Chocolate ganache tart and WTF 2021
Gargantubaby: Is Batman real?
Jenny: No, Batman is pretend.
GB: Then who saves the day in our real world?
GB: Mommy, when I hurt you, I always say I’m sorry. But you always say, you better be.
GB jumps on the bed in his green-and-brown-striped pajamas, and lets out a wet-sounding fart. We’ve already done bath time, and he’s refused to sit on the toilet.
GB, I say, again. Do you have to go poo-poo?
No, Mommy, he says. Those are just farts of glory.
***
Oh, 2021. Here are some thoughts.
THE BOOK
I spent most of 2021 hawking my book, You Look Tired: An Excruciatingly Honest Guide to I Don’t Even Remember Right Now. Some cool shit happened:
I got paid $70,000.
Badass writers Jancee Dunn, Bunmi Laditan, and Meaghan O’Connell blurbed it.
Badass writer Beth Spotswood at the San Francisco Chronicle did a Q&A with me that ran in the Datebook section (the storied Sunday “pink pages”).
Some very cool radio stations and blogs had me on as a guest and interviewed me (thank you, every single one of you content creators and book lovers!!! Except the prime-time Republican with the sound effects who tried to get me to talk about how much “we” hate women who “lose all the baby weight”).
Beloved local indie A Great Good Place for Books in Oakland agreed, excitedly, to host my book launch.
Catherine Newman, bestselling author and writer of the etiquette column for Real Simple, agreed sight unseen to host my book launch, and she was fucking hilarious and we had a blast.
Foreign rights were sold, and my book is being translated into TURKISH.
DOZENS of friends, family members, colleagues, and new pals supported me in many ways, with emails, social media posts, purchases, asking indies to carry my book, snapping photos in bookstores, showing up to events, and more. THANK YOU I LOVE YOU ALL
And, here’s a reality check for anyone who, like me, once believed publishing a book is the end-all, be-all. As I discovered, publishing a book is not what you might expect it to be. I’m forever grateful, and I know how it feels to hear someone who’s accomplished something split hairs. BUT YOU DON’T COME HERE FOR THE SUNSHINE.
Although DOZENS of extremely kind friends, colleagues, and people I don’t even know wrote Amazon and Goodreads reviews and posted about my book, “You Look Tired” did not get a single “real” review. This was a possibility I did not foresee.
Millions of pitches, to all kinds of publications, podcasts, conferences, and festivals, were turned down.
My print run was 7,000 books. Amazing, right? And, as of today, 2,904 of those have been purchased BUT WAIT: That means bought by RETAILERS, including chains, online bookstores, and indies. Although my agent warns me not to trust these numbers, so far a total of 605 books (including ebooks) have been sold to actual human beings. My first book, a “chapbook,” which my friend Lindsey designed and which I did not get paid for, had a print run of 400. I hawked those books to friends, family, and SFSU faculty, who very kindly agreed to teach it to their students, so I sold out the print run in a few months. This book, which was edited, copy-edited, designed, and illustrated by professionals, which had a publicist assigned to it, and for which I, or the book, appeared in a few major publications, has sold only slightly more. I truly do not know what to make of this.
But here’s what I know: It’s not because the book isn’t good, or inclusive, or funny. I really, really like my book. I’m proud of it, and I still think you should buy it. Also, do you see the problem? I’m complaining about having sold 605 books! Post-contract is where publishing a book starts to mess with your head. It’s not just getting a contract — it’s which publishing house, how many offers you get, and how much the deal is. Post-publication, it’s which outlets review or mention your book (or not), which podcasts and radio shows or TV shows (or not) you’re invited onto, the print run, the Amazon rankings, and how many books you’ve actually sold.
To come back to center and appreciate — even believe in — my success, I’ve had to almost completely disconnect from the marketing of my book. Only then can I appreciate every single copy sold (or borrowed from the library!), and imagine someone who cares about me shelling out $25 — see again the friends and family members who bought multiple copies, just to support me — and the strangers who laughed at the title, or who actually opened the book and laughed at the pages, who reposted my words on social media, quotes from my book and from interviews, who DM’ed me with sweet words of praise and gratitude.
Also, I truly believe I gamed the system, especially given the amount of money I was offered. Most people I know who’ve published books worked a lot harder and a lot longer and got paid a lot less. I started writing a book proposal in 2019 because I had a regular column at Romper, and I knew I had a limited window to leverage that platform — if they could hire me that easily, they could let me go just the same. At the time I was able to provide numbers — readership of my columns, Romper’s total social presence — that might lead a publisher to take a chance on me. Also, every single person in the process (that I know of) was a White woman, like me. Many things worked together in my favor.
It never quite felt real — maybe because I churned out a book in six months, unlike any creative writing process I’ve ever been through or advocated to students. It still doesn’t feel real, or maybe what it feels like is not so different from how I felt before, so it doesn’t feel like I was expecting it to feel, which was different, or more different. I expected to feel vaunted, transcendent, changed (of course, I always assumed I would be publishing a towering work of fiction that skewered something or other). Everything, from the pitch to the acceptance to the writing, editing, publishing, and marketing happened during the pandemic, too, so I didn’t have a month of staring out an icy window at a snow-covered prairie in Lake Forest, Illinois, choosing my words carefully as food was cooked for me in the next building and my husband provided child care back in California. I churned out jokes every morning from 6 to 9 a.m. during lockdown in a deadly pandemic, and worked another eight hours after that at a union-busting nonprofit while my 3-year-old found more and more ways to not learn.
Because of social distancing, I had no rounds of drinks toasting my acceptance by the publishing world nor leapt into someone’s arms with joy (I kind of wandered toward SJ in a daze after I’d accepted the most lucrative offer). Still, I admit I had my hopes up that the world would creak to a stop in awe of one woman’s take on pregnancy, the postpartum period, and early parenting.
Maybe it would have? But as it turns out, marketing is not my forté, and after the book came out I just was not motivated to write a single op-ed or to spend every day on social media, learning how to do “Reels” wherein you pick a song clip and then film yourself pointing at text bubbles. Have you seen my book? I’M TIRED. I ALREADY SPENT MORE THAN A YEAR WRITING THE PROPOSAL AND THE BOOK ALSO I HAVE A JOB AND A KID.
So, promotion on my part was a fart in the wind, as my dad would say (although he’s nice enough he probably wouldn’t say that about my book). The weird thing is, it feels like I worked my ass off.
A very good friend, who is on her fourth book, told me that, after her first came out, she spent $1,000 on two outfits from J.Crew. “I thought I was going to be on the Today show!” she cried. She wasn’t on the Today show. Nobody told her she was going to be on the Today show. I was not on the Today show, either, or any TV show, although a very funny dad I know, whose very funny parenting book came out around the same time, was on Good Morning America SEE WHAT I MEAN ABOUT THE MIND-FUCK WHY WASN’T I ON GMA SHANNON I LOVE YOU BUY HIS BOOK HERE.
And I was right about the window. A few weeks ago, I wrote to Romper, after a year of feeling ambivalent about my column since my beloved editor was laid off. I wrote to an editor at 8:42 p.m., suggesting we start up again, and a different editor replied at 5:01 a.m. the next day to cut me loose. After three years of me writing a (mostly) biweekly column that was featured on the homepage, the 103-word email opened with this:
I think I heard that you started a new job this summer. That's exciting!
I'M NOT SCOOPING ICE CREAM AT THE PIER B***H I'M AN EDITOR FOR THE COUNTRY'S LARGEST NPR/PBS AFFILIATE
What is up with New Yorkers? Also, what is up with New Yorkers?
CHRISTMAS
Christmas was awesome. At the last minute, we decided to drive to Portland, Oregon, instead of flying to avoid the omicron, and although we had to leave Portland early to avoid a snowstorm in the Siskiyou Pass on our way home, we ended up having a fabulous time with family, and even snuck in a last-minute, unplanned snowboarding trip to Mt. Shasta Ski Resort. I only drunkenly yelled at SJ in the stairway of his father and stepmother’s house that he needed therapy ONE TIME. WIN.
MY NEXT MOVE
It’s true: I’m the new copy editor at KQED. Starting in the last few years, my daily work has become inspiring and compelling in a whole new way, rather than a way for me to support my writing. I’ve always enjoyed editing, but recently I’ve been able to define my roles as intersecting with diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging. Although I won’t (can’t) give up writing, my next move won’t be another book (for now! Don’t give up on me, Laura Lee!). I may have found the day job that is fulfilling enough that maybe, in the mornings and evenings, I can spend time taking care of myself and my family without feeling like I should be doing something else.
But I’ll still blog about raising this child I am completely in love with, and maybe I’ll even write more about my marital problems!
Also: I’ve been learning a lot about nonviolent communication (NVC) this year, and I hope to deepen my practice, which I’m sure doesn’t include calling people out on my blog, but … baby steps!
LETTING GO
Two nights ago, I had a dream. I was all dressed up, in a red sheath dress, with my long brown hair up in some kind of chignon, a word I have never written but apparently know. I was supposed to go to a party, where someone from my real life — someone who takes up way more space in my psyche than I care to admit, who haunts me with her disdain, dismissal, and success — was hosting a party in a fancy restaurant that, lo and behold, she owned. I was in a hotel room of sorts with another friend — this person’s best friend in real life — who was also getting dressed up. She slipped out of the room, avoiding me, without inviting me or expressing any interest in my coming. It hurt my feelings. But I realized, without anger, that I don’t have to do this anymore. I don’t have to go to the party I’m not invited to. This is my real life now, and it’s different from the time when we were all friends. No more chasing, my dream said.
In the dream, I didn’t go to the party. (But I kept the dress.)
RANDOM
Someone I went to grad school with, an incredibly nice person and gifted writer, who had her book launch at the same Oakland indie I did, 1. is a billionaire I KNEW SHE WAS RICH BUT I DIDN’T KNOW HOW RICH, 2. is, with her husband, the founder and CEO of Roblox I ALSO DID NOT KNOW THIS, being held up by the New York Times as an example of tech giants using tax savvy to skirt millions of dollars in capital gains taxes and enriching their family members, rather than, say, giving back to the society that created the landscape that made such wealth for them possible and that offers public schools, social programs, libraries, firefighters, roads, and bridges. I dreamt about her all night, and my mind is beating itself up trying to figure out how to feel. As usual, I am looking at the handwritten sign on my wall that says, “These things coexist.”
***
Driving down Masonic, I see a school that I think is one of the schools SJ and I are interested in sending GB to. (It’s actually not the school.)
Jenny: GB, see this building here? Do you know what this is?
GB: The end of the world?
GB: Mommy? Do horses know about robots?
GB hops into the room on his pink bouncy ball, naked except for his koala bath cap from Daiso.
Jenny: You are so cute.
GB: Even when I'm putting my penis on things?
We have a neighbor with a massive, seriously souped-up pickup, with an unbelievable alarm. For weeks I thought someone was honking out of frustration because it just sounds like someone laying on the horn. Then, when it started going off outside our house, I could look outside at the blinking headlights and see it was an alarm.
One night at 9:30 p.m., it's idling right outside my window for five minutes, 10 minutes, because the neighbor is doing whatever the fuck I don't care.
I grumble and pull back the curtain like a proper middle-aged person.
"What is it, Mommy?" GB asks.
"Oh," I say, "there's a truck in the neighborhood that makes a lot of noise."
GB smiles. "Then you better call it ‘fuck truck.’"
He's learning!
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This chocolate ganache tart takes time, but is UNBELIEVABLY EASY and UNBELIEVABLY DELICIOUS, and that’s all I want in a recipe. You need:
60 round buttery crackers, such as Ritz WHICH I USED
3/4 cups (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 TB confectioners’ sugar
1 cup (6 oz.) bittersweet chocolate chips
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1/8 tsp. kosher salt
Flaky sea salt, for serving (optional)
You need to:
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Place crackers in large zip-top bag; seal well. Using a rolling pin or whatever you have, crush crackers into fine crumbs. (Or pulse in a food processor, but seriously, who wants to clean a food processor if you don’t have to!)
Melt 1 stick butter in a small saucepan over medium-low, stirring occasionally.
Put cracker crumbs in a large bowl. Stir in sugar. Stir in melted butter until mixture is well combined and the consistency of wet sand. Transfer to a 9-inch tart pan with a removable bottom NO or a 9-inch pie plate YES. Press crust into an even layer on bottom and up sides of pan.
Bake until lightly golden, about 10 mins. Remove from oven and let cool completely, about 45 mins.
Meanwhile, make the ganache. Put 2 ins. water in a medium pot over medium; bring to a simmer. Fit a small saucepan (or heatproof bowl I SPENT WAY TOO LONG TRYING TO FIGURE OUT WHAT A HEATPROOF BOWL IS DOES THAT MEAN IT DOESN’T CONDUCT HEAT OR IT WON’T MELT I USED A METAL BOWL) over simmering water, making sure water doesn’t touch saucepan. Combine chocolate chips and cream in saucepan. Cook, stirring constantly, until chocolate is completely melted and mixture is glossy, 4 to 5 minutes.
Remove saucepan from water; stir in remaining 1/2 stick butter, 1 TB at a time WHOOPS I BUNGED THE WHOLE THING IN BUT IT WAS FINE, until fully incorporated. Stir in vanilla and kosher salt. Let cool to room temperature, about 30 minutes.
Pour cooled ganache into cooled crust. Refrigerate, uncovered, for at least 2 hours and up to 6 hours, covered after 2 hours. Before serving, sprinkle with flaky sea salt, if desired.
