a Miss on the Hit or Miss? page of life.
But at that moment, I didn’t want to make fun of her. I related to her. I understood her. Ginger Lynn and I were both invisible in that bar, and united by our desire to get out of it. But one monumental difference was clear to me then, even if it wasn’t to her.
Ginger Lynn would definitely be back.
the seventeenth
I knocked on Tyra’s door to find out whether she would prefer an electronic or hard copy of my first draft.
“Mighty Aphrodite! I’m so thrilled to see you!”
I blushed with pride, honored that she was so excited to read my essay.
“You need to read this book,” she shouted, thrusting a hot pink paperback into my hands. “For inspiration!”
And Tyra started going on and on about how the author was one of the brightest among a new breed of social satirists, and how the Park-Avenue-born-and-bred author had reinvented the submersion genre of journalism by going undercover at a podunk New Jersey high school to see what middle-class life was like there, and how the author had crafted a
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
for the MTV generation, and how the author had eviscerated suburban culture with her razor-sharp wit and wisdom, and how the author had surprised them because as a Manhattan heirhead she had no reason to do anything with her life besides go shopping and clubbing, and how the author was being profiled in the New Jersey issue because the unreleased film version of the book was already generating a lot of bad buzz and she wanted to relaunch herself as a social activist . . .
“Have you heard of the author?” Tyra asked. “Have you read the book already?”
What to say? What to say?
Do I tell her that yes, I have not only heard of the author, Hyacinth Anastasia Wallace, and the book,
Bubblegum Bimbos and Assembly-Line Meatballers,
but I hung out with the author when she was hiding behind the name Hy and also, unintentionally, provided her with the title of her hip-hop opus? Do I tell her that I have read this book already because the “fictional” high school the author trashes, located in the “fictional” town she trashes, is none other than the very real high school in the very real town I am from, and the “fictional” characters she trashes are all based not-so-loosely on very real people I know, and the “fictional” character Jenn Sweet is none other than yours truly?
This isn’t something I brag about. It’s something new friends only find out about me through a third party, usually a Pineville resident who is proud of being immortalized with an ISBN number. I’m too embarrassed about not living up to the high standards set by my supercool fictional self. Yes, I trash people privately in the pages of this journal. And yes, I get a schadenfreudian lift from reading about people being trashed in the pages of
True.
But I think the reason I’m incredibly uncomfortable with doing the public trashing myself is because I know firsthand what it’s like to have my trust violated in that way.
Of course, if I had submitted my editorial “Miss Hyacinth Anastasia Wallace: Just Another Poseur” along with my internship application, Tyra would know this already. But I was down to my last copy and I was too lazy to go to Kinko’s and I had other Op/Ed samples ready, so I sent it without. See how one innocent decision comes back to haunt me?
“Cinthia Wallace is writing a piece for us,” Tyra said.
“She is?”
“Jiminy Cricket! Yes! She’s studying sociology and political science at Harvard. And she’s using what she’s learned there, plus her innate investigative skills, to write an in-depth piece exploring the reclamation of the term ‘guido’ from a pejorative to a positive.”
My mouth just hung open.
“What do you think of that?”
What do I think? I think I’m being ripped off, that’s what! That was my idea! Mine!
Of course, I didn’t actually say any of this.
“Holy horse hockey! What about your piece about
But at that moment, I didn’t want to make fun of her. I related to her. I understood her. Ginger Lynn and I were both invisible in that bar, and united by our desire to get out of it. But one monumental difference was clear to me then, even if it wasn’t to her.
Ginger Lynn would definitely be back.
the seventeenth
I knocked on Tyra’s door to find out whether she would prefer an electronic or hard copy of my first draft.
“Mighty Aphrodite! I’m so thrilled to see you!”
I blushed with pride, honored that she was so excited to read my essay.
“You need to read this book,” she shouted, thrusting a hot pink paperback into my hands. “For inspiration!”
And Tyra started going on and on about how the author was one of the brightest among a new breed of social satirists, and how the Park-Avenue-born-and-bred author had reinvented the submersion genre of journalism by going undercover at a podunk New Jersey high school to see what middle-class life was like there, and how the author had crafted a
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
for the MTV generation, and how the author had eviscerated suburban culture with her razor-sharp wit and wisdom, and how the author had surprised them because as a Manhattan heirhead she had no reason to do anything with her life besides go shopping and clubbing, and how the author was being profiled in the New Jersey issue because the unreleased film version of the book was already generating a lot of bad buzz and she wanted to relaunch herself as a social activist . . .
“Have you heard of the author?” Tyra asked. “Have you read the book already?”
What to say? What to say?
Do I tell her that yes, I have not only heard of the author, Hyacinth Anastasia Wallace, and the book,
Bubblegum Bimbos and Assembly-Line Meatballers,
but I hung out with the author when she was hiding behind the name Hy and also, unintentionally, provided her with the title of her hip-hop opus? Do I tell her that I have read this book already because the “fictional” high school the author trashes, located in the “fictional” town she trashes, is none other than the very real high school in the very real town I am from, and the “fictional” characters she trashes are all based not-so-loosely on very real people I know, and the “fictional” character Jenn Sweet is none other than yours truly?
This isn’t something I brag about. It’s something new friends only find out about me through a third party, usually a Pineville resident who is proud of being immortalized with an ISBN number. I’m too embarrassed about not living up to the high standards set by my supercool fictional self. Yes, I trash people privately in the pages of this journal. And yes, I get a schadenfreudian lift from reading about people being trashed in the pages of
True.
But I think the reason I’m incredibly uncomfortable with doing the public trashing myself is because I know firsthand what it’s like to have my trust violated in that way.
Of course, if I had submitted my editorial “Miss Hyacinth Anastasia Wallace: Just Another Poseur” along with my internship application, Tyra would know this already. But I was down to my last copy and I was too lazy to go to Kinko’s and I had other Op/Ed samples ready, so I sent it without. See how one innocent decision comes back to haunt me?
“Cinthia Wallace is writing a piece for us,” Tyra said.
“She is?”
“Jiminy Cricket! Yes! She’s studying sociology and political science at Harvard. And she’s using what she’s learned there, plus her innate investigative skills, to write an in-depth piece exploring the reclamation of the term ‘guido’ from a pejorative to a positive.”
My mouth just hung open.
“What do you think of that?”
What do I think? I think I’m being ripped off, that’s what! That was my idea! Mine!
Of course, I didn’t actually say any of this.
“Holy horse hockey! What about your piece about
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