Several weeks ago, my roommate moved out of our tiny but charming apartment, and I was suddenly overcome by what I can only describe as a twee anomie. In retrospect, of course, I understand that my near-obsession with the obnoxiously intimate friendship we shared was merely a convenient distraction from my failure to challenge myself to achieve personal and professional self-actualization—but at the time, I was confused and frightened. Fortunately, I had a few amusingly eccentric self-destructive tricks up my sleeve.

First, I moved in with two women. Though both were charming, sexy, financially stable, and ostentatiously available—and at least one was probably my soulmate—we didn’t sleep together because that would just have been too obvious. I crashed on the couch and stayed up late eating Chinese food while joking with one of the hotties about being “undateable” as the other hottie banged a series of vapid studs. I paid less than my share of rent while I continued to wait for the promotion that my boss was signaling, with decreasing ambiguity, that I was not going to get.

Surprisingly, this arrangement didn’t prove sustainable, so I flew to Paris for a two-night stay in an apartment I’d been invited to use by an acquaintance who obviously didn’t want or expect me to take her up on the offer. I thought she deserved the punishment, though, for being (a) rich and (b) insufficiently sensitive to my self-induced financial woes. Of course, putting two thousand dollars on a credit card for a trip that I mostly ended up sleeping through (via jet lag) just exacerbated those woes, but as I walked along the Seine, I imagined myself as the adorable star of grainy black-and-white independent film footage, and it was all worth it.

At some point I flew to another state to visit my parents, played by my actual parents. The visit went by in a warm montage of me eating all their food and hogging the bathroom.

Finally, I decided to go back to the last time and place where everything had been right and good in my life: college. I took a job as an R.A. in a summer dance program, where I falsely assumed I’d be able to participate in classes with the gifted 15-year-old students despite the fact that I’m a 38-year-old who’s just been told that I need to abandon my dreams of ever being a professional dancer. I also worked as a server on the events staff, a job that I correctly guessed would occasion some amusing incidents involving my possibly-on-the-spectrum inability to follow social cues. My old roomie even showed up for one more platonic cuddle, and the bastard broke my heart yet again.

That was some sort of epiphany, I guess, because I suddenly decided to completely, very publicly get my shit together. Just in case that wasn’t clear from the montage featuring everyone I’d pissed off on my picaresque personal journey, I started dressing like an adult. I also spontaneously abbreviated my name. I don’t act “cute” any more, because I don’t need to prove anything to anyone. I know I’m cute—and so does my mailman.

– Jay Gabler just saw this movie, which is basically the story of his life.