Аманда Палмер - The Art of Asking; or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Let People Help

And so you will take the coffee, because the truth of the matter is that your acceptance of the gift IS the gift. And if you’re not in a hurry, you will also draw the barista a picture, or draw a picture for his friend who’s a huge fan, or tell her about the Ben Folds song. And when he’s not looking, you leave a ten-dollar bill in the tip jar. Because you can. And because you remember how fucking amazing it used to feel to empty out the tip jar and see a ten-dollar bill.

The gift must always move .

I finally wrote a new song. I realized, while I was writing it, that it had been almost a year since I’d written… anything. Not since the Kickstarter launched, the band hit the road, the cancer hit Anthony, the bomb hit the marathon, and my whole plan fell apart. I hadn’t been spending very much time by myself. I’d been spending it with the fans, with Neil, with Anthony. I hadn’t even wanted to connect the dots. There were too many. And collecting them was hard enough.

I find it really hard to write around people, physically. Even Neil. I’m too self-conscious. One day while we were still in the rental house in Cambridge, I got an idea for a new song. Neil was writing in the house. Though he was two rooms away, I still felt like finding privacy was impossible. I went outside into the corner of the garden of our rental house with my ukulele, and tried to see what would happen. The garbage collectors came by to pick up the recycling and waved hello. I went and hid behind the neighbor’s garage.

Behind the garage, I wrote a song. The year. The hurt. The hate. The fans. Anthony. Blender setting = 1.

I recorded it into my phone. I called it “Bigger on the Inside.”

Our first job in life is to recognize the gifts we’ve already got, take the donuts that show up while we cultivate and use those gifts, and then turn around and share those gifts—sometimes in the form of money, sometimes time, sometimes love—back into the puzzle of the world.

Our second job is to accept where we are in the puzzle at each moment. That can be harder.

I know people who support their spouses, their families, or their recovering/destitute/unemployed friends. When speaking off the record, sometimes they say they resent it. They have an uneasy feeling of obligation.

And I know others who are rich in the same kind of wealth or power, and who make an art of being able to help those around them. It takes a lot of work to get it right.

On the other side, I know people who accept support from their friends, families, or spouses but really can’t get comfortable with it; they avert their eyes, they refuse to discuss, they feel a huge shame. Others accept the help offered to them with grace and humility, and announce with a smile that they’re living at home while they figure shit out. Humor is key.

Some days it’s your turn to ask.

Some days it’s your turn to be asked.

Neil was going to take me to the airport to catch my flight to Australia.

I had spent as much time as I could with Anthony before I left. He was doing better, finally off the last dose of steroids and cancer drugs. He had just been to the hospital, where he’d had a battery of tests: he was officially in remission and getting ready to self-publish his second volume of his memoir-stories.

We went for a long walk around Lexington that ended in our regular coffee shop stop. The kid behind the counter asked for my autograph and told me he’d just emailed my TED talk to his mom. He tried to give me my coffee for free. I refused. Anthony rolled his eyes.

Mrs. Huge , he said, poking me in the ribs as we sat down. I took his cane and after whacking him with it, leaned it carefully against my coat, where it wouldn’t fall over.

Ha , I said. Mr. Big. You know I owe you everything? My whole soul?

You don’t owe me nothing , he said.

I’ll be back in April , I said. Enjoy the evil, soul-numbing, sucking torment of the Boston winter .

You’re a pussy , he said. There’s no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing choices. You just can’t learn to wear a fuckin’ sweater .

He knew I hated it when he said that. And he said it every single time I complained about the cold.

I glared at him. I hope it blizzards on you all winter. I hope you have to shovel ten feet of snow every day .

Ha. YOU. YOUUUUU , he said, in his gravelly godfather voice, pointing at me. YOU… I love. You helped me .

I’m going to miss you , I said. I’m so glad you’re not dead. Have I mentioned that lately? That I’m so glad you’re not dead? I am. And maybe I’ll write about your sorry ass in my book .

Make me famous, okay? he said, brightly. Maybe I’ll finally get some free coffee around here .

I’m kind of afraid to write it , I told him. I feel like there’s all this pressure to get it perfect. It took me like two months to write the TED talk, and that was only twelve minutes, and even then I fucked up and went over and it was more like thirteen minutes, and I’m worried the book will suck, and it’ll be convoluted and self-centered…

Shut up, beauty , he said. You’re going to do great. Just tell the truth. And don’t forget what I’ve always told you about people .

You’ve always told me, like, seven hundred things , I said.

You can’t give people what they want. But you can give them something else .

Ah .

You can give them understanding. Just tell the story. Tell it all. They’ll understand . He smiled at me. You’ll be fine .

I’m going to miss you. Please don’t get cancer again while I’m away, okay? Please? Promise?

Can’t promise that, beauty. But I can promise to love you. That’ll have to be enough .

That’s enough , I said.

I stretched over the café table to hug him.

It’s enough .

Blake (remember him? the ex-boyfriend ex-white-angel statue?) emailed me this story.

Early on in my busking career I got caught in a summer rainstorm.

You know how it is sometimes in Boston, there will be a drop or two of rain and it’s a fifty-fifty chance it will either clear up and get sunny again or just plain downpour. Eventually I made a rule for myself that if the bricks on the sidewalk got more than halfway covered in water it was time to get down and seek shelter, but this was my first real rainstorm. I knew my costume wasn’t waterproof; the wings were largely made of papier-mâché, but I also knew the costume needed some improvement and figured if it got ruined that’d be all the more motivation to make a second version. So, the clouds rolled in and the raindrops came slowly, then quickly. The pedestrians tend to disappear as soon as the first few drops hit the ground.

It seemed like there was no one around, and I wondered what it would mean to busk in an empty square. So I stayed. I held a pose with my arms slightly out and down. Not the easiest pose, but one I could hold for quite some time.

I waited the rainstorm out, getting soaking wet, down to the core.

After probably only fifteen or twenty minutes of really heavy rain, the sun came out.

The rain stopped and the sidewalk started to dry.

I had really thought no one was watching, but for the next several minutes people came from all directions and they spoke to me, saying they had seen me in the rain and that they were touched.

I didn’t really think it was that big of a deal at the time. It was an easy choice.