The problem with young poets
Is that they’re much too earnest.
They emote so gushily, you gag,
But with age, they learnest.
Note: If I could, I’d record these short poems and put the audio up here, because they have a sort of timing that is a challenge to convey. Then again…if I was trying to write good poetry, I’d try harder to meet that challenge, I suppose.
There’s been a lot of back on forth lately (mostly forth) about some really outrageous things in the news. You may have been tempted by the delicious aroma of moral superiority. You may have even taken a bite. I’m sure it tasted oh-so-good, but I have a question for you.
Do you even know where your outrage was manufactured?
Most people assume that because they are personally having the outrage, it’s locally sourced. But how do you know your outrage is wholesome organic outrage, not some pre-packaged, processed frankenfit? For all you know, Big Aggro is importing your outrage from an overseas factory server farm! They aren’t even required to label it!
Manufactured outrage is full of toxins that slowly poison you from the inside out. These toxins may make your outrage look better, or feel better, but they’ve been proven to cause tight sphincters, jerking knees, and hurting butts. Did you know that compounded outrage is addictive, just like heroin? It’s no mistake that they call it website “hits.”
The healthiest course of action is probably to avoid outrage altogether. It’s not necessary to anyone’s well-being, and the risks of it being a processed, additive-laden nightmare are high. If you just can’t go without a little outrage in your life, though, here’s an alternative to supporting Big Aggro:
Be outraged about things within a 25 mile radius of yourself.
Support local outrage, and know that your outrage is genuine, organic outrage grown right in your backyard.
I spent a lot of time yesterday cleaning up dog vomit. The dog has bad ears and they get infected without my noticing because I am a terrible dog owner. Since she is twelve, and blind, she doesn’t do much normally—so “lethargy” and “inactivity” are sort of her natural states. Hard to notice when her activity level goes from .5 to .2. Antibiotics to cure the disgusting ears have all kinds of other disgusting side effects. Poor doggy. Anyway… I don’t often think, “I have a college degree and 15 years of experience, and I am doing THIS,” but it crossed my mind more than once during Festival de Papertowel and Rugcleaner. Let’s stipulate that I am slightly overqualified to clean up dog vomit. There are, however, a list of things in the world that I am not qualified, nor will ever be qualified to do.
I put this on right after I took the picture because I was slightly chilly and it’s still perfectly functional.
We keep moving this box of unopened organizers because we don’t have anything to put in them.
I don’t even really understand this, and I made it up myself.
Run away! Run away!
[i] Yes. I said “gal.” I’m taking back “gal.” I don’t actually know what’s wrong with “gal,” except maybe it’s a little familiar. In the wrong context, sure, that would be offensive, just like a man can be called “buddy” in an aggressive way. I’m a gal, she’s a gal, wouldn’t you like to be a gal, too?
Burning question of the day: Why wasn’t my house always spotless before I had kids? Seriously, there was, in hindsight, no legitimate reason why it couldn’t have been clean all the time. I guess I was just really lazy. And happy. I was lazy, and happy, and I played video games and worked a lot. Now, when I talk about what I’ve been doing all day, or better yet, what I got DONE, I find that I’m … fudging it a little? What I say…doesn’t seem to mean what I used to think it meant.
“I cleaned the floor.”
Used to mean: I picked up every single thing and vacuumed and mopped the entire house.
Now: I picked up most of the things, and kicked the others around the carpet so I could vacuum. Then I squinted my eyes to simulate an older person who doesn’t see well, and paper towel spot-cleaned anything on the laminate that was glowing green or creating texture.
This is where they live, because they are mine and I clean the floor. Put yours away.
“I cooked dinner.”
Used to mean: I spent at least 45 minutes cooking some spicy, complicated creation from scratch, using every pan and spoon I owned.
Now: We are eating anything besides take and bake pizza.
So, 45 minutes to make the meal, and an hour to wash every dish in the kitchen? *does math, frowns*
“I did laundry.”
Used to mean: I spent all day Sunday washing and drying all the things, so that I could spend my time watching X-Files, folding the laundry, and putting it away during commercial breaks. Voila! All the clothes clean for Monday morning.
Now: I washed and dried some clothes, many of which are small and annoying to fold. They are sitting on the bed RIGHT NOW. If I can sneak off after dinner, I will fold a few of them, then the rest will get smashed into the giant pile of wrinkles in our bedroom. Sorry, dear.
“I cleaned the bathroom.”
Used to mean: The bathroom was ready for a picnic. You could eat off any surface you desired. Everything was sanitized, shiny, and the end of the toilet paper was folded into a little triangle just to make you feel fancy on the john.
Now: Visible signs of the small people have been hurriedly scrubbed off with a disinfecting wipe, and a flushable brush has been swished around the toilet to remove whatever it will remove. Notice I didn’t mention the tub. That’s what shower curtains are for. If you look, it is your problem—why are you looking in my shower? Weirdo.
Pin This! Effort-free growth chart for the little ones! Smear their hands with a different color of sidewalk chalk for each year.
“I’m ready to go.”
Used to mean: I’m ready to go, except I need one more thing that I forgot. There, now I’m ready.
Now: I might be ready to go in about 15 minutes, after I get the other 17 things the children *need* to be happy, find the other shoe, tie them into the carseats and then run upstairs and “fix” my hair. That is conditional. If anyone needs to use the potty, flips out over a sibling saying the wrong thing, or comes down with a flash virus, all guarantees, implied or otherwise, are forever cancelled.
“I did the dishes.”
Used to mean: Who are we kidding? I never kept up with the damn dishes. It pretty much means the same exact thing now as it always did: We’re expecting company.
I suppose I owe you an explanation of what exactly an “optimistic cynic” is, should one exist beyond hipster irony. I have branded myself this after a great deal of thought. The question about the glass–half-full? half-empty? It seems a little simplistic to me. If it does it for you—“I’m an optimist! Super big YEAH for a half a glass of something!”—then I am a little suspicious of your intelligence. If you are going to get all weepy about the glass being partly empty, well, go suck that egg somewhere else. Sure, it’s half-empty, but I’m pretty sure we can DO something about it if you stop whining for a minute.
Sad glass is sad (and pensive). Perhaps it is thinking about when it was a full glass.
It comes down to this minor point: Optimism and cynicism are in a struggle for my immortal soul. Optimism is a form of humility. The optimist believes that others are probably doing the right things, that the world will work out, because they feel somewhere inside that they are not the pinnacle of creation. Those sunny optimists are always ready to believe that someone outside of themselves could, probably even DOES, have a good answer. The right answer. This is very, very silly, but bless their little hearts anyway.
The cynic is inherently arrogant. She can find a problem with your plan in five seconds flat, has no reluctance to tell you about the problem, and harbors a suspicion that you will pretend to listen, then go off and do your damn fool thing anyway. I worked for a company at one time that tried to “value” this as a necessary part of progress, despite it being very annoying. I did well there. I also worked for a company that nearly fired me for it (that, and my lack of appropriately dangly gender parts).
Here’s a close-up of dangly bits! (No, this is not that blog, you can stop looking.)
That experience led to a year of pretending to be someone I was not, in order to keep my job. It was transformative and awful. I had to keep my know-it-all, how-dumb-are-you, that-is-the-worst-idea-ever mouth shut. FOR A YEAR. I still knew that the folks in charge of the projects were wrong, and I still knew that my idea was smarter, better, more efficient, etc… I just didn’t say anything. I learned to take orders. I found another job and QUIT. The partners were sort of shocked, because they hadn’t seen that the cynic was still there, chafing at every stupid command.
Let’s pretend! I’ll be the Japanese schoolgirl…. (No, this is not THAT blog either! Move on.)
The transformation was this, however: I listened. I had to hear out the idea/opinion/thoughts of the people in charge, and sometimes, it was fine. It was good enough, and it was easier. I didn’t love it, but I learned to trust a few people, and I learned some things from them. In this new and humbler incubator, the repressed optimist stirred, stuck her hand up out of the primordial ooze, and claimed a breath of life. Couldn’t put the silly tart down after that. She keeps popping up. “That’s the dumbest thing ever, but it just might work! Let’s try it!”
Get thee down into my belly, thou evil tart!
Some amount of cynicism is a requirement in the world we live in. You could believe all the stuff in your e-mail. You could have lots of friends in Nigeria that you help with a little cash. If you hadn’t sent that chain letter out to 200 of your Facebook friends, you probably would be bald and impotent! Great job! Coconuts are a miracle! I know, pretty snarky, but in order to avoid the bad actors with bad motives, it’s necessary to evaluate a lot of things with the presumption that the “person” on the other end is all-in for themselves.
That said, it is just as necessary to operate with a degree of optimism. If you don’t have some hope that things are going to turn out alright, how do you get up in the morning? How do you touch a doorknob, knowing that half the people who touched it before you probably just pottied and didn’t wash their hands? You have to grasp that knob like an old friend, and believe that whatever germs and crud are living on there will get along with you just fine. Having children is the Xtreme version of this. I can’t think about all of the things that are going to go wrong there long enough to write about it. I just hope for the best and try not to screw them up too badly.
Yes, I did just compare touching a doorknob to raising a child. Toooooouch meeeee!
Where does this leave me when I face another day of washing approximately six million Disney-branded plastic dishes? I am still going to see all the things that are wrong with your thought/idea/project/baby, and if you catch me at the wrong moment, I will tell you all about it. Most of the time, though, there will be enough sweetness to keep you hopeful that somehow, it will still all be okay.
PS. If you like the term, by all means use it. I have a feeling a lot of us GenXers are in the same boat. The same poorly constructed, taking on water, probably built by one-armed orangutans, just might make it to the other side boat. We need some sort of secret handshake.
YOU SHOULD BE HAPPY 