Brand Me Famous

Have you ever Googled your own name? Come on, just admit it: You’ve indulged in the ultimate narcissistic pastime, haven’t you? Well I have done it…several times, in fact – each time hoping for a different result.

I’m the only Tanya Nel I know, which used to make me feel unique and rather special. However, I discovered that there is in fact an entire army of Tanya Nels out there, when I Googled my name. And, horror of horrors, they all seem to be more “famous” than I am. Every few months I repeat the process, hoping that my name will appear at the top of the search results list, along with an extensive list of commendations on my extremely important contribution to this world.

Surely I deserve some praise for my generosity. For example, the fact that I pay a small fortune to car guards every day (for foreign readers who may not know what car guards are: car guards wear bibs, give gap-toothed smiles, and make grasping gestures with their hands – yes, I know this sounds like a description of a baby, but the difference is that a car guard expects to be paid for this behaviour). Surely I deserve some Internet recognition for my contribution to world peace. For example, I don’t have any nuclear weapons in my back yard, which is more than American president Barack Obama can say, and he’s just been awarded a Nobel Peace Prize.

Andy Warhol predicted that in future everybody would be famous for 15 minutes. I first became aware of fame when Britney Spears released her first album (a multi-platinum seller) at age 16. I was 23 years old at the time and experienced my very first bout of depression, when I realized that a teenager was more successful and making more money than I ever would in my entire life. It probably had something to do with the fact that she danced suggestively in a school dress and pigtails – I’ve considered doing the same, but Teasers strip club is the only venue willing to host my performance.

The fame phenomenon continued to grow since then; everybody wanted to stake their 15-minutes-of-fame claim. Thanks to the Internet this became possible for mere mortals. The concept of creating a personal brand and becoming visible on the Internet has become a major priority for most people.

One way to become visible is by joining a social network. My first entry into the world of Internet social networking was via Facebook. Initially I was overwhelmed by insecurity: what photo should I display as a profile image? Perhaps a photo of myself surrounded by friends, to show how popular I am. Or a particularly sexy photo, to make my ex-boyfriends squirm with regret. Once I chose the profile photo, I had to deal with the calamitous reality that I had a pathetic number of Facebook friends. What would people think? I frantically searched for every person I ever knew in my life, hoping they would accept my friend request.

Internet visibility is about much more than just social networking; it’s about making yourself as desirable as possible. The aim is to get people interested in you, your skills, your product, or whatever else you’re trying to “sell” via your Internet image. The Internet is a fantastic tool. Unfortunately it’s also a source of endless BS – searching for factual information on the Internet is a bit like shopping at a second-hand clothes shop: you have to schlep through a ton of crap to find a gem.

I love using e-mail and the Internet. For one, I’ve made lots of new Nigerian friends, who’ve promised to send me millions of dollars in exchange for a small initial administrative fee – I’m still waiting for the millions to roll in, but I’m absolutely sure it will happen. I’m also grateful for all the spammers, including American agencies that send me weekly Green Card lottery applications (I wonder whether they would stop if they knew I had Muslim friends). Aah, the Internet is such a friendly place, filled with so many helpful, generous people.

Now I’m off to post another pointless status update on one of several social networks - I know my friends and followers can’t wait to read that I’ve just eaten broccoli for dinner and that I have a foot fungus. But which social network will it be? MySpace? Twitter? Facebook? Or maybe all 3? Yes, I think I’ll settle for My Twit Face.

Howareyou?

In South Africa we have this habit of automatically saying “Hi, howareyou?” when we meet people. The usual response: “Fineandyou?” We don’t think about it, we don’t actually care about the other person’s response; we just say it and get it over with. Sometimes we eagerly skip straight to the response, without waiting for the other person to first inquire into our well-being (“Hi, fineandyou?”), which causes a moment of social discomfort for both parties.

Occasionally you’ll greet an elderly relative and they’ll respond with: “I’m okay,” (whiny tone of voice) “I’m just having trouble with my knees.” (Groan, sigh, knee rub, headshake) “I think it’s the weather. My joints always complain when …” Two seconds into the monologue they’ve already lost me – depression hits me and I start longing for a Minora blade and a hot bath.

In the 80’s Dale Carnegie Fever hit the world. Everybody read his book “How to win friends and influence people” and memorized his social guidelines. The first rule was to smile when speaking to someone. So, people spent hours in front of the mirror trying to coax their lemon-sucking lips into a warm smile. Then they went out into the world, applying this and other techniques on everyone they encountered. The result was astounding: Everyone smiled back. Of course they did not consider the fact that all the other people were also following Carnegie’s guidelines. So, suddenly the world was full of smiling people, who made each other feel great, in a warm and fuzzy kind of way.

The Carnegie memo was sent out to everyone whose business required dealing with other people (unfortunately a major administrative error resulted in the memo not reaching the Civil Service). Sales reps, estate agents and business executives flocked to Dale Carnegie seminars. It turned out that you could make a lot of money out of people, if you managed to make them feel warm and fuzzy.

The Carnegie memo finally caught the attention of politicians. The days of ruling a country with an iron fist were over. The public wanted politicians who cared about them. Suddenly politicians were flashing brilliant smiles, doing victorious air-punches, hugging babies and patting disabled people on their heads (with gloves on – it may be contagious).

And so it was that we managed to create a world full of caring optimists, who said all the right things at the right time. It was during this era that visiting a shrink became a favourite pastime. The reason was simple: we were no longer allowed to have authentic relationships with people; we could no longer express our real feelings; we were expected to always be happy and “genuinely” interested in other people. In short, we were focused on other people’s happiness, rather than our own. So, a shrink became an essential ingredient in many people’s lives.

Sadly the Carnegie philosophy is still alive and well today, two decades after its introduction to an unsuspecting world. In essence I have no problem with optimism and making others feel good about themselves. It’s admirable, but only when it’s genuine, and when it’s not being used to manipulate people. I find that I’ve become very suspicious of people who are always happy and smiling. I can’t help but think: “What do they want from me? What are they hiding?”

I while back I watched the Oprah Show, which discussed the secret depression and unhappiness many people are suffering from. People stated how their friends, colleagues and family believed that they had the perfect lives. Outwardly their lives seemed perfect, yet all kinds of trouble were brewing and stewing below the surface. Every now and then one will read an article about a husband who killed his entire family or a child who shot pupils at a school. Usually the article includes a comment from a friend along the lines of: “He was such a nice man/ boy. I don’t know what could have caused him to do such a thing.” In desperation they’ll try to blame it on violent video games or Marilyn Manson.

The reality is that we are all carrying a heavy burden of secret fears, pain and depression. Yet, we are not allowed to express it. We’re forced to suppress it, like a giant pimple that grows and builds pressure just under the skin. Until one day a single event causes the pimple to burst to the surface, spilling all its ugliness out into the world.

I’ve decided not to let that happen to me. I’ll remain an optimist, but may occasionally choose to let off some steam. So, next time you say “Hi, howareyou?” don’t be shocked when I respond with: “Well, I’ve got a giant hemorrhoid and I hate my non-existent calf muscles.”

I remember when I was young...

A strange thing happened to me last week. A friend offered to lend me an audio seminar to listen to. Naturally I expected her to hand me a CD or maybe a memory stick with the files on. Instead she gave me this fat plastic thing, with 2 holes in the middle and what looked like a piece of ribbon wrapped around the holes. I stared at it, stared at it again and finally my memory bank came up with a name for this thing: A cassette tape.

I had not seen one of these since my pre-wrinkle days (a looooong time ago). Eager to listen to the seminar, I was suddenly confronted by the fact that I needed some kind of apparatus to play the tape. I did an archeological dig through cupboards and boxes - somewhere between the Bronze Age section and the 80’s section I found this bright yellow thing, with fat buttons on it. I dumbly pushed at the buttons like an ape woman, making guttural animal sounds. It was a discovery of immense magnitude – I had managed to excavate the mythical Walkman.

Playing the tape was a whole new experience. There was no simple way of skipping backwards and forwards to different tracks. This was a chronological process: Listen to side A, turn the tape around, listen to side B, turn the tape around, and only then could I get back to the start of the tape. Not only did I find it all very frustrating and slow, but I also discovered a lack of small-muscle control and dexterity in my hands. I have an overdeveloped SMS-thumb, a hand palm shaped like a computer mouse, and an index finger that wants to left-click with obsessive-compulsive regularity. Retrieving and turning a cassette was positively exhausting.

I never thought I’d be one of those people who'd say stuff like: “I remember when I was young…” Well, I was wrong. I remember when I was young you couldn’t create a latest hits CD by downloading tracks off the Internet. No, you had to sit by your radio on Saturdays, listening to the top 40, your finger poised over the record button. The skill lay in pushing ‘record’ just after the DJ uttered his last word, then you had to carefully listen to the song and try to figure out when the DJ would start speaking again at the end of the song.

You’d usually end up capturing the DJ’s first few words on tape. So, you had to quickly rewind and try to pinpoint the exact moment just before the DJ spoke, in time to record the next song (the anxiety caused by such a moment, would classify this process as an adrenaline sport). By the end of this process you’d end up with a tape filled with songs that started halfway through the first verse, ended halfway through the last chorus, interspersed with half-spoken words by the DJ. It was the era of the “mix-tape”.

I remember when I was young you also couldn’t send off an email to catch up with friends and family. No, you had to write a letter. You had to contend with pens that dried up halfway through the letter, forcing you to complete the letter in different coloured ink. There was no spell check and delete button to correct spelling mistakes. The end product looked like a dog’s breakfast: 3 different shades of ink, white blotches of Tippex, and blobs of smudged ink where the pen decided to vomit onto the page.

Then you had to put up with the postal service. It took at least 2 weeks for your letter to reach your cousin in Upington, another 2 weeks for your cousin to get her act together and write a reply, and another 2 weeks for her letter to reach you. By then you’d forgotten you even had a cousin and had moved on to bigger and better things.

The world has certainly changed a lot since then. We now live in the era of instant gratification, thanks to the wonder of technology. If I send an email and don’t get a response within an hour, I start badgering the recipient with repeat emails. If someone does not answer their cell phone, I feel offended: “How dare they not answer their phone?” Technology has brought many great luxuries into our lives, like iPods, the Internet, mobile phones and email. Unfortunately we now believe that this gives us the right to intrude on each others' personal space anytime and anywhere.

Sometimes I miss the days when personal space was still respected. I remember when I was young…

Post-Purchase Cognitive Dissonance

Sometime during my late twenties, a subtle shift occurred in my life. I went from having a “less is more” attitude to having a “more is more” attitude. I used to require a few basics to see me through any event: some cash, lip balm and…well, that was it. Now every excursion is a major palaver.

When my husband and I go to the beach these days, it looks like we’re packing for an army. There’s enough food to see us through a major catastrophe. Who knows, we might suddenly become the victims of an earthquake, a civil war, whatever.

My handbag has also grown in size with every birthday. I shudder to think what lies hidden in the depths of my bag. The truth is that I haven’t been able to reach or see the bottom of my handbag since the last millennium. So, I have good reason to worry about what I might find down there.

One day, after a long search for a missing item, I reluctantly opened my handbag, it being the only unexcavated item left in my house. Somewhere around mid-depth I retrieved a scarf I’d lost about two years earlier. As I dug deeper, a smell of decay started to emanate from the bag. I became very nervous. Was it possible that Madeline McCann, the little girl who disappeared in Portugal, was lying at the bottom of my bag? The thought was so distressing, that I immediately stuffed everything, including the scarf, back into the bag.

When I left university I moved to Namibia with one large suitcase and 2 boxes – these contained all my worldly possessions. Now I travel with the same amount of luggage when I go away for a week’s holiday. I have this lingering fantasy of backpacking through Europe. ‘Fantasy’ is the keyword here. If I had to travel across Europe now, I’d require a few ox wagons to carry all I’d need for the journey.

I’m currently doing my taxes, which means I’ve had to trawl through enough paperwork and receipts to stuff a king-size mattress. Reading through the receipts I started wondering whether they weren’t perhaps someone else’s. I couldn’t remember buying half the stuff. I recognized the daily necessities, like Lindt chocolate and coffee at Vida Café. Some of the items seemed like relatives I’d just been introduced to after being stricken with amnesia – I knew I was supposed to recognize them, but I simply did not.

I opened my closet to search for the item marked ‘Boots Brown’ on one receipt. Instead I found ‘Boots Brown x 3’. How did I justify buying another pair of brown boots, when there already were 2 pairs in my closet? I could only surmise that I had been suffering from a particularly potent form of PMS on that day – at least, as a woman, I have a scientific reason for being deranged one week out of every month.

Even though I hate shopping, I still can’t stop myself from buying more than I need. The worst is when I buy something, then walk past another shop minutes later, to discover a similar but much better and cheaper version of what I had just bought. We have named this syndrome Post-Purchase Cognitive Dissonance – basically, you immediately regret and despise a recent purchase. The best way to circumnavigate this syndrome is to instantly go into denial after a purchase – if you can’t remember it, you can’t regret it. Problem solved.

My husband went on a business trip to West Africa a couple of years ago. There he picked up a strange bug after eating chicken (they said it was chicken, but who would ever really know the truth). Other than suffering from nausea and diarrhea, he also had short bouts of memory loss. The first morning after his return he woke with a start and looked around our bedroom with big eyes. I was pretty terrified, as he clearly did not even recognize me. The thought occurred that he was probably experiencing a severe form of Post-Purchase Cognitive Dissonance, wondering how the hell he had ended up with all this stuff around him.

It reminds me of the Talking Heads song “Once in a lifetime”:
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife
And you may ask yourself: “Well, how did I get here?”
And you may tell yourself: “This is not my beautiful house!”
And you may tell yourself: “This is not my beautiful wife!”
And you may ask yourself: “Am I right? Am I wrong?”
And you may tell yourself: “MY GOD, WHAT HAVE I DONE?”

Little Shop of Horrors

Women and shopping have become synonymous in our society. Shopping isn’t just an idle indulgence. It’s a skill that needs to be honed and perfected. It’s fair to compare it to sport. In order to be good at shopping one needs (as with sport) a certain amount of natural talent. I’ve tried to fake it for years, but finally had to accept that I do not have the talent or the stomach for shopping.

One thing I’m very good at is making lists. It’s a skill I’ve perfected over the years to support my procrastination habit. My list-making skills really come into its own when I prepare for The Big Shop. To me, every shopping trip is as great in magnitude and packed with danger as an expedition into outer space. Careful planning is required.

I divide my shopping list into clusters, matching each item to the shop where it can be purchased. Next I calculate the quickest and most painless route through the shopping centre. Sometimes the most painless route requires that I park at one entrance and visit the surrounding shops, then return to my vehicle and drive to another entrance to visit shops on the other end of the shopping centre.

Inside the shopping mall I’m inundated with enough input to feed 25 sensory organs. Unfortunately I have only 5 sensory organs, so it all very quickly becomes too overwhelming for my fragile being.

Each shop plays a different genre of music at full volume. I’m one of those people who tend to walk to the beat of whatever music is playing. Needless to say, my body quickly turns into an uncoordinated jelly as I pass one shop after another. One moment I’m doing a MacFly stroll to the beat of some hip-hop number; next moment I’m doing my John Travolta strut (circa ‘Saturday Night Fever’) to the beat of a dance track. In-between all of this I’m dodging screeching children and shopping carts. At some point I start resembling a character from Monty Python’s ‘Ministry of Funny Walks’.

Navigating my way through the throngs of people feels a lot like driving against traffic up a busy freeway. Some people simply refuse to yield to fellow shoppers - they push their carts with white-knuckled aggression, eyes focused straight ahead and jaws clenched. Other people seem to have all the time in the world – these out-of-towners (recognizable by their neon Crocs) usually visit shopping centers in groups of 10 or more and spread their beef-and-potato bodies out evenly across the width of the passage, blocking all traffic.

Mostly I’m aware of the cloying covetousness emanating off the skins of my fellow shoppers. Their eyes dart from window to window, like malnourished children at a buffet. Drops of perspiration gather on their upper lips, as they run their clammy hands over a desired item. Every now and then a pink tongue darts out and they lick their lips in anticipation of the purchase. It’s just too much need, greed and speed all crammed together in one small space.

I’m a very disciplined shopper, not easily diverted from my shopping list. But sometimes even I fall victim to the dazzling ‘50% Sale’ posters. The last time this happened was about a year ago. I sipped a chocolate milkshake, emulating the eager anticipation of other shoppers, while ogling a pair of marked-down shoes. I stroked the leather with sweaty fingers, saliva gathering in the corners of my mouth. So lost was I in the fantasy, that I forgot to swallow properly.

Next thing I knew a gulp of milkshake went down my breathing apparatus. I choked, wheezed and spluttered. Surrounding shoppers nervously shuffled away, afraid my uncouth social behaviour might be contagious. Finally a fashionably dressed woman rushed to my side, applying her version of the Heimlich Manoeuvre (somewhere between a tickle and a fondle). Giggling under her titillating touch, the milkshake was finally dislodged.

This was a warning, a Divine message: Straying from your shopping list may lead to fatality. Now I understand what they mean with ‘Shop till you drop’.

Confessions of a New Age hippie

I have a confession to make: I’m a New Age hippie! No, I don’t wear tie-dye clothing and I don’t say things like “Peace” and “Flower power”. I’m a modern day hippie – a picture of respectability on the outside, but a lentil-eating, tree hugger on the inside.

Just say the words Organic, Environmentally-Friendly and Hemp, and I’m putty in your hands. Mention words like MSG, Polyester and Genetically Modified, and my nose crinkles up like I’ve just smelled a particularly stinky fart.

Just last week I developed a skin rash on my face. I followed the standard route of first consulting the Hippie Bible, ‘Heal your body’ by Louise Hay. Was there perhaps an emotional cause for my facial affliction? According to this book, I had old buried fears and anxieties. With the customary naiveté of a hippie, I pretended that this was a major revelation (Honestly, who doesn’t experience fear and anxiety in this age of hip-hop and celebrity chefs?).

Dutiful hippie that I am, I put on some Zen music i.e. a colon-cleansing blend of Tibetan singing bowls, tingshaw bells and gongs (panflute music is SO passé, dah-lings). I twisted myself into the lotus position, took a few deep, cleansing breaths (Ugh, is that garlic I’m smelling?) and proceeded to chant a series of positive affirmations: “I am safe. I…” (a police siren whizzed past my house – so much for feeling safe). “I am at peace. I…” (the Zen music reached a crescendo, ending in a crashing gong that made my teeth rattle – well, so much for peace).

Clearly this wasn’t going to work. I extricated my limbs from the lotus position and found that I could no longer feel my toes. I was also shocked to find that the lotus position had caused an old netball knee injury from my teens to flair up. To add insult to injury, my face now resembled the bum cheeks of a baby with nappy rash.

It was time for Plan B: Inner child work (a.k.a How to blame absolutely everything on your childhood and parents). Inner child work requires plenty of journaling. Journaling is an old favourite of the hippie clan – a hippie can fill an A4 notepad with deep and meaningful thoughts, faster than you can say “Monosodium Glutamate”. In fact, I suspect that the hippies might be one of the main causes of deforestation for the production of paper.

I started by analyzing my relationship with my father (a perennial favourite). I discovered that my biggest cause for anger towards my father was the fact that he had non-existent calf muscles, something I unfortunately inherited. Could this be the cause of my fear and anxiety? Was I afraid that someone might notice that I have concave lower legs?

A quick check in the mirror confirmed that two days of psychoanalysis had not healed the rash on my cheeks. If anything, my cheeks were now redder with indignation over my tapeworm legs.

It was time to move on to Plan C: What do the experts say? Hippies stick to a couple of basic rules when seeking advice from others. Rule number 1 - never follow advice given by anyone with a medical or scientific background, as it’s most certainly part of some major conspiracy. Rule number 2 – if the expert’s name starts with ‘Sri’, ‘Swami’ or anything vaguely Hindustani, then they definitely can be trusted.

My enthusiasm plummeted as I surfed the Internet for a wonder cure. Every site suggested that I should cut foods like wine, chocolate and red meat from my diet. This was NOT going to work for me. Depressed and despondent, I drank half a bottle of Shiraz, wolfed down a few lamb chops and finished with a slab of chocolate.

I woke up the next day to find that my rash had almost completely disappeared. The only problem was that I now had a severe cramp in my stomach. I automatically reached for my Hippie Bible. As I stretched up for the book, opening up the gastric pipes in the process, a mighty burp burst from my lips. The cramp was gone. I always knew that book would prove to be good for something.

Paranoid Android

Being human, I have a natural tendency to believe that I am the centre of the universe. It can be a great confidence booster, but also renders me prone to frequent paranoia attacks. The source of my paranoia can be quite bizarre.

Take my dogs, for example. I have two miniature dachshund that I dote on. Their adoring eyes follow me everywhere I go…and I mean EVERYWHERE. Because they can’t speak, their eyes do the talking for them. They have perfected the art of silent, purposeful staring. It can be very disconcerting and has given rise to a new and rare psychological condition. It’s called Dachshundiphobia: the fear that somewhere, somehow, a dachshund is watching you.

Another trigger for paranoia is any public space containing coughing and sneezing people. The worst is public transport. I’ll inevitably end up sitting in front of a sneezer. There’s no way I can explain the feeling of dread that surges through my body, whenever someone sneezes into the back of my head. The sneeze usually generates a gust of air so forceful that it blows my hair forward. At moments like these, I’d rather throw myself from the moving bus/ train/ taxi, than risk catching some new strain of Mad Swine Bird Flu.

I can only point the finger at the media for making me so fearful of other people, even the kindliest and cutest of humans. A child can be the picture of innocent beauty one moment. Add a trail of snot on their upper lip and they are transformed into a monster. For months we’ve been held in the grip of what can only be described as mass hysteria over something called the H1N1 virus. What the media forgets to tell us is that flu kills between a quarter and half a million people every year. So far, the H1N1 virus has managed to kill just over 700 people. Yup, bad news and fear sells and we are the suckers who fall for it over and over again.

Some causes for paranoia are far more enigmatic, bordering on the paranormal. Take for example the age-old question of “Where do missing socks go?” I can understand if socks go missing in public laundries, but how can it happen in my own home? Just a few days ago, I loaded clothes into my washing machine. I counted the socks as they went in: there were 4. I counted them as they came out: there were 3. What’s up with that? Is there a sock monster in my machine?

Another thing that bothers me and causes some paranoia is the colour of navel fluff. Fortunately, I have a hairless bellybutton, so I don’t gather fluff. My husband is less fortunate in that department. I do regular navel checks (as one does) and can state with certainty that all navel fluff is blue. Other amateur husband de-fluffers have confirmed my findings. My husband mostly wears khaki, beige and green clothes (some kind of camouflage fantasy stemming from his childhood). So, why is his naval fluff blue?

Another paranormal mystery is to be discovered when we bow at the porcelain altar - i.e. when we throw up. It has come to my attention that my vomitus ALWAYS contains chopped carrots, even if I haven’t eaten carrots in months. I know that the human body has been explored and explained in detail. But is it possible that scientists have all failed to identify the chopped carrot pouch in the digestive tract? I think further research should be done into this little matter.

I would like to write more on this subject, but I’m currently finding myself frozen with fear. An eerie sense of foreboding is causing my typing fingers to seize up. Could it be that somewhere, somehow, a dachshund is watching me?