I’m vain. I’m conceited. I think I’m smarter than I really am.
I spend a lot of time acting, or arranging my body, as though someone were watching me.
I’m jealous. I exclude myself from whole worlds of experience because they involve other people’s achievements.
My critical mind is always roaming, searching for something to feel alienated from. And to worry about. I am trapped in my mental scripts. Yet I wouldn’t meditate if they paid me to.
I very much want to be admired, and have cultivated and achieved far more admiration than affection.
I try to get people to admire me by asking them a lot of questions. I don’t always remember their answers for very long.
I’m easily offended. My love is more conditional than unconditional. My favorite expression is FUCK ’EM IF THEY CAN’T TAKE A JOKE. But it’s aspirational — I never actually feel that way.
I have little idea of who I am apart from my many faults.
I thought it might all change as I got older. It hasn’t so far. The world has just spit me further out than it used to.
I’m honest, but sometimes that feels exhibitionistic.
Nevertheless, I would say that I’m having a good time.
Here’s a song about it.
—Larry Bush for Alte