So's I know most of everybody thinks I'm crazy. Hell, I even think I'm crazy. But, like what is craziness to begin with? What is insanity anyway? No, seriously- I'm not trying to wax philosophical or anything fancy. It's just in this day and age when most everybody you know is on one drug or the other- be it pharmaceuticals like Ridalin and shit or the hardercore stuff like heroin- in order to keep their neurotic tendencies at bay how do you like define that shit.
Normally, we'd say that crazy is crazy because sane is normal therefore anything outside of the norm is abnormal, right? But it seems to me the norm is crazy.
We're all insane in one way or another, we've all got our idiosyncrasies, our strange realities. To me it just seems some people are simply better at hiding it all, you know denying it, than others.
I used to be good at hiding my weirdness, I used to be a liar, a thief, a two-faced son of a bitch- basically I used to be a model citizen. I played sports, I played women, fuck I even played the godamm violin! I fought with men, I drank on the weekdays and a bit more on the weekends. I went to my job- my soul sucking pointless excuse for employment- day in and day out. I was on the clock in one way or another twenty-four seven. Superficially speaking I was well-adjusted, handsome, polite, care-free, responsible, and happy. And, inside I was miserable; a wreck, a car crash, an absolute mess.
I'd cry for no apparent reason. I'd wake up in the middle of the night screaming and freezing because my body would be covered in sweat and agony incarnate. Yeah, I used to be normal. I once was your-so-called model citizen.
I once had a girlfriend, a job, a future. A future in America's sense of the word. You know: if I cut enough corners, fucked over enough people, treated my friends like dogs and ate them, became opportunistic and advantageous enough I would have made tons of dough. I would be sitting in meetings, sleeping through them, I would have had a little sexy secretary bitch (pardon my language women; the derogatory was used solely for emphasis) to take notes for me, and I'd give her the time in the copy room until I knocked her up. Which is usually how those affairs end. And once I knocked her up I'd pay her a handsome severance fee so she'd never bother me, hire somebody even cuter, even more ditzy, to fill her position. And I'd keep on "living". I could have had all of that.
An expense account, vacations in foreign countries- so far away that I couldn't even begin to locate them on a map, places you couldn't even pronounce the name of if they were spelled phonetically. That could have been me. Sipping martinis, drinking sex's on the beach while performing the dirty deed, making whoopy on the white sands of some Mexican beach.
Who knows I might've even decided to keep one of those babies made with one of those secretaries, one of those little babies conceived on top of the fax machine. Maybe we would- me and the ditzy, gum chewing secretary- have even started up a family.
Lots of well-dressed itty-bitty, "perfect," kids (imagine two runts cut out of a catalogue that only assholes and grandmother's read). They'd more or less become and be accessories. You know, something my wife would put in a stroller and push whenever she felt her outfit was lacking in dignity or responsibility. You know, something I'd take with me to office parties in order to give my co-workers and potential clients the impression that I was a family man with a good head on my shoulders. But, all other days we'd ignore them completely. Hiring a nanny and sending them off to boarding schools- their tiny little hands clutching brand name luggage, their whole existence shoved inside of a Ralph Lauren, a Tommy Hilfiger, a Burberry suitcase. Or some other two-named dumb ass designer. Yeah, they'd have hair all parted and greased. They'd have all the money to afford all the things they don't need for an eternity. They'd grow up never knowing me. Yet they'd go through life hating me nonetheless. And one day- after years of being estranged- I'd die and leave them the keys to my estate and they'd hang a picture with my face in the doorway and pretend they knew me. They'd tell their friends and their family what a great man, a great father I had been, they'd learn to cherish and appreciate my name. My wife would wear all black on my funeral. Her black mascara running cinematically onto her cosmetically enhanced cheeks, her plastic surgery created superstar nose and cheek bones. She'd continue on like this, crying and pretending she rather be dying than living without me, for a about a week or whatever the socially acceptable grievance period happens to be at that time. Then, afterwards, she'd stop mourning and begin living the life she'd been dreaming of before she met me. Before I knocked her up and ruined her life, before I rendered her future impossible. She'd marry and spend all of my money on and with her new "hubby." Or, she wouldn't marry at all, who knows what her life could be.
Yeah, that could've been me. I could have been a picture-book image of the perfect man. The American dictionary definition of happiness. Or maybe I couldn't have. Maybe I wasn't born with the bullshit gene inside of me. After all, I come from not old money or even new money- I come from no money. Therefore I know it means nothing. I know that happiness is not something you can see. Not something to be witnessed in expensive clothing. I know Giorgio Armani won't make me happy, I know Prada and Gucci won't make me pretty. I know the four-door sedans, the BMW's, the luxury vehicles, the Lexus, the Mercedes Benz, or the Volkswagens- for the more practical family man- will not drive me to my destination. They will not deliver me from evil and rest me gently on the pearly steps of some picturesque heaven. I know success isn't measured in currency. I know you can't buy love with wrinkly, green pieces of nothing showcasing some dead president's face. I know that having a whole house or a mansion littered with- no, covered in- Benjamin Franklin will not make me a better man. But what will, I ask myself, I ask you, I ask anybody listening to please just make it easy and give me a clue.
What will- what will make me happy? What will make me admirable, desirable, a joy to be around, what will make me myself, what will make me succeed, what will?
I ask myself as I stare down at the slick, shiny ground. The wet asphalt- wondering if my demise was all my fault, was it that spilt salt I neglected to toss over my shoulders?- staring down at the ground through eyes that are crying, tasting salt on my lips. What will make me happy?
I ask myself as I decide whether or not to kill myself. To commit myself to something finally- no more broken plans, no more flake-outs, no more ignored promises- I will commit suicide and maybe before I fall and land, crashing into the cement forever, maybe before I die, before I attempt to erase my strife, I'll be able to define life. Maybe then, in the final moments before the final moment- I will be able to say that I too know the true definition of happiness.
Or, possibly, I will just regret jumping and leave a nasty mess for some minimum-wage paid worker to clean in the morning. Maybe and well, most likely, it will take three whole weeks before anybody even notices that I've gone missing- such is my life: boring and lonely. But don't you worry, dear reader, if I do succeed I will most certainly teach you how to do it. I can teach you how to do it. Trust me.
Normally, we'd say that crazy is crazy because sane is normal therefore anything outside of the norm is abnormal, right? But it seems to me the norm is crazy.
We're all insane in one way or another, we've all got our idiosyncrasies, our strange realities. To me it just seems some people are simply better at hiding it all, you know denying it, than others.
I used to be good at hiding my weirdness, I used to be a liar, a thief, a two-faced son of a bitch- basically I used to be a model citizen. I played sports, I played women, fuck I even played the godamm violin! I fought with men, I drank on the weekdays and a bit more on the weekends. I went to my job- my soul sucking pointless excuse for employment- day in and day out. I was on the clock in one way or another twenty-four seven. Superficially speaking I was well-adjusted, handsome, polite, care-free, responsible, and happy. And, inside I was miserable; a wreck, a car crash, an absolute mess.
I'd cry for no apparent reason. I'd wake up in the middle of the night screaming and freezing because my body would be covered in sweat and agony incarnate. Yeah, I used to be normal. I once was your-so-called model citizen.
I once had a girlfriend, a job, a future. A future in America's sense of the word. You know: if I cut enough corners, fucked over enough people, treated my friends like dogs and ate them, became opportunistic and advantageous enough I would have made tons of dough. I would be sitting in meetings, sleeping through them, I would have had a little sexy secretary bitch (pardon my language women; the derogatory was used solely for emphasis) to take notes for me, and I'd give her the time in the copy room until I knocked her up. Which is usually how those affairs end. And once I knocked her up I'd pay her a handsome severance fee so she'd never bother me, hire somebody even cuter, even more ditzy, to fill her position. And I'd keep on "living". I could have had all of that.
An expense account, vacations in foreign countries- so far away that I couldn't even begin to locate them on a map, places you couldn't even pronounce the name of if they were spelled phonetically. That could have been me. Sipping martinis, drinking sex's on the beach while performing the dirty deed, making whoopy on the white sands of some Mexican beach.
Who knows I might've even decided to keep one of those babies made with one of those secretaries, one of those little babies conceived on top of the fax machine. Maybe we would- me and the ditzy, gum chewing secretary- have even started up a family.
Lots of well-dressed itty-bitty, "perfect," kids (imagine two runts cut out of a catalogue that only assholes and grandmother's read). They'd more or less become and be accessories. You know, something my wife would put in a stroller and push whenever she felt her outfit was lacking in dignity or responsibility. You know, something I'd take with me to office parties in order to give my co-workers and potential clients the impression that I was a family man with a good head on my shoulders. But, all other days we'd ignore them completely. Hiring a nanny and sending them off to boarding schools- their tiny little hands clutching brand name luggage, their whole existence shoved inside of a Ralph Lauren, a Tommy Hilfiger, a Burberry suitcase. Or some other two-named dumb ass designer. Yeah, they'd have hair all parted and greased. They'd have all the money to afford all the things they don't need for an eternity. They'd grow up never knowing me. Yet they'd go through life hating me nonetheless. And one day- after years of being estranged- I'd die and leave them the keys to my estate and they'd hang a picture with my face in the doorway and pretend they knew me. They'd tell their friends and their family what a great man, a great father I had been, they'd learn to cherish and appreciate my name. My wife would wear all black on my funeral. Her black mascara running cinematically onto her cosmetically enhanced cheeks, her plastic surgery created superstar nose and cheek bones. She'd continue on like this, crying and pretending she rather be dying than living without me, for a about a week or whatever the socially acceptable grievance period happens to be at that time. Then, afterwards, she'd stop mourning and begin living the life she'd been dreaming of before she met me. Before I knocked her up and ruined her life, before I rendered her future impossible. She'd marry and spend all of my money on and with her new "hubby." Or, she wouldn't marry at all, who knows what her life could be.
Yeah, that could've been me. I could have been a picture-book image of the perfect man. The American dictionary definition of happiness. Or maybe I couldn't have. Maybe I wasn't born with the bullshit gene inside of me. After all, I come from not old money or even new money- I come from no money. Therefore I know it means nothing. I know that happiness is not something you can see. Not something to be witnessed in expensive clothing. I know Giorgio Armani won't make me happy, I know Prada and Gucci won't make me pretty. I know the four-door sedans, the BMW's, the luxury vehicles, the Lexus, the Mercedes Benz, or the Volkswagens- for the more practical family man- will not drive me to my destination. They will not deliver me from evil and rest me gently on the pearly steps of some picturesque heaven. I know success isn't measured in currency. I know you can't buy love with wrinkly, green pieces of nothing showcasing some dead president's face. I know that having a whole house or a mansion littered with- no, covered in- Benjamin Franklin will not make me a better man. But what will, I ask myself, I ask you, I ask anybody listening to please just make it easy and give me a clue.
What will- what will make me happy? What will make me admirable, desirable, a joy to be around, what will make me myself, what will make me succeed, what will?
I ask myself as I stare down at the slick, shiny ground. The wet asphalt- wondering if my demise was all my fault, was it that spilt salt I neglected to toss over my shoulders?- staring down at the ground through eyes that are crying, tasting salt on my lips. What will make me happy?
I ask myself as I decide whether or not to kill myself. To commit myself to something finally- no more broken plans, no more flake-outs, no more ignored promises- I will commit suicide and maybe before I fall and land, crashing into the cement forever, maybe before I die, before I attempt to erase my strife, I'll be able to define life. Maybe then, in the final moments before the final moment- I will be able to say that I too know the true definition of happiness.
Or, possibly, I will just regret jumping and leave a nasty mess for some minimum-wage paid worker to clean in the morning. Maybe and well, most likely, it will take three whole weeks before anybody even notices that I've gone missing- such is my life: boring and lonely. But don't you worry, dear reader, if I do succeed I will most certainly teach you how to do it. I can teach you how to do it. Trust me.
No comments:
Post a Comment