Shep Rose - Average Expectations: Lessons in Lowering the Bar

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Copyright 2021 by Shep Rose with Dina Gachman

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First Gallery Books hardcover edition March 2021

Photos in text courtesy of the author.

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Interior design by Jaime Putorti

Jacket design by John Vairo Jr.

Jacket photographs by Chad Griffith

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Rose, Shep, author.

Title: Average expectations : lessons in lowering the bar / Shep Rose; with Dina Gachman.

Description: First Gallery Books hardcover edition. | New York : Gallery Books, 2021.

Identifiers: LCCN 2020044100 (print) | LCCN 2020044101 (ebook) | ISBN 9781982159795 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781982159801 (paperback) | ISBN 9781982159818 (ebook)

Subjects: LCSH: Rose, Shep. | Southern charm (Television program) | Television personalitiesUnited StatesBiography. | Reality television programsUnited States. | Conduct of life. | Southern StatesSocial life and customs.

Classification: LCC PN1992.4.R578 A3 2021 (print) | LCC PN1992.4.R578 (ebook) | DDC 791.4502/8092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020044100

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020044101

ISBN 978-1-9821-5979-5

ISBN 978-1-9821-5981-8 (ebook)

For Josh Adams, Randy Light, and Jane Furtado

It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Shakespeare

Hobbes: So, the secret to good self-esteem is to lower your expectations to the point where theyre already met?

Calvin: Right. We should take pride in our mediocrity.

W riting requires discipline. It means youre sitting alone for long periods of time instead of being out there in the world having fun, with a babe on one side and a beer or two on the other. Or a babe on each side holding a beer for you. Or two babes on each side you get the picture.

So why the hell am I doing this?

I had it made! As I write this, Im entering the seventh season of filming Southern Charm. Ive got a few side investments and companies (or hustles, if you want to make it all sound culturally relevant and cool). I was happy and lazy sitting on the beach in Charleston, living in Shepland, which is a magical place devoid of stress and full of beer and good times. The name came from an older guy who owned a pizza place in my hometown (for which I was a delivery boy), and he made it up in honor of yours truly. In Shepland nothing matters and there are no consequences. Everything just seems to work out, and being blissfully average is the goal. Ive spent my entire life there, lowering the bar, with very few interruptions. Until now.

So why make the choice to suddenly give myself deadlines and responsibility and work?

Being on reality TV means that strangers might know my name, or they might call me an asshole on social media. Thats when you really know youve made it. But it doesnt exactly mean Im sitting atop the television industry as far as prestige goes. Its not like people confuse Shep Rose with Daniel Day-Lewis. On second thought, maybe I am the Daniel Day-Lewis of reality TV? Someone so deep into the character that the character is ME?

Plus, I have had a pretty darn good education for someone who strives for blissful mediocrity. I refuse to rest on my laurels, though, as mildly impressive as they are. In any case, dammit, its high time I put pen to paper before my life stories are swept into the dustbin of time. That would be a tragedy, as youll see when you (hopefully) continue reading this book.

Never in a million years did I envision that I would be on a show like Southern Charm. I never imagined I would work in entertainment at all. You see, in the South, where I was born and bred and still live, youd literally get laughed off the screened-in porch if you said you were going to try to make it in Hollywood. Even hinting at a minuscule interest in theater was met with a skeptical side-eye. It was generally accepted and expected that you grow up to be a banker, a lawyer, a doctor, or a real estate magnate. My family is full of esteemed people who were way above average: a great-aunt who was the first female athlete on the cover of Time magazine, grandfathers and uncles who were decorated soldiers or revered businesspeople, lawyers, and politicians who mingled with world leaders. And then theres me, Shep: reality TV personality and all-around average guy. Although being average isnt so bad, as Ill prove in these pages.

Is there an alternate universe where Im an investment banker? I mean, it wouldnt have been that unlikely, considering how I grew up. If I had become a banker or lawyer, I would have basically been playing a role in a movie. At least on Southern Charm I can just be Shep. In my twenties, I went down that road for a minute, but I had an epiphany on a trip to Hong Kong (more on that later) and realized that I would never be that guy in the suit saddled with responsibility, tied down, and having zero fun. Around that time, one of my dads friends told me that nothing matters before youre thirty, so Ive just stretched that to forty. Maybe Ill push it to fifty. Right now, Im just a guy out there in the world trying to amuse himself. Its not a bad role to play, but it pisses some people off typically the misery loves company sort.

I went to school with varying degrees of success. I was a straight B student. I studied the night before and pretty much skated by, and eventually my parents learned that I had what you could call a behavioral problem. You see, I may have been patient zero for ADD and ADHD; I forgot which one I had/have (which is classic ADD/ADHD). When I was in fourth grade, my family was living in Alexandria, Virginia, because my dad was working for the Reagan administration (again, above average!), and my mom and my teachers agreed that I might need to be examined by some behavioral specialists. My mom took me to a doctor, and they put me in a room with a table and a chair and told me to take a test. Little did I know there was a two-way mirror behind which Im assuming sat Manhattan Projectcaliber scientists, watching and studying little Shep, mouths agape at what they were witnessing.

After the allotted hour, my mom was asked to talk to the lead scientist (aka a child psychologist). Just for some context, this was around 1988, so Ritalin was in its infancy and was being wildly overprescribed. So, the good doctor pulls my mom aside and this is what ensues: