I Hate Myselfie

by Shane Dawson

  Neve: That hair. What is with that hair? You need to cut it all off or you will NEVER get anywhere in Hollywood.

  From that point on I knew this woman was no longer to be trusted. Even I, with all my self-hatred, knew that my emo hair was in style and very marketable to a young audience. This chick was a fraud. And it took her making fun of my hair to show me that. After class I walked back to Allan’s office to have a one-on-one with him. A few teachers tried to stop me but I was like a pregnant lady making my way through Disneyland looking for a turkey leg. People were going to either get the fuck out of my way or be killed. I opened his door and let myself in.

  Me: I need to talk to you.

  Allan: You seem angry. Here, have a mini Twix.

  Me: NO! There’s no amount of miniature candies or clever mugs that could change my mood right now! You guys are a FRAUD!

  Allan: GASP! Who is this? Because the Juan I know would never say such accusatory things!

  Me: My name is SHANE and I want my mom’s money back!

  Allan: Ok, I see that you are upset. Use it. Let’s do a monologue. Have you ever seen the Tom Hanks movie where he finds out he has AIDS? There’s a scene in there I think you could NAIL right now. Let me print it out!

  Me: NO! No monologues! No Mitchel Musso comparisons! I want my money back NOW!

  Allan: Cynthia, can you shut the door?

  A tiny hand shut the door and Allan motioned for me to have a seat.

  Allan: Yes. We are a business. We need people who are willing to pay big bucks to get a ticket to Hollywood. And yes, some of the other children are hopeless and their parents probably should have visited the business next door years ago if you know what I’m sayin’. But there are some of you who are talented who we really are going to help out. You are one of the lucky few. We are going to get you the best agent we can find and I promise you, a year from now you are going to be winning a Teen Choice Award and we will be in the audience cheering you on.

  Me: So you’re telling me that you KNOW some of the kids out there are hopeless?

  Allan: I’m telling you some of those kids out there smell like abuse and it turns me on.

  He let out a small laugh. I didn’t. I got up.

  Me: You are a horrible, horrible person and I hope you get all the bad karma that you deserve.

  Allan: Wow. Looks like you’re the one who’s bringing SASSY back!

  Me: I hope you enjoy your life.

  Allan: Wait. Ok, I’ll give you your money back. I’ll even set you up with one of my agent friends. Deal?

  I took the deal. But I also walked out of the room and told all the other students’ parents what a scam the company was. Unfortunately none of them cared. The slight glimmer of hope that all those movie posters on the walls were giving them was enough to blind them to reality. A year later I decided to go to their website to see if Allan still worked there and what I found wasn’t shocking at all. The company had gone under because of all the legal fees they weren’t able to keep up with due to all the lawsuits from their former students. I breathed a sigh of relief. Karma does always come back around. And a few years after that when I won a Teen Choice Award for Choice Web Star I thought about all the people who had helped me get there. And not one of those people was Allan or anyone from that shitty acting academy next to the abortion clinic.

  DENNY’S AND DEATH

  ABOUT THE ARTIST

  Ivy Sangers is eighteen years old and studying journalism in Utrecht, a province in the Netherlands. She has been drawing ever since she was a little girl, and her main interest is painting portraits. Follow her on Twitter at @Ivys_.

  The smell of Denny’s at three a.m. reminds me of two things: (1) burning-hot diarrhea rushing out of my swollen hole and (2) the death of my grandmother. The first one is pretty obvious. I mean, they have an entire menu dedicated to “BACONIZING” and “CHEESIFYING” their food. That just sounds like anal leakage. The second is because that’s where I was the night I waited for my grandmother to die. I know, it sounds morbid, but it’s the truth.

  It was a night of me and my brother Jerid constantly checking our phones to see if we had a text from our mom saying “She’s gone” and then some kind of terribly conceived sad-face emoticon. Most likely something like “8*{” or even something like “#(P&.” I’ve gotten that emoticon from her before. I have no idea what it stands for but it can’t be good.

  I was twenty-one years old, and I had just moved out of my mom’s house and gotten an apartment with my older brother, so our phones were usually filled with texts from her every morning. Usually about a dream she’d had in which we’d both died a violent death, and she was just checking to see if we were ok. You guessed it, I got my calm, rational personality from my mother.

  My grandmother was a pretty healthy woman considering she lived on a diet of fat-free cookies and old-people candy, so when she was admitted to the hospital it was a shock to us all. She complained of her legs hurting, so we figured she had torn a muscle from too much running to the toilet (my bowel issues are genetic). But the doctor said she needed to stay overnight for additional testing. She took it as a mini vacation and wasn’t worried at all, and neither were we. Old people go to the hospital all the time! Unfortunately it was more serious than we thought. The next morning I had a voice mail on my phone from my mom. She was calling from the hospital, and I could tell it was serious because it didn’t start with her singing some kind of Weird Al parody song.

  “Shane. Call me when you get this. Grandma’s not doing well. I think this is it.”

  I’ll never forget that voice mail. It hit me in the gut like a BACONIZED CHEESIFIED quadruple burger. I was numb. I ran into my brother’s room without even knocking on the door to make sure he had time to cover his morning erection. He jumped out of bed when I told him the news and we rushed out of the apartment like it was on fire.

  My brother and I had a very special bond with my grandma. Most of the happy memories I have from childhood involve her. She had a shitty attitude and hated everything. She watched trashy TV shows and yelled at the screen. She was a night eater and left the bathroom door open while she did her butt business. She was my soul mate. One of my favorite memories was when my brother and I dressed her up as 50 Cent and had her repeat his incredibly racist and demeaning lyrics on camera. I always thought I’d want to show that video at her funeral but she had a black friend, so when the day finally came I decided it would have been all kinds of ­awkward.

  But back to that awful morning. My brother and I hopped in the car and sped down the freeway like we were in a shitty Nicolas Cage action movie. We almost killed about eight people, but it would have been worth it. If I didn’t say good-bye to Grandma before she passed I knew I would never be able to forgive myself. I had so many things I wanted to say to her. I had so many selfies I wanted to take with her. (She loved a good selfie. #NOFILTER of course.)

  We got to the hospital and ran up to her room faster than we had ever run before. It was like there was a drug dog chasing us and our asses were packed with coke. I was completely unprepared for what I saw when we finally got to her room. She wasn’t watching trashy TV and yelling at the screen. She wasn’t treating the nurses like waitresses at TGI Fridays. She wasn’t doing her butt business with the bathroom door open. She was lying on a stiff cold bed with a tube down her throat and a machine pumping oxygen into her lungs. She was a shell of the woman I knew. I had no idea who this woman was. The woman I had seen just the night before was fun, loud, slightly prejudiced. But she was gone.

  I broke down into tears and had to leave the room. I did the only thing I knew to do: vlog. I went into the bathroom and took out my iPhone and started talking to it. I talked about how scared I was to lose her. How mad I was at God for doing this. How horrible hospital bathrooms smelled. I spilled my guts and it made me feel slightly better.

  About an hour later I went back in
to the room and the rest of my family was standing by her bedside. We aren’t the chattiest of families so the awkward silence wasn’t all that awkward. Nobody knew what to say. What can you say? The doctor walked in and gave us the lowdown.

  “She has a lack of salt that caused her body to shut down. She has a few days left. I’m so sorry. If you’re hungry there are TERRIBLE snacks in the cafeteria that are covered in arm hair from the ‘cook.’”

  Ok, that last half might not be exactly what he said, but you get the gist. So we waited by her bedside for the next few days. We tried to entertain ourselves by playing I Spy, but the game gets kinda depressing when all you have to “spy” are urine tubes, poop bags, and a half-dead person. So we mainly just played on our phones. After a few nights my brother and I decided to eat our emotions and Denny’s sounded like just the place to do it. At three a.m. there were plenty of hookers, hobos, and drunken teenagers to keep us company. We ordered pretty much ­everything on the menu, including something called a “Spice to MEAT Ya.” After eating that disaster I thought I would for sure die before my grandma.

  BEEP BEEP.

  A text. My brother and I made eye contact. Who’s gonna look at their phone first? Who wants to get the sad news and tell the other one? Maybe we should just get another “Spice to MEAT Ya” and go into a food coma.

  RING RING.

  A text and now a PHONE CALL? Nobody calls anyone anymore unless someone is LITERALLY DEAD. This couldn’t be good. I answered my phone and it was my mom. “Grandma’s awake! She’s sitting up in her bed eating meat loaf and complaining that the nurses all look like ninety-nine-cent-store cashiers! She’s back!”

  Two miracles happened that night. The first being my grandma’s resurrection and the second that my ass didn’t bleed from all the beige food I shoved down my face hole. We rushed back to the hospital and there she was, the woman I hadn’t seen in three days, sitting upright and asking for someone to turn on “that show about that midget family.” I cried happy tears as I flipped through the channels to find TLC. That night we had so much fun. We laughed, cried, and showed my grandma countless viral videos of people falling down and getting hurt. It was truly one of the best nights I had ever had with her. And then I was hit with reality.

  “Can I talk to you for a minute?” the doctor said with a look on his face like he had just accidentally aborted my first child.

  I walked out into the waiting room with him—my brother and mom were in the bathroom—and he told me something that took every ounce of happiness out of my body and replaced it with the feeling of jagged pieces of broken glass.

  Doctor: Your grandmother hasn’t taken a turn for the better I’m afraid.

  Me: But she’s up! And miserable! She’s her old self again!

  Doctor: Shane, sometimes when a person is dying there is a period of time when they become conscious so they can give their families closure. It’s a phenomenon, and we really can’t explain it.

  Me: Wait . . . so is she already dead? Is that a ghost? A demon? AN ALIEN?! I’m so fucking confused and the CHEESIFIED milkshake I had is starting to make me hallucinate.

  Doctor: No, that’s your grandmother. She doesn’t know she’s dying. She doesn’t feel pain. Her brain is blocking all of that. She is enjoying her last night with her family and when she falls asleep, she’ll pass.

  GREAT. Now I had to tell my mom and brother that grandma actually wasn’t well, she was just having a supernatural experience like she was a character in some kind of terrible Kirk Cameron Christian movie. Thanks, doctor! You really know how to bring down the mood. Good thing you aren’t in the children’s ward, you DREAM CRUSHER.

  So when my mother and brother came back I told them what was going on. They weren’t surprised. My mom had seen somebody die before and my brother had watched A LOT of documentaries about death, so they’d both had a feeling that was what was happening. So one by one we went into the room and had a conversation with Grandma and tried to get as much closure as we could.

  I thanked her for everything she had done for me. She was the reason I started acting. She was the reason I had a sliver of confidence in myself. She was the reason I smiled as a kid. When I was scared of my mom and dad’s fighting I would run up to her room upstairs and she would hold me for hours. There wasn’t a bruise she didn’t kiss or a cut she didn’t spray with HORRIBLY PAINFUL MEDICINE. She meant everything to me and then some.

  My brother and mother had some time with her and then around midnight she fell asleep. We all stood and watched her. The waiting game was happening again. A few hours later her heart was still beating. She wasn’t letting go. I asked the doctor how long he thought she had and he said it was up to her. If she was holding on to something it could take a while. I knew what I had to do.

  I asked my brother and mother for a moment alone with her. I sat by her side and I held her hand. I whispered to her.

  Me: Grandma? Are you there?

  She replied in soft, almost inaudible whispers.

  Grandma: Shaney?

  Me: Do you know that you are dying?

  Grandma: Yes.

  Me: Are you scared?

  Grandma: Yes.

  Me: Is it because you don’t want to go to hell?

  Silence. Then a tear fell from her closed eye. My grandma wasn’t always the most pleasant woman to be around throughout her life, and I’m sure she was feeling a lot of guilt about that.

  Me: You might have been kind of a bitch to a lot of people in your life, but to me you were my rock. You protected me. You made me feel special and never judged me. God is so proud of you and you have nothing to be afraid of.

  She gave me a small smile. Her eyes were still closed. There wasn’t much life left in her but there was enough to hear me.

  Me: Is there anything else you’re afraid of?

  She squeezed my hand as hard as she could, which was still gentler than a toddler.

  Me: Are you scared to leave me and Jerid?

  Grandma: You need me.

  I burst into tears. She was right. I needed her so badly. I was just beginning to become successful on YouTube, and I was nervous about what my life was going to turn into. My brother was just getting his life together and needed her pep talks. But we needed to let her go.

  Me: Grandma, I love you so much. But I want you to let go and not worry about us. We’ll be fine. And you can watch over us every day and make sure that we are on the right track.

  Another tear from her beautiful, peacefully closed eye.

  Me: It’s going to be so much better up there. You’re gonna fly and shit! That’s insane! I’ve always wanted to fly. You can come hang out with me in my dreams and do all that cool angel stuff that we learned about from that terrible Touched by an Angel show that we used to watch together.

  She smiled. God, that show was terrible.

  Grandma: Thank you, Shaney. I love you.

  Me: I love you so much.

  I kissed her hand and she ran her fingers through my hair. After a few peaceful minutes I went into the waiting room and told my brother to go in and talk to her. They had a private conversation. I’m sure it was similar to ours and just as special. We felt at peace with the situation so we went home to get some sleep. My mother wanted to stay the night and be by her side. The next morning we got a phone call from my mom saying that she’d passed that morning. She even opened her eyes and said, “I’ll always be there for you guys,” before she left. I feel bad that I wasn’t there for her last breath but I also feel like the moment we had shared the night before was so special that nothing could top that. And to this day I will never forget the feeling of her hand squeezing mine. And every time I go into a Denny’s at three a.m., which is frequently, I know she’s there sitting in the booth next to me dreading the diarrhea that’s bound to come.

  I love you, Grandma. Always.

  MY BIRTHDA
Y SUIT

  ABOUT THE ARTIST

  Alex Grim is a multitalented artist from Portland, Oregon. He grew up all around the United States. In Pensacola, ­Florida, at the age of five, he knew he wanted to draw seriously, with encouragement from his mother, after failing to draw a cat with a crayon in kindergarten. Primarily a sculptor now at age forty-two, Alex picked up the drawing pencil again after a nine-year hiatus . . . just for Shane. ­Follow him on Twitter at @AlexGrim.

  I’m going to start this off by saying I am not a fan of swimwear. Any way you look at it, it’s underwear that you pee into. The material always feels like rejected scraps from a shitty Halloween costume and whoever thought using Velcro instead of zippers was a good idea needs to be shot. Up until I was eighteen I had never even tried on a swimsuit. My outfit of choice at the local pool was jean shorts and a shirt I could really get lost in. Sometimes when I lie in bed I can still hear the suction sound of my fingers pulling my wet shirt from the deep cleavage between my boy tits. One time I even wore my grandmother’s muumuu to the beach. I’m not gonna lie, getting out of the water with all that wet polyester clinging to my curves made me feel like Bo Derek in 10. If my grandmother and I had sported that muumuu side by side in a trashy magazine I think I would have gotten the coveted “Wore It Best” title, but I digress.

  On my eighteenth birthday I stood naked in front of my zit-cream-covered mirror and stared at my body. Really STARED. I was a man now, and I wanted to see what I was working with. Sure, I had great hair (thank you, Mom) and extremely hairy shoulders (fuck you, Dad), but what I couldn’t stop staring at was my loose skin. After high school I lost around 150 pounds, and I still had all the stretched-out, saggy skin. My body looked like that painting with all those melting clocks. My droopy chest and hangy stomach were like cartoon frowny faces. Of course when I would lie down I looked like a fucking supermodel. I’d just tuck all that skin under my back and armpits and suddenly transform into a Greek god. But as I stood in that mirror and saw that frowny face staring back at me I realized I had to do something about it.