Every Sunday morning I make coffee and open my laptop to postsecret.com. That, or I wake up on whatever couch/bed I slept on and pull it up on my blackberry. I’ve been doing this since my sister introduced me to it sometime in college.
What is Postsecret?
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a postcard. It’s completely fascinating. People from all over the world send in their postcards with secret confessions, humorous observations, etc. etc.
Well, recently, I was fortunate enough to attend a book signing at Book People. It began with Grimes waking me up at, oh, I don’t know, about 7 in the morning on a Saturday, after getting completely smashed at my “Ugly Christmas Sweater Wine Night”, and, according to Gtalk chats (yes, the one I posted recently with Lucas), apparently I stayed up rather late and had a fabulous time.
Back to the story. Grimes came to wake up me. I just patted the bed and told her to climb in, as I had no idea on this Earth why she was waking me up. Probably because we were still under the influence. Or that the day before I had been up almost 24 hours, and had only gotten about 5 hours of sleep the night prior. She quickly reminded me we needed to get down to Book People and get our wristbands.
After a quick bout of “bed monster” I realize what’s going on. Okay, I’ll get up for that.
We somehow manage to pull ourselves together. I pull on my medical boot that I’ve been wearing due to a very fun and unforgettable night downtown (tags: reconnection, meeting a family, etc. etc.) and we’re off. I beg Grimes to drive because I was smart enough to smash my driving foot. I’ll have you know NOTHING is moving on South Lamar at 8 a.m. in the morning, and getting there was a piece of cake. So me and my equally incoherent friend stagger in line and actually get into some great convos with the chicks in front of us. We discuss writers and the depth of “For Sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn” (Google it, it’s really thought provoking). And about an hour or so later, they let us in. We pick up four wristbands and buy three books.
We walk outside and realize Counter Cafe is across the street. (Eff yeah! Texas Monthly’s #2 Burger in Texas!) We jaywalk across the street (well, okay, I hobble across the street). And take two seats at the legendary counter. We order the famous Counter Burgers and shoot the shit with the waitress (she was awesome). We then look down and laugh that we’re ordering burgers at 9 in the morning.
Yeah, I think we’re still drunk.
We eat our famous burgers and drive back to my place. I pull up said Gtalk convo with Lucas and proceed to bend over laughing in tears.
Sometime in the afternoon we got down to Book People. We find our other two companions and give them their wristbands. We sit around for like an hour in our second row seats and then wait in line to enter the room where Frank Warren, the founder of Postsecret, is perched to sign books.
Grimes says that she never knows how to act around celebs. I tell her to just think of him as an artist. We are at a book signing after all.
I feel like I’m graduating from Texas A&M again as several people are walking down the line and verifying our names again. I get to the front of the line. The Book People chick reads my Post-It.
Book People Chick: “Mary?”
Mer: “Yup, that’s me”
D: “Did she ask if you’re married?”
Mary: “Haha, no, but I AM working on it”
Clearly this is heard by the entire room, which is as quiet as a pin. Sideshow Bob is done with his book and has walked out, giving Grimes, Dee, and I the entire floor. After the room cracks up, we start the picture taking. I stop everything to shake his hand and thank him for all the help he provides for others and just how comforting the entire project is to everyday people and those in pain. I think he liked that. Grimes and D are standing there surprised.
It was a great experience and Sideshow Bob still thinks that I asked him if he was married. Geez, guy. If you had waited for your friends you would have known!
A little later we all got to sit around and listen to him speak. He began to explain how this brain child began, and how his mother completely disapproved. He explained how it was just a local art project that, thanks to the magic of the internet, he began to receive secrets from farther and farther across the country and then eventually around the world. The phenomenon, I interpreted, was much bigger than he expected (or so I assume, he didn’t exactly say that).
My favorite line of the whole discussion was when he said something his wife told him. “Thanks a lot Frank, now we can’t EVER move!” (all the postcards go to his house).
He also confessed how he himself had lost some people in his life to suicide, and battled with it himself for awhile. If you haven’t visited Postsecret, there are very commonly links to suicide prevention websites, phone calls, and every so often they have related fundraisers.
The room then opened into an informal Q&A where we learned how every weekend, Frank sits around his dining room table and picks out arrangements for the 20 or 30 some cards posted every Sunday. He told us he tries to find connections between all the cards, and now that will always enter my mind every Sunday.
I won’t go on much longer, I’ll just recommend that you at least check out postsecret.com sometime. It’s not for everyone. In my experience, people fall in love with it or they don’t get it. Give it a shot. Pick up the books at the bookstore. Some people hide their own secrets in there…
He asked me if I’d ever sent in a secret.
I told him I’d thought about it.
But I just don’t have any secrets I can’t confide in my friends…
