#letter

throughtheeyesofmyself:

It takes time.

A little while ago, not much more than a few days ago, I was a child who went about in a world of colors, of hard and tangible forms. Everything was mysterious and something was hidden. Guessing what it was was a game for me. If you knew how terrible it is to know suddenly, as if a bolt of lightning elucidated the earth.Now I live in a painful planet, transparent as ice, but it is as if I had learned everything at once in seconds.My friends,my companions became women slowly, I became old in instants and everything today is bland and lucid. I know that nothing lies behind. If there was something, I would see it….

— Frida Kahlo in a letter to Alejandro Gómez Arias, (29 September 1926)

A few of you guys messaged me this weekend about a video released by somebody else that bears a striking resemblance to one of mine. Here are my thoughts.

I’m a huge fan of the Rob Delaney approach to originality in comedy. To paraphrase, his outlook on the inevitable parallel thinking that happens in this industry is “wow, it sucks that you might have stolen that bit from me. But I would suck even more if I couldn’t come up with 3 funnier jokes to take its place.” I’ve been on both sides of this fence. It never stops feeling weird and uncomfortable, but this ideology has gotten me through it almost every time.

This week I found out that a company who has solicited me for paid work twice, and has asked for and received a writing package from me as recently as 5 weeks ago, has produced a video that is shockingly similar to a video I made several months ago. I want to underscore that I don’t own any YouTube format - people have done the makeup shtick before me, and they’ll be doing it long after I’m dead and we’re all farming water on Mars to appease World President Robo-Trump. I also want to add that I don’t have any insight into the situation beyond what I mentioned above and my own extrapolation of these facts. Which, at the end of the day, is really worth nothing at all.

When this has happened before, the response I get from family, friends, and viewers is outrage. People ask me what I’m going to “do about it,” and so before you guys slide into my DMs (which don’t get me wrong, I love. Please slide into my DMs every day, preferably with a picture of your cute pets. It gives me life) I thought I’d let you know what I’m going to do about it. I’m going to do better. I don’t want to waste my creative energy or your valuable time rallying everyone to fight some nebulous Internet war over a video that’s already out and could be similar to my own purely by coincidence for all I know. It’s not productive, and the look ain’t cute either. Instead, I’m going to work even harder, push my creative boundaries even further, and I’m going to bring you guys new, fresh, exciting work that I’m really proud of. Because at the end of the day, my job is not to chase down my old jokes - it’s to write new ones.

Finally, I want to say that I appreciate each and every one of you more than you could imagine. I know that you guys let me know about these similar videos out of concern, care, and loyalty, and those little FYIs are still always welcome (gotta keep tabs on the competition! *wink*) Truthfully, I wouldn’t have this job (or, let’s be real, any job - it’s ruff out there gang!) if it weren’t for you guys. Every week I’m deeply humbled to read your comments and your tweets and your messages, and I’m honoured that you’ve chosen to make me a little part of your life for 3 minutes a week. Thank you for everything, and I look forward to doing better for you guys in the future.

Love, Megan

lochiels:

““I just miss you, in a quite simple desperate human way.””

— Vita Sackville-West, Excerpt from a letter to Virginia Woolf   (via violentwavesofemotion)