Are You Interesting or Are You Performing?
John Gregory Dunne and Joan Didion
*AN EXCERPT VIA DEAR CITY GIRL, SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE SHORT STORIES, ARCHIVED LETTERS AND DISCOUNTS ON MERCH AND FREELANCER FOR HIRE POST.
Aren’t we all performing? For an audience so imaginary that from the second we get ourselves out of bed each morning, we are playing our role of a lifetime. The morning person. Some do it for the content, which means they have to get up once to press record, get back into bed, perfecting their bed tousled hair, until on the count of three, they arise camera ready. For the non-performers, such as myself, who become fully awake when I’ve seen what I look like in the mirror. Total bedhead, face feels flat or sometimes looks bloated depending on what I ate or drank the night before. Not camera friendly.
I am not a walking aesthetic like the girls you see in street style videos with much planned out outfits. Nor am I the girl you’ll meet through a friend, at a social gathering where I divulge every topic of interest I attach myself to. You know this type. An hour after being introduced everyone is well aware how much yoga she does a week, that she’s into reiki, lived in Alaska for two years with her boyfriend, but for now they’ve settled in BedStuy, loves to travel, their next move might be Dublin Ireland where she’s always wanted to since she lived there as a kid, yet she mispronounces Cillian Murphy’s first name with a “S”. She performed her little song and dance to let everyone know that she’s having a good life. Honestly, there’s nothing wrong with that. Out of all those tidbits, the one I was most interested in was her time in Alaska. Why is a bag of Cool Ranch Doritos something insane, like $35 for one bag (saw it on a TikTok)? And I could’ve asked her, but learning her life dossier tired me out. Alaska is Alaska. And not being able to say a famous person’s name correctly, especially if you’ve heard it enough for an entire year plus a three month awards season — I didn’t find her interesting at all.
