Are you real or are you fake?

Questions of identity, plus my weekly shareables: Republican Woodstock, the Texas Canon, and David Byrne in the big suit

Photo by Susan Mohr on Unsplash

The other afternoon I was on our porch doing some reading, and it was so pleasant out there I decided to doze for a bit. I was half-asleep when I spotted two little girls coming down the sidewalk. They stopped in front of our Little Free Library. I noticed one of them staring at me. She elbowed the other girl and said in a stage whisper:

“Is he real or is he fake?”

This was not as strange a question as it normally might have been. We are well into Halloween season in our neighborhood, and there are ghouls and goblins of all sorts hanging out in the yards on our street. She might have mistaken me for some sort of hideous monster. Which means I should dress better before going outside.

But afterward, the more I thought about it, I decided her question was a pretty good one.

It’s probably a good self-check, every so often, to think about whether we’re being real—with other people and ourselves—or if we’re playing a character we think we’re supposed to play.

It’s not wrong to step into character every so often. If you’re doing a favor for someone, they don’t have to know you think it’s a chore. You’re not obligated to say whatever’s on your mind no matter who it hurts.

I do think, though, that our authentic selves can get lost sometimes in the fog of being what we think we ought to be. For me, especially when I was younger, that came from a fear that people wouldn’t like the real me. Maybe some of you had (or have) that same feeling. It took me a long time to learn that the people who care about you will love who you really are.

This is probably too much baggage to load onto a stray question by an 8-year-old girl. But that’s how my mind works sometimes.

By the way … after she asked her friend if I was real or fake, I slowly opened my eyes wide. She grinned and grabbed her friend. “He’s real!” she said.

Real is better.

10 things I wanted to share this week:

1. My weekly for WFAE was about Sarah Stevenson, who spent decades quietly changing Charlotte history.

2. My friend Michael Graff, the biggest Baltimore Orioles fan I know, wrote a beautiful piece about baseball and fathers and sons. I was honored to make a brief cameo. (The Baltimore Banner)

3. Eli Saslow, the best newspaper reporter in America, has another astounding piece about an overwhelmed private security guard trying to hold his little slice of Portland together. The photos by Erin Schaff are outstanding, too. (NYT)

4. My friend Paige Williams, Mississippi to the core, has an amazing piece about the Neshoba County Fair, also known as “Republican Woodstock.” (New Yorker)

5. DOG NEWS: From now until DOGLAND comes out (April 2024!), I’m devoting this slot to dog stories. This week: President Biden’s dog really does not like the Secret Service. (Politico)

6. I can’t wait to see what my friend Chris Vognar comes up with as he tries to define the Texas Canon. (Houston Chronicle)

7. My favorite awards list every year is the MacArthur “genius grant” list, partly because the recipients have no idea they’re getting one until they get a call. This year’s list includes Ada Limón, who is known to some as the U.S. Poet Laureate but, much more importantly, was my guest on SOUTHBOUND in 2021.

8. Katalin Karikó was one of the winners of this year’s Nobel Prize in physiology and medicine for her work on what became the COVID vaccine. Along the way, her boss at Temple University tried to get her deported for taking another job, and the University of Pennsylvania demoted her four times. Perseverance is pretty damn good revenge. (CNBC)

9. We have started watching THE DIPLOMAT and are completely hooked. I’ve seen it described as “THE WEST WING with F-bombs” and that’s not far off … it is thoroughly enjoyable, everybody acts their asses off, and Keri Russell has an incomparable knack for making herself not beautiful while still being absolutely beautiful. (Netflix)

10. The 40th anniversary re-release of STOP MAKING SENSE is in theaters, although I’m sure that’s a typo because I was in college when I saw it and I’m sure that wasn’t 40 years ago. Anyway, while I do the math, here’s “Girlfriend Is Better.” Nothing is better than this. Is it?
    

    
    Have a great week, everybody.