Chasing Windmills

Continued from previous post…

Looking back, the corner office and all its trappings could be summed up via the old expression: be careful what you wish for. You’d gotten the carrot only to find out you didn’t like carrots. You’d grabbed the brass ring but it hurt like hell holding on. Climbing the ladder you hadn’t realized the rungs below would disappear until it was too late. There was no stepping down a few lengths to adjust, catch your breath, and assess the view. You had to keep climbing or plummet, which is exactly what happened. This was not to say certain ambitious and notorious colleagues hadn’t greased the rungs, expediting your fall; they had.

Came a time there wasn’t a safety net. No cushy job after the severance. No friends to catch you, even those you’d helped on their own ladders to the top. You try not to be bitter. What good would it do? Resentments were like taking poison and expecting others to suffer.

Enlightenment didn’t prevent you from occasionally trolling these pricks. Waves of resentment rolled in now and again, like the king tides in Marin, defeating you. Maybe you turned to the Internet, desperately trying to find an outlet for your vitriol. Mercifully, mostly, you never pressed send.

You remember the day you crossed the one hundred thousand dollar mark. When you were 30 years old, and recently married. You took Sarah out to celebrate, sat across from her in the restaurant, maybe even held her hand, speaking about the future as if it were a gift. If you ever were in love with her it was then, when nothing felt impossible. That night even drinking too much seemed fine. You don’t remember if you and Sarah made love but it hardly mattered. Intoxicated, the two of you. The next morning hangovers were pleasant. Lazing together in pajamas, drinking coffee, reading the paper, gazing at homes in the real estate section, day dreaming about the fantastic tomorrows both of you would share.

And yet, even then, you knew money was most of all a yardstick for your ego. Titles would serve the same purpose. Copywriter. Senior Writer. Associate Creative Director. Creative Director. Vice President. Group Creative Director. Senior Vice President. Executive Creative Director. Rungs in the ladder. Notches in your belt.

Perhaps after achieving success, as was accused, you became complacent. It’s possible. You had made compromises, believing certain situations required it. You must wonder about that now.

You were most content when your work got noticed, won awards and attracted people to you. One campaign in particular ran the table at all the award shows, garnering praise around the world. It would become the agency’s show pony, and you rode it proudly. The best whore in the whorehouse and you were its pimp. The man. Waiting for an elevator at work, a group of marketing students gathered behind you. You heard one of them excitedly whisper to his mate. “That’s him!” He was talking about you. “No fucking way,” the other guy said.

Way.

Being revered was beyond anything you’d ever experienced, more gratifying than your promotions and trophies. And it had come unsolicited. Out of the ether! For what seemed like the first time, you’d been noticed for greatness not flaws. No longer were you the fat kid punched in the gut and crucified on the diving board. You were special, with proof. You’d waited so long for that moment had fantasized about it. Comeuppance. By then the fantasy was less about smashing your tormentors and more about gaining respect and validation. You had no idea what it would look like until that afternoon by the elevators, when the world shifted, ever so slightly, favoring you.

You chased that feeling like the drug that it was, madly looking for it in every promotion, every raise, every accolade. It was never enough but the next one would be.

Relationships and family took a back seat. Any idiot could find a mate and have babies. Friends were transient. Parents weren’t there. Finally, you had something you could control. What you craved was conditional and directly related to your accomplishments. Your vocation became the most important thing in your life. You drank. You got high. But it was just a byproduct of success or a panacea to failure. Finally, you had a calling.

You were chasing windmills.

Falling off the Pedestal

You have been steeling yourself for this conversation, for this moment. Actually, the right time was two years ago, when you had been caught. Maybe neither of you was ready then, hard to know. Yet you cannot wait any longer.

You knock on Remy’s door. She doesn’t answer. But you know she’s there. Your daughter deserves her privacy. She’s a woman. Regardless. You crack open the door. Peek inside.

Softly, you say her name. “Remy?” Again. “Remy?”

She has on headphones. Beats by Dre that she got for her birthday. Bright red and cost a fortune. She’s listening to hip-hop, the language of the streets, the African American experience, rife with “F” bombs and the radioactive “N” word.  You can hear it pulsing through her sleek headphones.

Unseen, you take a moment to observe her. A small person, she seems half swallowed by the comforter on her bed. Her bobbing head reminds you of the gophers that occasionally poke through the grass in your backyard. You think it’s funny: this little white girl listening to rap.

Save for the blues, you grew up loathing disco and rap. You remember an ill-fated promotion called  “Disco Demolition Night” at Comiskey Park in Chicago. An unruly crowd of mostly white teenagers, incited by a local DJ, lustily roared as a mountainous pile of disco records got blown to bits in center field. An embarrassing spectacle, it caused a riot. They had to cancel the baseball game. You’re glad Remy has an open mind, even if it sometimes scares you.

Remy sees you and removes the headphones. She is genuinely surprised. Her eyes widen.

“Hi,” you say. “Can we talk?”

“Right now?” She asks. Remy bites her tongue, a habit she’d recently developed. Your request was unusual, as was your presence in her room. She braces herself.

“Yes, please,” you say. “If that’s okay.” You enter her bedroom and take a seat on the large ottoman.

Remy crosses her legs on the bed. “What’s up, dad? She asks. Nervously, toying with her headphones. Finally, she turns off the music, shutting her laptop.

“Don’t worry,” you begin. “You’ve done nothing wrong.”

“I’m not worried,” she says, timidly. “I mean not really.”

“Let me start by saying you’re an amazing person, Remy. I don’t tell you that enough.” It’s true, you didn’t.  In spite of dragging her to California, disrupting her life, utterly, Remy had remained stoic throughout the ordeal. She has no friends! Her mother had cried. She doesn’t belong to a group! Feebly, you’d reasoned that Remy had sisters and that the move had brought them closer together. But you knew Sarah was right. The move had hurt Remy, thrusting her into a world of diffident girls uninterested in befriending a pale and diminutive child. A wound you’d made infinitely worse by betraying her mother. This is why you are here, to make amends.

“When I was a boy, I put my father on a pedestal,” you say. “Maybe even more so after he left us.” You pause, pulling one of Remy’s long brown hairs off of the ottoman, watch it fall to the floor.  “I don’t remember when he fell off it exactly but I do know it was painful…realizing my dad had flaws and weaknesses, a life that did not include me.”

Remy looks right at you. Her brown eyes remind you of your own.

“Anyway,” you continue. “I think we both know exactly when I fell off your pedestal. That is assuming you had me on one in the first place.” You force a laugh.

Remy smiles. Thank God, you think.

“The night your mother found those texts on my phone. When you and your sisters saw her yelling and crying. That was the moment.” Though you desperately want to avert your eyes from Remy, you do not. Doing this correctly demanded your full attention. And so you say the hard part: “When I betrayed your mother I betrayed you as well.”

Remy nods, uneasily. This was an adult conversation, maybe the first she’d ever had with you.

You press forward. “I don’t expect you to put me back on that pedestal, Remy. Or even to forgive me. I know what I did was wrong and that I hurt this whole family. And for that I am truly sorry.”

You stop talking. You’ve said what you came here to say. You will not provide reasons or excuses. You must accept that she may give you no quarter. The outcome was not yours to determine. Only that you own the mess that you’ve made.

Remy speaks and her poise surprises you. “Thank you, father,” she says. “It’s true. I did have a hard time when we moved here. I pretended it was cool but it wasn’t. And then what happened, what you did … that made it even worse. It was awful.”

You nod. “Yes, it was.”

Remy comports herself, sitting up straighter. “But in the last year or so I found my place. I have friends now. It’s not perfect but I like my life. I grew up.” She laughs. “Just in time for college!”

You had not expected humor. Nor would you have linked Remy’s maturation to your own bad behavior. But the dots connected. Your weakness begot her strength. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t fair. But that’s exactly what had happened.

You are not glad hearing this, but reassured. “I was scared I might have lost you. And I would have understood it. But I want you to know that you will never lose me.”  You look down, contrite. Play with your wedding ring.

Remy sighs. “I’m glad you and mom are still together,” she says. “I know that it can’t be easy, for either of you.”

In that moment, gazing upon your daughter, you realize what you just did here was right, the words and the deed. If only you could continue down this path. Being intimate, vulnerable and honest. If only…

“At school, the sisters always preach forgiveness,” Remy says. “That we should even pray for the people that hurt us…”

You’ve heard that said before, in AA. It was a textbook example of something easier said than done.

“And so I prayed for you.”

You point to the ceiling. “Do you know every morning I ask God for help? And every night I thank Him for giving it to me.” You pause.  “For keeping me sober… For all of my blessings… And for you.”

Remy’s phone vibrates, lighting up. Somebody wants her and you don’t wonder why. She’s a remarkable young woman.

“It’s okay, I won’t look at my phone,” she says. “If you’re not done.”

“I am done,” you say, getting up. You don’t want the conversation to end. Yet, you didn’t want to push it either. In this family, intimacy was damn near a mirage, like water in the desert. Too much all at once could be detrimental. “Look, I know this is awkward but can we end with a hug?”

Remy rolls her eyes. All the same, she climbs off the bed, opening her arms.

In these tiny arms that you created. She squeezes back. Next time, would she come to you? It was more possible now than it had been ten minutes ago. Every year, their high school has a Daddy-Daughter Dance for its freshman. Proud fathers and their flowering daughters, everyone enjoys it. You recall being petrified. Holding your daughter that close felt so awkward. Yet, she was scared, too. Reluctant. Her tiny bones seemed to vibrate. Like father like daughter.

The thing about falling off a pedestal is getting back up onto solid ground.

Pen 15: Analysis of random episode for Alcohol, Tobacco and Drugs (ATOD).

Most of the television shows and movies I watch contain a preponderance of alcohol, tobacco or drugs. Many of them are integral to the plot itself. Platforms like Netflix and Hulu (among many, many others), free and clear of network restrictions, opened Pandora’s Box in terms of sexual and violent content. To say nothing of the Internet.

Some of the most popular and/or critically acclaimed shows on any screen are predominantly about illicit drug use, alcoholism and related topics: Breaking Bad (Methamphetamine), Shameless (ETOH) and Euphoria (<ATOD) One needn’t be a pearl-clutcher to say it’s difficult finding mass-appeal content that doesn’t feature ATOD’s.

But I tried.

“PEN 15” is a serial on Hulu about two awkward adolescent girls navigating the perils of middle school. The conceit is that the two leads are actually adult women playing themselves from that time period. It’s actually pretty good.

In the episode I watched the two girls find them selves hiding in the girl’s bathroom at school to avoid bullies (a constant threat for them), when they find a cigarette on the floor. This lone cigarette proves to be a catalyst for all manner of awkward, ridiculous and potentially scandalous ADULT behavior.

Later, the girls are playing with dolls together when their entire childhood gets called into question. Old behaviors suddenly seem boring to them –childish.

They toss the dolls onto the floor and reach for the cigarette.

But in order to smoke it they will need a lighter. So the girls decide to dress up to look older and this becomes a whole scene onto itself. Using makeup they took from their parents and the “flyest” clothes they can muster, the “ladies” glam up in order to venture to the corner store in their neighborhood. They believe looking older is necessary in order to purchase a Bic lighter. There, one mocks a child who is line with his mother for being “with his mommy.” The two adolescents ape all manner of supposed older behavior –costume, makeup, attitude- all because of the still un-smoked cigarette they found in girl’s bathroom at school.

As it has been for countless adolescents, the cigarette symbolizes adulthood. PEN 15 (a combination of characters intended to mimic “penis”) is a coming of age comedy and the cigarette portends all that await these two awkward kids on the cusp of being teenagers.

The show then introduces another concept familiar to every kid who ever got the talk about ATOD: that smoking cigarettes is a gateway to even more scandalous behavior. The girls show up at the hangout of a group of 8^th grade girls and ask if they can join them “to smoke.” The older girls invite them in. After a lot of posturing (in order to impress the older kids) one ends up chugging a beer. The other tries a whippet (inhalant) and passes out.

Not only has the still-unsmoked cigarette lead to alcohol and inhalants it has also presented the viewer with a classic case of peer pressure and its effect on young people regarding drinking and using drugs.

Then the boys show up.  In a painfully awkward scene each boy chooses a girl ostensibly to pair off and make out: the ultimate taboo! The two girls reluctantly pair up with two boys and, while they don’t “hook up” per se, the promise of illicit sex hangs in the air. We see brief scenes of the 8^th graders canoodling in the dark.

A parent shows up and “busts” the party before anything else occurs. The two hero girls end up taking the fall for the beer and bad behavior. A be careful what you wish for moment for the two aspiring teenagers. Here, getting busted is also an iconic plot point in the age-old tale of experimenting with drugs. In shows like Breaking Bad and Shameless people get arrested or even killed for getting caught, Of course, in this story nothing like that remotely happens. The two are sent home to their mothers.

Handled briefly here, a poignant scene featuring one of the girl’s mothers frowning sadly at her daughter. She does nothing but walk away. Yet, her silence speaks volumes, more punishing to her child than a scolding. A parent’s disappointment is yet another trope in such stories (and in reality). The sad, helpless mother is an indelible part of the ATOD narrative.

The final scene of the episode has the two girls back in their playroom… pondering the unlit cigarette that started it all. They decide to put it away in a jewel box, saving it for another day. They resume playing with their dolls. Roll credits.

To be sure, the ending is sweet. Yet, it’s interesting to note that they do not dispose of the cigarette but rather hold onto it. The butt caused them nothing but trouble yet the trouble was a shared memory of an adventure that bonded the two girls. Romanticism is an inextricable part of ATOD’s.  Always was and maybe always will be.

Two careers beat as one: Trying to get people on and now off controlled substances!

Outdueling alcohol and tobacco with advertising is like bringing a knife to a gunfight.     

For over 25 years, I worked in the creative department at a number of big name advertising agencies. I was (and am) a copywriter by trade and began my career in that capacity, at the Leo Burnett Company in Chicago. During my lengthy tenure at that storied agency I wrote and produced copy for numerous alcohol and tobacco clients, including (in no particular order): the Phillip Morris company (now named Altria Group), Diageo (Wine & Spirits), Anheuser Busch, and the Miller Brewing company. These were and are Fortune 50 multinational companies spending many, many millions of dollars a year on marketing alcohol and tobacco products to any number of audiences, none more coveted than the youngest populations.

      Though federal and state laws were in place regulating the drinking and smoking ages of consumers, by definition mass media easily allowed advertisers to circumvent them. After all, a beer commercial televised on a football game could be seen by adults and children alike. Print media (remember that?) had more discernable target audiences i.e. Playboy and Esquire (adult males) Martha Stewart (adult females), etc. Outdoor adverting (billboards, bus shelters, and the like) had the unique benefit of being able to infiltrate very specific markets via targeted media plans. Putting malt liquor billboards in impoverished urban neighborhoods is a classic and controversial example of how easy it was for advertisers with money to influence the people who could least afford to drink and smoke – economically, sociologically, psychologically, physiologically and even spiritually. But hard times beget hard drinkers and heavy smokers.

      And we all knew it.

      Really, every department in the traditional ad agency (creative, strategy, accounts, media) was built to optimize getting the right messages to the right people. I spent my days crafting copy specifically designed for specific drinkers and smokers, existing and potential. I knew who they were: their age, sex, ethnicity, proclivities and so on. We all did. Our clients paid us to know everything possible about targeted populations. And they had their own people doing the same. Elaborate strategies were developed and implemented to move product. As data became more accurate and actionable, the ability to optimize reach and efficiency grew exponentially. Unsurprisingly, substance abuse disorders among these targeted groups routinely were in excess of national norms. The ramifications were not lost on public servants and various anti-drug/alcohol/tobacco groups.

      Consequently, in order to combat this growing problem, many governmental and societal watchdogs invariably found themselves playing catch up and keep away. Banning outdoor ads near schools and eliminating cigarette ads from many publications were two of the more significant regulatory measures put into place. On another front, groups like Mothers Against Drunk Drivers and the Truth Initiative began calling for more stringent policies while underwriting marketing efforts of their own. Many of their efforts have been successful. For example, most teenagers no longer consider smoking cigarettes a right of passage. But many huge efforts were also huge failures. Recall the “Just Say No!” campaign?  It had the opposite effect on young people, perversely making illegal drugs the definition of cool. Getting folks to try something is a lot easier than getting them to stop. It’s not so much a matter of putting the genie back in the bottle; it’s getting the genie to stop drinking from it!

      Therefore, during our class discussion on prevention strategies for reaching and influencing people with either existing substance use disorders or the potential to develop an SUD, it became painfully apparent that these same strategies were (and still are) employed by advertisers to reach the very same audiences!

      For example: The Diffusion of Innovations Framework i.e. utilizing an influencer to create momentum behind a new idea is among the oldest saws in the advertising tool kit.  E.M. Rogers may have coined the phrase in 1962 but using celebrities to sell goods and services dates back hundreds of years, not long after the printing press was developed.

      The Health Belief Model we talked about (that messages will achieve optimal behavior change if they successfully target perceived barriers, benefits, self-efficacy, and threat) perversely mirrors the most common messaging strategies employed by marketers of beer, wine and spirits: Drink this and you’ll be in with the in crowd. Different agendas. Same conceit. “Good for you” can be spun.

      Advertisers are as interested in the Stages of Change Theory as any drug counselor, assessing someone for the likelihood that they might use as opposed to might not.

      And so on.

      Rules and regulations change. But human nature never varies. The theories driving many of the popular environmental strategies for the prevention of drug and alcohol problems are eerily (and necessarily) similar to the strategic marketing plans for alcohol and tobacco. When anti-groups have the most success effecting the environment via advertising it is when they employ the same levels of creativity, sophistication (and hopefully budgets) as their nemesis do. Like they say: fight fire with fire. Know your enemy.

Written for course at Berkeley Extension Certificate Program in the Treatment of Substance Use Disorders

To Muse and to Dread

It’s late. You stare at one of your many aquariums. The tank light is off but you can still see the neon tetras flitting about in the darkness. Hence the name. Oh, to be one of them. Cared for. No predators. Mating with impunity.

Once, when you were a boy, your brother had become terribly mad at you. You don’t remember why. He’d taken it out on your butterfly collection, breaking the mounts with a baseball bat. Grimly, you imagine Sarah smashing your aquariums, myriad fish splashing onto the floor gasping for air. Outside you hear the wind blowing down from the mountains.

Enough. Turn off your computer. Make sure the house lights are off as well, the front, the back and the hallway. The girls always leave every light on. They are teenagers.

Has it only been three days since receiving the letter? It seems painfully longer. You are in purgatory, riven by dread, knowing yet unknowing what terror awaits you. The extortionist had given you ten days from the postmark to sort out your payment. Waiting for the gallows, you would have expected time to pass faster.

Take your pills. Brush your teeth. Find the bed in the darkness. Slip under the covers, next to your wife who, tonight, is not snoring. Not yet anyway. Hopefully she won’t before you fall asleep.

To be continued…