Lose Well by Chris Gethard

Author:Chris Gethard
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2018-09-03T16:00:00+00:00

Weird N.J.

Spend enough time adrift and feeling alone in your pursuits and you’ll eventually cobble together a support system of like-minded people. Mine involves some artists; not just comedians, but also musicians, filmmakers, and other assorted oddballs. I also enjoy the friendship of people with real lives and stable jobs, things like “lawyer,” “teacher,” “food server,” or “public relations guy,” but for now let’s focus on the dreamers, freaks, and goons who ply their craft adjacent to mine. I lean on them every day. Whenever I fear I’ve lost my way, I turn to them for counsel. And, while they all don’t do what I do, their work inspires me to make mine better. Their commitment to integrity and ideals is a constant reminder for me to never lose sight of my own.

What I’m trying to say is you have to find a tribe. Having a unique idea inherently feels like being alone. Learning how to put your idea into the world can at first feel like shouting into a vast void. But once you break the seal and let out those yells, a funny thing happens—you very often hear the shouts of other frustrated dreamers coming back at you. These people are your allies. They’re the ones who get you through times of doubt, who make your ideas better, who inspire you with their own work and their hustle. Tribes of like-minded weirdos interested in the same things as you are always best, and often waiting for you in the unlikeliest places.

The first time I saw an issue of Weird N.J. magazine was in the window of Middle Earth, a comic book store on Bloomfield Avenue in Montclair. I wasn’t supposed to go to this store. My father came with me once and saw that they had more adult books of the “comix” variety, R. Crumb–type things. Stories with naked ladies and cursing and all that good stuff. I never even glanced at them. I was too obsessed with Marvel to care about anything else. Still, my father was worried that Middle Earth attracted perverts and kindly offered to drive me a little farther to the more aboveboard Time Warp Comics in Cedar Grove. No one needs to learn about the birds and bees via the twisted thoughts and drawings of disgruntled cartoonists. But I couldn’t always wait for him. If he was busy I’d miss that week’s releases, and that was unacceptable. There was no chance in hell I was going to wait an extra week to find out if Colossus was going to keep living on Magneto’s asteroid in the sky! Comics were my addiction as a kid and I needed them as soon as they came out. I’d sneak to Middle Earth when my dad wasn’t around to take me to Time Warp Comics.

One day I walked toward the entrance of the store and froze when I saw the covers of Weird N.J. issues eight and nine in the front window. I was transfixed. I’d never seen this magazine before, but I knew in my heart right away that this was for me.

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