Nobody Cares

by Anne T. Donahue

  “That’s an amazing coat,” the store owner says, catching me trying to snap another selfie. I quickly pretend I’m checking something out on my phone, mortified that my moment relishing a Disney villain aesthetic has been interrupted. “Do you want me to take a picture of you?”

  I pause for a second, debating whether or not to own up to my narcissism, whether I’m feeling so unfuckwithable that I’m willing to let someone I hardly know in on how powerful an old mink can be. I glance at myself for a second, wondering what the previous owner of this coat would do, whether I should dial down my enthusiasm for having found a piece I connect to so well.

  “Yes, please!” I say, handing over my phone.

  After all, clothes are always about who you want to be and how you want the world to see you. And I want everyone to know that I indeed plan to take over the world in this massive fucking coat.

  Just Do What I Say

  I’ve learned there’s no real difference between me in real life and the person I am on Twitter or on Instagram or in my newsletter. I know that I am loud and brassy; I gesticulate wildly and will pep talk you in your immediate face because who’s better than you? No person, thanks. And I know this because I got to speak on a panel recently, and no matter how hard I tried to lean into an indoor, professional tone, I still couldn’t shut up the broad I’ve become.

  So help me, I can’t stop talking. And now I can’t stop thinking about it.

  Which is something I’m slowly learning to feel fine about. I’ve written about self-esteem and about confidence and about embracing the person you are (versus the person you think you should be), and how liberating it is to say “I AM ON MY OWN TRAJECTORY, BUT THANKS FOR THE FEEDBACK, JK I DO NOT CARE.” I know that trying to be another person is doing a disservice not just to yourself, but to the human you’re attempting to emulate. And I know that doing this sets us all up to lose because we usually only attempt to emulate a very specific part of a stranger’s life, which we’ve interpreted subjectively. Sitting here, writing this, I tell myself I get it. And sitting there, reading this, you probably think you do too. But then fast-forward to tomorrow, next week, or sometime next month, and I will inevitably find myself caught in a “Why do I always bring up serial killers during small talk?” mental cyclone. And then I will play and replay everything I said and the looks I got and the tone someone used when they said they’d email me, and I’ll fixate on all of the worst parts until I find out five months later that nobody but me even remembers having had that conversation at all.

  So I’m going to try to defuse that. Because usually when we need a reality check the most, that’s when we have the least luck finding it. WELL, QUEST NO MORE, unless you have access to an actual best friend who’ll tell you to get with the program. Because I’m here to tell you that what you said wasn’t so bad, your voice wasn’t too loud, and everybody you spoke with was just relieved you were willing to talk, so they wouldn’t have to. But don’t take my word for it.

  Just kidding, absolutely take it.

  ~

  Hi.

  “Fuuuuck, I cannot believe I said that thing.”

  Oh shit, what did you say?

  “Ugh, just like . . .”

  Actually, no. Expand, please. Was it racist?

  “What? No.”

  Sexist?

  “No.”

  Homophobic?

  “No.”

  Transphobic?

  “No.”

  Xenophobic?

  “No.”

  Okay, well, right away, congratulations: you’re not an idiot. Otherwise I’d tell you to apologize immediately, take accountability for what you said, donate —

  “Yeah, I just said no.”

  I know, but you could also be lying, so let’s get this taken care of. Like I was saying before you interrupted me on my own page: donate to an organization that assists the community you just offended, educate yourself on why what you said was offensive and what led you to feel comfortable saying it, and figure out a way to educate those around you.

  “Okay. Well, I didn’t say anything along those lines.”

  Great! So, moving on. You’re embarrassed.

  “Well, I just said something that came off weird, and I said it in a tone, and I made myself seem like a thirsty disaster, and I just made the worst impression.”

  Okay, two things: 1) You probably didn’t, and 2) nobody cares.

  “Stop trying to plug your book.”

  This book? Called Nobody Cares? Thank you for buying it. (It also makes a great gift!) I read a piece recently about how nobody really thinks about what somebody else has done — unless it’s fucking egregious — beyond seven seconds or so. So trust that everyone is so caught up in their own shit that they haven’t for one minute thought about yours.

  “No, but I saw one person give another a look.”

  Okay then, fine. They gave each other a look. About you. And? Do you really give a fuck? Who are these people, anyway? They were upset that you spoke loudly or said something inoffensively unfunny? To them? Okay. Sure. Also: not every person is going to represent Your People, so take it in stride that you will likely never see these fools again. And if you do, you’re not enemies, you’re just going to stick to conversations about the weather.

  “But what if they talk about me?”

  They probably will. But I mean, hi: we all talk shit. If you think I’m going to sit here and pretend I love every person and do not actively engage in conversations about why so-and-so’s tone cemented our eternal feud and animosity, you are about to be very disappointed. I’m a human, and so are 99.9% of other people. We don’t like everybody, and we talk shit sometimes. Tale as old as time.

  “Okay, so I should just take shit from people?”

  Here’s the thing: no. But also, it’s a control thing, right? We want to control the way we’re seen. We want to be in charge of the way we’re received. Even though that’s impossible. Try as we might (and believe me, I’ve tried), there’s nothing we can do to sway certain minds. LET IT GO. REVEL IN THE SWEET LIFE YOU HAVE.

  “So, I should just stop caring about what everyone thinks of me.”

  I mean, yes. Kind of? Yes. Well . . . no, yes. Care about what your family thinks, or your close friends, or if your employer is like “I love how much you’re into hats, but you really have to stop wearing the falafel hat from She’s All That because this is a law firm, and you’re in the middle of a custody battle,” then take off the fucking hat. But everybody else? No thank you.

  “Okay —”

  Here’s the thing. Deep down, we know if we’re good people or not. Right? Like, when you fuck up, you know you’ve fucked up. And there’s a difference between “I’ve been calling her Crandall!” (one of my favorite Simpsons lines) and “I have just said and done something terrible that requires immediate attention.” YOU KNOW. So, did you come away from your weird, embarrassing whatever-the-fuck convinced that you are a bad person?

  “No.”

  Obviously not. Also, if you’re that consumed about a five-second-or-whatever interaction, odds are you’re very careful not to be a piece of shit. So, you said a thing that got a look, or you spoke too loudly, and now you’ve just identified a person who’ll probably not end up being a wonderful friend.

  “That’s it?”

  Dude, that’s IT. And while we all love to shit-talk amongst our nearest and dearest, I’m willing to assume that no one is genuinely consumed by a person to the point of talking ONLY about that person. Like, it’s weird if someone is obsessed with the way you pronounced “pear” at a party. It’s weird if an entire dinner is about what was wrong with your outfit. That’s weird for them, not you.

  And also, here’s the other thing about not always being universally loved: NO ONE IS. Not a single soul. Some people hate Beyoncé. Some people hate Harry Styles. Some people hate
Rihanna. Those people are idiots, and I hate them, but that’s the truth. And if not even the Holy Trinity are universally loved, what hope is there for the rest of us? So you might as well just be and do you. When I find out someone doesn’t like me, after writing them off as a balloon animal who isn’t worthy of my time, I just think WELL, TOO BAD FOR THEM, I GUESS. And, like Arya Stark (that’s her name, right?), add them to the list of people I will mention when I win the first of many awards to remind them: fuck you.

  “Wait, but you said that nobody cares and to revel in your sweet life, and —”

  Listen, man, I may believe those things and subscribe to them, but part of my sweet life includes pettiness. In the immortal words of my friend Sarah, “I don’t forget.”

  “You’re frightening me.”

  And therefore you are giving me the respect I deserve.

  “Get out of my house, Anne T. Donahue.”

  Anne T. Donahue? WHY, SHE’S BEEN DEAD FOR 35 YEARS!

  “I’m serious.”

  Yeah, I’m so sorry. I’m absolutely going to overthink this, actually.

  Friendship Mistakes I Have Made

  (So You Don’t Have To)

  Like most of us, I often assume that I am perfect. I tell myself I am the greatest friend in the world, that I have never done anything wrong, and that any person who interacts with me is blessed and lucky and being smiled down upon by whatever higher power they believe in.

  And then, after a few moments of beautiful delusion, I convince myself that my friends will all soon realize that I’m not as great as they thought I was, and my next birthday party will consist of them telling me why we’ll never speak again. (This is why I’ll never have a birthday party.) Which isn’t a totally unfounded fear. While I know even the best and longest friendships have peaks and valleys, I have lived that valley life hard. My long journeys to the bottom would justify “accidentally” deleting this chapter in lieu of trying to put a positive spin on all the friendship lessons I’ve learned, bless us, every one.

  But alas. Lessons are learned by acknowledging the grossest and cruelest parts of ourselves, so to spare your best friend tears on their birthday, or them wondering why you ghosted for three years without explanation, I present you with the mistakes I’ve made so you don’t have to. Because if I’ve learned anything, it’s that you should do what I say — definitely not what I do.

  Mistake #1: Projecting your insecurities onto your friend (at the mall on her birthday)

  My friend Judith and I have a long-standing joke: when it’s one of our birthdays, the other suggests that in celebration of another year lived, we should go to the mall and yell at each other. Because I did this to her in the spring of 2012.

  At the time, I was a sad person. I was a self-medicating alcoholic, two-time dropout who was tens of thousands of dollars in debt, and Judith was a woman seemingly sailing through her undergrad and, despite being four years younger than me, she was (and is) one of the most grounded and balanced people I knew. In short, how dare she.

  We went to the mall on her birthday because both of us love the mall. We’d gone for breakfast before and planned a day of snacking and shopping. But as we were rifling through the underwear table at American Eagle, she told me about her plans to move to the area of Toronto I held responsible for my disaster life, and I casually responded, “I hate hipsters.”

  Judith looked confused and said that wasn’t really fair; that many of her best friends would be categorized as hipsters, and sweeping generalizations don’t tend to be helpful. Furious she couldn’t understand that it was everybody else’s fault my life had hit bottom (likely because she had no idea I was at bottom), I kept going. I said that I hated the type of lifestyle she and her friends had, that I hated the city she was moving to, that I was better and more mature and everybody should know it. In the years since, Judith has told me that once you realize you’re in an argument with me, it’s too late and you’ve already lost (regardless of whether I’m right or wrong), but in 2012, she’d never seen this side of me before. She stood there, on her birthday, trying to figure out what I was actually angry about, and when she wouldn’t let me just drop it, I began twisting her questions into accusations and left her standing there with tears in her eyes. “I told you I didn’t want to talk about this anymore,” I said. “I wish you could’ve respected that.”

  The rest of the day was quiet and awkward, but we still got snacks, and I apologized for “seeming angry” before going home and writing her a lengthy Facebook message reiterating how disrespected I felt by her not letting me just drop an argument I’d started for no reason in front of many lacy boybriefs. And then, despite her asking me to hang out and catch up, I avoided her for months until she had a housewarming dinner I felt I couldn’t get out of.

  Judith treats her friends like family, so her capacity for forgiveness is more generous than mine. (I treat my friends like mafia family — which means I will do anything for them unless they hurt me, and then I will order their deaths.) (Just kidding.) (Or am I?) And while I apologized for “being so weird” that spring and summer, it wasn’t until I began delving deeper into my mental and emotional shit that I came up to acknowledge how much I’d projected onto her. It wasn’t her fault that I felt bananas or that I had to live with my parents. It wasn’t her fault that she was excelling at school and I couldn’t seem to land regular work. It wasn’t her fault that she had a boyfriend who loved her while I kept pursuing various incarnations of David Blaine.

  So remember that before you start yelling at your friend in front of an underwear table. At least have the decency to yell at them in the food court, where mall arguments belong.

  Mistake #2: Not telling your friend about your intention to hook up with her ex

  In grade 11, my official crush was on Chad. But I was soon distracted by his friend Ben, who I decided would be the Harry to my Sally. We’d been fast food coworkers, pals who talked regularly on ICQ and hung out platonically — but he was dating Alana, who I had yet to become friends with. Ben, according to me (and only to me — definitely never to him), was my best friend. And that meant we would end up together.

  Obviously, I didn’t relay any of this to anyone during the course of Ben and Alana’s twoish-month relationship. I’d been jealous to start, but after befriending Alana one night over cigarettes and mutual anxieties, we’d become friends in our own right, and her boyfriend was an afterthought instead of one at the forefront. Until they broke up.

  Here’s a red flag, kids: anyone who asks you to keep your relationship a complete secret is probably not worth your time. (Unless he’s royalty. And even then, that might not be a shitshow you want to wade into.) In Ben’s opinion, I wasn’t just Alana’s best friend, and therefore off-limits publicly, but a social misstep who put his Cool Guy clout at risk. Thus, our hookups could happen only under the umbrella of discretion and after solemn promises (from me) that no one would ever find out, so he wouldn’t be judged by his friends. And I, desperate to make him realize how special I was, agreed. Kind of. I told all my friends who weren’t Alana and pushed her to date a friend of ours who seemed interested so I could ease my conscience. Don’t do that.

  The good news is that it worked out — for everyone but me. Alana dated her boyfriend for a handful of years, and he turned out to be kind, cool, and all you could ask for in a teen boyfriend. And me? I ended things with Ben after he called the girl he wanted to date literally minutes after we’d fooled around. I sent him an email saying I didn’t think it was working out, and he sent one back saying he agreed and planned to ask out the girl he’d called after we hooked up, anyway. Cool!

  A few months later, I finally fessed up to Alana as I’d become consumed by guilt. I’d been so calculating in orchestrating my Ben situation that I hadn’t even bothered to see if the boyfriend I’d urged her into dating was actually worth her time.

  “I hooked up with Ben!” I confessed one ni
ght while we were roaming the neighborhood.

  “Oh!” she said. “Good for you! Recently?”

  And I laid it all out for her: the sneaking around, the lies, the deceit, the fact he was now dating a girl he’d once brought over for pancakes (because I was naïve enough to think that if I earned her adulation, she’d be the Carrie Fisher to my Meg Ryan and suggest he and I date each other). I told her about the email he’d sent me one night after I kissed him goodbye before walking into my house: “By the way,” he’d written. “Don’t do that again. This is not what this is — I don’t want you to think we’re dating.” Definitely not the Harry to my Sally.

  Alana laughed between dutiful “What a dick!” responses. “By the way, I wouldn’t have been mad!” she said. “You should’ve just told me!”

  Mistake #3: Abandoning ship

  In too many ways, I am Don Draper. I’m smart, I’m confident-sounding, I could be played by Jon Hamm, I look terrific in slacks, and I’m brilliant at ghosting on situations that have the capacity to get messy. With age, I’ve learned that abandoning ship will only make everything worse, but for no less than 29 years, I assumed my unexplained absence was a viable and legitimate way to handle conflict. Some memorable episodes:

  Problem: My friends were angry at me for bailing on birthdays or long-standing plans without any real explanation.

  Healthy solution: I would have to be vulnerable and elaborate on the social anxiety I had yet to feel comfortable with on my own terms while simultaneously shattering the belief that I was flawless and/or godlike.

  My solution: Bail until I wasn’t invited to anything anymore.

  Problem: I decided that a friend and I had grown apart because they didn’t like the same bands as I did, so instead of trying to find common ground or accepting that people are different, I stopped talking to them.