Fame and fortune isn’t always fun and games.
Especially when it’s not really yours…
Katie Crouch had a doppelganger. She even was the same age, had gone to the same college, was also an aspiring author, and no matter where she moved, this Katie Crouch clone seemed to move there as well.
The best part? Her name was Katie Crouch too.
I came across this Tale of Two Katie Crouches while listening to one of my favorite story-telling podcasts, Snap Judgement. If you want to hear the full story, you can listen to it here, but for today’s purposes, let me skip ahead a bit.
Katie #1 thought it was the coolest thing that not only did Katie #2 exist, but they were so alike in so many ways. However, Katie #2 could have cared less though, and just went on living her life as if she was literally the only Katie Crouch in town.
Now, where things take a bit of a turn was when Katie #2 wrote a book that kinda took off. It even made the New York Times’ Bestseller list. The problem, of course, was that since Katie #1 was also trying to make it as an author, everyone she knew just assumed that she was the one who had just made it big.
Congratulations poured in. Friends took selfies with “her” book in bookstores. Everyone was overjoyed and elated for her. Even the media came knocking on the wrong Katie’s door.
Yeah, it was super-awkward.
And she found she couldn’t escape it no matter how hard she tried. She was constantly reminded that Katie #2 had beat her to making their shared name famous, even further reminding her of how from her dreams of being a big name in the book world she was.
Verily, verily, it was damn-near a nightmare…
Somewhere in between overwhelming success and abject failure, toils most aspiring creators of content–and yours truly is no exception. Is this blog the widely-read, much-talked-about source of wit, mirth, and life philosophy I envisioned it to be? Um, let’s just say it’s a “work in progress.”
At the same time, I have the consolation that I’m not just screaming into the void, and the hope remains that if I keep putting in the time and effort that eventually it will pay off in the form a decent-sized readership. (Dare I even dream of making a profit?!?)
Over the past month or so, thanks to some involuntary home renovations, the previously consistent creative output found in these parts has fallen off a bit. And without new content, one can naturally expect to see their traffic dwindle to a trickle.
Therefore, it was a very much a pleasant surprise to see a sharp uptick in visitors to this humble blog:
Could it be? Was I actually on the verge of success, fame, and fortune as humorist/writer/memoirist?!?
Of course, this couldn’t just be a random event, so I felt compelled to investigate the source of all these new readers. So I scrolled down a bit further:
Oh no…
*groans loudly*
Not The Conspiracy Theory Of Everything! I finally get some exposure, and this is the article that these new readers are using to form their impression of the larger body of work to be found here?!?
While not the worst writing that I’ve had the poor judgement to publish, it’s pretty close. In my head, the thoughts were rather coherent, and so when I needed to spit something out in short order so I could enjoy a beach vacation with my family, I thought it would be the perfect article to write.
Well, it turned out that my thoughts weren’t so coherent when I tried to put pen to paper, and eventually I gave up on making a cogent argument, basically just saying “F*ck this sh*t, I’m going on vacation! Peace!”
And now, this is what the world thinks The Point of the Story has to offer.
Well, this is embarrassing.
Even worse, I eventually started wondering “Why this post? And why now?”
It wasn’t long before I regretted trying to answer that question. It turns out a 4-hour YouTube “documentary” came out recently:
Oh, that’s super-fucking-awesome. It is pretty much the anti-thesis to my anti-conspiracy thesis. So pretty much all these new people accidentally discovering my site? People actively looking for conspiracy theories.
Son of a biscuit.
The only word that I can think of to describe this? “Katie Crouch #1, I feel your pain.”
Content created on: 11 April 2021 (Sunday)
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