Dear Sugar,
I have no idea what I’m doing with my life. I know that’s normal for someone in his or her mid-twenties, but I seriously have no idea. In two months I will no longer be able to stay where I’m living now for free. I have little money, and no concrete options. I could return home and get a dead-end job, which seems like mental suicide. I could go back to where I lived before I took this six-month siesta, but that feels like moving backwards, and I want to keep moving forward. I could move to a new city, a new place, but where? I can’t even narrow down a country, let alone a city, or what I would like to do there. I don’t even know how to make the decision–based on place, based on opportunities available, based on interests, based on … a whim? I don’t know the necessary information to even articulate the question of what to do next. I feel like a third grader whose teacher has asked them what they’d like to be when they grow up. The possibilities are endless, but I have no concept of what any choice would realistically entail. Please help.
Playing Grown-Up
Dear Playing Grown-Up,
You know those scenes in movies where one of the characters—it’s pretty much always a woman—becomes so hysterical and unreasonable that another one of the characters—it’s pretty much always a man—either slaps the woman or tosses a glass of water in her face so she’ll shut the fuck up and think straight? Imagine me doing that to you right now, my darling infant baboon. Only imagine it soft and sweet and Sugar style.
Done? Done!
Okay, so let’s see what we’ve got here:
No money + no (free) place to live (soon) + no idea what you’re “doing with your life” + no “concrete options” + no willingness to mooch off of mama and papa + no impulse to go back to where you were previously living + no idea where to live next + no desires based on geography, jobs or personal interests = You really are going to make me tell you what to do, aren’t you?
Good thing Sugar likes that, honey pie.
Option 1: Walk out the front door tomorrow and make your rounds at the various semi-swanky restaurants in the city where you now reside for no other reason than you have a temporary, free place to live. Wear something nice. Arrive between the hours of 2:30 and 4:30. Ask to see the manager. Say, “Hello, my name is Playing Grown-Up and I would like to apply for a job.” Repeat until you find one. You will then have a purpose. Your purpose will be to work maniacally for hours on end either washing dishes, tossing salads, burning your fingers on the grill, bringing people their food and beverages, or clearing their dirty glasses and plates away. This will destroy your spirit, but it will be good for your soul. You’ll make money. You’ll meet interesting, bitter, amazing, alcoholic and beautiful people. Some of them will help you understand what it is you want to do with your life. These people will still be your friends in thirty years.
Option 2: Visit the web site: http://www.wwoofusa.org/ and become a member. It only costs $20. You will then have access to more than a thousand organic farms in the United States that provide free meals and housing in exchange for work. You can go from one place to the next until you figure out where you want to be, geographically-speaking. You’ll meet all kinds of really funky people and learn about ecological farming practices. You’ll eat incredibly fresh vegetables and very possibly get laid in a barn.
Option 3: Stop asking yourself what you want, what you desire, what interests you. Ask yourself instead: What has been given to me? Ask: What do I have to give back? Make a list. Make the list very long. Then give it, my addled friend. Give it.
Yours,
Sugar
Dear Sugar,
I just turned 35 and I’m still single. I’ve been reading nerve.com and I like the articles and thought I would post a personals ad. As I look at the other ads I see that most people are pretty open about freakiness in bed. I’m not shy, but I think sex is best discovered in the bedroom. I filled out the ad and thought I did a pretty good job. Should I give it a go even if I’m not an uber gutter punk? I’m just sketched people will think I’m a freak upon meeting me.
Thanks!
Sketched
Dear Sketched,
You know that ass-kickingly fantastic album “Exile in Guyville” by Liz Phair? On it, there’s a song called “Flower” that goes, “I want to be your blowjob queen / You’re probably shy and introspective / That’s not part of my objective / I just want your fresh, young jimmy / Jamming, slamming, ramming in me…Everything you ever thought of is / Everything I’ll do to you /I’ll fuck you till your dick is blue.”
Wow. I love that song! Every time I hear it I have to keep myself from grabbing the next man I see and offering to be his blowjob queen. I mean, not even because I’m horny! Just because Liz Phair makes it sound like such damn hot fun!
And then there’s this other song on the album called “Fuck and Run” that goes, “And whatever happened to a boyfriend / The kind of guy who tries to win you over? /And whatever happened to a boyfriend / The kind of guy who makes love ’cause he’s in it? / And I want a boyfriend / I want a boyfriend.”
The way she sings it, her voice is all raw and wavering and fragile. She sells it—how deeply she aches to love and be loved—with the same convincing gusto she sold her avid desire to be someone’s blowjob queen.
This is a long way of saying that most of those people who put ads on nerve.com are selling it too, Sketched, and they’re way too scared to do it in their raw, wavering, and fragile voices. And who can blame them? It’s so, so, SO much easier to be the blowjob queen than it is to be the person who aches to love and be loved. Those people who claim to be freaky in bed? Most likely they’re simply grand-standing in order to conceal the fact that they are as terrified as you about being rejected.
Write the ad, Sketched. You’ll be okay.
Yours,
Sugar
