self-indulgent memorializing

A tribute to Michelle Trachtenberg that accidentally turned into a rant about aestheticizing dead famous people.

I’d love it if one of my most profound early cinematic memories came from a Terrance Mallick film or Jurrasic Park (1993). But it does not. It comes from Harriet the Spy (1996). Early in the film, Harriet (Michelle Trachtenberg) visits an object garden. Bottles dangle on tree branches, there are bubbles. Shit is everywhere. The bottles, which swing in the wind, sound like less annoying wind chimes. The sun shines through each bottle, creating a colorful oasis. Harriet is in awe. And god, so was I. This scene remains one of my most tangible experiences in a theater. I wanted to live there. I wanted to have a garden like that one day. I wanted to be Harriet.

the girls (still) want to be her

I am not the first and certainly will not be the last Writer Girl™ to say it. I snuck around my neighborhood with a composition book (I filled in all the white with a red pen nearly giving myself carpal tunnel and arthritis at age 7), plastic binoculars, a yellow coat (subtle), and sunglasses. But Rosie O’Donnell wasn’t my nanny. I didn’t live in the chicest midcentury meets 1990s townhouse. I climbed trees and saw nothing, but I still thought I would work for the CIA one day. I couldn’t walk to a store. Or climb on a roof to look inside an old man’s chic loft apartment. I was a non-event at school… so if anyone did find my composition book, they wouldn’t have opened it. Despite my many hurdles, Harriet M. Welsch inspired me to write, observe, and ostensibly, become who I am: a person who writes out of pure passion and a desperate need for praise and attention (but not too much, please).

Trachtenberg passed away this week at 39, so I rewatched the Harriet the Spy* yesterday. It’s a remarkable performance. Harriet is a challenging character for even Meryl Streep.: she’s messy, mean, and goal-oriented to the point of self-absorption, and her arc is deceptively complex for a children’s movie. But Trachtenberg played Harriet with verve while demonstrating a better understanding of humanity than I have in my 30s. A prime example is a scene late in the film when Harriet sees a therapist and slowly reveals herself to him. The skill level—which we must not forget includes riffing with Rosie—is unmatched, even for the best of the best child actors. Millie Bobby Brown (new Jersey’s Helen Mirren) wishes. Similarly, her performance as Georgina Sparks in Gossip Girl elevated the show to a level it did not remotely deserve.

*Did you know that J. Smith Cameron played her mom? Nickelodeon said icons only.

Social media is not real life. SOCIAL MEDIA IS NOT REAL LIFE. SoCiaL mEdiA iS NoT ReAl LiFe*. But I let it bother me. Mere minutes after Page Six reported Trachtenberg’s death (with the word EXCLUSIVE in the headline, jfc), the dumbest people alive started posting thirst traps of Trachtenberg, mostly from her role in Eurotrip. Listen, I don’t think there is anything wrong with sharing thirst traps of someone when they die. In fact, I would LOVE IT if this is exactly how people reacted to my death since one of my fears is that I am not perceived as attractive. Damn, my vanity. Anyways, it’s the immediacy with which people started sharing these, and the attitude. I refuse to link these mostly because I refuse to go out of my way to find them, so trust my memory. I saw a post on X with pictures of Trachtenberg that said something like “Tumblr lost another one.” Another suggested that Trachtenberg was the original Sydney Sweeney. My Instagram feed was flooded with Y2K aesthetic accounts posting photos of Tratchenburg from approximately 2003-2008. It’s wonderful that she was so loved. But Michelle Trachtenberg was a person and a professional actor. She was not an aesthetic, and neither is Sydney Sweeney. Neither is Jane Birkin or Shelley Duvall or anyone who dies, famous or not. Anyone who is familiar with me at all knows I love being horny online. But it’s crossed a line, and I’m afraid there’s no going back.

*dELia*s was real tho

Last year, musician Ethel Cain posted on tumblr about an “irony epidemic.” “Nobody takes anything seriously anymore,” she wrote. “It makes me feel so crazy and annoyed because I am constantly bombarded by jokes.” The post, which she deleted even though she was right, explains how she encounters this online and in real life, including at her fucking concerts. Language like “she ate that” has led to mean nothing and say nothing because it’s replaced “this is good because…” and has already led to the death of criticism: actual critics who write for reputable publications write like they’re posting on fucking X. I thought of Ethel Cain’s words while seeing content related to Trachtenberg’s death (how depressing that I just called it content), and something possibly even dumber is happening.

I’ve noticed a disturbing trend on social media that feels like it’s been going on for a long time—could be a year, six months, or three weeks. Anthony Bourdain has, too, become an aesthetic to the point of becoming nothing more than a meme for people who want to brag that they want to travel and eat. His life and work is being presented as some enviable experience as if the man was a fucking influencer. Yes, Bourdain traveled to cool places all over the world and ate some of the best food in the world, from Michelin-star restaurants to holes in the wall. But Bourdain was sick. So sick that he hung himself in a hotel room in France in 2018. He was 61 years old. He was found by his friend, chef Éric Ripert. Bourdain lived a wonderful life while he was here, and I feel truly privileged that I got to live the same time as he did. His writing inspires me, and I selfishly wish there was more of it. It is devastating that he was in pain despite his talent and success, and even more devasting that he’s been reduced to an aesthetic, ignorant of what he was going through. I wondered for a second if I am too sensitive about this because I relate. But, no. This behavior is insane.

I don’t know where this self-indulgent memorializing came from, really. But I have theories. Maybe we’re starting to witness the brain damage of an entire generation that grew up on the internet and with social media in early adulthood. Maybe COVID and lockdown took the hardest working brain cells. Maybe this is a sad reflection of how people handle trauma. I don’t know, all I know is that it is a disturbing display of humanity.

The internet and, by default, social media have detached us so much from real life, real feelings, and real emotions that we’re completely devoid of them. People are so self-obsessed that they don’t stop and think: is it insensitive to aestheticize the life of a man who traveled but was so sad that he killed himself? Is it maybe too soon to post a dead woman’s boobs?

xx

what i watched this week: The White Lotus (more on that eventually I’m sure) The Traitors, Survivor, videos of snowstorms on YouTube, Harriet the Spy, Hoosiers *rest in peace Gene*