Dear Every Trashcan Nine-Year-Old Me Couldn’t Find In My Classmates’ Homes:

Thank you.

No, really. Thank you. I know you’re probably not used to hearing that. I’m nineteen now, and to be completely honest, I haven’t thought about  you much during these last ten years. I’d be willing to bet few people do. You lead a tough and thankless life. It’s about time someone gave you the appreciation you deserve.

You made me who I am. Before encountering you and all of the self-doubt, social awkwardness, and stone cold fear that trying to find you without asking Jacklyn’s scary mom entailed, I was naïve. I thought the world was good. I thought things would always be taken care of for me. The figurative peanut butter-and-jelly sandwich with toasted bread and removed crust that I always thought would be ready-made for me for the rest of my life – that was all a big joke. And you were the first one to teach me that.

Adults are scary. They always will be. Nine-year-old Liz was especially intimidated, though. Disapproval was and is at the core of the black ball of fear that has ever held me back from anything. So, clutching my crumpled-up napkin after eating snacks at Caroline’s house after school, I was naturally rendered paralyzed. How do I ask her scary dad where you are? This house is weird. In my house, the trashcan just sits out in the kitchen like trashcans are SUPPOSED to. But here, you’re being elusive. And I guess everyone thought it was TOTALLY COOL to not inform me of your whereabouts when I first arrived. I’m standing here in the kitchen, napkin now damp with my nervous palm sweat, trying to get IIIIN YOUR HEAD and figure out where you are without having to resort to asking that tall, deep-voiced man over there.

You see, every trashcan nine-year-old me couldn’t find in my classmates’ homes,…you gave me a gift. In order to finally find out from Mary’s loud, Long Island-born smoker mother that you were in fact behind the third cabinet from the right under the microwave but you have to jiggle the cabinet door a little bit because it jams, I had to swallow my pride and accept that the world is mean sometimes. I had to ask a strange adult for help, which at the time for me was like entering a dirty, dark poker game where I could most definetely die.

You were my first administrator of crippling self-doubt. That’s something that not only has never gone away, but has informed all of my life decisions since. If I didn’t have crippling self-doubt how could I ever do comedy? How could I be compelled overcompensate for my sense of inferiority by demanding positive reactions from others because of things I say? If I hadn’t met you, I wouldn’t have become the attention whore I had to be in order to audition for theatre in high school and win the Class of 2010 Senior Superlative of “Most Likely to Win an Oscar”. That award got me a hug from Caleb O’Connor, captain of the boy’s varsity soccer team. He played guitar and went to church.

So, thanks.

Sincerely,

Liz Arcury

P.S. – I’m sure you’re wondering why I didn’t just ask the kids where you were. Hint: I wanted them to like me even more than I wanted the adults to. I had to see them EVERY DAY in school. There was a social web and my brain told me that asking them a question like that would get me kicked out of the web as quickly as possible. Those issues were readily instilled long before I met you, so don’t worry about it. Just be happy you’re a trashcan.

The American Cancer Society, Invisible Children, and The Humane Society can welcome a new addition into their charitable circle. Walk To Work is the brainchild foundation that lends loving support to less fortunate American citizens whose schedules are traumatically interrupted on a weekly – and in some cases we have been told of, daily – basis by red-vest-wearing-paperwork-bearing sweaty volunteers with boundary issues.

Though still in its embryonic stages of development and marketing, the organization has raised over 23K for its cause. All proceeds go toward reaching out to those who were listening to their iPods at 6:30am and effectively tuning out the world until they were caught in an eager Red Cross worker’s line of vision. The harsh “Hey, can you come talk to me for a minute? Red Cross. Wanna help people out?” yelled on the sidewalk can be and often is louder than “What Difference Does It Make?” by The Smiths played on an mp3 player and proceeds to snap the young businessperson out of their pre-workday mind-tranquilizing stroll to the subway station.

“It’s like my whole morning zone is totally thrown off,” states city dweller and marketing assistant Gina Gabriel, 24. “I have to walk by that corner to get to my office building. There are no shortcuts. I’ve looked.”

Gina is not alone. There are millions of young professionals just like her who face this mood-killer every morning as they make their way to their respective businesses. Though the Red Cross workers must know that one in formal business attire walking briskly past donning white earbuds will always politely decline an invitation to look at the clipboards they are rapidly waving with desperation, they still persist, and there is nothing Walk To Work can do to stop it, even if they had all of the celebrity endorsements and rubber bracelets in the world.

What they can do is provide emotional support and psychological treatment to those affected. The ‘treatment’ offered is donations of newer technologically advanced noise-cancelling headphones that can easily plug in to any iPod, Samsung Android, or smartphone.

“This is a godsend,” lauds Gabriel. It is clear that she is filled with emotion – and newfound hope. “I totally won’t hear them talking to me anymore so I won’t have to feel weird and say ‘no thanks’ every morning. It’s like they won’t even be there.”

This only marks the beginning of the fight for a peaceful, non-jarring pedestrian experience across America. The charity has galas, press events, and celebrity endorsements in the works. As the foundation’s motto says, “Hope is in Help, and Help is in Better Headphones”.

You can donate to Walk To Work by dialing 1-800-NO-THANKS-IM-IN-A-RUSH-IM-SORRY-NOT-TODAY-I-GIVE-BLOOD-ALREADY or texting PASSIVEUSA to the number found on the company’s website. The website is under construction as Walk To Work is currently preoccupied with their embroilment in a legal battle with The American Red Cross over featuring Chayanne in television commercial advertisements.

New ground was broken in the life of Maxine Thayer and in the history of Southwest airlines this afternoon. At approximately 4:32pm while flying 34,080 feet above Kansas City, Missouri, Thayer, 43, spoke the words “that’s cute” insecurely while pretending to untangle her iPod headphones.

The latter action was necessary so as to seem nonchalantly preoccupied. Thayer had been peering at the white bichon frise of Jordan Caper, 28, sitting to her left since Caper had opened the Macbook approximately 84 minutes earlier. The personalized wallpaper, a digital photo taken from home, sparked a potential non-forward-seeming conversation starter in Thayer’s mind. Despite the cuteness and casual intentions of the comment, she was paralyzed by fear of a seconds-long awkward exchange with Caper, a stranger to her.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before,” reports 4-year Southwest flight attendant Ally Simms, 30. “You see it about once every third flight. Somebody opens their laptop and their seatmate passively glares at the screen for about three-and-a-half seconds, and then quickly shifts in their seat or reaches for their SkyMall in front of them.” Simms walks the aisles of economy jets like this on a daily basis and was kind enough to delve into this underground neurosis of air travel. “Even though we can’t see the screens, we know it’s most likely a pet photo that would implore the seatmate to speak up with a compliment and then get uncomfortable.” 

The puppy’s delightful posture – laying on a couch with his face peering between two pillows – insinuated that a comment about it would have been appropriately deserved. The impersonal stigma of the setting and general fear of having to make go-nowhere small talk for the rest of the long flight as a result of the initial well-intentioned phrase  is a consistent barrier, though.

“Maxine’s a game changer,” Simms continues. “She’s made it okay for people to trust their first instinct in potentially awkward social situations on Southwest airlines. Not only will the general atmosphere of flights be more positive, but now corporate is putting stakes in shy passengers using this newfound confidence to order priced drinks that they’ve always secretly wanted instead of the free three sips of water or ginger ale.”

My name is Roxanne McLachlan and I lost my homecoming queen crown to Dakota Fanning.

We go to Campbell Hall Episcopal High School here in North Hollywood, CA. Well, I go here. Little Miss Fanning maybe shows up six days out of the school year when she feels like it or when she’s not being flown around the world and being in movies. We barely ever see her walking down the halls and when we do it’s always a big fucking production. I usually go home sick those days.

When voting came around in September all my friends said they would vote for me. Everyone said they would vote for me.

I was poised to win, after all. My glitter glue posters with collages of pictures of me and my friends (which I stayed up super late cropping to make sure only the popular ones were in there) and the words “Vote Roxanne CHEHS Homecoming Queen!” were so good. I also handed out lollipops with the saying written in Sharpie on the wrapper. I was a shoe-in. Not to mention the fact that I’m extremely popular. Yah, I said it. But I’ve worked my ass off for it so whatever.

Since freshman year I’ve gone to every football and basketball game because that’s what you have to do to. Did I have any idea what was going on? No. Do I like sports? No. Do I spend nights thinking about how I could take all those hours and add them together and spend them in true happiness reading my favorite book “Pride and Prejudice”? Fuck off. And don’t tell anyone that’s my favorite book.

And the fake laughing at the jock boys’ jokes. Holy shit. It’s become muscle memory now. But it’s what you have to do. If they don’t think you think they’re hilarious they won’t invite you to Steak ‘n Shake after the big game. And that’s where the real becoming popular shit goes down. That’s where I got Jensen Berger’s number after I faux-giggled when he made a Family Guy reference.

Dakota was in Vienna that weekend being given a wreath of yellow flowers from the Austrian Federal Chancellor.

I even showed up to the homecoming game an hour and a half early to thank everyone for their vote as they filed into the stands. Of course, there was always the fear in the back of my mind that when people looked at the ballot and saw fucking DAKOTA FANNING they would have a knee-jerk reaction and think “I didn’t even know she went here but wow that’s awesome I’m totally voting for her!” But I quelled that fear when I thought of my years of hard work clawing my way up the ladder of Campbell Hall. And when I thought of how everyone said they would vote for me. That helped calm me down, too.

I was ready for halftime – when the winner would be announced. Relaxed and confident. Dakota had won the year before and that was freaking me out a little bit since we had been JUNIORS and the entire homecoming system is based off the idea that everyone participating are SENIORS but she won by a 96% margin by write-in anyway since she had showed up to one session of AP US History the day before voting and everyone was freaking out because they didn’t even know she goes here. That aside, I kept telling myself that there was no way she could win two years in a row. She didn’t even make posters or lose her virginity to Jensen Berger.

My baby blue bubble dress swished and swayed in the September night wind as I walked onto the field. Hearing the cheering that proceeded after my name was called when the announcer rattled off the homecoming court list reaffirmed my self-esteem. I was assigned to link arms on the field with Ryan McCullough, a tall dark-haired lacrosse player. He looks just like how I imagine Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy. It was looking to be a perfect night.

No sign of Dakota. The court list was finished being announced and Ryan squeezed my hand. The vice principal’s booming voice came on over the loudspeaker.

“And, your homecoming king for Campbell Hall Episcopal High School’s 2010-2011 school year is…Jensen Berger!”

As the smattering of applause died down, a little black cloud of people appeared at the entrance in the bleachers of the football field. The view became clearer as they got near. It was men in black suits crowding around someone. I bet you can fucking guess who it was.

She took her spot on the field and blew kisses to the crowd. I’ve tried to block out the incredible joy that was on their faces but I can’t. Even under the harsh bright stadium lighting I could make out my mom flying to her feet crying with joy and pointing excitedly at Dakota.

“Looks like our favorite student decided to make a special trip for us tonight, folks! What a sweetheart. We love you Dakota. Let’s see the next announcement here – woah, crazy coincidence everyone! Joining Jensen Berger in Campbell Hall history, your homecoming queen is MISS DAKOTA FANNING!”

The next weekend my dad took me to pick up my car that was an early graduation present. I had my favorite purple Corolla all picked out beforehand and everything. We got to the lot and it was empty. Some sweaty guy with a nametag came up to us and said that Oprah had bought every single car from this lot the night before to give away to her studio audience.