The woman who wrote about her 30th birthday party, who couldn’t leave the house and didn’t want to “forc[e] other people to as well,” is the same woman who wrote a collection of essays that were recently published in “Delusions: Of Grandeur, of Romance, of Progress” (St. Martin’s Press) that is so deeply personal, she can only be commended as a hero for her courage.
Cazzie David, a self-claimed “nepo baby,” — yes, she’s the daughter of Larry David and Laurie David — has written in this assemblage of essays what, I think, every girl or woman has thought: Aging is a “death march”; “I’m a burden on … everyone I’ve ever known.” She’s written texts to a guy in the Notes app — so as not to send them — in her darkest moments at least once. And she confessed to all of that in a permanent manuscript. I think she deserves credit, or at the very least, were this part of the Alcoholics Anonymous recovery program, which can’t be possible because she doesn’t like to drink, she passed step one: Honesty. It’s clear that David didn’t write this book because she thinks she has the most important voice in the world, but maybe so that someone can say, “Well, same.”
I won’t pretend to know exactly why David decided to publish her innermost thoughts, but I’ve always loved to read, because I think the act is an exercise in empathy. I think to read is to become more compassionate. And there were several elements of “Delusions” that I felt tug at my heart, made me laugh out loud at the absurdity of what we’ve both experienced, and induced an anxious pit in my stomach because, as much as I love to push some of these thoughts down, they’re there, and I can say on some authority that they’re in the minds of a lot of women in their 20s.
David focuses a lot on age — the premise of these essays are that they’re about the lead-up between her 29th and 30th birthdays. There is some discussion of her worry about accomplishments; on the day of her 30th birthday, she said that what her “youthful ego hoped to achieve by now would have probably required [her] becoming a modern-day Joan of Arc.” But there is a much stronger focus on how to find a partner. She describes the importance of this in this way: “I once saw a chart online that mapped out the people you spend the most time with at different stages in your life … from 22 onward, it was a slow incline of time spent with your partner, until finally it’s just the two of you, and everyone else is dead.” She said that “choosing a partner is the equivalent of choosing the person who you will eventually enter a mutual solitary confinement with.”
I’m 25 years old, and, man, do I worry about age, so imagine my dread when I read that. She even went on to say that the choice affects the fate of your future children, their future children, and on and on and on “in perpetuity, until the apocalypse.” But what really struck me in this chapter, called “Romantic Advice to Ruin Your Life By, or the Code,” is that David touches on how the noise around romantic relationships, or how to find the right partner, makes the whole idea seem impossible.
That’s what was so curious about these essays. I figured I’d add this to a list of books, podcasts, Instagram reels, etc., that attempt to let me in on the secret on how to find, secure, and marry the right guy. This wasn’t that, and that’s why I liked the read. “This advice will fly at you from all angles. From random taxi drivers. Your mom’s friend that you haven’t seen in eight years. The person who cuts your hair (especially them). Really anyone who is or has ever been in a relationship,” she wrote.
David goes through all the advice she’s received, often against her will, which often contradicts what she was told prior — “Opposites attract. You have to have things in common. There’s no rush. And also don’t wait too long! Relationships take work versus It shouldn’t feel like work.” All the advice, as she and I came to realize, operates on the inaccurate assumption that one size fits all, that all partners act the same, and have the same brains. I like what my dad tells me after I cry (very rarely, I think) about a lack of a boyfriend: “Men and women are one of life’s greatest mysteries no one’s solved yet.”
David, who vacations on the Island much like I did before I took a full-time job at The Times, discussed the summer between those two pivotal birthdays in terms of a guy who she said she liked for about a decade and also summered or lived on the Island. She brought a red minidress to wear in front of him (never happened), she took mirror selfies to post on social media so he could see, and she rationalized his every text or move. I mean, who hasn’t? But also who’s admitted in print that the red minidress was packed for summer for his specific opinion?
The book doesn’t hand out unsolicited advice. It just is relatable, and sometimes, that’s really nice, so you don’t feel like you’re a crazy person.
Cazzie David will be speaking at Islanders Write on July 16 at 3 pm on a panel called “Comic Approaches to Serious Subjects.” “Delusions” is available at Edgartown Books and Bunch of Grapes.
Hayley Duffy is a news editor and reporter at The Times. She’s in her 20s, and is single.