Basking in a Pool of Human Desperation; It's the Right Thing to Do

Sidle up to today's guest reviewatrix, Mongolian Girl. Be nice or she might offer up one of her pumpkin muffins. -Miss Missives

Know what I want you to do Jeremy Kerman ? I want you to sit still and pay close attention while I tell a little story.

Last month my husband, Hellbilly, and I were finishing out a horse stall. That means I had a nail gun in my hand and was pressing one end of a 2x10x14 board as hard as I could against a post with my shoulder. Know what that board decided it was going to try? Moving a bit out of plumb. So you know what I did? I dug my boot deeper into a pile of horse shit, pressed so hard against that board that I thought my shoulder was going to slide out of its socket, popped a nail into it to get it to stay put, and then popped about 20 more nails into it. Then I stood back to admire my work, waved the nail gun around in the air over my head, and said, “That’s right, you fuckin’ bitch. You stay where I say you’re gonna stay, ‘cause me and this nail gun? We’re your fuckin’ daddy now.”

That’s what it looks like to push a dream into reality, Jeremy. You may think the dream Hellbilly and I have of raising, training and showing American Quarter Horses is…whatever. I don‘t care what you think of our dream. I care what we think of our dream. And what we think is that we are going to press our minds, bodies, souls and emotions so far into this dream that, even if it fails, we are going to go down in flames with our pride and integrity intact.

Your blog is easy for me to look at. I appreciate it when someone offers up a simple, white canvas. It makes me think that the owner of the blog must have a great picture to paint on that canvas. But that‘s the problem, Jeremy? The picture you are painting is nothing more than some kind of washed out watercolor thingy that‘s about as interesting as that pink poke-a-dot skunk one of my Great Aunts painted and gave me for by 14th birthday. And Jesus, the Essenes, and even my fucked up bitch of a neighbor, Rotunda know you are capable of it telling your story, Jeremy. Your writing is clean and crisp, letting me know you are capable of telling a story without going on and on and on until I decide finally cleaning that tiny piece of cat shit out of our bathtub is more interesting than reading one of your posts.

You went to UC Berkeley and got a degree in Mathematics. You followed that by working for a Congressman, going to NYU Law School, and then working for a corporate law firm. Then, of all things, you decided to dump the entire thing and pursue your dream of becoming an actor.
Nobody, I mean nobody, spends as much time as you did in college and pursuing a career, walking out of the entire thing to become an actor, and ends up without a story to tell.
Instead? You give us this, this and this. Oh, and this. What the fuck?

This is what I want to know:
When did you first start to realize you were headed for or in the wrong profession?
How did you try to avoid this truth?
Getting drunk?
Fucking anything that moved?
Hiding out in your apartment watching Judge Judy while jacking off into a bag of Cheetos?
Why did you go forward with the status quo for a while anyway?
Guilt?
Pressure from the outside?
Ego?
Fear?
What kind of shit did you pull for the Congressman?(I’m not retarded, Jeremy. I know you pulled shit for the Congressman. Spill it.)
Who at that corporate law firm did you want to fuck all night, torture and kill, have as your mentor, stand up to?
How have your old classmates, friends, and family reacted to your choice to become an actor?
Have you had to tell any of them to fuck off, get out of your way, anything?

Let’s talk about this: You actually say that Simon Cowell of American Idol is the only person in Hollywood who is willing to directly tell someone they stink. On top of that, you mention, in the very same post, that you think Al Pacino must have gotten his start as an actor by having to wear a smelly bumble bee costume.

Are you fucking kidding me?

Simon Cowell and American Idol are a disgrace to anyone who ever cared about the dreams of another human being. Stop watching American Idol. Stop watching TV altogether, for chrissake. That shit you wrote about Fox News discovering something about the Large Hadron Collider made me want to hurl. The only thing Fox News, CNN, MSNBC or any other news outlet of their kind have ‘discovered’ is how to boost ratings by way of drama, trauma and sanctified bullshit.

Go watch Dog Day Afternoon and wait. Wait for and then take in every single moment of the character named Leon Schermer.

Watch This Boys Life and take in every act of desperation out of the characters Dwight, Caroline and Toby.

Check out Carlito’s Way and bask in the pool of human desperation that seeps out of the David Kleinfeld character.

Give every moment of your attention to the characters of Little Bill Dagget in Unforgiven , Sam Cayhall in The Chamber, and especially Harry Caul in The Conversation .

Fall into disillusion with the character of George Hanson in Easy Rider .

Then? I want you to find these people. No, not the actors. I mean real people who are living desperate lives. People who are desperate, just out of prison, suffering, grieving, dark, maimed, twisted and broken. Meet these people. Talk with these people. And, most importantly, lay yourself bare to these people. Then shut up and listen. Why? Because they are going to tell you the truth about yourself. And then? Find the people in Hollywood who make you squirm. Those people who have either lived desperately or exposed themselves, without judgment, to those who are.

Otherwise, I’m afraid you’re going to end up doing one of two things with this notion you have of becoming an actor:
1) End up a famous asshole who simply produces more American Idol-like shite to clog up the airwaves, or
2) Completely fail at becoming an actor and come away from the entire experience having learned nothing and looking around wondering where your pride and integrity have gone.

I also want you to completely dump your blog and start a new one if the reason you are not telling your story is because you’ve given your URL to people you don’t trust to handle your innards when you lay them out.


½ star for an uncluttered blog, crisp writing style, and having a story to tell if you would just fuckin’ tell it.





If you do dump your current URL and get a new blog, I want to know.

Oh, yeah, and here’s a flaming finger for linking to a site called Dame Magazine that claims they are ‘for women who know better’. I suggest you find some women who actually do know better, but have decided not giving a flat flyin’ fuck is a much better idea if they’re going to get on with their lives.