July 24, 2024

Self-Loathing Is A Choice

New episode feat. Shalom Auslander, a watercolor postcard, + what happens when I procrastinate for 5 minutes on a Saturday (it's a notepad massacre)

The Virtual Memories Show News

A 2x/week email about a podcast about books & life

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This week I posted Episode 597 of The Virtual Memories Show, feat. a conversation with Shalom Auslander around his fantastic new book, FEH: A Memoir (Riverside Books). FEH explores the judgmental disgust of FEH, how it infected his life, and what it meant to get sick & tired of the disgust and outrage FEH-stival and look for a way out. We talk about the sense of shame, disgust and self-loathing at the core of humanity’s common story, why every bookstore should be called, ‘You Suck’, his friendship with the late Philip Seymour Hoffman and how they bonded over FEH, and how hard he’s worked to find the un-FEH for his kids. We get into how Story is our operating system (but what happens when there are bugs in the OS?), how the FEH machine came after his psychiatrist, his embrace of misotheism, and his video series UNGODLY where he reads the Bible and asks, ‘What if God is the antagonist?’. We also discuss his ultra-orthodox upbringing, how “Jewish heritage” has been subsumed by Holocaust memorials, his antipathy toward the pop-culture Anne Frank and how he rewrote her for HOPE: A Tragedy, his time in the advertising industry and how it led to his TV show Happyish, his bleak Peanuts parody strip that got Jeannie Schulz’s approval, the neurological condition where blind people believe they can see and how it parallels our existential state of FEH, the realization that cynicism doesn’t mean you’re smart (just lazy), and a lot more. Give it a listen! And go read FEH: A Memoir

Last week I posted Episode 596, feat. artist & illustrator Maurice Vellekoop as we celebrated his new graphic memoir, I’M SO GLAD WE HAD THIS TIME TOGETHER (Pantheon). We talked about the midlife crisis that led to the memoir (and the subsequent crisis that almost made him give up), the joy and pain of putting his life on the page, his process of self-discovery as a gay man and an artist, and why his mother hoped she wouldn’t live to see the book come out. We got into the long sigh from his partner (an editor) that told him the first draft needed a drastic rewrite, the role sublimation has played in his art & sex life, his accidental technique for drawing himself crying, his decision on how to depict sex in the book, and the realization that he had a 500-page book on his hands. We also discussed life on Toronto Island and what it was like during lockdown, his Pride tradition, why publishing a book of erotica was a great stepping-stone for making a memoir, and more. Give it a listen! And go read I’m So Glad We Had This Time Together

Recent episodes: Laura Beers • Robert Pranzatelli • Bob Fingerman • Swan Huntley • Stan Mack • Jim Moske • Adam Moss

Will No One Think Of The Notepads?

In a fit of self-loathing this weekend — ironically while procrastinating on editing this week’s episode centered on why self-loathing is not something we’re born with — I inflicted myself on a poor notepad. (Yes, there’s a Swan Huntley / You’re Grounded vibe here, sans drawings.) (No, to quote Madonna, I’m not like this all the time.)

Instaxery

No podcasts or visits with past guests last week, so no new Instax pix.

I’m going to make a book of these — Instax on left-hand page, writing on right-hand page, similar to Jarrett Earnest’s Valid Until Sunset (currently on sale from the publisher; go get it!). All the pix will be from my 2024 in-person podcasts, as well as when I get together with past guests; the pix won’t be of the people themselves, but of something of theirs, or something in their environment.

It’ll be crowdfunded, likely via Kickstarter, because let’s be honest, what publisher is going to say, “Yes, unknown late-middle-aged suburban white man, we’d love to publish your book of strange writing centered on a podcast we’ve never heard of”? So if you’ve got ideas about what sort of rewards I should make for different tiers of donors — like, things you’d love to receive if you contributed, say, $30, $40, $50 OR A WHOLE LOT MORE to this project — let me know. (Plus, ideas for stretch goals, on the remote chance people actually support this project.)

Artistry

Once again, didn’t draw anything all week, though I did go out to the art supply store to pick up a stack of sketchpads, since I apparently worked my way through the last stack of them, which is some sort of accomplishment. Anyway, this morning, just to give you something (to laugh over), I painted a postcard of dried hibiscus leaves. I used Caran D’Ache FIBRALO brush-pens, + a watercolor brush, basically limiting myself to two colors (I added a little yellow for some highlights). You should go to the Flickr album of most of the art I’ve made & find something you like.

Postcardery

Let me know if you want to be on my postcard-a-day list. (Financial supporters of the podcast get a hand-drawn/painted postcard as a thank-you. I’m falling behind on those; better get to making some art after I send the above one out!)

One of the great things about sending out a postcard every day is that people sometimes write back. One of the worst things is when people write me an email to tell me they got my postcard.

And sometimes they send postcards that make me laugh very hard, like this one:

Until Next Time

Thanks for reading this far! I’ll be back on Sunday (from another undisclosed location!) with links, books, & workouts, and on Wednesday with a new episode, and maybe some art & more Instax.

Why do all the things I say / Sound like the stupid things I've said before?,