If loving writers and wanting to support their work financially is “a problem”, then yeah, I have a problem. I have 50 fucking problems to be exact. Most of them will be a problem for a whole year, a few are monthly problems and a handful are Founding Member problems.
That’s the first step in “healing”, right? Admitting I have a problem…? Okay, I can see this reeks of addict behavior: indulging in something I love to the point of excess, building a tolerance, and then needing bigger “hits” to achieve that original feeling of blissed out happiness. Okay, that’s true too. Your point?
I know it’s cliche to say, “I can quit whenever I want,” so fuck it, I’m not going to say that. Surprised? I can admit that I cannot quit whenever I want because I love supporting other writers. If that’s so wrong, I don’t want to be right (that’s a lie, I always want to be right, which isn’t a problem because I usually am right, and that’s because I keep my mouth shut unless I’m 99% positive that I am right).
In terms of money, it’s not an issue. I have an MA in Visual Arts Administration from NYU. It’s basically a degree in nonprofit management, and we all know that “nonprofit” is a misnomer. Those organizations get tax exempt status for crying out loud! Do you know how many sunflower mugs the Met Museum sells in a year? Neither do I, but I bet it’s a fuckload!
Okay, my funds are not “unlimited” although money does literally grow on trees if you think about it. I just happen to live in one of the most expensive cities in the world, and aside from a few dinky parks, (like Central), and weeds that grow in sidewalk cracks, we don’t have a lot of vegetation.
This is the part where I have to tell you, “We need to talk,” and you’re going to act like a perky, unsuspecting heroine from a ’90s romcom and say, “Okay, sure!” You’re completely blindsided when I say, “Babe, it’s not you, it’s me,” and we all know what that means, wink wink (it’s totally you). But really, in this case it’s both of us, but still mostly you. Fine, we all know it’s 100% me.
I continue, “I rushed into this whole paid subscriber thing too fast, I didn’t know what I wanted, and I still don’t, but I know I want something more, something new – I’m like a mermaid, attracted to shiny objects like new Substack graphics. Okay, yes, it’s also about the words, it’s 100% about the words in the articles, that’s why I subscribe, I totally don’t look at the pictures AT ALL!” Are you calling me a pervert? Fuck it, I am, just a little bit.
If I could do a Barry White voice (Google it Gen Z) this would be the time to whip it out, but I’m a skinny white woman with a squeaky voice, that’s all I’ve got when I say, “Babe, you know I love you. I wouldn’t have given you the most important resource that I have, money, if I didn’t love you, right?
No, strike that babe! I gave you my time, and that’s not a renewable resource. The time I spent with your words, the way I let them touch me in all the right places. I know, we had a good thing, and we still might because the guilt I feel at the thought of leaving you is overwhelming.”
I wish I could just print my own money but they watermark the shit out of those bills now, and I’m too soft to go to prison, although if Martha Stewart can do it, maybe I could too. Nope, orange was never the new black, not in New York City and not on someone with my skin tone. Yeah, going to prison for you is going to be a hard pass.
Look, for most of you my paid subscription won’t be an issue until February 2025 or later, when I get an email that my subscription is about to auto renew. Why don’t we just kick the can, (it’s most likely an empty La Croix pamplemousse), down the road for a few more months and just enjoy the time we have together right now, in the present?
Please believe me when I say I do love you, but there’s a chance this is going to hurt you more than it’s going to hurt me. Okay, that’s a lie. Most of you won’t even notice I’m gone. I’m just another anonymous “paid subscriber” to you. A statistic really. Just another crazy fucked up fan who floods your dms with bad haiku, (the plural of haiku is haiku, I Googled it). We’re a dime a dozen to you.
Wait a minute, are you breaking up with me? With ME? How could you do that? Weren’t we great together? I thought we had a non monogamous thing happening here. You have other paid subscribers and I have other paid subscriptions, right? Wasn’t that our deal?
Okay, we never like, sat down and actually used words to form sentences that formed paragraphs which conveyed thoughts and feelings, but wasn’t all that implied? Are you saying I’m a shitty communicator? Yeah, I can be sometimes, but that doesn’t make me “not right” and you right.
I don’t know, maybe this is part of that 1% of the time when I’ve been “not right”. How am I supposed to remember? It happens so infrequently I can’t recall what being “not right” feels like. I guess I could try hypnosis again, but I literally just fall asleep every time the hypnotizer drones on and on, and I remember nothing.
I don’t sleep well at night, but let’s just try to stay on track here, okay? I was maybe breaking up with you in February 2025, when I realized you didn’t know we were in a non monogamous relationship and it turns out YOU are canoodling with way more people than I am. So really, who’s the slut now? Maybe we both are!
Okay, I gotta go. I have 110 freebies knocking on my door. Maybe subscribing to over 100 Substacks with reckless abandon isn’t all that healthy. I don’t know, when Maggie Smith (a likely name) wrote about reckless abandon in her Pep Talk last week, she got over 400 likes! That’s gotta mean SOMETHING, right?
Seriously, I love you, don’t ever change. Like, really, stay the same because change is scary and I've had my fuckload of it over the past 5 years.
Ciao bella!
Confessions of a Substack Slut.