Jewish genes
I grew up in a town that wasn’t very Jewish at all. I was probably one of ten Jewish kids in my school, and my only Jewish friends were from camps I went to over the summer. I wasn’t very religious, but did go to Sunday school and even had a Bat Mitzvah. I could read Hebrew, but was never taught what I was reading, so looking back, my Jewish education feels half-assed. I could read words out loud but not understand them? Why didn’t we learn the other half of knowing a language? Years of Wednesday evening and Sunday morning classes, done for one night of performance art (my Bat Mitzvah), where I stood on the altar and competed with my frizzy hair for the leading role. There was a girl in my school who was also Jewish, but she didn’t have a Bat Mitzvah, and I remember questioning her about if she was in fact Jewish if she didn’t have this ceremony. The ceremony I just mentioned as having no real stake in, one where I could have been reciting a Hebrew dictionary for all I knew. What a dick. I don’t know if I really meant it in that tone, but I had no clue what Jewish meant or was, and I sure as hell wasn’t evolved enough to understand that there are varying degrees of religion and beliefs for everyone. I know that she probably questioned her Judaism because of me, and I’ve always felt a lot of guilt about it. Maybe I’m more Jewish than I think?
Hot-wire
I hot-wired a car and was the getaway driver for a bank robbery in 1998. This is a lie, but wouldn’t that be incredible!? What if I was Baby Driver?! While I’m here I want to mention the fact that I think that movie, Baby Driver, would have been way better if the role of Baby was a woman (or if any woman in the movie said more words than a baby might). I think this about almost all films, as most of the nuanced, fun, and risky characters are men. Would you believe it less if it was a woman? Right, only a straight white guy with floppy hair can play a highly skilled getaway driver with an inner-ear problem and bizarre social skills. The film would completely lose its relatability if it was a woman! How would we pay attention!? How would we laugh at that!? While I’m inside this room, getting down and dirty—I woulda KILLED it as Baby! Come on, you’d watch that movie! Me sitting in a getaway car, scrolling the wheel of the original iPod, searching for the perfect song to drive away to. Oh, man, that would have been something special. You can put your bookmark in here now if you need a second to process, no pressure to continue right into the next minor regret. That was a lot to take in.
“Little Suzie”
I went to overnight camp for a very long time—twelve years. I started at ten years old and was a camper until I was sixteen. And then I was a counselor until I was twenty-one. There’s a lot to be said about this experience, but this is about one tiny thing I remember from when I was about twelve. One day that summer I made up this song, “Little Suzie”—the only lyrics being: “I went to the market, to see my little Suzie. When I got there, she wasn’t there, so I left her alllloooooooone.” It’s the type of song that doesn’t really jump off the page, one where the performance plays a significant role. Anyways, I was singing this song and ended up asking a few of my bunkmates if they’d heard it. One of them said, “Yeah, of course I know that song!” I proceeded to say, “Ohh, do you?! ’Cause I just made it up!?” Again…what a dick! I particularly don’t like when people pretend to know things they don’t, and strongly believe it’s okay to NOT know everything. It’s all right to not know every song and it doesn’t make you uncool. So, part of me was like—why are you doing that, annoyed that she felt the need to fake it, but looking back now with my adult glasses on, I see she was just trying to fit in and I called her out, in fact I set her up. NOT COOL, ABBI, not cool at all. There’s so much content to consume, a constant flow of news stories and one scandal after the other to keep track of. It would be crazy to know everything let alone every piece of pop culture. That’s why we have friends and co-workers, family and interactions with people at all, so we can share what we know with them and vice versa. So, yeah, I was a huge asshole about my hit song, but “Little Suzie” and its catchy chorus always reminds me to be a bit kinder in this world of overflowing information.
Fixing the raffle
When I was about seven and my brother was ten or eleven, I fixed a raffle at our elementary school so that he and his girlfriend at the time, Whitney Star, would win. I was selected, I’m not sure how or why, to be the one to put her hand into a bowl of crumpled pieces of paper with names written on them and pick the winner. I came up with a scheme, completely on my own, to write their names (Brian Jacobson and Whitney Star), each on a separate piece of paper, and already have them in my tiny hand when I put it into the bowl. So then, when I removed it, I’d have selected their names! Lots of questions and concerns here: Where would I have seen something like this? Why was I willing to risk life and limb so that my brother and his girlfriend would win this raffle? When did my childhood turn into a B-story from an episode of Full House? This holiday extravaganza was held in the cafeteria with booths selling crafts and baked goods. There were a lot of people in attendance and the drawing of the winners was an anticipated event. Everyone had stopped doing what they were doing to see who won. Me drawing my own brother’s name was highly unlikely, and when I did, it clearly meant I had fixed the raffle! On top of that, I was only supposed to draw one name! What was I thinking!? But I was seven and extremely scrappy, if I do say so myself. This is an adorable way to cheat the system. The whole room, including my parents and my brother and Whitney Star, immediately knew what I’d done. But all in all, a slick way to do it, right? Pretty clever for a seven-year-old. I don’t know if I actually regret this one, I like this kid.
Hotel bathroom
I wish I’d had sex this one night with this guy in a hotel bathroom. I was hooking up with him after a Bar Mitzvah for which I’d been hired by the family to take photos. I’m not sure how I fell into this, but there was a brief period of time during college where I was being hired by friends or friends of my dad’s to take photos at events for a couple hundred bucks. That was a ton of money for me at the time especially since I was using a terrible digital camera. I’m not talking about a high-end digital camera, I’m referring to those tiny digital cameras where you slide the piece of plastic over to expose the lenses. The ones where you have no control over anything—total point and shoot. Did I also mention I’m not a photographer? I fear these photos, capturing important milestones like Bar and Bat Mitzvahs and high school reunions, were not in the best hands. I suppose they got their $200 worth, but I’m now consumed with a larger fear that one of these people will read this, go back and look at said photos, and realize how awful they are. How that moment in their child’s life wasn’t properly captured, how people’s faces are probably cut off and everyone’s eyes are red. How me not being able to figure out the right flash setting might not have set the scene properly. If that is you in this moment then, listen, memories are way more important than photos, and that’s the real takeaway here. Maybe I did you a favor? So, on this particular night, I was taking photos at a Bar Mitzvah of a family I went to camp with. I had hooked up with this guy the previous summer and we now found ourselves in our mutual friend’s hotel room, making out in the bathroom. I don’t know why I didn’t have sex with him, it was a clear mishandling of the situation. I had two hundred bucks in my bag, hazy circles in my eyes from the terrible flash, and my priorities weren’t lined up. I should have fucked that extremely hot, sweet guy on the toilet of that hotel bathroom and I didn’t.
Two onions
My first year in New York, I interned in the art department of the Onion News Network. I tried my best to make friends with my “boss” but she was just terrible to me. I was so excited about the job—to potentially blend my artistic skill set with my new love of comedy—but she didn’t want any of it, and I’m not even sure why I was hired. It was such a short time, maybe a month and a half, but this was 2006 and if I still remember these two incidents, then they’re significant to me. Time doesn’t dictate impact. Not that this moment was major, I will ju
st never forget it. We were shooting a sketch in a hospital all the way uptown in Manhattan and it was a long day. I was carrying a bunch of garments on hangers, and I had to go bring them back to where we were storing everything—a room they’d given us on a lower floor. I got in the elevator with this boss—who I should say was maybe a year or two older than me. I went to push the button for this lower floor, and she Slapped. My. Hand. She actually slapped my hand! She then pressed another floor and reprimanded me in front of a bunch of other people who were also working on the show…because I pressed the wrong floor!? Bright Lights Big City, I had entered Hollywood, ladies and gentlemen! Was everyone a complete shithead? I should also point out, I had pressed the right floor and someone else corrected her. I regret not quitting, right then and there. It’s hard to stand up for yourself when you’re new and young and scared.
I did quit the next week though. I sat across a desk from the woman who was my boss’s boss and began to tell her I was done. Thank you, but I didn’t like working there, it wasn’t right for me. She then asked me to go to her boss’s apartment and set up his DVD player. WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?? And then…I did it?! Abbi! Abbi Lee Jacobson! I had just quit, because I felt terrible in this environment. It made me question working in comedy for fear that this was how everyone was, and then I bashfully went to this apartment and unsuccessfully tried to set up this dude’s DVD player. Ugh. I wish I could hug my younger self and take her out for a nice dinner. Tell her that this is hilarious and is okay. We all do things because we’re scared and intimidated. Last week, eleven years later, I sold a TV show with the dude whose DVD player I unsuccessfully set up. Welcome to Hollywood, baby!
Hooking up with girls
I regret not having hooked up with or dated girls in college. What a major missed opportunity. I don’t really remember being into anyone, women-wise, at that point in my life, and I like to think I would have acted on it if I was, but art school feels like a place where that would have been fun. I was so shy there, so extremely introverted. So different than the versions of myself that bookend those four years. But I should have fucked at least one girl, right?
Not going on a raid at camp
I wish I’d gone on a raid when I was ten. For those of you who didn’t go to overnight camp for twelve years and have no idea what a raid is, I’ll fill you in. A raid is when you sneak out of your bunk in the middle of the night, usually to a bunk of the opposite sex. As you get older it can include a wide range of sexual encounters, different forms of smoking, etc. Sometimes just talking! WILD! [Note: I went on raids as I got older—both the sexual and talking variety.] But I was ten and it was my first year at overnight camp, and I hated it. I was terribly homesick, and it’s hard to believe I ever went back, let alone for eleven more summers. On this night, my entire bunk was going on a raid to the boys’ bunk, and I decided not to. I was so nervous and hadn’t really found my place among the other girls yet. I just couldn’t bear the thought of getting in trouble. I wish as a kid I was less afraid of getting caught. I wish I took more risks, but I didn’t. My whole bunk went on the raid as I lay in my tiny bed, under the covers, wishing I’d gone. They all got caught and were docked, meaning they couldn’t go to the dance that next Sunday night. But I wasn’t docked, so I went to the dance. This was just the fucking worst. Ten-year-old me, not comfortable in my own skin or clothes or hair, stood alone because I didn’t muster the courage to do something outside the box. I went back to the bunk and hung out with my friends. It was the first time I realized that the rules aren’t always meant to be followed. You’re supposed to break them sometimes, especially if you want to experience the best stuff.
Venison Boy
When I was a freshman in college there was this boy, this senior that I had a crush on. He lived in a town house a few streets away from my dorm and I don’t even know how we first met, but I know that we flirted from the outset, chatting a bit here and there, smiling from afar on our way to classes. He had a beard and was a sculpture major or something really sexy like that where he worked with his hands. I was enamored. I’d walk down his street on my way home to my dorm, hoping to run into him. Then, one day, he invited me over for dinner the following night…to his house!? Something I’d wanted to happen for weeks was goin’ down and could it be true that I had made it happen? When I arrived, in a cute outfit for the time, which would be a terrible outfit now, I saw that it was him and his roommates having dinner. I was bummed, and thought it was going to be more intimate, but I ran with it, making small talk with his roommates, trying to be cool enough to hang with other seniors. They’d been grilling stuff on the back patio for dinner and I didn’t question what it was, but then it was announced that dinner was ready. We sat down at the table and I found out: Dinner was venison. They’d gotten a deer somehow from someone, or a big piece of one, and were cooking it…They all acted like this was a casual, normal thing, and I became quiet, and withdrew into my freshman, non-meat-eating body. I don’t eat meat, at least not game-y meat like venison. I’ve never had a hamburger and I know you’re like, “Excuse me?” as that seems to be a detail people latch onto. Anyways, I’ve never had a hamburger and haven’t eaten beef since I was twelve. But I ate this fucking venison. Or at least a little piece of it. I did so for this guy, and for what? I’ll tell you what—to be informed late in the evening all about his fucking girlfriend!? What are we doing here?? How could he not know why I was there, that I was eating deer for him!? I ate deer for this bearded fuck and he has a girlfriend? This is a story like many stories in my life where unfortunately, I was living on a completely different plane of reality than the person in front of me. Basically, I had been invited over there because they had a pile of deer meat, and they needed more stomachs to store it. BULLSHIT, buddy! And guess what, Venison Boy—I don’t even know your name. I didn’t even pretend to know it or try to come up with a fake one. I regret eating that meat for that boy whose name has left me.
SANTA FE BACKLOT
I drove into Santa Fe during magic hour, that transient period of time in between day and night, when the light is just perfect. I checked in, and hurried through the hallways of my hotel, lugging my bags to my room as quickly as possible with the hope I might be able to get back outside and find a spot for dinner before the sun completely set. Once outside, I skipped the first few restaurants I passed near my hotel, as they seemed too obvious—the busy spots right on the square, bustling with tourists—I was a tourist, but not that kind of tourist. I needed to find the hole-in-the-wall, the hidden gem. After checking out the one place I’d been recommended by a new friend I met in Marfa and leaving upon realizing I would be seated at a large, round communal table (I have to really be in the mood for that), I was ready to eat almost anywhere. I had pretty much given up on whatever invisible standard I’d seemed to be holding myself to when I stumbled upon a tiny Mexican restaurant with outdoor seating in the middle of an alley. This was the kind of spot I was looking for! It wasn’t fancy, not even particularly cute, but it was busy enough that I could believe the food would be decent and I liked the fact that they put their outdoor seating in the middle of an alleyway that still had cars slowly maneuvering around it. That’s a bold move, and I love an outdoor seating area with chutzpah. I read Joan Didion (cliché, I am aware) over fajitas for two (touché, my own cliché) and watched the sun finish its descent. The next day I wandered around the main square past other tourists and dipped in and out of shops devoted entirely to turquoise bracelets. It’s astonishing how I spent two days in Santa Fe and didn’t leave completely covered in turquoise.
Santa Fe was so different than anywhere I’d ever been, a quaint, small town full of Native American art and history. The pace felt distinct and significant, but as much as I was enjoying the vibe, I couldn’t seem to get away from a nagging thought. I didn’t want to acknowledge it, because I felt terrible, but it kept returning: “This place…looks fake?”
I pushed it out of my head, “It’s not fake, I’m here, this
is a beautiful, real city!” I circled blocks, took photos of adobe rooftops and artisans’ knickknacks in outdoor markets. I studied the architecture, the color, the way the tops of buildings seemed to slope randomly with asymmetrical curves, subtly breaking all the rules. Then, it came to me, I knew what it was. Santa Fe felt like a studio backlot in Los Angeles. I know this is an insulting description of an extremely charming city, and I apologize to the people of Santa Fe for my limited cultural knowledge and my annoying habit of comparing one place to another. Maybe it was the light, or the abundance of tourists? Or maybe I’ve become so Hollywood, I can no longer experience actual culture? I don’t even spend time on LA backlots, I’ve only ever driven through them, hanging off some executive’s golf cart, and that was probably because the executive felt bad for not buying the show I was there to pitch them in the first place. I guess that’s the problem with working in the business of making fake things seem real—when you see the actual, real thing, you can’t always appreciate it. Kudos to the backlot designers though, you’re clearly killing it.
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