Appearances can be deceiving

I have to admit that from time to time, meaning every day, I stop by various gossip websites and check in on the lives of the rich and famous celebrities who enjoy either an elevated status in America or a degree of infamy. The past few days have provided me with an extraordinary amount of insight into just how screwed up this world is. For example:


Kirstie Alley, a rabid Scientologist who has achieved the ultimate status of “clear” (she can control things with her mind and she is generally superior to everyone else except my dog) has launched a weight-loss program, despite the fact that it appears from recent photographs and interviews that she lacks the, er, credentials to give weight loss advice.

She is getting an enormous (wink, wink) amount of press this week as she promotes her weight loss “elixir,” which is basically some vitamins, a website, and a weight tracker. Genius. The word on the street (10th and Salmon, to be specific) is that the company is a front for Scientology and that profits will be split between Ms. Alley and the cult, I mean, church.

Here’s the thing: according to Scientology, a person who reaches the high levels within the church that Kirstie Alley has reached (“Clear” and above) “has achieved the extremely high state of being able to be at cause knowingly and at will over mental matter, energy, space and time as regards the first Dynamic (survival as self)." To put it less ambiguously, because like everything else ever written by L. Ron Hubbard that was written really badly, a Clear is supposed to be free of the "reactive mind" (similar to Freud's "unconscious mind"), and is theoretically responding to stimuli only by conscious control.

Don’t get me wrong, that all sounds great, really wonderful! But if that is true, why can’t Kirstie put down the burrito and jog around the block a few times? A Clear is supposedly capable of moving inanimate objects with the power of their brain alone…so why can’t they move their body away from the table?

In the interests of full disclosure, I should note that I find it profoundly unfair that simply because she was on a hit television show last century, this woman who has gained and lost the same 90 pounds about twelve times should be in a position to make money off that fact. I have recently dropped 13 pounds by working my tail off in the gym and monitoring my food intake carefully. Where’s my book deal? Where’s my reality show? Why can’t I go on Oprah? I think Oprah would like me, and then we’d go out to lunch and become friends and she’d introduce me to her best friend Gayle who is TOTALLY NOT her lesbian lover and then she’d give me some of her money and I wouldn’t have to blog for cash anymore.

Oh wait, I don’t make money here. Nevermind.

OK, the other story that REALLY irked me was the GQ interview of Rielle Hunter, Johnny Edward’s mistress and baby-momma who took her pants off for a photo shoot and was subsequently infuriated when the magazine printed the photos. Because she thought they were head shots. No, really. Behold:

I especially like the really sexy pose with Kermit and Dora (watch our Kermit, Miss Piggy is going to be pissed!). I wonder what was going on in the photographer’s mind at the time. Who was the intended audience for these photos? I don’t want to sound reactionary and un-arty-like, but it seems to me that these photos might appeal to a pedophile who doesn’t want to get caught looking at actual child pornography. In a way, posing this fame-hungry DPPNF (democrat potential presidential nominee fucker) seductively with children’s toys is prurient. At the very least, it’s just bad photography, which anyone can tell you is abhorrent. Since I forced you to look at those hideous shots, I will attempt to reverse the damage to your eyeballs by presenting you with this:

This is of course Tom and Margot, the day we brought her home to complete our family of four kids, one ex-husband, one future fiancé of one ex-husband, and a tangential relationship with a very large cat named Audrey. Pictures of handsome men and adorable puppies never fail to bring a smile to my face. Tom, if you are reading this, by “handsome men,” I obviously mean “handsome men to whom I am (currently) married.”

I digress. The interview itself reads like a transcript of an overheard conversation in a girl’s high school locker room. Ordinarily I would provide a link to the article, but in this case the content is so toxic and gag-inducing that I cannot be held responsible for any of you clicking through to it from here. However, one thing that really shone through in this piece is the fact that John Edwards and Rielle Hunter are truly meant for each other, so if communicating that was the writer’s intent, I suppose she achieved her goal. Still, that GQ commissioned this trashy interview and these awkward attempted soft-kiddy-porn photos is really disappointing. I’d cancel my subscription if I had one, but I don’t because I am not a gay 25 year old male. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.

Finally, I was saddened to hear today that Sandra Bullock’s husband has been caught with his hand in the naughty cookie jar, and the actress has pulled out of public appearances and gone underground, which in Hollywood-speak means she is not currently standing in front of a camera talking about herself or her latest project, rehab stint, or the Dalai Lama. The scoundrel, aptly named Jesse James (because he’s a relationship outlaw, get it?), has apparently been “making the beast with two backs” (good one, Shakespeare) while his wife has been out of town filming. Here is a photo of Sandra and her I assume soon-to-be ex-husband at the Oscars:

Don’t they look happy? She is glowing and beaming, looking at him as if he had just given birth to a solid gold baby. And SHE’S the one who won the damned Oscar! They have only been married four years and if the allegations are true, he’s been cheating for at least a year. On her. With this:

What hit me about this story today was the profound disparity that can exist between the projected life and the real one. The average American who has heard about Sandra Bullock, especially in the past few weeks, probably thinks she has a damned near-perfect life. She’s talented, her latest movie is a hit, she won the Oscar, she’s rich, she’s beautiful, blah blah blah. The list of things for which we can all envy Sandy Bullock seems to be infinite. And yet, when you peel back the layers of the onion a bit, she’s got problems just like the rest of us. Big ones.

How many other people are out there, seeming to have it all and at the same time really struggling? How many out there are an active participant in the marketing of their life as one series of wonderful and life-affirming incidents after another? What percentage of us draft our own false narrative and transmit it via our facial expressions, choice of car, club membership, and boasting of our long and happy marriages that resemble nothing more than a false storefront on a movie set?

There are many famous examples illustrating the hypocrisy of perfection: L. Ron Hubbard railed against anti-depressants but died with them in his body; Tiger Woods portrays the loving husband and father for commercial gain but really he’s a manwhore; Ted Haggard preaches against homosexuality even after being found with a penis in his mouth.  Then again, these false portrayals are all around us. Phoniness is overwhelmingly annoying to me, as well as to Holden Caulfield, but I guess it is too much to ask that we all tell the truth. One of my new goals in life is to project an accurate portrayal of who I am and what I am about.


But of course that’s easy for me, because my life is perfect. Can’t you tell?