1984: I’m born in San Diego on Good Friday, which was also 4/20. Before you think this is some kind of omen, let me assure you that the only thing I smoke is my competition.
1989: I smear poop on the wall in kindergarten; perhaps my first true artistic expression. 1993: My fourth-grade teacher thinks something could be wrong with me. The list includes ADD and Tourette’s syndrome.
1994: My dad takes me to Wal-Mart, where I ask a sales associate if they have “the Ren and Stimpy dolls that flatulate.” This is evidence that I possess both a large vocabulary and a slightly twisted sense of humor.
1997: I fall in love with my first article of vintage clothing: a persimmon-red pair of disco pants. I secretly change into them in the bathroom of the roller rink.
1999: I land my first job, at a Subway. I get OCD on the BLT.
2000: I hate high school, and am sent to a psychiatrist who diagnoses me with depression and ADD. I try the white pills. I try the blue pills. I decide that if this is what it’s going to take to like high school, forget it. I throw the pills away and decide to homeschool.
2001: My parents get divorced. I’m okay with it and take the opportunity to move out and be on my own. I choose an apartment in downtown Sacramento with a bunch of dude musicians. My room is a closet under the stairs, and my rent is $60 a month.
2002: I hitchhike up and down the West Coast, finally landing in the Pacific Northwest. I pursue a life of dumpster diving (do not knock a free bagel until you’ve tried one) and petty thievery. 2002: I sell my first thing online. It’s a stolen book.
2003: I am detained for shoplifting. I quit cold turkey.
2005: I leave my boyfriend in Portland and move to San Francisco, where I am fired from a high-end shoe store.
2006: I get a hernia, which means I need to get a job to get health insurance. I find one checking IDs in the lobby of an art school. I have a lot of time to kill, so I dick around on the Internet and open up an eBay shop called Nasty Gal Vintage.
2014: I am the CEO of a $100-million-plus business with a fifty-thousand-square-foot office in Los Angeles, a distribution and fulfillment center in Kentucky, and three hundred and fifty employees.
(Insert the sound of a record screeching to a halt here.)
Sophia Amoruso, #Girlboss, Portfolio (6 May 2014)