All That You Leave Behind: A Memoir(29)

A week later I showed up at my new company, filled with optimism. I had earned my place there on my own. I had a clean slate, and I was going to take full advantage of it. I introduced myself at reception and was met with a puzzled look. I asked if the editor of the site, the guy who’d hired me, was there. “Not yet; let’s see who you can talk with.” I had no desk, no boss, and I was pretty sure no one knew why I was there or who I was. Not a great sign.

It got worse a couple of days later, when I was told that my first project would be to produce video for a Web series branded by a car company. Even as a fairly green producer, I knew that this was not good news. I’d traded a gig full of artistic and personal freedom at VICE to now make “branded content”—two words that should make anyone shudder.

I felt trapped and acted accordingly. All of the good advice my dad had given me fell by the wayside in my rush to find a place to stand. Things like “Don’t be the first to speak; listen to the room” no longer applied. I thought I knew better. I thought it was my job to change up the video priorities at the company. Turns out, it wasn’t.

VICE had a “Work hard, play hard” ethos that gleefully went to extremes. That was likely what Yunna was smartly referring to when she said it wasn’t the right environment for me and my drinking. Party as hard as you want—no one will notice or remember your antics because they are all equally blasted. That wasn’t true of my new surroundings, where they definitely noticed.

A couple of months into my new gig, I was in St. Louis on an all-day shoot. After we wrapped I went out with the crew and proceeded to get wine drunk, which led to my slowly but surely blacking out. I woke up the next day with little memory of what had happened the night before. I called Matt, a co-worker, and asked him what our start time was that day. He asked to meet me downstairs. I splashed cold water on my face and headed downstairs.

Matt met me with coffee and asked me to sit down. “Are you okay?” My painted-on smile faltered. “Yeah, a little too much to drink last night, but I’m ready to get back into action and get started shooting today.”

He visibly cringed and said, “Oh, Erin.”

“What?”

“You broke the camera last night. Don’t you remember?”

In that instant it all came rushing back to me. The wine at dinner, the loud car ride home, ordering more wine at the hotel. The camera falling off the table. I had gotten too far out of pocket. No one else had been drunk.

I scrambled out of the lobby in a fit of embarrassment, telling Matt I had to make a phone call. The other producer on the shoot texted me and asked if I could run and get a hard drive, as I had a rental car. I replied, “Yes, of course.” I was on the edge, but I knew if I could just finish a task I would feel better. But where the fuck was the car? I don’t drink and drive as a rule, but I was out of it just enough to not remember where the car had been parked by someone else. I couldn’t ask Matt and look like even more of a mess. I got down on my knees in that godforsaken parking lot and asked the universe for help. But the universe didn’t answer, so I chose the next best thing.

“Hey, Dad.”

“What’s up, Dolly? You sounded blue in your voicemail.”

I cut the bullshit and dove headfirst into the situation.

“I…it just isn’t going well here. I can’t control my drinking on shoots and it got out of hand last night.” I explained the sequence of events, as much as I could remember. I felt panic rising in my chest even as a wave of relief crashed over me. I had put words to the secrets I had been keeping within me.

He listened carefully and then responded: “Listen, I’m really sorry you are going through this. It sucks and I have been there but you need to establish firm boundaries. No drinking on shoots, and honestly you should probably take a break from it altogether. Ask your co-worker where the car is, get the drive, and drink a fuck-ton of water. And then remember you don’t have to live like this.”

I knew he was right, but it wasn’t what I wanted to hear. Who gives up booze at twenty-five? I felt like there had to be another way.

At the end of the day I sat in my hotel room and wrote down a list of promises.

         I will not drink on shoots.



     I will stop crushing on my co-worker and putting him in an uncomfortable position.



     I will listen and watch how they do business here and determine a way to insert myself into their organization.



     I know how to make great videos and I will show them as such.



     I will turn this around.





I returned to New York and headed into work with a new resolve. Each day I flip-flopped between this place of new determination to get the job done well and responsibly, and thinking about what a fuck-up I was. I could not get that moment when I was reminded about the broken camera out of my mind. I would fight to shake it off and boot up version 2.0 of my working self. I showed up early, responded to work emails at all hours of the night, and constantly focused on developing fresh ideas. Slowly, I felt a shift taking place as a result of cutting back on my drinking.

I started working on a film about a topic I knew very little about but which fascinated and horrified me. Having been fed a cultural diet of All the President’s Men, I felt a growing sense of excitement to do work that felt meaningful. Evidence showed that numerous Iraq and Afghanistan vets were coming back from tours with mysterious illnesses, so we traveled across the United States, interviewing soldiers, lawyers, state representatives, and finally a rep from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.