this is not a cry for help

2003-02-05 - 10:29 p.m.

a girl bought a book the other day. the title was: 'quarterlife crisis: surviving your twenties.' it was from the self-help section. i wondered if there were any answers in that book for me, even as i thought of george carlin saying, 'tell the clerk, "fuck you, i'm goin' home."' then today i looked at the bad girl postcards from the cameron tuttle books, and i thought that maybe i just need a good road trip, just like in 'the bad girls' guide to the open road,' only without the gratuitous sex with strangers. so i put that book on hold, as well as 'the bad girls' guide to the party life' and 'uncle beazley's abzs.' i added them to the angel dictionary already in my hold stack. i can't quite decide if i really want wings deciphered or not. i rather have the urge to buy the book and never open it. i just want to have it, y'know? just in case the world ends or something.

i'm not depressed, amazingly enough. no more than usual. unless i'm so far depressed that i can't even tell anymore, like when you feel warm after initial frostbite. you feel warm, then your appendages turn black and fall off. i might be depressed like that. but i don't think so. i'm just having a life crisis, regardless of where it falls in the grand length of a lifetime. and it almost all revolves around my career.

i have no ambition of any sort. there is no profession that i can think of that makes me say 'yes! that is what i want to do! that is what i want to be!' because every job that i can think of seems pointless. perhaps it's more of a spiritual crisis i'm having here, something about zen and the art of life maintenance. i just can't think of a reason to be here, living my life. what do i do? nothing. i do nothing. i feel nothing. i have no passion, no calling, no reason for it all. and i'm just really tired of groping around in the dark. all i want is a wee little flashlight, just a thin beam to latch onto, just something to see my way.

not that i'm in a hurry to leave this life. i'm far too lazy to commit suicide anytime soon. and life doesn't suck or anything. i just can't comprehend what the purpose of it all is, and it's bugging the hell out of me. my current job is meaningless. that much is obvious. i sell over-priced crap to dickheads with lots of money. these same ass-monkeys pay for a $0.50 newspaper or a greeting card with a hundred dollar bill. and i goddamn hate counting out $90.50 worth of change. sure, i'm getting a promotion, but i was also written up for not saying 'thank you' to the customers yesterday. never mind the fact that i'm polite as hell to some pretty volatile people, and that i always say, 'have a nice day,' oh no, i have to say 'thank you' at the end of a transaction. the manager who wrote me up said, 'i know it's splitting hairs, but it's important.' there was salad oil on the corner of the write-up paper. this woman had nothing better to do than sit on her fat ass eating salad, watching me like a hawk, and waiting for me to not say 'thank you.' 'i didn't say thank you?' i asked her disbelievingly. 'no, you didn't say it twice.' god forbid. it's such bureaucratic bullshit. these same yuppie dicks who shop there come up with these 'customer service' rules. and secret shoppers, what the fuck is that about? like my job isn't meaningless enough, that someone has to come around and try to catch me slipping up? the managers try to make me feel like nothing. the customers try to make me feel like nothing. fellow employees who try to boss me around (and of course i'm not talking about anyone in particular) try to make me feel like nothing. i mean, my self-esteem ain't so hot to begin with. and then i worked in retail.

so my job is a piece of shit. big, fat, stinking bullshit. so i think, what other job can i get? i used to want to act in movies reeeeal bad, but now i've decided that i just don't want that kind of judgment from the rest of the world. i don't want joan rivers and her offspring judging how fat my ass looks in an evening gown. i don't want people taking my picture unless i give my permission. not like i'd get work anyway, because god forbid the stick-figures go hungry from lack of exposure. besides, even movies are pretty pointless. oh sure, i still adore them because they take me away from the mundanity in my own life, but still, if the whole world died and got reborn, movies would be one of the first things to go. movies, though lovely, are pointless. they only manage to redeem themselves by showing us beauty, but even that's not real. it's distorted, stretched, and almost grotesque.

so i was all, 'i'll be a librarian!' but now that i think about it, i don't think that i'd like to be a librarian. i think that i desire to be a librarian like i desire to be a nun, and that's just to closet myself from the rest of the world, be it in books or religious practices. being a librarian, for me, would be like hiding. but what am i hiding from? don't know.

so i was all 'i'll go live on an artist commune thingy, and make art and live a simple life in a creative community!' still closeting myself from the world, but at least not alone this time. but though making art would make me happy and make my spirit flourish, what good do artists do for the rest of the world, really? yes, yes, there is the beauty and the enlightenment, and i'm not forgoing that. but seriously. why? what's the point?

so then i'm all 'work for non-profit, for habitat for humanity, for peace corps.' but still, it's just...why? we work to unify ourselves, to make us all equal, but to what ends? what would the model for a perfect world be, seriously? it's not sameness, the nazis proved that much. but as long as there is difference, there is fear and resentment. and yes, without the bad how could we recognize the good, but still, what does it mean, what does it mean? why are we here? why am i here? am i meant for something greater than what i am now? but if so, why me and not all the other people working in shitty-ass retail jobs? are we all meant for something greater? how can the world function with everyone having the same goal? we'd all just be clawing and kicking each other to reach that greater point. so what is the greater point? and why are some failing and some succeeding, unless we are all failing, or perhaps we're all succeeding. but which is it?

so many questions, so many, so many...

and i find myself watching 'ghost world' again and again, and everyone i know mentions how cynical enid is, how she's funny but sad, how sad her life will be because she'll have no friends, being so negative. but i don't see her as negative, i just see her as honest, as cutting through the bullshit. she doesn't want what the others want, but what does she want? all she can see is what she doesn't want to be. and i can relate.

when these questions seep into my brain and i can't get rid of them, it's quite depressing, and tiring to boot. as i listened to the dancer in the dark soundtrack tonight, i thought about how i need to see that movie again, and how i need to see all of my life theme movies again, to remind me of things i can't quite remember. i need to watch velvet goldmine to remember what is beautiful, and hedwig and the angry inch to remember purpose, and dancer in the dark to remember to find beauty in all levels of pain and despair, and fear and loathing in las vegas to remember to throw caution to the wind. but first i need to watch the last unicorn, to remember magic, and ways long forgotten, and that there are no happy endings, because nothing ends.

i am optimistic, i am, and i believe in life's rich tapestry and stars at night and singing at the top of your lungs and dancing and magic. most of the time i remember enough to be satisfied. it's only when i think of my life as a whole that i grow fearful and dark. 'nothing is trivial,' the black bird said, and most times i know that. it's just that sometimes i don't.