Read Online Celebrity Detox: (the fame game) by Rosie O'Donnell - Free Book Online

doesn’t take away from the bottom line. There are too many things in the world that are just immutable to money. You can throw all the money you have at these things and they don’t flinch. Money doesn’t touch depression. It doesn’t alter shame. It doesn’t trump death. There’s a researcher who did a study on how money affects people’s happiness. He spent years studying this subject. What he found is that up to a certain point, money influences quality of life. Rank poverty lends itself to problems in health and education. But on the other end of the spectrum, he found that very wealthy people have actually
more
mental illness than people who are middle or working class. My question: why? Does the money make them mad, or are they so mad to begin with that they operate under the misguided notion that money can solve the problem of their own mortality. In my case, the answer is both.

    My face was on AOL, next to a survey, while the world was warming and the war was going on. Kelli got her hair cut, and I saw her eyes in a new way. I went from being a slacker artist who spent all day painting in shades of yellow, to a prodigal celebrity who had to be up at six and out the door by seven. In the flick of a switch, yes. People began calling, writing. Some I knew. Some I didn’t. Some were in trouble; some I had already helped in the past, and those it seemed to me I’d already saved; in my mind I’d done enough and what happens is people still want more; it can feel boundary-less, and you say to yourself, “Wait. Wait a minute.” But I don’t feel angry in the face of people’s needs, or even demands. It just confirms for me that everyone has the same misguided fantasy that out there there is some person, or green bill, that’s going to change everything and set it all straight.
    But to be that person, to be seen as any sort of savior, that can take its toll. I went to the US Open with Kelli and the kids before
The View
. I did my own hair and we had a great day. For almost two hours Chelsea talked to the woman who had had her legs amputated and looked through the book of women athletes and totally loved the whole experience. We ate pretzels and had hot dogs; I had Blake on my lap and Parker next to me. And Kelli was sitting behind us with Billie Jean King and the whole family had a great time. Then we went back to the finals two weeks later and my show had been on for four or five days, and it was horrible. I was now one of the observed. They put me on the monitor with Jim Carrey who was there with Jenny McCarthy and all the other celebrities that you could watch; everyone looked to watch where the celebrities were, and I realized I had become one of the people that got looked at, and when that happens, you cannot observe accurately because you are the observed. And it’s a trap.
    Noise. And you know, I was sitting up there and worrying what clothes I was wearing and if I looked okay and watching people look at me and nod and then ask for my picture and the autograph. And the ones with frowns on their faces that I knew didn’t like who they thought I represented or who they thought I was—to them I was the enemy. Terrorist even. Traitor. And then other women, came right over, saying, “Hey, how’s it going, Ro?” as if I had gone to their high school, and I responded in kind because that’s who I am.
    After the matches we went to dinner at an Italian restaurant in Queens. A woman followed me into the bathroom. She could see my feet in the stall and I could see hers as she stood by the sink. “Rosie!” she said. “My name is Phyllis, I’m gonna wait! Take your time, honey! But I’m out here waiting! When you’re done, I’m gonna give you such a hug! I’m gonna give you a squeeze!”
    And what I was thinking was how was I going to poop in this situation. My whole life was ruined because there was not a private bathroom in my dressing room at
The View
, so now I could not go poop until I got home. I