Romantic Comedy(50)
At this point, I don’t usually feel stressed by shows. There are pros and cons to having “hit it big” early, and one that might be both is that by now, even as I recognize how much my career is a product of luck, it’s the only life I know professionally speaking. Looking back, I was in serious danger of flaming out almost as soon as I got started. After my first and second albums came out back to back, I was drinking a lot, acting like a jackass in my early 20s, and generally letting success go to my head. In October 2003, there was a horrible accident in Miami where my drummer, whose name was Christopher and who was the sweetest guy, fell off a drawbridge over Biscayne Bay. This was a huge wake-up call, and following Christopher’s funeral, I entered rehab for two months. I still think about him every day and wish I had stopped all of us from climbing the bridge. I considered quitting performing altogether. I wasn’t sure if fans or the media would blame me for Christopher’s death, and while this didn’t happen, I have always felt very conscious of being given a second chance.
About your question of if I work out three hours a day…I do not work out from 10AM-1PM, as I may have implied. I work out from more like 10AM-11:15AM. But since we are being honest, it’s questionable how healthy my relationship with exercise and food is. I am proud to say I have not relapsed with alcohol （and thank you for answering my question about drinking so straightforwardly）， but I am pretty compulsive about exercising. This is not a humblebrag because I don’t think it’s good to be compulsive about anything. I was scrawny growing up and could eat whatever I wanted until I was about 30. At that point, as soon as I put on some weight, I stopped eating sugar and wheat. When I got Covid, I lost too much weight so I decided to start having bread again last spring and now, even though I’ve cut out grains again, I weigh 13lbs more than I did when I hosted TNO. Do you remember that sketch when I was wearing a very silly leather vest and shorts? I knew in advance I might be asked to wear something revealing for the show plus I’d be on TV and having my picture taken while promoting my album so I did a cleanse the week before. In the past, I have fasted in advance of photo shoots, but now that I have some distance on all of that, I think it’s a habit I want to be finished with. I’m sure this will result in me looking less fit, and people will make snarky comments, but maybe I can learn to be at peace with it.
OK…I am seriously considering deleting that last paragraph because I am scared of how vain you will think I sound…but I also am curious what your reaction is. And no, I absolutely do not talk about this stuff with most people.
I know what you mean about getting older and having a different sensibility than the people coming up behind you. I feel aware of that when it comes to social media, which seems pointless to me and which I don’t deal with myself but it is such a part of the machinery now. Another weird thing for me that’s been true since the beginning is that, although my recent album sales are respectable, it’s close to impossible that I will ever again reach the sales of my first album （even accounting for all the shifts in how music is sold during the last 20 years…which is, as you might say, a story for another time）。 Earlier in my career, this made me worry that I was failing the people at my label, but over time, it has helped me recognize that the one thing I can control is my music…not sales, not market trends, not critical reaction. I just can try to put my best work out there.
I swear to you I was a freaky goth, and for proof here’s a picture of me from age 14. Please enjoy my way too long bangs, horrible-fitting jeans, and black nail polish. I was terrified of girls, worshipped The Velvet Underground and The Cure, and hated having to wear a coat and tie to my all-boys’ school almost as much as I hated the mandatory sports.
I suppose the style of my side project band is…rockabilly? It’s less poppy than my solo work, as I’m sure you will be sad to hear. I often wonder when I will play again before a crowd. I miss it like crazy and also, thinking of people pressed up against each other, sweating, singing at the top of their lungs…it’s so hard to imagine that ever feeling normal.
I bet every version of your screenplay is great. I can’t wait until I’m in a theater watching a movie you wrote.
from: Sally Milz <[email protected]>
to: Noah Brewster <[email protected]>
date: Jul 24, 2020, 7:22 PM
subject: Actually
You’re definitely my best pen pal! Without question! I was just trying to play it cool.
There have been 3 others:
Pen pal 1 （4th-6th grade / 1992-1994）—Freja Mikaelsson who lived in Gothenburg, Sweden. My mom’s college roommate married a Swedish man, and the moms cooked up this idea that their daughters, who were the same age, should write to each other. I have a hunch the main reason was for Freja to practice her English while the only Swedish I ever learned was “How are you?” and “I am fine, thank you.” For a while, Freja and I corresponded a lot—mostly stuff like “My favorite color is yellow” and “I do not have any pets but would like a rabbit”—but it eventually petered out. Some of her letters might still be in a box in Jerry’s basement, but the basement is, shall we say, not optimally organized.
Pen pal 2 （freshman year of college / fall 2000）—Martin Biersch. I went to high school with Martin （not to be confused with Vinny Kaplan of the Hy-Vee cereal aisle） and one night the August after we graduated, a bunch of people were hanging out at the pool at my friend Erin’s house. I guess you could say Martin and I had a moment, and though we’d barely spoken in four years of high school, we started emailing each other after I went to Duke and he went to the U of Missouri, aka Mizzou （not sure if he ever went to see any shows at the Blue Note but I’ve heard it’s a cool space, possibly a former movie theater）。 Martin and I emailed each other every few days from late Aug/early Sept to Thanksgiving break. Our emails weren’t explicitly romantic but they weren’t explicitly not romantic either （such things can be murky, right?）。 And then we both were back in KC for Thanksgiving break and there was this particular bar that people from my high school used to go to the night before Thanksgiving because they served you without an ID. When Martin and I saw each other there, it was probably the most awkward interaction of my entire life. Like, I could barely speak. And same for him. Looking back, I think the awkwardness was because whatever the dynamic was between us was unclear—neither of us knew if it was more friendly or flirty—and also, and I don’t mean to be glib on this topic, I’m pretty sure we were both totally sober （I definitely was）。 We interacted for about six minutes, most in total silence （I think I talk an average amount now, but I was extremely quiet through college, and Martin was a quiet guy, too） and then I said I had to go to the bathroom and we haven’t spoken or emailed since. Do you think he’s still waiting for me to come back from the bathroom?