Here is a set of essays by a stand-up comic, structured as letters to her young daughters. It is fun and silly. Here she is on a failed one night stand:
That’s what happens when you spontaneously go home with a fellow struggling stand-up comic or, even worse, an improviser. (Please says say ‘fuck no’ to those ‘yes and’ mother fuckers).
I have for some reason read quite a few books by stand-ups, and I’m always struck by how incredibly rough it sounds: the travel, the horrible venues, the silent audiences. I admire it. I was especially touched by her early twenties, which sound a lot like mine:
Every day in NYC was about spending as little money as possible.
People don’t talk about that too much, preferring to focus on having genius or technique or whatever, but in my experience being able to live on nothing is way more important