I just read Rosie O’Donnell’s book Celebrity Detox. As with her other book, Finding Me, it is absorbing. Very real in one sense but then somehow inexplicably flawed or warped. But this is life, and all of us. At first I thought that maybe it was just not being used to such honesty, such vulnerability in a book by a celebrity about his/her own life. But what I think the actual problem is that she presents a real attempt to be honest and truthful and yet the truth that comes out is a flawed person with a giant ego. Still reading her books gives me a feeling of immediacy. I hope she writes more in the future.
On a personal level it makes me think about celebrity. We all want fame in one way or another. Fame seems to be the primary marker of success these days; we think that touching fame or being famous will make us better or happier or more fulfilled. I do feel those things, far more than I usually want to admit. But I also fear it; look at all the examples of famous people who have problems. Fame, both thinking about it for myself and paying attention to the fame of other people pulls me from myself. It is at best a time waster because it always pulls me from reality, from productive creativity. It also skews the reality center. I love Rosie’s idea that fame is an addiction.
What I don’t relate to in the book is her attack on people who like control, order, and for things to be smooth. I feel I have both elements in myself, the real raw feeling that Rosie describes and the desire for people to get along and for the surface to appear as cohesive as possible. Most of us have those as conflicting impulses. For me I think the two forces balance me out so I’m not a total monster or a totally obsessive person either.
