postcards from the edge by carrie fisher

Meryl Streep plays Suzanne with the sort of disaffected gumption I often see in myself: light in the eyes, heavy in the gut. Just as my life spiraled out of control, so too did Suzanne Vale ’ s, the drug-addicted actress who suffers an overdose in the movie ’ s opening chapter.

It ’ s a movie I ’ ve always loved, but one that found its footing in my heart as my 20s crescendoed into a ball of incomprehensibility. In that slum, I turned - as I often do-to my obscene fairy godmother Carrie Fisher, and most notably the film based on her book and her life, Postcards From the Edge.

An endless cycle of doing nothing to get better, just tripping over reality and conjuring another “ last ” that wouldn ’ t come. The “ last ” of it all prolonged the serious nature of my predicament, as my sanity slowly slipped from my grasp like a handful of marbles.

This is the last time I will drink a bottle of wine in my bed on Saturday night while watching YouTube videos about tiny houses. ” This is the last time I will eat carbs for a whole year. I began to measure my moments in “ lasts. Not some magical clap of thunder, cloud of smoke, and boom: metamorphosis. I wasn ’ t fit for a change, because I wasn ’ t fit to fix myself. I knew, intrinsically, that it wouldn ’ t be. I looked haggard, too old for 30, but also well-earned a face that ’ s seen some shit. Sick from a never-ending plague of regret the stain of bad memories that bubbled into my conscience every morning, taunting me years later like some infected ingrown hair. Stretch marks, flabby skin, sullen cheeks. Instead, as I stood before the bathroom mirror, I was even more acutely aware of my bodily flaws. Someone I might like better.īut, remarkably, I hadn ’ t morphed into my new form overnight. Someone easier on the eyes, quicker to a smile. I woke up on my 30th birthday and thought I ’ d see someone brand new in the mirror. It ’ s the age of miracles, when the last morsels of wasteful youth are drained from your body and you emerge fully formed on the other side of not giving a fuck. “ I shot through my 20s like a luminous thread through a dark needle, blazing toward my destination: Nowhere.

Postcards from the edge by carrie fisher