“Girls” recap: Acting on impulse

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 13:11:00 +0000

Being over the edge can actually be embarrassingly useful. It, like losing one's job, forces confrontations mere happenstance cannot easily achieve. In reasonable doses, it's the means by which we erode meaningless bonds, break people down to their elements, and collapse all the strictures polite society was designed to achieve.

BUT NOT QUITE YET.

As we begin this season's penultimate episode, we slide up into what I have begun to think of as a Dunhamian shot: the bed and bedroom seen from the side, like Freud's ideal diorama. In this bedroom are the yet-more-encoupled Nat (Natalia) and Adam, about to make love. We know this because Natalia says, “I'm ready to have sex now,” telling Adam “You've been really nice all week,” then laying out information and prohibitions, including “no soft touching” (takes her out of the moment) and coming outside (“I'm on the pill”). Though his expression is briefly inscrutable, Adam reacts to these proscriptions with relief. “I will do all of those things ... I like how clear you are with me.” How, responds Natalia beatifically, could a person do anything any other way?

My own sober miracle

Sat, 12 Jan 2013 16:00:00 +0000

I’m not sure how many times I’ve heard some asshole at an AA meeting telling some poor newcomer, "Hey, don't quit before the miracle happens." It’s one of the many seemingly meaningless platitudes repeated over and over again in 12-Step rooms.

It wasn’t a saying I’ve really thought all that much about, and when I did, I’d just think it sounded dumb. Still, at the same time, I guess I was sort of waiting around for some kind of miracle to happen. Not that I believe in God. But I figured if I worked hard enough, eventually something would come along. It's human nature.

And then, not that long ago, I guess it did come along.

But the truth is that there have been a lot of miracles in my life since getting sober. There are the two books I’ve written and the novel I just sold. There is the fact that I re-met my future wife after not having seen her for 15 years, though we were best friends throughout middle school and I was in love with her the whole time. There is the miracle of how much I’ve come to love my life now, after having been so fucking deeply unhappy for so very long. There is the miracle of my relationship with my family and my friends and two dogs and one cat.

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“Girls” recap: Acting on impulse

My own sober miracle