I live in Hollywood.
This isn’t cos I came out here from some Midwestern town, or even from boston or something. I grew up in the valley, and then I moved here. End of story. No glittery dreams, no celluloid visions. I never wanted to be an actress. Or even a makeup artist. Or a scenic artist. Or a screenplay writer. In fact, I never really knew what I wanted to be, and I still don’t know. Just because I’m writing this doesn’t necessarily mean I want to be a writer; and just cause I taught art for ten years doesn’t mean I want to be a teacher, or even that I have some hidden dream of being an artist.

And even if I do wish I could be a successful artist, or writer, or poet, I don’t know that I’d really want to BE any of those things, you know? There is a fine and delicate difference between wishing something might open itself up to you, and actually becoming that thing.

This troubles my parents deeply.

They’ve even taking to now hinting in tightening circles around the importance of my finding a good relationship with a man who’s “stable”: their shorthand for financially viable with “prospects.” I can't believe I'm hearing this kind of talk in relation to me: you always see it accomapnied by some sort of laugh track in comedies ("Honey, when are you going to find a nice man and settle down?" cue the laughter...), but I never thought it would start this soon. I'm 25. Am I out of the loop to think I shouldn't have to hear this for six, seven years yet? This sort of talk has begun in maybe the last two years now, and I think it’s because they’ve resigned themselves, not without hope but with a grim realization of my own dim “prospects,” that I need someone to support me; some moneyed man to finance my arty, flighty, wacky career sine waves and my turbulent personality—or some such thing. Whatever they think of me. However they assess me.

While I have to admit this might be nice, I don’t honestly think I will find anyone to have a relationship with whom I can both tolerate and feel attracted to and will be “financially stable,” because men like that tend to have to work a lot to be so loaded, and thus they, to some degree, even if they don’t admit it, like to work; and I think while they might find me intriguing at first, like having a circus performer over to dinner, after a while they’d quickly tire of my impractical tendencies and my stupid yammerings at attempts to do something, anything, of consequence; because I don’t believe working in an office is a thing of real consequence; besides, most men of this stripe find me weird to begin with. I just don’t think its gonna work out. Boy, will mom be disappointed.

I, however, am not disappointed.

Even though, right now, I do work in an office.