Heather Havrilesky schrijft,<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A few years ago, I was sitting around in my mother\u2019s house during a summer trip back to my hometown (where I now live), and she pulled out a book written in Swedish. The book had passages about a small town where some of her ancestors lived. Don\u2019t worry, this isn\u2019t a post about genealogy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So I picked up the book and began reading it in my best Swedish Chef from \u201cThe Muppet Show\u201d accent. Soon I stumbled on a series of intriguing words:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWow!\u201d I said. \u201cWhat do you think that means?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cProbably children and grandchildren or something like that,\u201d my mom said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We Googled it and she was right. Barn is children, barnbarn is grandchildren, and barnbarnsbarn is great grandchildren. This struck me as incredible \u2014 as in almost<\/em> fantastical<\/em>. Imagine if this was your native tongue! <\/p>\n\n\n\n Or imagine that you created<\/em> this language. Imagine you started with a word, let\u2019s say nerf<\/em>, and then you assigned it a meaning, children<\/em>. Now when you want to express your children\u2019s children, you can just say nerfnerf<\/em>. And when you want to talk about your children\u2019s children\u2019s children, naturally you\u2019re going to say nerfnerfsnerf<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now imagine you\u2019re writing a book. Instead of writing \u201cAll of her descendants were in the room there, all the way down to her great grandchildren,\u201d you write something like \u201cGathered there were her nerf, nerfnerf, and nerfnerfsnerf!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n So much better, really! You\u2019re such<\/em> a good writer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/p>\n\n\n\n For the rest of the day, pacing around my mother\u2019s house, and at lunch, and later at the dinner table, I couldn\u2019t stop saying those words. They sounded like a line from the Swedish Chef\u2019s opening song:<\/p>\n\n\n\n Barn, barnbarn, och barnbarnsbarn!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n My siblings and my husband and even my own children grew quickly annoyed with me. And maybe you\u2019re annoyed, too. Maybe you hate Sweden and puppets and Swedish puppets the most of all, plus you\u2019re still wondering whether or not my mother visited that basement in Salt Lake City where they keep all of the genealogy records. Yes, she visited that basement. My mother doesn\u2019t half-ass that sort of thing. She flew all the way to Utah to look with her own eyes at those records, which the Mormons are keeping for all of us<\/em> for some reason, possibly because they\u2019re just super polite and helpful or possibly thanks to some fun little eccentricity of Joseph Smith\u2019s that involves studying the genetic code of wicked heretics so they can be permanently erased from the planet at some blessed day in the distant future, leaving extra space for extra wives. Just for example.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Oh, I have many Mormon friends and Swedish relatives so I\u2019m allowed<\/em> to make fun of their religion and their language, respectively. The long hours I\u2019ve logged with my Mormon friends \u2014 all of us throwing our heads back and laughing good-naturedly about quirky, delightful Joseph Smith and his fascinating notions about the apocalypse \u2014 have earned me this right. I\u2019m also allowed to mock the Swedish language and to encounter an accent given to a puppet in 1976 as a useful map of how that language should sound, because my genes share some key genetic sequences with that puppet. So why don\u2019t you<\/em> stay in your<\/em> not-related-to-a-Swedish-puppet lane already?<\/p>\n\n\n\n And listen, if it\u2019s up to me, all of my barn and barnbarn och barnbarnsbarn will cultivate a rich family tradition of singing the Swedish Chef song every year at Christmastime, or as they call it in Sweden, FARFAR JUL TID, which means, quite literally, \u201cBreak out your vapes, kids, because \u2018tis the season to GET LIT.<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once after a few lunches and dinners in my company, a very respected TV journalist said to me, \u201cYou\u2019re not a collector, you\u2019re an inventor.\u201d This was her exceedingly polite way of saying, \u201cYou\u2019re pretty full of shit\u201d or as Logan Roy put it, \u201cYou\u2019re not a serious person.\u201d But she might\u2019ve also meant \u201cYou\u2019re an artist, not a journalist\u201d or \u201cYou don\u2019t want to gather facts, you want to pull something straight out of the deepest, darkest caverns of your ass.\u201d But mostly what she meant was, \u201cIt\u2019s sometimes hard to remember what purpose you serve, but I\u2019ll give you the benefit of the doubt for as long as it takes to finish this drink.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Everyone I\u2019ve ever known reaches this point with me. And to be fair, it\u2019s hard for me<\/em> to remember what purpose I serve a lot of the time. But that journalist friend was right about one thing: My ability to thrive depends on my ability to invent. I am unable to follow someone else\u2019s map forward, and the second I start doing something that fifty other people can do just as well, I need to quit that thing and do something else.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This sounds competitive because it is. I am a competitive person. I would guess that most people who want to invent weird shit rather than collecting facts and stats and gluing the facts together with some quotes from local experts \u2014 see how I\u2019m making most nonfiction writing sound like a second grader\u2019s collage made from pictures cut out of magazines? \u2014 are also pretty competitive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n All I mean is that I\u2019ve never had much respect for a giant collection of facts. A big messy pile of facts isn\u2019t evidence of good ideas or liquid intelligence, it\u2019s just a bunch of souvenirs from places you\u2019ve been. So what?<\/em> I can visit there, too, just by pulling out my phone and saying \u201cSIRI, TELL ME ABOUT THE MING DYNASTY.\u201d See how competitive? I don\u2019t want to stand on the shoulders of my fader, farfar, och farfarsfarfarfar. I want to build my own ladder STRAIGHT TO THE MOON!<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n You can be so competitive that it makes you a little stupid. That\u2019s me. I don\u2019t want to know too much about a lot of things, because I\u2019m worried that those facts could take up valuable storage space in my increasingly limited warehouse of a brain. Once upon a time, my brain was a vast, empty Amazon warehouse three blocks long and two blocks wide, so I could afford to learn about, you know, the French revolution or the horticultural practices in Sub-Saharan Africa. But these days, my brain is more like the trash compactor in \u201cStar Wars\u201d: There\u2019s already so much random, pointless bullshit in there, and the walls keep closing in, and everything is getting smashed together and crushed to pieces. The French revolution used to have room to stretch its white-stocking-clad legs, but lately it\u2019s been reduced to \u201cJefferson was there for a minute\u201d and \u201cPeople set up barricades in the streets kind of like they did in the second half of Les Miserables<\/em>.\u201d The French revolution inside my brain is mostly just Kirsten Dunst and Cosette eating a cake with pink frosting and singing \u201cBut the tigers come at night!<\/em>\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Not my fault. I don\u2019t have the storage space to be a collector. I can organize my stuff better, sure. I can throw stuff out occasionally. But I can\u2019t take in new facts. They don\u2019t spark joy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And look, my focus isn\u2019t on information or knowledge anymore. Fuck knowledge! All that junk is just going to turn into splintered trash sooner or later. That\u2019s not my top priority. Right now, my top priority is to keep my one little sea monster buddy alive for as long as possible. You know, the one who lives in the trash compactor? He\u2019s the guy who makes all the magic happen.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I need him slithering around and pulling people into the murky trash water. That\u2019s how we make the donuts around here. We pull people into the muck and listen to their screams. Wow, that was probably the inspiration for Dagobah, now that I think about it! George Lucas probably loved that trash compactor scene so much that years later, he\u2019d stay up late at night, congratulating himself (masturbating) over how thrillingly creepy it was to see Luke pulled under the brown water. <\/p>\n\n\n\n See how creative my stupid mind gets, when you send it the message that FACTS NO MATTER AT ALL and tiden \u00e4r obegr\u00e4nsad?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n My mind is a hungry garbage monster. It doesn\u2019t want to eat crushed up facts. It wants soupy brown muck and tender farmer boys from Tatooine who dream of traveling to distant planets. Mmm, garbage monster love<\/em> crushed dreams! So yummy!<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yesterday my husband wanted to tell me something he read about in the news. He\u2019s always doing that, the absolute pest<\/em>. He\u2019s always reading the New York Times<\/em> or Defector<\/em> or some other shit and then recounting some part of what he just read. He sounds terrible, right? I mean, wtf, right?<\/p>\n\n\n\n I could practically hear the facts rattling around in his brain warehouse, ready to be blown out of his industrial dumbwaiter of a mouth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou know, yesterday I was\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIf this is about politics or sports or something, I don\u2019t want to know,\u201d I said. \u201cIf it\u2019s emotional or personal or it\u2019s some idea or concept you\u2019re turning around in your head\u2026\u201d (this was wishful thinking on my part) \u201cthen I want to hear all about it, but if you want to tell me something about RFK Jr. or Phil Mickelson or what David Roth said on his podcast, then no.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n My husband just looked at me. See, he\u2019s with me because I surprise him all the time. Jot this down ladies: Keep \u2018em off balance!<\/em> They eat it up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cYou\u2019re\u2026\u201d He was about to say impossible<\/em> or annoying<\/em> or the worst<\/em> so I hushed him. I don\u2019t want those harsh words weighing on him, giving him a guilty conscience. I want him to feel unencumbered, free, so I generously interrupted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cI started writing a new book this morning,\u201d I said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s all big ideas right now. Big, big, BIG<\/em> ideas. And in order for those great big ideas to give birth to large-ish ideas which will give birth to smaller ideas, I need to steer clear of media pollution.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n I really did use those words: Media pollution. I meant frivolous factoids and weighty world events alike. I meant all news from the outside world is poisonous to me at this particular moment. I meant I need my garbage monster to eat a whole village full of tender farm boys who dream of far-away galaxies. I meant I need my garbage monster to grow fat on succulent twice-smashed dreams and fallen hopes three ways, fat enough to give birth to other slithering garbage monsters who will, in turn, give birth to even more<\/em>garbage monsters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I meant that I need my pathetic trash compactor of a brain to be filled to the brim with slithering garbage monsters of all sizes, barn and barnbarn and barnbarnsbarn.<\/p>\n\n\n\n (The accent is on the middle syllable, by the way: barn BARNS<\/em> barn.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n I need to get obsessed. That\u2019s what I meant. Obsessed enough that I can swat away all insignificant information that is not nutritive to my garbage monsters. And the tiny little cracks filled with air and murky trash water in my trash compactor brain must go to my children and also to my friends and also to my mother. My children are teenagers and they need to talk about whatever, anything and everything, while I listen very closely and remember everything. My friends are new friends here, so they require close listening, too, particularly when you get two of them together and they\u2019ve known each other for years and you have none of their shared history so you have to listen with all of your might, just to keep track of various first marriages and failed businesses and dead aunts and so forth. And my mother is 81 years old and she\u2019s the most interesting person I know but many of the other<\/em>people in my family (not naming any names here) don\u2019t listen to her closely enough (MY HUSBAND! Wtf, right? What an asshole!).<\/p>\n\n\n\n So that means that my husband needs to not say words out of his dumbwaiter mouth while all of my various generations of garbage monster, my skr\u00e4p havsmonster barnbarnsbarnbarnsbarn<\/em>, are feasting on my gigantic new thoughts and brilliant new ideas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n ***<\/p>\n\n\n\n Now let\u2019s use our imaginations. Imagine, for a second, being my husband and learning that you\u2019re not allowed to say words unless they\u2019re emotional or<\/em>they pertain directly to something your 81-year-old mother-in-law just said. I mean, what a surprise, to fall in love with someone young and charming and wake up more than a decade later to THAT? What a deliciously unexpected plot twist, right? What an absolute TURN ON, innit?<\/p>\n\n\n\n Keep \u2018em guessing, ladies!<\/em> Keep \u2018em off balance, on their toes, trying to understand what the hell happened to their lives and who the fuck you are and what you\u2019re even talking about. Pure seduction! First rule to a good marriage: BE INSCRUTABLE.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Second rule? Feed your garbage monsters. They\u2019re the ones that keep the magic alive. Get obsessed with their mental wellness, their oral hygiene. Go full Tiger Mom on your garbage monsters. Make them take up the oboe. Send them to tennis camp.<\/p>\n\n\n\n That\u2019s how you become a legend. Then your descendants don\u2019t need to go to some dank basement in Salt Lake City to know that you\u2019re their mormor or their gammelmormor or that you stole their farfarsfar\u2019s jul and got high as a drake with Drake at jultid one year. Because it\u2019s the stuff of legend. You wrote a whole goddamn book about it, a book packed not with neat little factoids and expert quotes but with ABSOLUTE FUCKING MADNESS, filled to the brim with garbage and garbage monsters alike, charmig and optimistisk and sexig and f\u00f6rf\u00f6risk.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n Normally I would not be so concerned with my legacy. But you have to be thinking competitively to start a book. It\u2019s not possible otherwise. To make something truly great, you have to think of yourself as a legend. I learned that from Drake one fateful Christmas eve. Or that\u2019s what my garbage monsters are telling me, anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Legend, One monster’s trash is another monster’s treasure<\/em> \u2013 Ask Molly<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Heather Havrilesky schrijft, A few years ago, I was sitting around in my mother\u2019s house during a summer trip back to my hometown (where I now live), and she pulled out a book written in Swedish. The book had passages about a small town where some of her ancestors lived. Don\u2019t worry, this isn\u2019t aRead more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[693,122],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68081"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68081"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68082,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68081\/revisions\/68082"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.imhd.nl\/log\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}