In the first year of his presidency, Ronald Reagan spent countless hours trying to persuade congressmen to approve a crucial sale of military planes to Saudi Arabia.  By all accounts, it was a grueling effort that a took a personal toll, so when Congress voted (by a narrow margin) to approve the deal, Reagan turned to an aide and said “I feel like I’ve just crapped a pineapple.”

That’s pretty much describes my feelings all year with this blog.  And just like anything you might expel from your bowels (pineapples or otherwise) I’m not sure if I’m proud of the results so much as glad that the year is over.

To recap: 365 days ago I vowed to become a Better Man by today.  In my first post, I wrote about waking up Christmas morning to find the tires on my car slashed.  It was the final insult in a year’s worth of indignities, and the parallels weren’t lost on me: my easy ride on the wheels of good fortune had been suddenly deflated by the ugly vicissitudes of life.

And so this blog was born, a chronicle of my efforts not only to reverse my fortunes, but to change for the better – to find the wisdom and fortitude to overcome my crises. I’d resolved to do this by taking on several laudable, hare-brained and occasionally dangerous projects, all designed to improve the quality of my character.    In the process,  I learned a few lessons:

LESSON #1: It’s Okay To Make Wildly Unrealistic Plans That You Fail to Achieve.

When Joseph Stalin ruled the Soviet Union, he laid out several Five Year Plans that came with virtually impossible economic targets the workers had to achieve.  We’re talking crazy goals, like wheat production that required more farmland than physically existed in the entire country.  When the workers failed to achieve their targets, Stalin made sure heads rolled…literally. That’s too bad, because in spite of the “failure” the Soviet Union still achieved phenomenal economic growth, outpacing even some capitalist countries.  Cranky, homicidal Joe was so focussed on what didn’t happen that he couldn’t see the progress his country had made.

In my Better Man-ifesto, I came up with nine very ambitious projects, ones with high numbers for both artistic merit and technical difficulty.  I did not stick the landing on most of them.  Project “Do Me a Solid” was all about volunteering, yet the most  I ever volunteered for was seconds at dinner. The God Project was another disaster – although I must admit my heart wasn’t in it. Having grown up going to church, suddenly going back felt a little like going to the fridge for the milk, finding it had gone stale, then putting it back thinking if I return later it might be good again.  In all, I failed to complete ANY of the projects in their entirety,  including the seemingly easy goal of being a Better Asshole (Project Ari Gold).

Now, it’d be easy to pull a Stalin and dwell my failures, but that would mean overlooking the unanticipated successes of this year.  Take Project Renaissance Man (self-reliance and technical aptitude) – I didn’t pick up ANY of the skills I’d set out to learning.  However,  I’ve since compensated for it by discovering my inner Boy Scout – for example, I may not know how to fix my motorcycle, but now wherever I ride I carry a space blanket, canteen, and a survival knife in my saddle bags.  That way if I break down on the highway, at least I won’t die of exposure, dehydration, or bear attacks.  In fact, my house is now littered with how-to guides, and wherever I go I carry tools for most crises, even if I don’t know how to use them.

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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jk9QYuslcP8

Lately, I’ve been giving a lot of thought to how I might become a Better Man through career advancement, and I think I may’ve found a role model.  His name: Rick Sanchez.

Now I admit, Rick is a low wattage bulb, and possibly unstable, but he has made his limited gifts work for him, although I rarely bothered to watch Rick’s List on CNN.  For that matter, I’ve never watched Glenn Beck, or Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Lew Dobbs, Jim Kramer or any other of those frothy-mouthed, Howard Beale wannabes either.   There’s nothing high-minded about my disinterest – I was just jealous.  That these men could be successful in television (even though their qualifications are dubious and their opinions often grossly misinformed) made me think just one thing: Fuck me, I could’ve made it too.

Historically, my exposure to their programs was limited to the selected morsels served up by Jon Stewart (a man with unique gifts, thus making his show bearable for me to watch).  Surely Stewart and his writers must believe in God, because it’s almost as these gaff-prone numskulls were created specifically for mockery by The Daily Show – can you imagine how dull the program would be if they weren’t around?

I suspect Stewart realizes how symbiotic his relationship with the pundit cabal is, and I think some of the sharper ones in that group know it too: thanks to the most trusted newscaster in America (Time Magazine called Stewart that, not me), these guys are exposed to a broad segment of people who would otherwise having nothing to do with them.   A lot of people could happily live out their lives without ever hearing these gentlemen and their rabid gobblygook (I’ve been waiting for an occasion to use that word!), so The Daily Show has had the effect of elevating their presence from “possibly harmful white noise that taints intelligent debate” to “something to which we should pay marginal attention”.

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Work on a major project has kept me from posting of late, and now that it’s over I feel cursed with something akin to phantom leg syndrome – I still get an itch to work on it.  Four weeks ago, I hated the project and everything about it, and wanted to be free of it once and for all.  Now that it’s complete, I find myself missing it, perhaps because while I was doing it I felt like I had the kind of purpose that’s been been conspicuously absent from the last few years of my life.

Now, I find myself untethered and a little lost. I’m not fully present in my own life – I’m like a ghost, playing mute witness to the things that directly affect me. I’ve been sitting on another post all week – a little opus about the joy I get from planning my own funeral – but no matter how much I tweak it,  it doesn’t seem to fit my mood.  That’s not to say it won’t – my own funeral is proving to be one of my favorite daydreams – it’s just the act of writing about it feels vaguely foreign, like I’m discussing someone else’s daydream. So I’ve abandoned that for the moment to try and write something more in keeping with what’s on my mind, and while trying to come up with the right combination of words it would seem Matthew Weiner has already found them for me.

Weiner is the writer/creator of Mad Men, whose brilliance has been dissected sufficiently that I need not do it here.   As much as I love the show,  however, I was uncomfortable with Don Draper in previous seasons. As his faithful copywriter Peggy astutely points out he “has everything, and so much of it” but he also failed to appreciate it and remained isolated from everyone.  That was something I might’ve been privy to but not now, and I see little point in looking backwards.   This season, however, has been different.  Don and I now share similar paths, in that his life (like mine) has really gone over the cliff.  The freefall was perhaps not as enjoyable as he thought it would be, and now he’s looking for a soft place to land.

It’s with that particular trajectory in mind that Weiner fashioned the voiceover that punctuates the end of the most recent episode (called “The Summer Man”):

When a man walks into a room, he brings his whole life with him. He has a million reasons for being anywhere. Just ask him. If you listen, he’ll tell you how he got there. How he forgot where he was going and then he woke up. If you listen, he’ll tell you about the time he thought he was an angel and dreamt of being perfect. And then he’ll smile with wisdom, content that he realized the world isn’t perfect.

We’re flawed because we want so much more. We’re ruined because we get these things and wish for what we had.

Before we begin, a little primer on Anti-Seacreast:   Brian Dunkleman, born 1971 in upstate New York.  Young Dunkleman aspires to be an actor when he grows up, but gets the attention of comedy clubs early and chooses to leave college for a career in stand-up.  Eventually makes his way to Hollywood, where he kills on the Tonight Show, gets a guest appearance on NYPD Blue as a comic suspected of murder, plus a cameo as the guy who buys the engagement ring Chandler was going to get for Monica (bastard!).  It’s 2002, and Dunkleman is a working actor.  He hasn’t hit the stratosphere just yet, but he’s making all the right moves. And then…the show.

To be honest,  I’m a little apprehensive about talking to him.  Think of it: every day for the past 8 years,  friends,  reporters, agents, managers, casting directors, strangers on the street, small infants, people waking up from a coma…EVERYBODY remembers you as the guy jumped off the fastest moving gravy train in TV, and has no compunction about reminding you of this fact. E-V-E-R-Y-D-A-Y.   That is, when they’re not treating you like cancer.  Yet when I get him on the phone, Dunkleman is gracious and cordial.  He and his wife just moved into a new place and he’s a little run down from a cold.

What did success look like for Brian Dunkleman before Idol?

Oh, I wanted to be an actor, and in particular, an actor on one of those one-camera shows, like “Curb Your Enthusiasm” or “The Larry Sanders Show” That stuff is brilliant, shows like “Weeds” or “Modern Family”.

But instead, you ended up on American Idol. Remind me again why you left?

Well, Seacrest only ever wanted to be a host, so that was the right gig for him. But I was afraid of getting stuck in reality TV. You gotta remember, at the time reality TV was considered a gamble, or a fad – everyone, me included, thought it would last a year or two, at best. Also, those (Idol) kids are put through a lot. That’s a tough show to be on, being told so bluntly not to pursue your dreams. I thought it was humiliating for them, and it made me uneasy.

Of course, the show blew up, didn’t it? Do you think you would’ve stayed had you know it was going to be so big?

Oh absolutely, but not because the show was successful. Had I known the damage it would do to my career as an actor, I wouldn’t have left. You see, once it got big, people stopped returning my calls. I had booking agents canceling gigs on me. I would get called for the auditions and the casting director would only want me to gossip about Simon Cowell. I went four years without doing any stand-up. Imagine not working for four years in real life. I felt like I had a big black mark against my name. Many times I thought I would’ve gotten more work if I’d been nobody. So yeah – had I known THAT was going to happen, I would not have left. I would not have stayed long, though…maybe 2 or 3 seasons, then out.

So you wished you’d never been on?

Many times, yes.

How did you cope?

For a time…really, really badly. I fell into a huge depression, I saw a shrink. I went on Paxil, but I had an terrible reaction – sent me into hypomania for a year (hypomania, btw, is a mood disorder characterized by sleeplessness,  rapid talking, unsubstantiated self-confidence, poor judgment, impulsive behaviour and excessive sexual activity – I think I may be a hypomaniac) . To this day, I don’t know if I cope with it well.

So you’re not out of the funk? You’re still bitter?

Oh I don’t know if I’ll ever stop being bitter…a tiny bit of that will always be with me. But really, I can only be upset with myself. My wife has stood by me the whole time and whenever she’s around, it’s hard for me to stay that way for long.

So how do you maintain the ability to function?

I don’t know. Head down, one foot in front of the other. I try to stay focussed on whatever I’m doing at the time.

But do you think you might have surprised youself and gained something from having to walk the wilderness like that?

Well, I don’t believe in things happening for a reason. If things did happen for a reason, then what’s the reason for Haiti? No, you make your own luck in life. Now, has it made me stronger? Absolutely. If you told me that after Idol, I wouldn’t get another gig for years, pre-Idol me would have said he couldn’t handle it. Post-Idol me knows that he can. The other thing is that I feel more gratitude, which is wonderful. I meet a lot of comics who will bitch about their performance on the Tonight Show, or bitch about their hotel room, or the club they’re performing at. I’m doing more stand-up now, and I just feel so glad that I get to do it. It’s thrilling, and if leaving Idol has done me a favour, it’s that I always feel happy to be working. I’m working at something I enjoy, which lot of people can’t say.

So, resilience and grace – check. Anything else?

Well, I’m working with a guy to develop a comedy series like the ones I always wanted to work on. We’re calling it “American Dunkleman” and essentially it’s about my post-Idol life and how I cope with it. It combines what I’ve always wanted with what I NEVER wanted, and it would be completely ironic if this were to be thing that blows up for me.

So where is the wisdom to be found in all of this? Any advice for someone like me, who feels he missed the boat?

That boat’s gone, man – find another boat. Sure, maybe things didn’t turn out so well, but you still gotta lead your life. Just keep working towards your dreams. Take whatever opportunities you can get, and be happy for them. Also, controlling emotions is for Vulcans – sometimes I’ll think about it and can’t help but feel bad..I just try to ride ‘em out.  Again, just try to do stuff you like, and have someone stand by you, like my wife does. Other than that, I don’t know.

As I get off the phone with Dunkleman,  I’m struck by how plain-spoken he is about all of this – no fronting, but not a tremendous amount of self-pity or anger, either.   I guess he’s lived with this fact of his existence long enough that it bores him more than anything.   I think I’d hoped for some grand epiphany, some stunning and unique piece of wisdom on how to cope with this mess.   The most he offered was “just keep going” which is good advice as any, I suppose…perhaps the  best advice.

I have high hopes for the Dunkleman (probably because we’re leading parallel lives). In many ways, Seacrest is a polished, blow-dryed example of an old paradigm – a seemingly flawless celebrity  with no real personality short of that which we (or Simon Cowell) project on him.  TV viewers today want to see the imperfections. They mistrust the façade that TV erects and they want to peak around it and see what’s holding it up – that’s probably why reality TV has stuck around so long and why a fall from grace such as Dunkleman’s, can get so much play on TMZ.  Dunkleman may not have realized this at the time, but he certainly does now and he’s trying to shape that to his advantage.  Now that even “reality TV” feels as superficial as that which preceded it,  a honest look from a genuinely funny person at the tragedy of his life, has promise.  I hope so…otherwise I’m screwed.

Do you remember Brian Dunkleman?  Does the name sound familiar?  Think hard. Maybe he was your high school valedictorian…your optometrist, perhaps.

Okay, this could take a while so I’ll give you a mulligan: Dunkleman was Ryan Seacrest’s co-host on American Idol for the first season. The reason you may not recall his name is because he left the show after season one was over. Now the words, “Seacrest Out” annoy  millions of people all over North America.  Seacrest has a multi-million dollar production company and a sweetheart deal with E! Network.  Yes, RS is poised to be the 21^st century’s Casey Kasem, or Dick Clark… another man of indeterminate age, gender preference and talent, who is also inexplicably famous.

Dunkleman, on the other hand, is so far off the grid he may as well be Amish. And not in the cool way.

BD  has given many reasons for leaving Idol, from wanting to pursue a career in stand-up to objecting to the way the contestants were treated.  No matter the reason, the result has been the same; poor Brian is living out his life in relative obscurity. Oh sure, there’s been Celebrity Fit Club and the occasional appearance on Howard Stern, but that’s about it.

It’s too bad, because Dunkleman was WAY better than Seacrest.  He knew it too.  If you watch episodes of the first season, you can almost sense the entirely justified contempt that Dunkleman has for his vapid co-host.   The side long glances whenever RS spoke, the cutting one-liners whenever Seacrest finished a line and  Seacrest seemingly so dim as to be oblivious.  It’s apparent (to me, at least) that Dunkleman is smarter than Seacrest, and more talented.  Had he stayed on the show, it’s not unreasonable to think that he might have enjoyed all the perks that Seacrest does today…and we might all be better for it.

Instead, Dunkleman made a fateful decision.  He would later suffer from serious depression and put on weight (which did get him the gig on Celebrity Fit Club).  One can only imagine what it must be like to know that you’re more talented in every way than some other guy you worked with and then watch as Douchey McDoucherson goes onto fame and glory, while you wear the scarlet letter… all because you made a different choice.

Sigh… I don’t have to imagine it.   You see, I’m a Dunkleman too. 

I have watched as charming but less gifted former co-workers have sailed to dizzying heights, while I’m left to tell people the story of how I once knew them.  One of them was fired from MuchMusic because she was mind-boggingly lazy and disinterested in the “work” part of TV which didn’t involve the chance to meet and possibly screw celebrities. Today, she co-hosts her own program on National TV, where presumably she gets to meet and screw celebrities every single day. I have tried to watch the programs on which my former colleagues appear, but as Gore Vidal once said, “When a friend succeeds, a little something in me dies.”   I know I’m not being gracious, but I can’t help it.

Now, one could argue my lack of career success is because I’m just not as talented as they are. Let’s accept that as a possibility, but table it for the moment.   Sure, I may not be everyone’s flavour of ice cream, but I have had enough success to prove that I know what I’m doing, even if I don’t get to do it that often.  No, as far as I can calculate, this is about a single decision.  I assume Dunkleman didn’t realize the gravity of his single decision at the time.  He does now, and has said publicly that it was a mistake for him to leave Idol.

The same can be said for me. A year into my stint at MuchMusic, I was offered the opportunity to leave my show in Vancouver to work in Toronto at the mothership.  I turned it down. I loved Vancouver, loved my freedom, loved my girlfriend (at that time), whose career was firmly based in the Lower Mainland.  I loved giving the indie bands who appeared on my show (and were unlikely to appear anywhere else on National TV) a leg up. Those seemed like solid reasons, at the time.

I had no idea that I’d slammed the door on a future.  Had I been in Toronto, I would have interviewed major celebrities, and those interviews would receive greater profile on the MuchMusic.  I would appear on shows that were a matter of priority to my employers.  Both my profile and caché as a host would’ve risen and for the network executives in that world, what you do is less important than the buzz around what you do.   That never occurred to me.   I know many bands were grateful for the exposure they received on my show, but career-wise this move, or lack of move as the case may be, was fatal.  I was like one of those people who sustains an aneurysm but walks around thinking he’s fine… until of course he drops dead.

Now I’m jobless. Sure, my confidence has taken a hit but I’m sure what few gigs I do get come as a result of my constant badgering and the resulting capitulation on the part of my employers.  I set no terms, I ask for nothing, I don’t change games…I don’t push for anything and I do exactly what is asked of me. Not exactly the way to get ahead, just the path to not falling farther behind.

So how does one recover from such a misstep?  I guess at some point, you have to make peace and move on.  A better man than myself would do that.  He acknowledges the mistake, accepts it, and vows to learn from it, without resentment or regrets.  The question is… how the FUCK do you do come back from something like that without being the Dalai Lama, or Nelson Mandela?

I suppose I could call those guys and ask, but who am I kidding, they’re not going to take my calls. You know who might… a man who’s  made just such a misstep; he’s been to the valley, he’s watched while mediocrity is embraced and his gifts go largely unnoticed.  The anti-Seacrest.

I called my manager in California to ask if she knew how to get a hold of Brian Dunkleman.   As it turns out, she MANAGES HIM AS WELL!  I had no idea! I asked her if he’d be interested in fielding my questions, and she tells me he’ll be more than happy to answer them.  So, the Pathos Twins shall gather for a pow-wow, and tomorrow you shall read about it.  Nelson out.