“I'm
on Medication,” says Illinois-born TV presenter and comedienne Ruby Wax OBE. “Ask me anything, I don't
care!”
I
plan to hold her to that.
It's
Thursday, 17th January and we're nestled in the history
section of Waterstones on Deansgate. Ms Wax is introducing
her new book, How to be Human: The Manual. She's written the guide
with assistance from a neuroscientist and a monk (the latter of whom
'matches her sofa'), each offering their respective scientific and
spiritual input. During the talk, Ms Wax tells us not only of how the
book was put together- how her time with the monk led him to be
picked as the face of the Lufthansa airline (and taught mindfulness
on the planes), among other things- but describes her own challenges
with mental health.
“We
all have a higher brain and a reptile brain,” she explains. “You're
smart, but you still want to screw the plumber. We're built to be in
small tribes of 50-150 max. Whichever direction we walked in, that
made us out to be bigots.” Ms Wax describes the differences in
pigmentation, and from that we've developed to the stage of creating
reality TV shows, in which we worship people with no talent.
I've
written a lot on PIASOM about instincts, something Ms Wax details
better than I could: your thoughts are computed 200milliseconds after
your feelings. That's why you should trust your gut.
“Imagine
your thoughts are manufactured by a queen bee in your brain. She has
all these worker bees around her. Let's say the queen wants a cup of
coffee. Some bees start to make an image of coffee, nasal bees make
the smell, others do other jobs, but they all put together her desire
for coffee.” This explanation, Ms Wax claims, has gone down well in
the scientific community. “Neuroscientists are amazed!” she
sarcastically claims.
The
talk meanders on from one quirky analogy to another, featuring
bizarre research findings (all her straight-A school friends are now
'all crack whores'), to British comedian Ken Dodd (who 'scared her
out of her brain'), to compassion ('watch your thoughts, but don't
get out the whip.') She advises us to fix ourselves before helping
others, to stop us 'carrying a stick of dynamite.'
She
touches on medication, but doesn't give away too much.
“My
drug of choice is revenge,” Ms Wax claims. “You take my parking
space, I'll rip your throat out.”
She
describes her experience on BBC
Genealogy
show Who Do You Think You Are?,
giving us a great impersonation of her Austrian mum, who 'used to do
wild Indian impressions in front of Americans' and telling us of her
'insane' great aunts. All of this spurts out of her energetically,
like a burst water main, before the Waterstones compare steps in to
move us on to question time.
First
she swiftly moves on from a question about the film Romance on the Orient Express,
in which she featured. (“Could we not discuss that? It was
pretty shit.”) Before long though, she's telling of her favourite
place ('in a kayak'), of receiving her Damehood in The Priory, of support group system Frazzled Cafe
running meetings in M&S, and of her favourite interviewee,
Philipino First Lady Imelda Marcos.
Ms Wax describes her as 'the hardest to crack' and a 'star fucker'
who 'sang love songs in her wedding dress.'
A
young guy a few rows back from me asks, “Hi Ruby. Do you remember
me?”
“Did
we have sex?”
“I'm
the guy in the Hawaiian shirt. You signed my book saying I was mad.”
There's
a silent pause.
“I'm
not stalking,” he says, perhaps unconvincingly, “so, please
relax.”
“You
look familiar,” Ms Wax replies, also somewhat unconvincingly.
“Sorry if I was rude.”
“How
do you keep your good looks? Is it the gym?”
“I
think it's your eyesight.”
Another
audience member asks, “Is curiosity innate?”
“Teachers
can train kids to be curious,” Ms Wax suggests. “I practice
paying attention. I'll focus. Everybody's interesting, but you have
to practice."
After
this we queue for the signing. Unfortunately I give my camera to the
guy behind me instead of to the Waterstones rep, and the guy puts his
finger in front of the lens when he takes the picture. Lesson
learned: always let the assistant take the picture. They've taken
hundreds. Here's the doctored image:
While
she's signing, I ask her the immortal baboon vs badger question. Who
would win in a fight?
“I
would say a baboon,” Ruby says.
Well,
she did say we could ask her anything.
