| |||||||||
"I have found that, to make a contented slave, it is necessary to make a thoughtless one. It is necessary to darken his moral and mental vision, and, as far as possible, to annihilate the power of reason. He must be able to detect no inconsistencies in slavery; he must be made to feel that slavery is right; and he can be brought to that only when he ceases to be a man." -Frederick Douglass Attention LMF souldiers. Today we go to war For our families of tomorrow. With A Toast to Longevity By Citizen Audrey (a.k.a. Gregory Town Candia (03) candiag@lafayette.edu) Five long years ago I was sitting in a high school office space Getting that competitive edge Worrying about the right career moves Caring about my future Being lied to about what to expect And now If I could do it all over again You damn right I'd know what to say To THIS So Mr. Candia where do you see yourself in fifteen years? Well. It's a Tuesday. I'm at my favorite Manhattan restaurant. Eating a chicken caesar salad. Drinking a glass of white zinfandel. Bitching to my best friends about being an overly successful thirty-something without the faintest FUCKING clue as to why I have no one to share my life with. Oh-migod! A friend of mine said it best. The reason Sex and the City is so popular is because it tells the story of an older, but not elder, generation where everyone is so unhappy in their relationships that they've already managed to pull half the stuff depicted on the show or else they really, really want to. Break free. Go live the fantasy sex life. Keep running. One day you really CAN escape the desperation. Really. You CAN. Because right now that's something everyone can relate to. Me personally? Hey I thought the concept was great For a season or two. Then it just got sad and became this aimless trip about four high-priced hoes who can't hold a relationship. I dunno. Somewhere in between the glamour of infidelity, casual sex, alimony payments, and subatomic nuclear families living in the aftermath of this great american free love wasteland started getting a little too comfortable. So everyday in celebration of my freedom I suck hard on a shotgun barrel called hope and pray for the soul of every living abortion born to parents who grew up on Friends and thought that was the way to be. Because six perfectly healthy turds floating for too many years in the toilet bowl of glorified college dorm life proves that not everyone has the right to breed. Excuse me barmaid? Can I get that Tom Collins I asked for? In high school you mess around. In college, it's like four more years of high school. You suck, you fuck, you hook up you have some fun. You never take any serious relationship too seriously. Because you just can't. Then out in the real world you're supposed to bust your ass to make sure you're financially stable before settling down. Meanwhile, you never get too emotionally attached to anyone. Because that'll slow you down. Heaven forbid. Ten years zip past. By thirty you're successfully alone. It's a good thing too, because they're calling us the Easy Mac Generation a generation of children, raised by a generation of children, who have no concept of love, longevity, or the long haul. We seek instant, instant, instant, gratification to such a degree, we're constantly blind to the future. And since you're in such a rush to get there here's the 30-second theatrical trailer you can download off the internet too many months in advance. Your first marriage will be a failure. A test drive. Free from any real commitment, obligation, or accountability. With a national divorce AVERAGE continuing to escalate well over 50%, think of marriage as being a really expensive New Year's party complete with mutual masturbation. Where you invite friends and family. Make some bullshit promises to yourself. Have some cake and champagne. Wait a year or two. Then do it again. Because if your parents couldn't figure it out neither will you Rated R. Includes adult language, nudity, and A LIFETIME OF UNNECESSARY HEARTACHE. On second thought I'm gonna need a Crown Royal on the rocks and make it a double. Thanks. So what's the moral of "Sex and the City" besides hearing Samantha harp on about how many times she's done anal? Um. Yeah The message is simple you'll never have the capacity to love someone else until you drag your ass off the playground of your Extended American ChildHood (EACH and every one of you). That's right. Today it's 18 years under someone else's roof plus 4 or more in college equals two full decades of dodging reality. Then add another 10 working years of believing you have the right to schedule love and life on your own little palm pilot terms because all you've ever known is self-satisfaction. And all this adds up to you still sucking on someone else's tit emotionally, spiritually, financially. So by thirty you're still a parasite. Playing with your thingy. Not a man or a woman. Then one day, when you actually think you're just so independent, you'll have a job that pays too much. In a lifestyle that doesn't satisfy. And for the very first time, you begin to realize that lasting human happiness has something to do with your full-time investment in other people. And your capacity to satisfy them and finding enjoyment in their satisfaction. But then you still can't manage to get it right. And you'll rush at this new and better goal, without taking your first baby steps towards long term progress and without the patience this uphill battle now demands. Because you've always taken the same approach to everything give to me it's mine and now it's only the goal that's changing so fast-forward through your next five seasons of Sex and the City and the middle age reaper starts calling on your cell, chewing up all your minutes you're pressed for time and primed for real disaster. The cycle continues throwing yourself at other lost souls being mutually parasitic convincing yourself it's love -- but it's only give and take -- never give and give -- so every relationship self-destructs. You go off and buy a house. But never build a home. You go have kids. But never raise them. Then you just give up on them. So now there's this spin-off series called Overly Successful Parents Committing Criminal Acts of Child Neglect where you go off to start other franchise families without understanding all the consequences from your first mistakes, I mean children, and the cause of their resentment. And you don't sweat it too much because they don't have the sack to fight the issue. Because they accept your failure, roll over, and tolerate it. Because you've already stunted their emotional growth to where they can't fully articulate what's going on and be truly sickened by your unbelievable irresponsibility. And being the good parent, you'll still want them to be as much of a success as yourself. So you'll give them the best of everything like you or your ex only visiting them for holidays, summers, or other half-assed lengths of time gold-embossed lettering on all the checks you use to pay for school as a model absentee parent and the pressure on them to succeed way too fast, way too young, in a working world circus, where they'll spend the rest of their lives trying to win over all the basic acceptance and approval from everyone else that you were never around to provide. So hey, I've got this new concept show for cable it's called A Quiet Happy Suburban Family With All Their Shit Together. It'll be just like Leave-It-To-Beaver with nothing left out but the beaver. You'll have a father who comes home from work every day to remember what he's fighting for. A working mother who takes a pay cut to spend more time with the family or the father does that. At any rate, ten years ago they began their life together in a one-bedroom apartment with nothing. So everything afterwards represents something THEY built. Together. Now they have two kids that go to school and don't worry about whether anyone will be home at 3. And a loveable German shepherd golden retriever collie named "All American Kick Ass Mutt" that eats all your leftovers and occasionally pees on the carpet. The mother and father fight over the best way to raise the kids. They always worry about paying the mortgage. The father gets laid off in episode 9. And the grandparents appear in the kids' life more than once every eight holidays. Because the tribe chooses NOT to divide itself across the country. In fact, instead of having the grandparents stuffed away in a nursing home, they regularly help take care of the kids and save the family the cost of day care. What a concept! Plus they'll bring some REAL wisdom to impact the youth. And through their trials they learn to rally together. Grow closer. Stronger. MOST TRIUMPHANTLY! Like a normal American family. But I don't think most people will buy it. Too weird. Besides. Who could relate to that? Instead I think I'll have the mom secretly involved in a lesbian affair with the babysitter in episode 8, or have Timmy, the pissed-off alienated youth who listens to too much Rammstein, end up in the emergency room in episode 15 from huffing Clorox while taking ecstasy with his degenerate friends in the basement after school when no one's around. That'll make perfect sense! Yeah! Then we can own every season on DVD! Now I'd like to buy you ALL, a round. Ladies and gentlemen. I wish to propose a toast Go on. Raise your glasses. Don't be shy. Raise 'em high. To the end of going nowhere fast. To the death of everything that doesn't last. To a generation that's real fuckin tired of being lead astray. To a generation that can't find its way home. To a generation quietly desperate for permanence. To that which lasts. My friends. A toast to longevity. Return to the Writings Section |
|||||||||
Copyright 2002 D Thomas Audrey - Email: DThomasAudrey@lycos.com |