was at a birthday party, for another woman who is more successful than I can ever imagine being, considering whether I should make lobster an honorary vegetable for the night, considering that I don’t get invited to lobster bakes at yacht clubs all that often.

The previous night, I was at a dance performance about “girlishness” that was billed as “erotic and grotesque.” It was sortof an interesting concept, but it didn’t come together at all. The best part about it was a survey slipped into the program. One of the questions required me to check off which out of a long list of venues in the City I’d attended performances at over the last 12 months, and I checked off about ten different places, which made me feel great about my life, temporarily.

I feel like there is something seriously wrong with me. I’ve felt this way my entire life. I’ve come to realize it’s a common element of the so-called “artistic temperament,” but I’m left wondering if I would still act the way I sometimes do if I didn’t have this sinking suspicion that I’m innately crazy or immoral or otherwise fucked up. Or is it the fact that my behavior sometimes fails to fall in line with my better judgment that causes the feeling in the first place. Is it really not worth pondering since there’s nothing I can do about it, or is that way of thinking just another symptom?

I’m whitening my teeth at home. You squeeze this sticky bleachy stuff out of a little syringe into these trays that your dentist makes and wear them a couple hours a night. It seems to actually work, though I don’t have that celebrity smile just yet.