Project

Mindy Kaling is my spirit animal.  I made that decision this evening while reading her book.  

I’ve sorta wanted to read her book since about noon today when I found it sitting forlornly in the 800s Dewey Decimal section of a Denver branch library.  I’ve learned this is where the humor books are kept and I always hope to luck out and find a David Sedaris title I’ve yet to read. I did find one, but I decided to save it for later.  I guess Mindy wins by default. I hope she never reads this in the fantasy version of my life where she and I become friends because I’ve watched 3.5 episodes of “The Mindy Project.”

I was desperate for physical books and I’ve been unable to find most of what I intended on reading this summer outside of an e-book. I made an attempt to get all cozy with my iPad, but reading e-books still brings back traumatic memories of my online master’s program.  I feel like I’m suddenly going to need to cite and annotate any text that I read electronically. They’re usually some labored breathing and crying once I realize I disposed of my APA manual once my thesis was accepted in its final form.

I brought my book to a coffee shop, ordered a chai, and settled at a table.  I found myself wondering if my choice of be beverage might be slightly racist because I’m reading a book written by an Indian-American.  I mulled my life choices and all the internalized bias I might hold as a white man, remembering that my gayness does not exempt me from being an intolerant asshole.  (This is actually a lesson many gay men need to learn and is probably the subject of a different essay. Moving on.)

I finally decided that if no one knows that I’m drinking a dirty chai while reading a book written by an Indian-American, it can’t be racist.  I cracked open the book, made it about two pages in when Ms. Kaling suggested that anyone reading her book was either a woman or a gay man. I felt personally attacked, but laughed hysterically, earning me dual looks of scorn from the women at the next table who were having a conversation peppered with phrases like “metastatic melanoma” and “hospice care.”  

I had a feeling that Mindy, as my newly annointed spirit animal, would continue to cause me to laugh in a way incompatible with “they found five new tumors,” so I marked my page with my thumb and slinked away to another part of the shop with my potentially-racist chai.  

Mindy did not disappoint. She told the story of an awful man named Nate who ghosted her after several good dates.  I had such ire towards someone who would treat my literary BFF in such a way. Nate must belong in the same pile as Spencer, Eric, Christian, Michael, Christopher (x2), and José in terms of human garbage I’ve dated.  (I left Kunal out of this because he’s the only guy I’ve dated that actually didn’t turn out to be terrible in the end. Kunal might even read this. Perhaps I’ll come to DC to visit you sometime.)

Part of me found myself wondering why I don’t do what Mindy Kaling does for a living.  I’m hilarious and could star in an amazing sitcom based on my misadventures. If it’s anything like my actual life, my sitcom would be a hit among middleaged women and sports-loving progressive straight men, but would earn a large number of eye rolls from gay men. (I still don’t understand why gay men don’t find me hilarious in the same way middle aged women do, but that’s a separate essay.)

I know I won’t be starring in a Fox sitcom anytime soon, but maybe if I make someone laugh with this shitty blog, I too can be a gay, white, husky Mindy Kaling.  

#dreams

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