Maybe I’m born with it, maybe it’s C-PTSD.
Open if you want to cry!
When I begin to write anything, I feel like I am in a dank bathroom stall, trying to start a brand new roll of one-ply toilet paper in the dark whilst wearing 2-inch acrylic nails. Coffin-shaped if you need the full visual.
Writing the start of anything feels like a valiant, but violent effort of grabbing around resulting in sad shreds of something that could have been of use had I approached the task with a crumb of patience. Even once I’ve smashed everything I’ve got into one passable wad, it’s pretty sad to use. I flush it away in disgust. This is why I don’t wear coffin-shaped acrylics and also why you haven’t seen me in your inbox in a month.
I have been pontificating on what is entertaining, but most importantly worthwhile, for you to read and I have been coming up with Nothing™️! I think about how the direction of this writing project has taken a sharp turn into tight-fives about monster truck rallies and work trip hyper vigilance. It’s quite fun for all parties involved, I will admit. I love making people laugh. I love the texts I get because I wrote a sentence that was just, “Sore-iana Grande.” I like my coworker telling me that her favorite day of the week is a Like Like Day (shoutout to Shelby). I don’t think I want that part to go away. However, there are some rather significant stories that I promised myself that I would share but have been too fearful to do so until now. One reason I haven’t shared is that I usually send these newsletters in the mornings and who the fuck wants to wake up to a mini opus on my trauma without warning? Another reason for hiding behind bathroom humor is that anything I put out here is pretty much permanent for all to see and pick apart. It’s terrifying.
The biggest reason for writing about Nothing Very Important So Far is that if I write something real about my life, I can hurt people or make people uncomfy (word of the month iykyk) when I talk about a younger, more precious version of me. That’s the big one.
This part is not a joke, but I tell my husband all the time that if I could be totally honest in public, in my writing, I might have already written my first novel. I might have already written a book that you won’t return to the library not because you love it (you do), but because it has an aesthetically pleasing book cover wrapped in crispy library plastic that future houseguests will be mildly impressed with and a little bit envious that you are a library kind of person and/or have time to read. You barely have time to read this, but I am so grateful that you do. I am not used to having a real voice, except for a mostly funny one. Even now, I feel like I’d rather remain mysteriously fucked up (which I used to think was attractive) and discreetly (majorly) depressed than be a writer. I’d rather beepboop on my keyboard and do a little job for the rest of my life than write - not just my story, but the fun (insane) little ditties that live in my brain. I’d rather protect people who couldn’t/wouldn’t protect me. Consequently, writing about the pain of growing up has always been the big red button that will immediately detonate and ruin everyone’s lives and reputation if I selfishly press it. All the while I take Wellbutrin and read sexy faerie novels to stave off the Hiroshima-level of anguish and anxiety that is kept at bay inside my body. My seams are somatically bursting via twitching and tremors and migraines and memory loss and searing pain.
What I am trying to share in this roundabout way is that I have recently been diagnosed with C-PTSD (Actually, it the second time I was diagnosed, I just didn’t believe it the first time.) and the reason why I started this Substack was because I needed to release something. Anything. It’s helping, but if don’t start writing about what got me here, it might be the biggest mistake of my life. The drama! I know. But my body has been screaming about it for a few years now.
So here is a start and I promise this will go somewhere:
When my dad took me out of the house for his random weekend appearances, we went to theme parks - a lot of them. Disneyland, Knott’s Berry Farm, Six Flags, Universal Studios, Raging Waters, any county fair within a 100-mile radius of the San Fernando Valley, you name it. Raging Waters trips were always particularly interesting. As some might know, Raging Waters was a glorified petri dish of bacteria and is a now-defunct water park. Grown men in their little flip-flops and moist shorts gawked at my dad’s sturdy frame, specifically, his exposed back which was tattooed from neck to butt with a giant 18. I thought it was because it was just a sick-ass tattoo, bigger than anyone else’s, and he had muscles, bigger than most, so the other dads were just jealous! Until I was tall enough to ride anything fun or curious enough to ask more questions, I had no idea that it meant something more. It meant that he was someone you didn’t fuck with. It meant that this latently dangerous bullmastiff of a man was moonlighting as my gentle, hilarious, curious, earnest father. Like all parents, he was not perfect by any means, but this is the man who would cry just looking at me. Who heard I wanted to play guitar and immediately bought me a Spanish guitar, as if I were the next Santana. My name, along with my mom’s, was tattooed over his heart for Christ's sake.
When he wasn’t shirtless, one of my favorite places to go with him was Universal Studios. Every time we went, he would have to tell me the story of how HERE was where he and my mother had their first date. It made my heart happy and heavy-ish to know that there was a moment in time when they were right HERE doing fun things together and they probably held hands and they probably kissed (gross) and they were probably happy. They were together! Outside! Here! They went on THIS now deteriorating tram to see the backstage lot where, as the story goes, my father let out an uncharacteristically high-pitched scream when the tram fake-sunk and the animatronic JAWS shark lunged out of the water. When he took me on the same ride, he giggled the entire time and would embarrassingly over-engage with the tour guide because he was nice to everyone. Too nice to everyone.
This is going to out me as the just-about-to-mold fruit that I am, but my favorite thing at Universal Studios was the Backdraft show. For those who do not know what this is, please Google it. If you are too lazy to Google it, same, but essentially it was a pointless pyrotechnics show based on the 1991 summer hit, Backdraft, featuring a baby-faced Kurt Russel and a lot of sweaty fire scenes. Anyway, wow I just loved that show. I loved standing in the very front and feeling the really real(!) fire heating my face and everything falling above and around us. I loved the roar of the dozen fires paired with the overly dramatic movie soundtrack that was synced to the perfectly timed and contained chaos of it all. I loved that my dad laughed the entire time to make sure that I understood that it wasn’t real. I hated that my eyeballs weren’t big enough to take in this dodgy spectacle in all at once. It was tight as hell! Did I bother to learn the scientific reason for how a backdraft happened during the lead up? Absolutely not. However, this is where I began to touch every. single. doorknob. After seeing this show, I had to touch-test every doorknob for quite some time to see if the doorknob was hot - before I exposed my body to a surprise inferno. This show may have been the genesis of my neuroses, but I sincerely believed in the possibility that there could be a raging fire behind my bathroom door waiting to consume my face and family and my Eiffel 65 CD. It would be my fault that I burned all of Canoga Park down because I somehow had access to an air-tight domicile with death waiting inside.
If things are bad, you keep the door shut or else.
It wasn’t until much later that I realized that my dad took me to all these places because most of the time he had nowhere else to take me. Everywhere else was unsafe or unkind or a movie theater. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I could feel it. I remember the time I threw a fit because he didn’t have a bedroom for me to put my things in when I stayed at my aunt’s. I remember the anguish on his face, probably wishing I was older so he could explain that there was a whole world that he kept me tucked away from coming in contact with. Sometimes I wish he hadn’t because I have so many, too many questions. They come up all the time. I never knew where he was or why he was there. Sometimes he would call and sometimes he wouldn’t. Sometimes I would get a letter from jail.
The dangerous world he was shielding me from abruptly took him from me before I could ask the questions I needed to. Before I could stop being mad at him for not calling me (because I told him not to anymore) and just fucking call him. I was trying to avoid the pain and confusion he was able to cause, yet somehow it all found me tenfold. Now, I just wanna talk to the man who had no idea what the fuck a Tamagotchi was but went to two Targets to find one. I want him to tell me that it didn’t hurt in the end, despite the hurt I am left to dodge around, forever trying to get out of its way so I don’t have to face it.
I am and have been the airtight door, handle melting.
There’s no good ending to this story because, yeah, the ending was really bad.
But there are glimmers of goodness tucked in between the memories. The dinners, the music and inside jokes, the literal rollercoasters. These are the stories I need to get out of me before I implode, despite the scathing email or two that I expect in response for being too open. Despite how cringe it is to be vulnerable out loud.
I really would rather talk about silly little things like lipgloss and monster trucks, and I will, because it is my God-given right! I’d also like to attempt telling more of my truths, even the ones that aren’t very funny.
Despite whatever lies behind it, I am finally opening this door.