Category Archive

My Uncle is getting married, which is nerve-wracking because my Mother will likely attend, and any family gathering with my Mother involved is likely to attract police, ambulances, curious townspeople, and will require years of therapy to erase from all of our brains.  My Uncle is her youngest sibling, and they also had a sister who was next eldest, but she passed away in a car accident a while ago, when she was only 26 years old.  I was fifteen when she died, living in Ohio with my Dad, and I had been to her wedding a few summers before: a glorious affair and a testament to her loveliness that she married her long-term boyfriend’s best friend and her ex-boyfriend was not only okay with that, he was in their wedding party.  She had long bone-straight black hair, an Italian beauty, and was gentle natured and kind to the flock of nieces and nephews my Mom would parade through her apartment in Boston every year for the Boston Marathon.  I remember she always had M and M’s for us, and we never had candy in our house so that was a treat in itself.  She ran the Marathon every year, and we would stand by the roadside at the bottom of Heartbreak Hill and give the runners oranges and wait for her to come by.  Shortly after her wedding, my Aunt was in the back seat of a car when it was hit by a drunk driver and she went right through the roof.

She survived, and was in a coma for a while, and woke up blind.  I still have the note she sent me in Ohio after she woke up which looks like it was written by a third grader.  She lived another year, and then died on a postponed honeymoon to Jamaica, I guess her head could not handle the traveling.  It is beyond heartbreaking that somehow she was taken from this Earth and my Mother is still here, making all of our lives a tiny bit less bearable.    I am hoping my Mom passes through this family event without incident, but it would be shocking if she could concede the spotlight.  She has softened over the years, with age and ailing health, so we might have a chance of escaping this wedding without her usual bouts of hysterical blindness or severe Munchausen’s syndrome in which she suddenly takes on, for example, the symptoms of my disease.  For my birthday this year she sent me an easel, and canvases and paint supplies, not even knowing my penchant for painting the words of T.S. Eliot crudely on canvases and distributing them to friends who all, in seemingly unrelated incidents, dump me soon afterwards.  It was an incredibly generous gift, completely unlike her, and although it was preceded by hundreds of phone calls announcing its imminent arrival, it was deeply appreciated and gives me a small bit of hope that she will attend my Uncle’s wedding graciously and surprise everyone, just like I was surprised two weeks after my birthday when the package of art supplies actually came in the mail.

It was really late, maybe 4 A.M one night when I had the urge to send Sarah an email. There is a reason these impulses only happen under the cover of night: in the light of day it might be embarrassing to chase down a girl who was at one time my best friend and has not wanted anything to do with me for years. But recent events have brought on introspection, regret, remorse, and most of all a desperate need to figure out what went so wildly wrong with my life. What’s funny is, I have been kind of – dare I say – happy lately, as happy as a single, family-less, ex-party girl can be, so I don’t quite know what I am searching for. I love my new apartment, it is spacious and comfortable and allows for beachside bike rides and barbeques, and I don’t like going out much anymore so I have more than enough friends. I have a relatively quiet job assisting a group of nerdy television writers who are quick to compliment my often sequined outfits and sun-kissed hair. I don’t have a boyfriend but I have a boyfriend-like guy who is great company and who makes out with me sometimes when I am not feeling well, and maybe I don’t have that girl I talk to a hundred times a day anymore, but I hate the phone anyway and I have a pen pal to whom I can tell anything, so there doesn’t seem to be too much more need for co-dependency in my life. But for some reason I emailed Sarah, just to tell her I am writing again, and show her the generosity of spirit I wish more people would show me, and she wrote back, cheerful as ever, as if we had continued talking eighty-five times a day this whole time, and I remembered that I always thought she should have a permanent exclamation point at the end of her name: “Sarah!” should be her legal name because she always seems happy to hear from you.

So we arranged to have drinks, and I am prepared for an ambush, but I don’t feel inculpable enough to prevent an onslaught of criticism, and I hope I don’t become so nervous I revert back to the manic and high-strung person she decided to abandon years ago. I miss Sarah terribly, just because it always made me feel great that someone as good-hearted as her would choose to have me as a friend, but I am not naive enough to think we will ever be friends again, for I am afraid too much has passed between these smiles. Still it will be nice to see her, I heard she is getting married and I am glad to see at least one of our lives turned out the way it was supposed to.

D-GIRL was a development girl in Hollywood and New York City for many years. While finding projects for actors, directors and producers to make into movies, she amassed a number of salacious tales of questionable morality that became an internet column entitled “D-Girl Diary.” She left show business to become a full-time writer in 2001.

(d girls image artist Tashina Suzuki)

There has been so much change in my life in the past month it seems almost contrived: if I were making this up, a good writer would tell me it’s too much. First, my Non-Boyfriend has decided he would rather spend time by himself than hang out in the eye of the storm with me, so I have not heard from him or seen him in a while. I moved to the beach and decided to start telling the truth for a change, and he lives on the other side of the world from me, in West Hollywood, and prefers fantasy to reality, and in retrospect if I had wanted this Non-Relationship to prosper I would have stayed holed up in Korea Town in my studio, but I opted for the lavish and pure life of Oceanside living, so I will be single for a while more, until I meet some tousle-haired beach bum who won’t mind my histrionics if it means a hot meal and a warm place to sleep. Second, I seem to have happened upon the only Hollywood assistant job that is actually, painfully boring, I think I would be better off working in an accountant’s office, or proof-reading M and M’s. There is not enough work to go around in our office. I would fire my unpaid intern if he was not so handsome and precocious: he knows the Box Office Gross of any movie ever made. He is like a film-geek Rainman.

I have also been really sick for a little over a month now. It started with a dumb virus but just like everything associated with my disease, it has morphed and degenerated and it started affecting my speech and ability to walk. It was hard to be cute for a while there, and even though I didn’t miss a day of work, I spent a good deal of the past month researching for our writers behind my computer and trying to act like I was be-bopping to music on my Itunes so nobody could tell that my arms and legs were jerking around because I was so sick. I don’t have an official Los Angeles Multiple Sclerosis Doctor yet, partly because I needed a reason to fly back to my beloved New York City every six months, but this past month I was sick enough to start doctor shopping out here, and I finally settled on the Amazing Dr. Wong, a gorgeous, tall Asian (!) Man whose teeth actually twinkle when he smiles. Dr. Wong is one of those people you just know was potty trained before he was a year old, and probably taught himself to read by age two. His movie star good looks and list of celebrity clientele, including the unstoppably quirky Miss Teri Garr, made him an easy choice against my Insurance covered doctors who all have offices on Alvarado Street and take patients on Saturday. It takes six months to get an appointment with Dr. Wong, and I will be paying thousands to be neglected by yet another stunningly handsome, elusive man. I may be single, and sick, and working a job far beneath my Masters Education and impressive resume, but I have the same doctor as an Actress I have admired since her role as the crazy Mousetrap lady in Scorsese’s After Hours and I live at the beach: this really is where people come to live out their dreams.

D-GIRL was a development girl in Hollywood and New York City for many years. While finding projects for actors, directors and producers to make into movies, she amassed a number of salacious tales of questionable morality that became an internet column entitled “D-Girl Diary.”

When I visit New York City it’s like seeing a boyfriend you sleep with occasionally and each time you see each other you pick up right where you left off.  This trip it was crowded and smelly, as usual, and exciting and vivacious, and there was some crazy car bomb parked a few blocks from my apartment: people and cities rarely ever really change.  I went to New York to see my doctor, because I have not found a good neurologist in LA yet, but the doctor’s appointment was almost an afterthought to seeing friends and cousins and going to a Yankee Game.  Nobody in that city seemed to care that I am trying to clean up my act and live a better life: I wasn’t treated any better, given any special sidewalk space or a reprieve from a long line.  That’s what I love about New York: it’s a narcissistic city and completely self-absorbed, just like all the men I date.  I’m uncomfortable with affection, have serious intimacy issues, and I feel completely at home being abused by this city.  As I walked down the streets feeling slightly ill the other day, the buildings spun around me and I swayed and wobbled, and almost fell about ten times: nobody even noticed.  It reminded me of growing up as the middle child of a huge family, when I was sick my Mom would say, “You’ll live.” And maybe give me a can of ginger ale.  For a nurse with eight small children, she did not have the gentlest of bedside manners.

Back in Los Angeles, I have moved to the beach.  Now that I’m living in a spacious ocean chalet I’m wondering why I didn’t make this move a while ago, but I suppose I felt comfortable suffering in my crime-ridden Korea Town studio. I don’t even know what to do with all this new space, it looks like I am squatting, but I finally feel like I belong out here: if I start making any kind of money as a writer there is an imminent danger I might actually be a carefree, happy Beachcombing California Girl.  My Old Boss who is now my New Boss was nice about me taking off to New York for a few days, but now that I am back he has tasked me with coming up with new ideas for television shows because the show we are working on has been tanking in the ratings.  I was hired to assist the writers on the show but my Boss has been using me more and more to assist him: his real assistant is a cocky, good-looking kid who thinks he is too cool to do menial tasks for my Boss.  Even with my luxurious new Oceanside apartment and my recent coast-to-coast jaunt, I am not too cool for grunt work, and Hollywood will always make me feel like I am cheating on New York – my flippant, cool boyfriend — with some guy who surfs and sleeps until noon.

D-GIRL was a development girl in Hollywood and New York City for many years. While finding projects for actors, directors and producers to make into movies, she amassed a number of salacious tales of questionable morality that became an internet column entitled “D-Girl Diary.” She left show business to become a full-time writer in 2001.

I have only been at my new job a few days and I already have the feeling it’s not going to last very long. I get nervous when I meet new people: I want them to like me almost pathologically, so I haven’t stopped talking for three straight days. I don’t know why I think people want to listen to me talk for that long, but silence makes me anxious, so I talk and talk, and because there is not much to talk about, most of the things coming out of my mouth are untrue. I spent last night looking this up on the internet, and apparently it’s a real psychological malady called Compulsive Lying Disorder and I stayed up until three in the morning reading message boards about the condition. I am suddenly empowered by the fact that my dishonesty has a clinical name, and there are other people who walk around telling lies all day. Although some of the people in the online forums are clearly wasting the opportunity to have a medical community recognize their amorality as a sickness, like the guy who says he has been telling people he is a vegetarian for years but secretly eating meat. I can’t believe I have never looked into this before, I have been in four mental hospitals and lost about thirty really good friends, and until now I have chalked this up to my eccentric nature. I remember the Sarah with the Big Boobs telling me people in Los Angeles talk about me worse than they talk about their dogs: I guess this is what she was talking about.

I’ve never really been called out about my lying before, I guess I’m good at it, but I think some people have been suspicious over the years, because unless my friends and family think I like driving around in an antique car, they are probably aware I have not exactly achieved the level of success I tout in my stories. As I’ve gotten a little older, I have grown weary of making things up, at this point I mostly just cover up for all the lies I told in the past, but since this is a new job and I want to impress everyone, I have gotten a few classics out of the hall closet and brushed them off, such as the imminent nature of my book publishing, which in actuality is a deal I lost a long time ago having never handed in the manuscript. I remember hearing from the Billionaire’s Daughter a while ago that Fifi doubted I actually have Multiple Sclerosis. Sigh. I wish I had made that one up, and if I had I would have picked a disease that had a name I could pronounce.