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

For the rest of my decade-long career, people occasionally came up to me and said they’d seen me in the rain.

As Neil pulled the car up to the departure gates, I looked at him, worried.

Are you sure you don’t want to come? I said. Maybe this is all wrong. Maybe you should .

He helped me put my bags and ukulele case onto a luggage cart.

I love you. I’ll see you in nine weeks, darling .

Maybe while I’m writing the book, I’ll figure out my life. And our marriage , I said. If I do, can I write about you and all your innermost personal details? Or will you divorce me?

He sighed. I won’t divorce you. You couldn’t get rid of me if you tried. It’s like Anthony said. You hit me. I stay hit .

I laughed.

It was freezing cold outside the airport, and the wind whipped at us. I didn’t have gloves or a hat on, and was only wearing a thin coat, since I hadn’t wanted to bring a heavy one to Australia.

He shut the back door of the car.

Just make sure you stay in touch during your book marathon , he said.

Promise. I’ll miss you , I said, and put my freezing hands under his sweater, warming them in his armpits.

He gasped, then smiled.

I tucked my mouth into the crook of his stubbly neck, and whispered:

Thank you. Thank you for letting me go. Why are you so good to me?

I don’t know, darling. Because I love you, I think .

We stayed in our hug.

I’m proud of you , he said. I’m proud of you for finally letting me help. Even if it took Anthony getting sick for you to ask. I’m still proud .

You know, I didn’t ask for the money just so I could stay home with Anthony , I said, pulling out of our hug and looking at him. I think I thought that, then. But I don’t think that now .

What do you think now?

I think I asked… because I trust you enough to let you help me. I mean it .

I love you , he said.

Then I turned away from him and pushed my baggage cart towards the glass automatic doors, looking behind me only once to blow him a kiss. He stood next to the car, waving. He looked happy. I believed him.

The glass doors slid open, and shut again behind me. I wheeled the cart over to the international check-in kiosk. I looked back through the doors, though the mess of people. He was gone.

Now I have to write a book , I thought. How the hell am I going to do that?

As I stood in the line, I realized I was crying. I wasn’t really sure why. I knew the story, I knew what I had to say, but it all felt too disconnected, even though it wasn’t.

I pictured Anthony sitting in the café, during the million-dollar Kickstarter day, looking at me and shaking his head, trying to be patient.

I thought about everything I was leaving behind. The cold, the winter, the cancer, the hate, the past year.

Can hate grow back if it goes into remission?

My brain started to flood with images as I stood there with my passport in my hand.

All the dots. The Kickstarter, the backlashes, the bombing, the poem, the house parties, canceling the tour, sitting on Anthony’s hospital bed while the chemical bag dripped into his body, the TED talk, the massage girl. The book deal.

Neil.

All the nights I held him as he told me his secret childhood stories, all his fears and worries.

And all the nights he’d held me, when I was lost in my own paralysis of terror, afraid to take his help, afraid for Anthony, afraid that I was doing the wrong thing, afraid of looking weak to everyone. The Queen Of Asking, too ashamed to ask.

The fanbase, the chaos of complicated, creative ways we’d asked and helped each other, comforted and made space for each other. All the bizarre exchanges of money, songs, tears, food, beds, gifts, writing, stories.

All the people I had hugged. Touched. Who had touched me. All the little places we’d found strange solace in one another… the massive, connected, heartbreakingly human messiness of the whole fucking thing.

I wiped my eyes, took my phone out of my pocket, and sent Neil a text.

If you love people enough, they’ll give you everything.

A few weeks after I arrived in Australia for the book marathon, I found myself walking through the packed and drunken streets of Melbourne during White Night, an overnight festival where pedestrians and revelers can wander freely throughout the city center all night long, until daybreak, as it explodes with performance, music, and artistic light projections illuminating all the downtown buildings.

After hours of wandering, happily lost, through the chaotic magic of the all-night museums and the churches filled with inebriated, ecstatic crowds of people, I was heading home when I spied a living statue working across Flinders Street, near the Town Hall. I can spot a living statue a mile away.

I walked across the street and watched him from a distance. He was crouched in a gargoyle pose; his body was completely purple in a costume that clung to his skin. His face was covered with an intricate handmade mask, which revealed just his eyes. It was decorated with little glued-on mirrors that made his muzzle look like a disco ball. He was majestic, dragon-like, beautiful. When a passerby put money in his cup, he un-froze and encouraged them to pat him as he made serpentine movements of pleasure. It was nearly dawn, and I wondered how long he’d been working there. I was tired, but I wanted to watch. I leaned against a tree across the sidewalk.

A group of drunken people stumbled over, jeering and laughing, and took a bunch of pictures of him. I felt my pulse quicken.

They stumbled away, and another group, drunker than the first, took over. Even though one of them gave him a dollar, the girl who went to pose with him shrieked so loudly I saw him flinch slightly. Then she took the can of beer she was holding and, giggling, tilted it above him, pretending she was going to pour it on his back. Her friends laughed loudly, and she darted away. Then they loitered in front of him, gabbing riotously and ignoring him.

I crossed the sidewalk, and as I crouched down and put in a two-dollar coin, I looked into his eyes. He came to life and then stopped for a moment. Then he lowered his head.

It was odd. He froze in that position and I stayed there on my bent knees, waiting to see what would happen.

Then his whole back started slowly shaking.

He raised his head back up and I looked into his eyes, which were brimming with tears.

We crouched there, for a moment, face-to-face.

I reached my hand out to touch his cheek, before taking him into my arms.

He buried his head in the crook of my neck, sobbing without a sound.

I closed my eyes. I tightened my arms around him. He tightened, too.

The drunken crowd who had just been tormenting him stared at us, and went silent.

We stayed, attached, on our knees, for what felt like two or three minutes.

I held him.

He held me.

He finally raised his head and looked at me through the slit in his mirrored mask, with his wet, red eyes. I felt his breath slow down.

I whispered in his ear:

Get back to work

…and I walked up the street without looking back.