Parallel Lives

I suppose in some different timeline, I would be a troubled movie star.

But in some strange Venn diagram, all the bad luck things that happen to a Hollywood movie star have already bled into this life.

At 19, I spent time in a psych ward following an overdose. That same year, I was raped.

At 35, I went to rehab for alcoholism following my mother’s untimely death.

In between, I’ve had my fair share of failed love affairs and closets full of fantastic clothes, a suitcase full of records, and a library full of the finest books.

Today, my PRNs got taken away from my underwear drawer at the sober living house. I don’t know who ratted me out, only that the fallout wasn’t nearly as nuclear as I thought it would be. I don’t imagine my stash of Midol and Motrin and herbal anti-anxiety supplements would raise much ire, but I despise not being able to grab them myself when I need them.

The only difference between the parallel universe where I am an actress in motion pictures is the flow of work I’d be doing, but who knows if I would have made it as big as Meryl Streep or Winona Ryder or any of the actresses I idolize. I may have made one stellar motion picture and then burnt out in some Cronenbergian/Lynchian palm tree fire on the slopes of Laurel Canyon.

In this life, I’ve held a number of odd jobs. Once as an Editor-in-Chief, the other time as a chef, once as a copywriter for an ad agency, and once upon a time as a Marketing Specialist for a nonprofit. All jobs, like my parallel career as a motion picture actress, burnt out after some time.

I look at the ashes and rubble of my trouble. The chipped obsidian of my bad luck gleaming beneath the moonless sky of my existential dread.

Good thing I have plenty of cigarettes.