I SHOULD START OFF by saying that I am one of the only television writers I know who is not depressed. I’m not saying this to brag. God knows I have my own issues. For instance, I’m almost certain I suffer from undiagnosed cases of paranoia, irrational snacking, abrupt rage, and borderline clinical-level superficiality. I’m just bringing it up because depression is something that I’ve come to accept from my creative community and I realize that’s probably alien to most people. I don’t know why the funniest people I know are also depressed. In my mind I’ve romanticized it as the tragic price you pay to be gifted, like Mozart dying at thirty-five. It’s sad that so many of my friends suffer this way.
I am grateful that I am a naturally cheerful person. That said, I am also a very anxious and high-strung person. Remember that kid who showed up forty-five minutes early to the SATs with eleven pencils and a huge black coffee? That was me. When I was a writer on season 1 of The Office I probably slept an average of three hours a night because I was so worried about being fired.
In my thirties, I gained a sense of calm that came from professional stability and, although this is not backed by science, a general slowing of my metabolism, which is why I can gain seven pounds from eating one heavy dinner. As calm as I might be, still, about once a month, I wake up at four a.m. and lie in the dark worrying about the same handful of things. I thought I would share them with you.
1. Did I leave my flat iron on?
2. Why was there so much hair in the shower drain? Am I going bald? Will I need to invest in a wig?
3. Where will I even keep my wigs? I have no room left! I keep shoes in my oven!
4. Why are my legs covered in small itchy bites? Do I have bed bugs? Do I not wash my sheets enough? Am I gross?
5. I have no idea if I am getting ripped off financially. I pay bills without reading any of the fine print. How much should a gas bill be? What does gas cost? Is gas the same as gasoline?
6. I am living beyond my means. Why did I buy that stupid photo at that charity auction? I’m not so rich that I can be buying photos! I don’t even understand photography! I only bought it because I had wanted to seem classy and had two glasses of wine!
7. Do I have a drinking problem?
8. What if that young stranger who wrote me asking me to coffee to “pick my brain,” and whom I declined because I was too busy, ends up being the next Alexander Payne and never forgives me?
9. When I watch movies and TV I am looking for things to dislike rather than things to like.
10. I will never have a husband and all my female acquaintances will.
11. I will have a husband and he will be like my female acquaintances’ husbands.
12. What if I will never be one of the “greats”? What if I’m only one of the “fines”?
13. What if that commenter on the message boards who posts constantly that I’m an “ugly fat Indian girl who looks like a turd” is someone I know socially?
14. I am too cavalier about the crazy things I say out loud and someone will write about them in a tell-all.
15. I will never be famous enough for someone to write a tell-all about me.
16. People at work laugh at the things I say only because I pay them.
17. People at work don’t laugh enough. Don’t they know I’m paying them?!
18. What if I have an early-stage cancer that has not been detected?
19. Is my father lonely? Would he tell me if he was?
20. What if my kids are really young when I die because I waited too long to have them?
21. What if no one loves me except my blood relatives?
22. What if I forget the sound of my mother’s voice?
23. What if God is not really out there?
24. What if I have nothing to say?
25. Do I have too much to say and not enough time?
They’re awful fears. They’re sweat-through-your-nightgown-into-your-sheets fears. I don’t wish them on any of you. But if you have them too, that makes me feel better. And if you feel better knowing that I have them, I’m happy.
Then, miraculously, after agonizing in the dark, my eyelids get heavy, my body un-tenses, and a rolling wave of sleep passes over me. I fall asleep, my fears evaporating like the water in the humidifier by my bed.