39 Comments
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Madeline's avatar

I was wondering when the next BAT was going to hit my inbox! Thanks for writing.

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

you know what we need? A BAT SIGNAL

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Madeline's avatar

tuna salad is the worst, DAMMIT JEN

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

plz don't blame Jen

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Madeline's avatar

You don’t tell me what to do

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Madeline's avatar

Thank you for sharing the tunnel. It's really really true in the challenge of being an artist while also trying to live – honestly, this is why I've always just kept my writing as a side job. You are making me braver, though!

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

perhaps if we are all in the tunnel it shall stop being so scary

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Madeline's avatar

team lauren rules

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

getting thist tattood

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Madeline's avatar

767 just like a plane babyyyyy!

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Madeline's avatar

I always assumed, but U know what happens with that –– is the header image Wylder?

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

lol nope some random dumb baby I found on the internet. Also I wish we spelled Wilder's name Wylder wtf

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Madeline's avatar

Never 2 late to change

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Michael Estrin's avatar

This was great, Alex! So glad I found Both Are True!

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

Aw man thanks Michael that means so much coming from you 💖

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Anne Kadet's avatar

Alex is the best! I was so happy when he told me you met at the LA meetup!

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

dang this world is getting smaller and frankly? I'm into it

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Craig Burgess's avatar

Alright, so time to get serious for 4.5 seconds

The audience/creator relationship is difficult on so many levels.

SCENARIOS

a) You open yourself up to 'building an audience', then you build an audience, then you hate yourself because now you pander to them.

b) You 'build an audience', but nobody wants to be part of your audience, and then you're sad

c) You steadfastly REFUSE to 'build an audiece', nobody pays attention, and you hate yourself anyway

It's hard to deal with. I mostly quit twitter, attempting to find the balance. Substack feels better for me though. I can be me and make the work I want to make, and if people enjoy it I can make more of it. It feels easier to find your people over here than other places.

Anyway, as Limp Bizkit said, 'U DO U' and 'I DID IT ALL FOR THE NOOKIE'

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

no matter what road you go down, what path you choose, it will always end up being for one thing and one thing alone. The nookie. So, naturally you can go ahead and take that cookie and, well, stick it up your ass.

Ok now I'll be serious for 4.5s - I think you're right about the scenarios and I would have laid it out the same BUT seeing them from a distance makes me realize - in all of them the writer ends up a sad sack o shit and I think that? is a choice. lol. Like, maybe there is a world where -

a) You open yourself up to 'building an audience', then you build an audience, then you're happy just like you were before building the audience and life is good!

b) You 'build an audience', but nobody wants to be part of your audience, and then you're happy just like you were before trying to build the audience and life is good!

c) You steadfastly REFUSE to 'build an audiece', nobody pays attention, and you're happy just like you were before!!

Is this a pipe dream? Sure. But friends, I ask you, is this even a pipe?

The only way out is through by which I mean community by which I mean good pals you can riff with about all this stuff, and thus feel a little less alone in this wackamole world

let us, as the gods once said, keep rollin rollin rollin rollin

ps holy shit this music video for rollin is something else - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYnFIRc0k6E

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Dane Benko's avatar

"and (2) believing that you have value"

Ugh but that means I have to have self-confidence and put myself out there and be comfortable with risk and comfortable with myself and open to new opportunities and experiences and generally not allow myself to wrap myself in a blanket and pretend I can stay there until given an afterlife that gives me all the good things I want and dream about without any of its negative consequences or the work to get there.

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

no that can't be right. we need to still be able to wrap ourselves in blankies, at least.

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Mark Dykeman's avatar

Once again, both are true.

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

RING THE BELL

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Myq Kaplan's avatar

i love this and you!

some specifics i love:

"both are, once more, true."

"Both Are True Pyramid Club"

"the suffix “-ation” meaning “party for hitting a milestone of 750 substack subscribers.”

"turtle my way"

"real people strangers"

"Well have I got a button for you"

"more Substack readers, more problems"

"you are a unique wonderful writer and you have created a great place to put your work"

"Too Mopey For The Internet."

"That light ended up being the train from the trolley problem chugging toward me after killing either 1 or 5 people (it wouldn’t say)"

"the Hole mines"

"car mechanics talking about salads"

"yea there’s a lady mechanic what are you a 1950s sicko?"

"everything in the middle (a salad)"

"And this isn’t just comedy: in an episode of comedian Myq Kaplan’s podcast Broccoli & Ice Cream (which everyone should subscribe to) with his friend and therapist Gus Cutz who I have never met but am obsessed with, Gus explains that therapy never works when he gives the advice for free. People need to pay for it so they feel that it has value - that’s a big part of what makes them commit to it."

"hardcore Mastermind Scheming Mode"

"History’s Greatest Minds from George Michael all the way to Fred Durst"

"Easy, peasy, hey frank go ahead and give that lemon a squeezy."

"the more you try to grab hold, the squirmier it gets."

"writing makes me feel good (said in the Ghostbusters theme song music style) especially when its done WITH you the audience, not AT or FOR you."

congratulations! thank you for listening to my podcast and telling other people to do that! maybe jen the mechanic REALLY LOVES BREAD SO MUCH that she doesn't even notice the salad in between the breads unless the breads aren't there (or it's like everything is too spicy for her unless there's enough bread, that kind of thing?), and i love you and this and thank you again!

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

i love u dude thank u once again you have made me not hate myself for a few minute s

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Myq Kaplan's avatar

i love U dude

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Tami Carey's avatar

Boy, I feel like you transcribed the exact conversation I have with my husband every few weeks. He, like your wife, executes a beautiful, graceful sidestep in those situations and we land in the same place. I really appreciate not being the only writer/ actor/ creative who says (or, more often, thinks quietly to myself) NO when someone asks “would you still do this if it were just for you?’ It’s an unpopular opinion, but no less true. The conversation, the shared experience, the collaboration, creating something bigger than a single imagination- that’s the thing.

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

exactly!! if I knew that no one was gonna see or hear or experience the stuff then I would just feel like I was talking to my own brain which is what I do all the time anyways and it makes me insane.

I feel like there's this thing that happens when you know that you're talking with someone whether its conversation or art or whatever and it is in that conversing that the ideas all start to make sense because you know someone on the other end has to be able to understand them.

anyways i'm rambling but that[s sort of the point! Also hi Tami nice to meet you I'm gonna subscribe to your newsletter now too

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Tami Carey's avatar

One thousand percent!

(👋🏻 - very excited to navigate this all in good company and to welcome you into outsourced optimism!)

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Geoffrey Golden's avatar

Congrats on hitting 750! 🎉 I, too, have had lots of feelings writing on Substack

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

hahah thank you Geoffrey!!

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Freya Rohn's avatar

I cannot tell you how much I love this honesty with wrestling with the global capitalist overlords. Damn. I feel it, we live it as creatives. It's so so hard and there is never a good answer. And what you said tho about audience and improv--exactly--you can't write into a mirror or you'll just get that same thought bouncing back and forth. Writing is about connection through and through, even when you're sending a message in a bottle five hundred years into the future (have not done that but feels like it every. single. day). Yours in solidarity.

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

Freya wow hi thank you. It's all less bad when we commune about it, and who knows maybe 500 yrs from now someone will see this the way we look at old postcards now and go "wow look at how ppl used to communicate! They were so emotional!"

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Freya Rohn's avatar

ha yes!

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Rachael Rejiester's avatar

I love what you write. I love commenting on everything you write and working in Barenaked Ladies somehow. :) I am truly happy that I found your writing. I don't have a ton of disposable income (see: two children, three cats, the incessant need to see Barenaked Ladies at least once per year) but subscribing to you is SO VERY worth it!

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

SHE HAS DONE IT AGAIN - what are we, 6 for 6? Also wow you have no idea how grateful I am for you and your support ❣ THANK YOU

also with that many kids and cats can't they sort of take care of themselves?

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Rachael Rejiester's avatar

Yeah, it’s pretty much a feral colony over here!

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Kari Kwinn's avatar

well, have I got a button for you! YES. YES. YES!!! You are DOING IT <3

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Alex Dobrenko`'s avatar

Kari thank u 💖

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