MINDY KALING IS MY SPIRIT ANIMAL AND OTHER TRUTHS I HAVE LEARNED

    Ok, I know all of you think I am a person who has his finger on the pulse of what’s hip, cool, current, woke, relevant, subversive, lit, etc.  And you know, it’s an obvious assumption, naturally, I grant you, what with my cool-meter being up there with Geraldo, Robbie Williams, the lead singer from “Living in a Box”, Mo’nique, the ghosts of Dick van Patten and Clara Peller, James Frey, and Lana Del Rey’s personal assistant.  I mean, I *did* have fleeting email discussions with Judy Blume and Jennifer Weiner back in the late 1990s, and I am pretty sure Jennifer Gray sent me an email once but I was too freaked out to answer her back, and I *did* have Rosanne Cash answer 5 of my Twitter comments back in the day when I was on the Twitter, so yeah, woke and lit, bruh. However, here’s a little secret I don’t share often, but I will with you today, my cherished Goop readers, so insert your vaginal eggs, light your “Gee, this candle smells like vagina” candle, make yourself a nice up of ayahuasca tea (try and get the vomiting over with before you read this though, as it’s a long one), and set a spell.  You see, I need to tell you that contrary to popular belief, I really do not have my finger on the pulse of much, nor have I since I began raising babies.  Really, truth be told, I am about as relevant as Loretta Lynn was back in the Butcher Holler or Washington State days, where she was looking after her four babies and canning shitloads of green beans for the year – sorry, I guess the slang for canning is like “putting up” or something – see, I can’t even get that right.  Anyway, since about, oh, I don’t know, the early 2000s, I have not kept up with tv other than my handful of reality shows (Survivor, Big Brother, Project Runway), a handful of sitcoms, and a bunch of HGTV bullshit I’m forced to watch.  So, while I knew there was this thing called “The Office”, and that it was based on a BBC show called “The Office” starring that annoying guy who actually seems kinda funny, I had no desire to actually watch either of them, because who has time for anything when you are trying to stay one step ahead of four kids? 

     Well, this all changed due to lockdown, and so let me be the first to say thank you sweet Jesus for Covid-19, because I’m slowly getting my tv mojo back.  I’ve got a post about the past year and a ½ and COVID in the works that is also in book-length form and needs finishing and editing, so I’m not going to say too much about that, but let me just say I got my feet wet, and finally started The Office at the beginning of November.  Well, we binged it and finished over Xmas, and now are ½ way through The Mindy Project, and this past weekend we watched all of Never Have I Ever.  All of this compels me to reveal to you the epiphany I had, namely that Mindy Kahling is a.) the fucking shit b.) genius extrordinaire c.) wickedly fierce a la Adele Dazeem d.) all of the above times infinity.  Like, I’d say she should be my best friend or my spirit animal, and I am going to try to explain all of this.  However, I don’t know if it will all tie together, but I am going to try and if not?  Well, goonie-goo-goo, bitches.

To really articulate all of this, I have to go back in time.  I was born the son of a hardworking sharecropper... well, replace that with Mountie, and you get my drift.  It was your typical childhood, with a healthy dose of dysfunction and a lack of coping skills on my part that led to a plethora of anxiety issues that still rear their ugly heads, but it was still pretty aiiiight, all things considered.  But this sorta changed right around the beautiful time of puberty for reasons you will see below.

When I was 15 years old, I was living the typical fantasy life of your typical teenager.  Well, by typical, I mean your typical socially awkward 15 year old, who is greatly influenced by certain elements of popular culture.  15 was actually a pivotal year for me for many reasons.  The first half of 15 was sort of a continuation of the past miserable three years.  When I was almost 12, I moved with my parents halfway across the country, from the west coast, to the middle of the prairies, leaving my friends and my three adult siblings behind.  To say I did not fit in in this new environment was an understatement.  It was like I stepped into some weird time warp, and I had nothing in common with anybody at my new school.  I was bullied, and as my new school was actually like this ghetto school (doing the research about schools isn’t anything my parents would have thought about – “What do you mean you don’t like the school?  You just go to the school by your house, for chrissakes, what are you, a prince? There’s no choice in this” -- is what they would’ve said if I would’ve voiced it, but that was something I never would’ve thought to do – you just didn’t do shit like that), so it was just all sorts of miserable.  Because I didn’t fit in, and didn’t want to fit in, I somehow thought it was all about me, and that finally they would give in and find a way for us to move back.  Again, this isn’t something parents of my generation would have even thought about, so that was just a waste of time, but anyway, I basically became this weird house hermit when I wasn’t in school.  I spent all my time reading and listening to music, laying on my bed.  My bed was this old bedframe of my grandmother’s, and I was on the bed so much that my head wore all the paint off the metal headboard.  I used to look at that smooth metal circle and wonder if the chemicals leached into my bloodstream through the crown of my head.  I was ready to develop lead poisoning so I could dramatically below to my parents that it was all their fault from my hospital bed.  Because I spent so much time horizontally (but not in the good Olivia Newton John way, but rather more in the unhealthy Boo Radley way),  I grew horribly pale from the lack of sunshine and the lack of exercise.  And, even though I was always a borderline chubby kid, I developed this weird disorder for a period of time where I couldn’t really swallow food because I thought I was going to choke (again, it didn’t cross my mind to tell my parents because, well, I was sure they’d be mad or something), so I actually got nice and slim.  That, coupled with the pasty-whiteness from all my time indoors, made me look like I had the newfound AIDS virus or something.  It was a real attractive look if you were going for some sort of cave-dweller/locked in a cellar vibe.  So this is who I was during the first half of 15.  The second half?  Well, that’s when I started high school and my entire life turned around and I suddenly had a shitload of friends and was busy every damn night of the week, and I was basically Carrie the week before the prom – it was like night and day.  So why am I telling you all of this vulnerable stuff when really I could keep it shoved down in my stomach like good kids of the 70s and 80s were trained to?  Well, because motherfucker, it sets up my appreciation for Ms. Mindy.  Actually, thinking about it, I’m not entirely sure it does, but I’ve typed so much by now, we will just go with it. 

So, all of this is to say that because I spent so much time alone during those formative years, I spent a lot of time in my head in fantasies.  Now, do not be alarmed, they were nothing nefarious like you’d think with the disturbing profile I just gave of my dark years.  Rather, they were the same sorts of fantasies I had during the good years before that.  Namely, they usually involved finding fame and fortune and happiness and popularity, and, especially, love.  I’ve always been a hopeless romantic in heart, and who else was better at tugging at my heart strings than John Hughes movies?  I think I was 14 when 16 Candles went out, and oh man, I thought Jake Ryan was the luckiest asshole in the world.  However, the movie that blew me away the most was Valley Girl.  First off, if you haven’t seen it, go see it. Motherfucker, that movie changed my life.  The movie is just your typical lower budget joint.  In fact, it was so lower budget that the posters and the subsequent covers of the VHS and DVD do not feature the stars of the movie, Deborah Foreman and Nicolas Cage, but rather some odd composites.  I can’t exactly remember why that is – I know I did find out the exact reason back when the internet was new and I was in some chat forum on my trusty old 30 hours/month of dial-up, but it escapes me now, but the takeaway is that it was something to do with the budget.  Also, the killer soundtrack used in the movie, and what really makes that motherfucker shine like a Meryl Streep turd IS the music that’s used, was only available as like some 6 song, limited edition type soundtrack.  It wasn’t until the early 90s when Rhino compiled the music from the movie and released two volumes of it – Songs from the Motion Picture Valley Girl, so that should tell you how restricted the budget was.  I am sure Craft Services was probably Arby’s Five of Five on that set.  But I digress.  The movie is lower budget, the soundtrack hard to obtain, but there are three main things about the movie that just pierced my heart.  First, as I said, the Romeo and Juliet type love story, with the greasy dope from Hollywood and the Val princess who were in constant conflict by the forces of conformity brought on by the strict regime of Val culture, made my little heart well up with hope.  Second, the killer fucking soundtrack follows me to this day.  It’s all too much to get into right now for the most part, but just google it and make a playlist, and we can talk until the cows come home later, ok?  And third?  The Valley.

Yes, the Valley.  I know that the Valley represented everything wrong with culture in Los Angeles and was the punchline to many jokes, but to me, it represented everything I ever wanted up to that point in my life.   In addition to be in California, the Valley was full of everything I coveted – suburban split level homes just like Knots Landing,  The Galleria (I was mall obsessed and I think I could spout off facts about what malls had the most stores – I know this makes me sound crazier than you already think I am), and valley girls.  Oh how I loved valley girls.  I used to listen to Moon Zappa’s song not acknowledge the joke, but because she did such a damn good job sounding like one.  I could totally picture my perfect valley life in my head.  I would be decked out like a smokin’ hot val dude, with a purple polo shirt with an ironed collar, a pair of Ray-Bans, a bunch of those jelly plastic bracelets on one arm and a few swatch watches on the other, with some totally bitchen floppy hair, with my chest hair shaved into a triangle like Nic Cage’s in the movie because I was sure that meant something (turns out it didn’t, and the director thought he was too hairy to play someone young so they compromised at that triangle thing.  I didn’t know that then, so I assumed it was some rad fashion statement).  Anyway, I would be cruising the Galleria with my totally fucking tubular girlfriend Andrea (pronounced An-DREY-AH) at my side, her leg warmers matching my shirt, smelling like Love’s Baby Soft and ending every sentence with “like, you know?”  We’d look totally rad riding the escalator together as we surveyed our kingdom from the top, before we disembarked to split some sushi at the Food Court.  However, our love wouldn’t be all superficial mall-rat show.  Oh hells no, we’d be real in love, and our song would be “I Melt With You” just like Randy and Julie in the movie,  and we’d feed each of fries at DuPar’s too, also like the movie.  Oh it was just so fucking romantic that scene where they play the song and show all of that that I could’ve just fucking died happy right then and there.  So the movie really was my touchstone for what I imagined would give me a happy, fulfilled life.  And what the fuck does this have to do with Mindy Kaling, you ask?  Well hang on, I’ll get to that in a paragraph or two.  Fuck, has anybody ever told you that you are impatient AF? 

So, I know we all like happy endings, and thus as I said earlier that 15 had a way happier ending than the start – I mean, not HAPPY HAPPY endings like in a questionable massage parlor, but good enough.  Anyway, I started high school that fall and within a month I had a shitload of friends, went partying every weekend, and basically had one fuck of a good time.  But that didn’t mean that I still didn’t live in my own fantasy world, like all teenagers do.  I pictured myself socially woke, not in some extremist kind of way, but in a “let’s write letters to Amnesty International for political prisoners in foreign lands so they won’t get killed” and “let’s write to leaders of countries to implore them to support Greenpeace” and such.  While it is true I never penned any of these letters, I still thought fondly and caringly of these organizations and die believe one day I would write these letters and considered myself a supporter.  I also prayed for the release of Nelson Mandela from prison and wanted to give South Africa a stern talking to, and when I made it big, there was no fucking way I would ever, EVER play Sun City.  Ab-so-fucking-lutely not.  I really, really wanted to get my hands on one of those Africa medalions that… oh shit, I’m so old now I can’t remember who wore one… Chuck D maybe wore.  Like that would’ve looked just awesome on a skinny white boy, but I wanted to show my solidarity.  Let’s just say that I wanted to fight the fucking power.  I also spent a lot of time lusting over celebrity crushes, like Lisa Lisa back when “I Wonder if I Take you Home” came out, and Denise Huxtable in The Cosby Show, and, well, I claimed I thought Grace Jones was hot, but let’s be real, that bitch scared the shit out of me, but I thought it made me sound cool.  Anyway, all of this to say that I imagined dating someone like Denise Huxtable, racists of the world be damned.  Oh, I imagined us strolling hand in hand in a park, with Morris Day from The Time singing “Ice Cream Castles” on a grandstand – those lyrics “You are fine/you are white/I am of color/let’s fall in love” hitting home, and our strong love would be a big fuck you to the bigots in the crowd: love conquers all, Hoss!  Or how we’d stick it through no matter what, as we listned to INXS’ “Original Sin” (dream on black boy, dream on white girl – sure the genders were mixed up in either song, but it still meant the same).  Basically, I imagined my love life to be a United Colors of Benneton ad.  Of course, this is not how my love life turned out.  I developed a crush on the one black girl in my grade, a heavyset gal who looked to be about 25 and dated this skinny gross white boy.  My friends somehow told her I had a crush on her and she didn’t say anything but didn’t appear to be thrilled by it, and so it was awkward and we never spoke to each other again, even though we were in the same drama class and had to do skits together.  Ugh, I thought I blocked all of that out.  Anyway, she’s in the show biz in Vancouver now doing something or other and she’s a lesbian now, and back in the day she starred in the Joan and Melissa Rivers biopic as “dorm friend #17” or something and actually had a line, like “Melissa, come party” or something.  Anyway, weirdly enough, I met her mother last year at the post office.  She was this little old lady ahead of me and trying to send this huge package to her daughter and I saw the name and so I blurted out “I knew Susie Nameless in high school” and we had a completely wonderful awkward conversation.  But I digress.  Long story short, I had all of these stupid ideas in my head that I thought were just the bees fucking knees.

So what in the everloving fuck does this have to do with Mindy Kaling you ask yet again?  Well, everything and nothing.  Now that I think about it, what I could’ve done is basically say “I sure like and identify throughout my lifespan with Mindy Kaling based on her work and the characters she’s created to date” on the Twitter, but I’m like 3 pages deep right now, so please Jesus, let me figure out how to salvage this.  Also, I haven’t been on the Twitter since pre-Trump days, so I can’t even remember how to log in, so I’m stuck with this format. Ok, here goes.  The whole thing comes down to 1.) her work on The Office 2.) The Mindy Project 3.) Never Have I Ever. 

    First, as I said, I’m a late-comer to The Office – like, 90 days ago, I hadn’t even watched an episode of it.  But from the beginning, I was a fan of Kelly.  Now, I know some of you will say that this fondness of Kelly would be because I always seem to get attached to supporting characters – hi, baby sister on Hello Larry, middle sister on Gimme a Break, Selma Bouvier on The Simpsons, and rest in peace, Mary from Eight is Enough.  But no, that’s not it.  Kelly was both funny and annoying in all the right ways, and I got a kick out of her.  However, what really sealed the deal is when I finally figured out that she was a writer on the show.  Now, I know most of you will be all oohing and awing over story archs and all of that shit, but the thing I loved most about the office?  It is the little crazy storylines – I’m telling you, these are what made the show – Meredith getting run over, Kelly recording a song with whatshername, Ryan doing stupid shit, etc.  Its exactly what my work life has been like – I am totally going to do a work life/Office comparison after this post.  Anyway, this is all the stuff that Mindy created.  Watching that show made me jealous actually, wishing I spent my 20s writing on a cool show, letting all the crazy shit flow.  Mindy is way tougher than I’ll ever be, but she obviously has the same zany, nutty side as I do.  And she's also got a romantic side.  It's like Sammy Hagar's song "Two Sides of Love" - there are two sides of Mindy as well!  She wrote the episodes where Jim and Pam get married, which I'm probably sure teared me up, but it was the same episodes where Kevin's shoes stink so bad, they get destroyed because they were toxic.  As someone who, after 15 years being gone from my old job, still discusses seeing this other coworker's ugly bandaged foot once with my old office mate, I appreciate that kind of shit.  It's funny and ridiculous, but motherfucker it still can happen to you.  So Mindy has the timing and instinct to balance the yin and the yang together.  I also heard a story that Mindy has to write a fucking letter to the Academy to be eligible for inclusion in the Emmys as a producer, while all these white boy bitches she produced with didn't have to do that.  Like what the fuck, Emmy motherfuckers?  Unless these white boys were blowing the committee for inclusion, you need to apologize your ass for that.  It sort of reminded me of back when my beloved aunt died.  She had asked my sister to do her eulogy, and my sister kept saying I had to help her because I wrote my parents' obituaries while she looked on.  So, I write this motherfucking 12 page eulogy that took says and was awesome AF and my sister added one line at the end: "aunty always said to wear lipstick" or something.  Anyway, the eulogy got a fucking standing ovation.  Seriously.  Did I get any glory? Nope.  I dropped a shit load of unsubtle hints, and my cousins sent me a bottle of booze with a note saying "thank you for helping your sister write the eulogy" and I swear, it still burns my hairy ass to this day. So basically, I know what Mindy's been through, except without the being a woman and person of color thing that probably was what got her excluded because Hollywood is a sexist, racist motherfucker.  Ok, so it has nothing to do with it.  Fine.  But I feel for her and I am glad she called the academy on Twitter.  I'm calling my cousins out here. I wrote that thing, boo yah. Also, love you guys!

    Now, why do I love Mindy from the Mindy Project?  How do I love thee?  Let me NOT count the ways, because it'll sound like some sort of fangirl bullshit, but let me say, in five sentences or less, that she created a character that is basically me, except I'm not a woman, nor Indian, nor an ob/gyn (but I'm pretty good with that stuff, I've been told.... well actually, I haven't, but I do know where all the stuff is and shit, and that's half the battle, lemme tell ya), nor do I live in NYC or an urban area, but these are but only a few small things that separate us.  Basically, the character Mindy Lahiri and myself are both smart, but we don't always let it show, and we have better coping skills than we let show, and we are both funnier than Erma Bombeck was after a few drinks, and we both know lots of trivial pop culture things, especially about Kardashians, and we are likeable.  And beautiful.  So basically, the character she created is relatable to a white, overweight, father of four on the motherfucking Canadian prairies, so like, I think she really did the impossible.  

Finally, I just have to touch on Never Have I Ever.  Lord love a duck, this show sealed the deal for me.  Mindy isn't actually in it, but she created it, and it's fucking perfect.  I may be 50 and 10 months old, but these teenagers take me back to those days like it was yesterday.  The dead father thing made me weepy all the time like I was getting my period, the stupid things Devi does is like the same stupid things we all have done, it touches on all the things we all went through - drinking, should I have sex just to get it fucking over with, my parents don't understand me, my friends are high maintenance, my mother is going to move us back to India.... you know, all the common things.  And what sealed the deal?  It's set in the Valley, baby!  Sherman Fucking Oaks, which was my second fantasy place to live back in my Valley Girl days (the first was Van Nuys, but I've since learned it's less Knots Landing and perhaps more shithole, but I am sure some will say I am wrong).  So, even though Valley girls don't really exist there anymore, there is still enough glimpses into the suburban Valley world where right next to you is the upperly mobile rich folks, and there's the conflict between the social groups, and so there's definitely a Valley Girl vibe running through it.  And the multi-cultural cast of kids? It is totally the united colours of Benetton (or UCOB from here on in) at the school, and it's beautiful!  And the dreamboat boy has a hyphenated last name, and as someone who hyphenated his own children and second guessed that decision ever since, it's wonderful to see that.  Anyway, she's created something so awesome and I'm sort of jealous because I wish I would've came up with it.  And Mindy's shows always touch on the whole "my parents want me to marry a nice Indian boy but I'm in love with non-Indian boys" thing, which takes me back to my own UCOB dreams as a teenager.  

    So all of this wraps up how I think she is fucking neato.  Mindy Kahling, you are a smart, fierce, funny, kind, strong, nutty, hip person.  We should hang out.

Love and Other Indoor Sports,

JT