I have been editing my old essays. And crying into pillows.
Eddie, I Hate You is a compilation of essays, originally written in 2017 as blog posts.
Editing and self-publishing this book has been a slow-burning exercise in nightmarish reflection.
There are 20 essays in this book.
Pieced together, they tell a typical story, rarely written: A young girl grows up, learning step by step that she is trash. Eventually she acts like a piece of trash. Men treat her like trash. She is garbage. Until something terrible happens. Stunned, she sits at home alone for as long as possible. Eventually, some new guy tries to treat her like trash and it’s such a joke that she write s a book about it.
Yes, I am laughing at myself. It’s an old habit that has worked against me.
A lot of the terrible people who have inhabit this memory have been invited into my life and allowed to stay because I have this incredible ability to find humour in cruelty, particularly cruelty directed right at me.
Thankfully, life involves movement. Otherwise, no one would ever leave.
At the start of the series, I am so upset about abandonment. It isn’t fair that men abandon us. It isn’t fair that people have abandoned me my whole life.
By the end of the series, after taking a look at all the people who have been here with me, even for only a second, I resolve to being alone.
People are stressful.
When life feels stressful, sometimes we crave other people for cushioning from life’s stress but the truth is, we are all stressful idiots.
I read the Eddie essays, I cry because I forgot. These essays were originally written as a purge and it worked. Three years later, I am reading them and I completely forgot about that one time and then that other time and then that terrible time and…..all the times.
I used to laugh away cruelty because I expected that the presence of anyone at all would bring me relief.
Wrong.
At the end of the series, I write: “All we can do is dive into the deep incomplete.”
I still think it’s true. Accept that nothing will fill in your blanks. Accept that you are a broken weirdo. But, stop expecting other people to be better than you.
No one is better than you. You are the person you need. And, if you invite someone in to be Good for you, make sure they are not cruel.
It seems obvious but it isn’t obvious. You have to teach yourself that cruelty is wrong. Otherwise, the cruelty will stun you and you will be stuck for a while in someone else’s incompleteness. Don’t let that happen.
If they grab you in a way that makes you feel fear. Kick, run, call a number, any number, and get yourself to a place you can call home.
I am ok. You will be ok.
“Eddie, I Hate You. A memoir by Rachel Ganz” will be available this November, 2020. Keep checking back here for more articles on my current experience publishing a book about my love failures.
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Thank you all, please be well.
-Rachel
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Rachel Ganz 