hell is a dinner party
Reviewers keep mentioning the movies Coherence and The Invitation in their write-ups of It's What's Inside (out now on Netflix), so I'm probably going to watch it at some point. I don't know what it is about, but Coherence and The Invitation, at least, are both horror movies about living in Los Angeles and going to dinner parties where no one likes you. That's relatable a.f. and I think it's probably why, after two years of my pleading, my spouse ultimately decided against moving here. (I've still not seen Bodies Bodies Bodies, either — another movie that keeps being named alongside It's What's Inside — so maybe it'll be a desktop double feature.)
When trying to pass out at night, I've been reading the newish book Character Limit. So far what I have learned is that Jack Dorsey and I, chillingly, both drink the same thing, which is homemade electrolyte water. People with chronic illnesses share a surprising number of DIY habits with libertarian techbros, because we share the same outsized fear of death. My own fear of death, stemming from childhood etc., has resulted in my always having been attracted to grandiosity in others. Bad news!
A couple years ago I had a dream about Elon Musk. In it, I was at some liquored-up techbiz event that Musk was also attending (in my waking life I'd been grimly fascinated by headlines claiming Elon Musk had repeatedly tried to make Nathan Fielder laugh at parties). In my dream, I had spent most of the night against the wall with my arms folded shit-talking Musk to a colleague, but later, when I was alone and lost in thought, Musk had suddenly appeared next to me. Immediately cowed by his presence, I greeted him and we started talking, and he acted like everything I said was brilliant or funny and, later, he'd become quiet and undistracted anytime I described sources of profound grief in my life. Then, just as quickly, he was suddenly gone. The colleague from earlier returned, smirking, and I admitted I'd really enjoyed talking with Elon Musk. The colleague said "Yeah, he's really good with trauma girls." I gasped. Then I woke up.
These days I keep my fear of death manageable and, when I do catch myself admiring grandiosity in a person, I take a moment to remind myself that big dreams are no more virtuous than small ones, and no more meaningful, and also, that the person might actually be a megalomaniac.