It’s not that I want you to die
Your ride just can’t live any more
Maybe you’ll learn watching your wheels burn
That you drive like a contemptible whore
You chill when I’ve got places to be
Got places to be when I want to chill
Seem to take glee in inconveniencing me
Who does 15 going down a hill?
Why the left lane when you’re not going fast?
Since you’ve been there no cars have been passed
Not sure how much longer my patience will last
If only I had phasers, you’d be gone in a blast
Please say you’re kidding, that’s not how you merge
Tentative like a nerd on prom night
Wonder what the perks are of owning a smart car
When the driver is clearly not bright
Oh sweet, more roadwork, it’s my lucky day
Next five miles will be a ball
To build a thoroughfare that needs so much care
Defeats the point of building one at all
Don’t tease me bro, quit touching those brakes
There’s nothing in front of you, this light we can make
If you just keep on moving, just what will it take?
Have mercy, do the speed limit and ease this heartache
In the end this is probably my fault
A smart one would leave the Beltway alone
When the traffic report makes the world news sound short
That should be the cue to stay home
That’s about all the rhyming this drained brain can store
In the words of the Raven I ‘quoth’, “Nevermore!”
Just one quick reminder, sure I said it before
If you do one thing in life, don’t drive like a whore.
Sunday, August 29, 2010
Friday, August 6, 2010
Wagoneer
Never seemed to take much to make you genuinely happy as a child. When I was little, for exercise my mom would pull me around the block in a red wagon. Would get unbelievably hype for these occasions, bubbling with anticipation each time like it hadn’t just happened twenty-four hours ago. Grab all my favorite stuffed animals, make sure the straps were straight on my OshKosh B’Goshes. Wave to all the neighbors like I’d just been inaugurated, blow kisses and make faces at everyone who didn’t have access to a Radio Flyer and a mom. That wagon was a one float parade, and my stuffed animals and I were mighty proud to be represented. Didn’t even mind if we ran long and missed the first few minutes of He-Man. If we actually got home early enough for me to get settled with some peanut butter & jelly and M&Ms before He-Man and Inspector Gadget started… well that was a textbook example of a perfect day at the office.
I long for the days when all it took was a ten minute wagon ride to make me happy for a whole afternoon. Adults rarely seem truly “happy”. We just get little pockets of “not miserable” for a few minutes at a time, peppered just frequently enough to keep us from spending our lunch breaks shopping online for anti-depressants and assault rifles.
Running through the Christmas list of contradictory things the average modern adult needs to feel “not miserable”, it’s a wonder we don’t give up altogether and start cooking drugs under a bridge somewhere. A crackhead’s path to happiness is so much more clear and efficient than ours. Wake up from previous night’s beating, fellate a stranger, get money, buy crack, smoke it, feel happy, disregard the fact that you’ve soiled your sweatpants again or are in a room with twenty other people who’ve soiled their sweatpants, ignore the guy in the Detroit Lions hoodie claiming to be the Son of God, get randomly beat up by one of your “colleagues” who thinks you still have rocks on you, fall asleep, rinse and repeat. That’s not a glamorous or sustainable path to happiness but it is straightforward and relatively achievable.
“Normal” people’s checklists for bliss reads like a dossier from Mission:Impossible, maybe an absurd scavenger hunt for fraternity pledges who don’t know any better. The stuff we dream about seems reasonable until we start sounding out some of it out. Flavorful food that is somehow good for you AND the environment, yet costs about the same as the regular food that is slowly killing everybody else. An important job that challenges us without being too stressful or keeping us away from our families. Getting to work with people who know how to get the job done yet are still always enjoyable to be around. A career that offers the possibility of Michael Jackson fame with Tito Jackson privacy. Affordable housing our friends and people who annoy us will covet, that is somehow magically located two blocks from public transportation, a quiet highway that never has traffic jams or needs roadwork, an environmentally friendly yet reasonably priced grocery store, and bully-less public schools with high test scores, a championship athletic program and a kick-ass wind ensemble. A masculine yet non-threatening dog that can play fetch with itself, use the toilet, remember to put the seat down, and knows better than to bark during SportsCenter’s “Sunday Conversation” or the last twenty-five minutes of movies. A car that gets us attention without telling the world how badly we need attention. The body of a Greek statue without having to spend nearly as much effort as everyone else who has the body of a Greek statue. We can somehow beat the odds and get all or most of or some of that stuff, still end up borderline suicidal if we don’t find a fulfilling three-dimensional companion for us to enjoy our hard-sought stuff with.
The things we want in a companion are so ludicrous they almost become endearing, like an old lady who doesn’t realize all that perfume doesn’t cover up the fact that she has a gas problem. Can’t even hate on us for what we’re looking for; it’s clear we must have some kind of disability and hating on the disabled feels mean. We want someone who looks like a movie star but is not a narcissist. Could have any man or woman she or he wants but is entirely devoted to us in a non-clingy way because they can see and appreciate the special-ness of “the real you”, all without being weird or needy about it. Interesting to talk to but has a pitch perfect sense of when to be quiet. A good sense of humor but doesn't try to be "on" all the time. Doesn’t snore, yet doesn’t mind that we snore. A fighter who will let us win. A fearless yet discrete sexual dynamo, ready to explore every deviant desire our depraved minds dare to dream up, who somehow hasn’t done or even wanted to explore any of that depravity with anyone else until we came along, because we’re that dammed special, no matter how often we have a tough day or an “off night”.
Anyone silly enough to try and hold out for such pipe dreams kind of deserves to end up spending their Friday nights in embroidery class, or going home at the end of the week to blog about their mom and red wagons. I used to get on my knees and pray every morning before work, would pray for the realization of my goals and the companion of my dreams. Eventually got tired of overhearing angels scream “B*tch, please!” in the background.
Even when we meet somebody interesting and have chemistry, it seems we too often don’t really know how to process feeling good for a sustained period of time. Brain simply can’t handle it.
“What the hell? Is someone else making us happy? Whoa whoa whoa, We can’t be afford to be that vulnerable. That will give another human being a chance to hurt us, and we don’t play that, under any circumstances. Need 50cc’s of freak-the-f*ck-out, STAT…”
Cue needless neurosis. Were we enjoying ourselves before? That’s nice, let’s change the channel for a bit, see how we like spending every available waking moment obsessing about how things are failing or going to fail, or why the heck this person is into us in the first place. Turns out our self-esteem is as low as our ambitions were high, time to act accordingly kiddies. Our conscience should be telling us to settle down, instead it’s just feeding us one bad idea after another.
“What is that, affection? Beats the heck outta me baby, haven’t seen too much of that around these parts. How to respond, how to respond? ...Um, I don’t know, best I can do for now is to hook you up with some suspicion, arbitrary aloofness, and a few transparent passive-aggressive control games. Maybe we could make a game of seeing exactly how many random and charming manifestations of our insecurity we can dream up before this person’s patience runs out. Yeah, that’ll work. That’ll be awesome. You know your conscience sure is talented baby; you should ask me about this stuff more often because clearly I am a genius.”
Can pack all that crazy and still have the nerve to be shocked and wounded when the other person tells us we aren’t much fun anymore, sit up whining to our friends.
“I don’t know why they left… I’m fun. What does fun have to do with companionship anyway?”
So cute. Never thought I’d envy crackheads.
It can’t all be as complicated as we make it. Need to relax, take everything back to the simplicity of that wagon. No telling what’s around the corner. Might be good, might be not so good. But it’s beautiful today and at least we’re out, out with a chance to experience something, so for now just shut up, wave to the people and enjoy the ride.
I long for the days when all it took was a ten minute wagon ride to make me happy for a whole afternoon. Adults rarely seem truly “happy”. We just get little pockets of “not miserable” for a few minutes at a time, peppered just frequently enough to keep us from spending our lunch breaks shopping online for anti-depressants and assault rifles.
Running through the Christmas list of contradictory things the average modern adult needs to feel “not miserable”, it’s a wonder we don’t give up altogether and start cooking drugs under a bridge somewhere. A crackhead’s path to happiness is so much more clear and efficient than ours. Wake up from previous night’s beating, fellate a stranger, get money, buy crack, smoke it, feel happy, disregard the fact that you’ve soiled your sweatpants again or are in a room with twenty other people who’ve soiled their sweatpants, ignore the guy in the Detroit Lions hoodie claiming to be the Son of God, get randomly beat up by one of your “colleagues” who thinks you still have rocks on you, fall asleep, rinse and repeat. That’s not a glamorous or sustainable path to happiness but it is straightforward and relatively achievable.
“Normal” people’s checklists for bliss reads like a dossier from Mission:Impossible, maybe an absurd scavenger hunt for fraternity pledges who don’t know any better. The stuff we dream about seems reasonable until we start sounding out some of it out. Flavorful food that is somehow good for you AND the environment, yet costs about the same as the regular food that is slowly killing everybody else. An important job that challenges us without being too stressful or keeping us away from our families. Getting to work with people who know how to get the job done yet are still always enjoyable to be around. A career that offers the possibility of Michael Jackson fame with Tito Jackson privacy. Affordable housing our friends and people who annoy us will covet, that is somehow magically located two blocks from public transportation, a quiet highway that never has traffic jams or needs roadwork, an environmentally friendly yet reasonably priced grocery store, and bully-less public schools with high test scores, a championship athletic program and a kick-ass wind ensemble. A masculine yet non-threatening dog that can play fetch with itself, use the toilet, remember to put the seat down, and knows better than to bark during SportsCenter’s “Sunday Conversation” or the last twenty-five minutes of movies. A car that gets us attention without telling the world how badly we need attention. The body of a Greek statue without having to spend nearly as much effort as everyone else who has the body of a Greek statue. We can somehow beat the odds and get all or most of or some of that stuff, still end up borderline suicidal if we don’t find a fulfilling three-dimensional companion for us to enjoy our hard-sought stuff with.
The things we want in a companion are so ludicrous they almost become endearing, like an old lady who doesn’t realize all that perfume doesn’t cover up the fact that she has a gas problem. Can’t even hate on us for what we’re looking for; it’s clear we must have some kind of disability and hating on the disabled feels mean. We want someone who looks like a movie star but is not a narcissist. Could have any man or woman she or he wants but is entirely devoted to us in a non-clingy way because they can see and appreciate the special-ness of “the real you”, all without being weird or needy about it. Interesting to talk to but has a pitch perfect sense of when to be quiet. A good sense of humor but doesn't try to be "on" all the time. Doesn’t snore, yet doesn’t mind that we snore. A fighter who will let us win. A fearless yet discrete sexual dynamo, ready to explore every deviant desire our depraved minds dare to dream up, who somehow hasn’t done or even wanted to explore any of that depravity with anyone else until we came along, because we’re that dammed special, no matter how often we have a tough day or an “off night”.
Anyone silly enough to try and hold out for such pipe dreams kind of deserves to end up spending their Friday nights in embroidery class, or going home at the end of the week to blog about their mom and red wagons. I used to get on my knees and pray every morning before work, would pray for the realization of my goals and the companion of my dreams. Eventually got tired of overhearing angels scream “B*tch, please!” in the background.
Even when we meet somebody interesting and have chemistry, it seems we too often don’t really know how to process feeling good for a sustained period of time. Brain simply can’t handle it.
“What the hell? Is someone else making us happy? Whoa whoa whoa, We can’t be afford to be that vulnerable. That will give another human being a chance to hurt us, and we don’t play that, under any circumstances. Need 50cc’s of freak-the-f*ck-out, STAT…”
Cue needless neurosis. Were we enjoying ourselves before? That’s nice, let’s change the channel for a bit, see how we like spending every available waking moment obsessing about how things are failing or going to fail, or why the heck this person is into us in the first place. Turns out our self-esteem is as low as our ambitions were high, time to act accordingly kiddies. Our conscience should be telling us to settle down, instead it’s just feeding us one bad idea after another.
“What is that, affection? Beats the heck outta me baby, haven’t seen too much of that around these parts. How to respond, how to respond? ...Um, I don’t know, best I can do for now is to hook you up with some suspicion, arbitrary aloofness, and a few transparent passive-aggressive control games. Maybe we could make a game of seeing exactly how many random and charming manifestations of our insecurity we can dream up before this person’s patience runs out. Yeah, that’ll work. That’ll be awesome. You know your conscience sure is talented baby; you should ask me about this stuff more often because clearly I am a genius.”
Can pack all that crazy and still have the nerve to be shocked and wounded when the other person tells us we aren’t much fun anymore, sit up whining to our friends.
“I don’t know why they left… I’m fun. What does fun have to do with companionship anyway?”
So cute. Never thought I’d envy crackheads.
It can’t all be as complicated as we make it. Need to relax, take everything back to the simplicity of that wagon. No telling what’s around the corner. Might be good, might be not so good. But it’s beautiful today and at least we’re out, out with a chance to experience something, so for now just shut up, wave to the people and enjoy the ride.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
