I Want to be the Girl with the Most Cake
In the past year and a half, I have really tried to unyoke myself from productivity culture. I've read at least three books on burnout that said equating what we accomplish with self-worth is just a dirty lie capitalism tells us or "internalized capitalism" if you're being all TikTok about it. Productivity is just a funnel for the real mirage, ambition, a tool to keep us working and never satisfied. It's called the hedonic treadmill—the idea that happiness is relatively stable regardless of major life changes. It's why finally accomplishing a big project or life goal feels good only fleetingly.
I've never seen a better illustration of the drive and downfall of the hedonic treadmill than Halt and Catch Fire. (Spoilers ahead, but this show ended in 2017, so whatever.) The AMC drama started as a 1980s Silicon Valley knockoff of Mad Men with Lee Pace as a Don Draper figure named Joe MacMillan, an ambitious former IBM executive who moves to Dallas to convince frustrated engineer Gordon Clark (Scoot McNairy) to build the first laptop. They hire a wunderkind punk rock programmer, Cameron Howe (Mackenzie Davis), and get advice from Gordon's hardware genius wife, Donna (Kerry Bishé), who is relegated to raising their two kids while Gordon plays with chips in their garage. They successfully build the laptop despite copyright infringement issues, funding crises, and competitors. Everyone should be rejoicing, but only Gordon seems to have gotten the memo. Cameron thinks they've compromised her code and leaves to start her own gaming company, Mutiny; Donna's envy over Gordon getting to live out his dream makes her quit her middling engineering job at Texas Instruments; and Joe has everything he envisioned, but it isn't enough, so he sets a truckload of their computers on fire.
Every season follows a similar blueprint: Joe has some grand idea, gets the band back together, pisses off a lot of people, and then either the industry scoops them or their own ambitions don't match the reality. Halt is an alternate reality where the same four people have a hand in inventing the laptop, chatrooms, eBay, and eventually the search engine, yet no one is ever truly happy. While Joe and Gordon start off as men with so much ambition they ignite everyone around them and nearly burn themselves down in the process, they learn it's not about the product but the people you make it with. But they're white men, and the world is expected to bend their will. Joe has the added complication of being bisexual and never quite fitting in anywhere, which might explain his chronic need to prove himself and inability to ever enjoy his success, but that's another essay entirely.
Cameron and Donna have to fight harder to be taken seriously and often fight each other in the process. Half the show is about them working as business partners at Mutiny, where Cameron devolves into the difficult creative genius and Donna chases the money to the point they explode the company. Cameron retreats to Tokyo to design video games so complicated they alienate players and trap everyone in her loneliness, and Donna becomes a venture capitalist rolling in status and alcohol but empty inside. In one of the most haunting scenes in season four, we watch Donna wining and dining VC friends at her all-glass modern home in San Francisco while Hole's "Doll Parts" plays with Courtney Love yelling, "I want to be the girl with the most cake/ I love him so much, it just turns to hate/ I fake it so real, I am beyond fake/And someday, you will ache like I ache."
Yet it's not really ambition that ruins Cameron and Donna's business and friendship, but their own egos. Cameron admits this to Joe when she returns from Tokyo at the end of season three: "It's just you go through life, and you have this idea of who you are and what you do, and then you discover it's total bullshit. It's a defense mechanism, and once you stop defending yourself, you can be all these other things." This idea stopped me in my tracks and made me ask what my own defense mechanisms were. For the past four years, I've felt guilty for "selling out" and leaving magazines for the comfortable benefits and steady salary of higher ed. It wasn't that I couldn't cut it in journalism, but just I didn't care enough. I ruminated on how I even went down such a wrong path, but maybe journalism was just a defense mechanism all along.
As a kid, I took summer creative writing classes before I could even read. I had a lot of ideas and loved sharing them, but somewhere along the way I started to question if anyone wanted to hear them (blame how ruthless middle school girls are). By high school my only creative writing outlet was a lunch club called Ink Slingers who were so emo I felt like a hack sharing my one superficial Devil Wears Prada knockoff story to their total indifference. I avoided the one high school creative writing class because I was too afraid someone would tell me I was terrible, and it would break me, so I pivoted to journalism. As college plans became the focus, I told people I'd major in English to be practical (LOL) and do journalism on the side. Journalism was still writing but less scary to fail because I wanted it less. It's a common path. Actor and TV writer Natasha Rothwell did something similar. "Rothwell originally studied journalism, too scared to consider acting as a career and thinking it would satisfy her interest in writing," Yvonne Villarreal writes in a LA Times profile. Obviously, based on Rothwell's success on Insecure and White Lotus, that's far from true, but to see someone else derail their own dreams with self-limiting beliefs was all too relatable.
But journalism was a plan and not a path. It took me through editing roles at college newspapers to grad school and all the way to Atlanta, where I landed my dream job as a copy editor. But after two years of that, I knew I was supposed to want something more, but I wasn't sure what. I asked mentors and friends to illuminate the next step for me, but my boss at the time respected people with wild ambition and not rational plans. I was using a playbook even I didn't want, and he saw through it and saw me enough to remind me I was a writer. I thought switching to a writing-based role in higher ed would scratch that itch for me, but it was still another cautious choice, the type of choice I've been making since high school: Which college could I realistically get into? Which internship would lead to a job? Which entry-level job would get me in the door? Which plan would give me a promotion? It all boils down to: What is a safe and guaranteed way to have a positive outcome? It's kept me employed and comfortable, which is not nothing, but it's also a box I've shut myself in.
The antidote to this hasn't been blowing up my life, but just being curious. I signed up for an intro to fiction class on a whim last December to ensure I didn't lose my writing to grad school. Having no expectations led me to be playful with my writing. Instead of making the safe choice and ensuring mediocrity, I had fun and am now 32,000 words into a novel. I have a new ambition, but maybe it's just been the real one all along.
As Halt shows, ambition isn't inherently a cancer but something generative. Used incorrectly, it can corrupt, alienate, and lead to perfectionism, but it can also bring people together and create truly innovative ideas. Everyone on the show is bored and restless when not challenging themselves. I felt the same. I thought higher ed communications was a respite from the failure of journalism, but the real failure was not pursuing the writing I needed to do all along. The people who have thrived in journalism really wanted it, but I wanted stability or thought I did. What I really want is community, curiosity, and creativity. It's not lost on me all the best ideas Joe has on Halt bring everyone together again, and none of the protagonists can be truly successful on their own—at least not in any way that matters. I don't need to be at the center of creativity holding a mic on stage anymore, but I just need to be a part of it. As long as I'm actively writing and believing in the validity of my own ideas enough to share them, that's all that matters.
TikTok Ramen
![ramen ramen](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/w_1456,c_limit,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc14ade36-3ac9-455e-bf86-753b615e0fed_448x475.jpeg)
I can't remember who originated this viral ramen recipe on TikTok, but search the app or google it, and you'll find dozens. This technique is basically how you make a carbonara and creates a rich and creamy sauce. Skip the mayo if you're averse. Add more water if you like your ramen soupy. Sometimes I throw in some American cheese.
One pack instant ramen (I used Shin Ramen)
1 Tbs. mayo (Kewpie is famous on TikTok, but I have Duke's because this is Georgia.)
500 ml. hot water
1 raw egg
1 tsp. garlic, minced or grated
1 scallion, chopped
1. Mix seasoning packets, egg, garlic, scallion, and mayo in the serving bowl.
2. Boil the water and cook ramen for 2 minutes or until done.
3. When ramen is almost finished, add a few tablespoons of the cooking water to the serving bowl and stir to lightly cook the egg without scrambling it. This is called tempering, and the starchy water will act as a binder for the sauce and noodles.
4. Drain the rest of the ramen and mix into the serving bowl.
Tess Recommends:
-Last year I fell off the Oscar beat, but this year I have loved being back in the theater so much I'm seeing everything. West Side Story has been the best all year. Spielberg brings a vivacity and relevance to this classic Romeo & Juliet redux with authentic casting, gorgeous costumes, and vibrant acting. Although I spent half the film wondering if Ansel Elgort should be cancelled out of it (he can sing and looks like Marlon Brando at the right angle, but his predatory personal scandals are distracting), Mike Faist as Riff is River Phoenix reincarnated, and Ariana DeBose is an electric Anita.