Naked in Dangerous Places - Cash Peters [130]
“You will be kind about me, won't you?” he jumped in, anxiously.
About you? Kind?
Er … honest answer? I'm very upset right now. You've just ripped my newborn's head off and you're playing volleyball with it. So … probably not.
“Of course I'll be kind,” I told him.3 “I'm always kind, you know that.”
“Yeah,” he said, not entirely believing me. Then, in a sardonic tone of voice sharp enough to slit my throat from ear to ear, he issued one last, and very conclusive, “Bye, Cash.”
And the line went dead.
It was over.
All of it.
There's really no disguising the level of disappointment I felt after I hung up the phone that day. I'd be lying if I told you otherwise. The best I could manage was a minicollapse behind the door, where I stayed for an hour or more, deflated and chagrined (if that's even a word), 'til my ass grew roots. Couldn't think straight, couldn't stand up, couldn't even muster the energy to drag the corpse that was my confidence off the mat and onto a chair. There's a peculiar gray area between grief and relief at times like this, I find. One I've only experienced once before, and that's after my mother died: another catastrophic and badly timed ending to something rather worthwhile, but also a source of major relief, knowing that the months of excruciating pain had finally loosened their grip and she'd been granted release at last. Well, same goes for the show. Along with the abject misery of defeat came that same sense of release, an undeniable rush of thankgoditsoverness that was profound and, quite honestly, uplifting.
“You're going to cry, aren't you?”
“Certainly not,” I told myself defiantly. There'll be no crying, no self-pity. It's only TV; it doesn't matter. (#14, this, maybe!4 Although I was very touched, I confess, by the hundreds of messages that came flooding in from fans once word leaked out.
I just wanted to express how upset I am that your show was canceled and how badly treated it was at the end. It almost seems like a seek & destroy mission.
—Ted.
Well, I see the network finally got what they wanted. I'm SO sorry to hear about the show being canceled. I'm PISSED. I wrote to them to let them know how much they sucked.
—Jacqueline.
I can't say I'm shocked your show was canceled. Every time I find a show that rises above the general crud on cable TV, it's like my brain sends a signal to the executives whose job it is to keep intelligent and original content from being broadcast. I should have known that my loyal patronage would be your show's demise.
—Brian.
You should be proud! The show was unique, creative, and different. You had a strong vision and stayed true to it every step of the way. Please don't diminish what was a great creative outlet for you.
This last one wasn't from a viewer. It's how one of our show runners summed it up later that day.
And I was proud of the series. No doubt about that. If you discount Fat Kid's input, as well as that of The Thumb, Eric, Jay, Tasha, the camera crews we used, and all the planners, editors, producers, and technicians back at the office, then I'd single-handedly made thirty-two travel shows in just over a year, and done it without dying. That's an incredible achievement.
Now, at the very least, I could look the Vice President of Sales (Pacific Rim) in the eye and say, with the humility of a man who'd been beaten by the odds more than once, but survived, “You were wrong, pal. See how wrong you were? Here I am, I'm still alive, I didn't get addicted to coke, and my relationship is still intact.
“Oh, sure, I was hospitalized three times, twisted my knee badly at one point, threw up on-and off-camera, visited Madrid on four separate occasions for no reason at all, got stoned, bitten by giant fleas, stripped naked and whipped, run over with an Infiniti SUV, fell down several hillsides, lost an organ, sustained permanent damage to the hearing in my left ear (from too many takeoffs and landings in one day), and aged ten years in the space of one, but really, isn't that a small price to pay to be where I am today?