for whatever it’s worth, probably not much, i will be 28 years old in one hour
it is likely that i am dead, and my punishment for . . . whatever . . . is to be trapped for all eternity in my hometown, which is populated by cardboard automatons who hate me
anyway: my hometown is a cultureless black hole where people go grocery shopping at gas station convenience stores and the olive garden parking lot is always full
here is a strange thing i have noticed: every time i park in a lot, there is always someone just sitting in their parked car next to me staring at their phone while eating a hot dog or a sandwich
i’m serious
ok, i am painting a picture . . . or perhaps a picture is being painted for me:
oakland: “this is me doing something that i believe is controversial at burning man”
portland: “this is me smoking pot in my bedroom while watching the x-files on my laptop”
austin: “this is me eating a breakfast taco and wearing a t-shirt for a startup i work for that does something that i don’t really understand”
my friend said to me yesterday, at least a little bit jokingly, that my recent posts make me sound like i “hate everything”
let me be clear, y’all: i do not hate everything
there is so much stuff that it would be impossible to hate everything
it would be exhausting also
BUT
it is true: i do dislike a whole bunch of stuff
how could you not, when the stuff They’re Presenting Us With is damn near universally terrible???
BUT
the thing is: i don’t dislike things themselves, i dislike, uh, the flimsy, stupid, superficial, desperation behind things, no matter what those things are
for instance i can appreciate when things are nice / well made / thoughtful, and so on, but just aren’t for me
as in: “yeah i can understand why people like this. i don’t like it, but i don’t think it’s terrible either”
that’s just personal preference! Good Stuff can be good, but it just don’t gnaw on your brainstem like the Good Stuff you like
most things, by a wide margin, are cheap and lazy and derivative. it is easier to make things like that. you can always tell when you’re dealing with something like that, because almost everything is like that. people vaguely envision an element inside a thing they like and then they want to make something that feels like that too. (or they just want to sell a carbonated beverage or a pack of cigarettes or a t-shirt. . . .)
but here’s the thing: pure creation is not enough. it is NOT ENOUGH to just make something and call it a day. real creation takes a lot of work, is often painful and drives its creator to the point of insanity, and is whipped up by someone who is paralyzingly self-aware and sensitive. i don’t go for this “A for effort” bullshit. just because you made something does not mean it’s worth a damn if it isn’t worth a damn
so as for me creating a list of websites i never want to see again, or a list of red flags i see in online profiles: all of this stuff is the same thing to me. it is cheap and lazy and derivative. there is nothing original or interesting or meaningful (i was hesitant to use this word) about any of it. these things were all someone else’s bad idea that have now spread like a virus and have been perpetuated by people who have rotten taste in everything—people who don’t really even know what they like or why they like it in the first place
my blind hope is that one day people will realize that putting things on your body, or calling yourself a certain thing, or saying certain things about yourself doesn’t actually have anything to do with the stuff you got inside you. it doesn’t say anything about how you would handle yourself if like a hydrogen bomb went off in your neighborhood, or if you had to deliver a baby in a bathtub, or if you had to fight an animal that weighed 600 pounds more than you, or if an alien asked to live in your garage, or if you could adapt to foraging for food and building shelter in a dead empty world once western civilization crumbles into bloody hell.
basically: why are you trying to prove anything to anyone? why are you desperately seeking approval from a seven-billion-strong audience of MORONS? the difference between Being A Real Person and being some slimy paper-thin human-shaped constellation of stupid crap you saw in movies or read in magazines or overheard more interesting people say is . . . well there’s a big difference between the two!
if everything you care about or like or consume is cheap and lazy and derivative . . . then how are you not poisoned into being a PERSON who is cheap and lazy and derivative???? if you eat a big bowl of air then you yourself will become a big bowl of air. you ever talked to a big bowl of air? yeah. i do it every single day of my life. it’s miserable.
i like the juicy stuff. give me the juicy stuff. i like the pulp. give me something to god dang chew on is all i’m asking. in the meantime i don’t mind standing alone and sounding insane as i pathetically lash out against the sins and trespasses of this, our modern age~~~~~~~~
people who “did a stint in central america” tend to be blindly optimistic to the point of being insufferable
people who studied psychology / want to be social workers tend to be unstable, mentally deranged, and absolutely ill-equipped for the job
people who studied philosophy are absolutely the worst people to get stuck on the porch with at parties (“spinoza was nuts!. . . .” “descartes’ dream argument, am i right???. . . .” “thomas pynchon is an unequivocal genius. . . .”) and usually want to be dock workers or truck drivers or some shit because they feel quote unquote enlightened and want to experience the grittiness of REALITY, man
people who enjoy burning man grew up in the midwest
people who wear corsets and (make themselves) look like tim burton characters are always dating some tall creepy bald guy who has a soul patch and wears suspenders
people who smoke a lot of pot are always telling you that the intense self-loathing, crippling paranoia, and dark whispering you hear in your head as a result of taking a single drag from a joint will go away if you just smoke the right strain bro
people who take longer than 10 seconds to explain their tattoos are not people you want anywhere near your family
people who say they “enjoy whiskey” can probably count the number of times they’ve had sex on one hand
people who go to house parties and discuss “the singularity” in earnest are virgins
every year i have to explain to my family that i don’t like my birthday and it’s ok if i’m by myself and i don’t want or need anything from them. is it really so surprising that a ghoulish jerkoff idiot like me wants nothing to do with the day he was thrust against his will into uncle satan’s nightmarish circus sideshow aka existence?????
‘catfish’
here’s the thing about people: it’s not that they don’t like you. it’s that they don’t care about you.
reptiles once ruled the planet . . . and then warm-blooded tool-making upright-walking apes took over, and the reptiles retreated underground. thousands of years later, at the apex of human apathy, they reemerged to exact revenge. using their shapeshifting abilities they disguised themselves as human beings and infiltrated our society. they now run every government and money-making enterprise on earth and will fuck us all into oblivion because they are cold-blooded and incapable of feeling empathy.
(it would be nice to spoon someone / be spooned by someone (so lonely))
