your house bigger now?”
I looked down at the ground, completely called out.
“What positive happened in your life because you tore this woman down?” she asked. “And, by the way, you showed exactly how much power she has over you because you spent an hour talking about her to a roomful of people.”
I realized what I had been doing. When you’re in a place where you don’t know what makes you happy, it’s really easy to be an asshole. I put other people’s pain on my Happy List.
I went home that night, and sure enough, my house was not bigger for tearing that woman down. Bubba came to greet me and we sat in the living room.
“I’m trying, Bubba,” I said. “You weren’t always perfect, either.”
Bubba was in fact a terror until he was two and a half, a whirling dervish of energy. My husband and I were with him in the park when we realized we needed to have him trained. A little boy was calling to him, so Bubba ran down an incline at full speed. His legs got away from him and he rolled into the kid like a bowling ball. The kid’s mom thought it was funny, thank God, but then, as the boy was on the ground, Bubba sniffed him and then peed on him.
The first time we worked with a dog trainer, he bit the trainer. Which was a blessing, because that led me to trainers at a ranch that bills itself as the Disneyland of dog parks. They helped Bubba become the best dog in the history of dogs.
He changed. So could I.
AFTER MY ESSENCE SPEECH, THE MEDIA LATCHED ON TO THE MEAN-GIRL narrative of what I was saying. They missed the point, because it’s not like I was some kid slamming people into lockers or spreading rumors about a sophomore. I was talking about being a woman. It’s not like you age out of bullshit. It just sort of shape-shifts.
Because I was a mean woman, I can spot them. Game recognizes game, right? You encounter them every day if you work with other people, period. Whether you’re a teacher, a lawyer in a large firm, or a stay-at-home mom. There is an epidemic now of people “being real” when they’re being anything but. It’s the person who loves being “someone” who notices every little thing wrong with what you say, do, wear, or think, and has to point it out. Those mean women, and mean men, affect people’s opportunities and experiences, at work or with their children.
When I see negative comments about me online, if I have time I will go down the rabbit hole of social media to see how great the life of the troll really is. Because you never know, maybe they’re right. Maybe they have something to teach me or for me to aspire to. I’ve done it countless times, Instastalking, Twitter stalking. Never once have I learned something from someone who talked shit. If anything, it’s “Baby, you really don’t want to put a bull’s-eye on your back.” But so many people really love the attention they get by trolling. It’s a temporary cure for their invisibility.
The problem is, there’s always an audience for negativity. There could be someone with a bullhorn screaming, “I’ve got a beautiful script here that gives a deeper insight into the human experience.” And few in a crowd would pause. And then someone says “I’ve got Jennifer Lawrence’s nudes,” and a line will form. Negativity and the exploitation of other people’s pain drive so much of our culture and conversation.
I know that, but I can still get caught up in my feelings. Recently I had an absolute complete meltdown over something said about me online. It was a castoff of a line, a joke the woman posted to get “oh the shade” likes and eyeballs. But I became fixated on it, imagining what I would say to her if she said it to my face, and knowing she never ever would.
I was with a friend when I saw it and held up my phone for her to see the post. I was full of “get this bitch” bravado, but she took my forearm and gently lowered it. Looking me in the eye, she said: “An empress does not concern herself with the antics of fools.”
She smiled, so I smiled. That kindness, one empress to another, one woman to another, released me from the bullshit.
BUBBA DESERVES A CODA, BECAUSE HE’S THE ONE WHO GOT