A Different Story
You see, it’s not a different story.
It doesn’t begin in space, its secondary characters don’t start a fire by snapping their fingers. It will not sell the idea of subtlety, it won’t promote promises. The comedy is dry but not funny, in fact it’s not there at all until you feel like you should laugh here. It’s a local gossip, sun and moon, tomatoes and chickens, people and poisons. Generally, the hits and misses at 7 will create trouble at 26, somewhere during or after the career phase, mostly regularly. Children of bigger children will grow up to have crisis. They’ll seek power, break monotony and love until they learn to hate or vice versa. This is a cliché, it causes trouble, Jeanette Winterson says. You are a cliché, so you’ll listen to Taylor Swift and try to fit music where emotions could belong. You recognize some voids from a time before, and you fill them with words and pastas. Or both. Some people will tell you to get your shit together, and you’ll relay that message to others, sometimes with cakes. Everybody has something to say, so evidently nobody has patience to listen, to read, to make love. Well, some do, actually.
It’s not a different story. You either watch something or you sleep. You either manipulate or you pull the same string, gently but gradually. This is ugly, that is ugly, they’re all telling you the same lies and you’re learning new filters. Art is subjective, they say. Then they rank them in competitions. Oscars, Grammys, fucking Instagram. You’ll get rich someday, at least enough. I promise you. And then you’ll write a story about yourself or your dog but you’ll ignore some muffled scream that sounds like I am, I am, I am or something. There’ll be no life montage, but it’ll be better without it. Why did Phoebe write that music called DVD Menu? Fuck me if I know. But I know this, that it gave her something to be for, something to get off the chest. Did it win a Grammy? Would it have made it worth it? It’s something to get off the chest. Or it isn’t. It can just be some music with no significance. It’ll remain insignificant until I listen to it again and give it some significance. Then I’ll live for a while and both of us would be significant for one minute and nine seconds.
Some of my friends meditate, it’s delicious. My favorite influencer meditates. They all meditate, and they’re all happy. No really, they’re all, all of them, are happy. They wake up, meditate, eat breakfast and continue being happy for the rest of the day. Sometimes they’re not happy. It’s terrible when that happens. So I offer them some tea and tell them to be happy. They tell me it’s not easy and I know they’re right, but they’re mostly happy, you know? So it’s okay. It’s not easy because it’s not natural, it’s unnatural. Nobody eats fries with chopsticks. It’s not easy. Use your hands, that is easy. And then wash them before you scratch an open wound on your body because salty hands really hurt.
Look, it’s not a different story. That doesn’t mean there are no heroes. There are. In fact, there are probably too many of them. But they’re all dying without ever making it to the ticker. Some of them aren’t but they will, soon. Don’t worry, they know it. Great people, good virtues. Some of them great kissers even. Some days, they meet each other and make great love and save people. Other days are gloomy, they’re filled with emails and notices and all sorts of troubles from the real germs of the Earth. I hope their marijuana is rotten, and expensive. But they have money and they know where it grows. They don’t get high on marijuana, they’re children of bigger children. They hate love because they’re looking to create a family out of hate. They need total control over love so somebody can finally throw a bone at them or touch their dick for five seconds. It’s a big, broken family. How do you find art in a broken family?
Love, I think. You try to tame it like an idiot. You assert dominance until you realize you have to submit to it. I know it’s awkward, your relationship with love. I know it’s the thing that you have no real education of. It’s not your fault, your parents never knew, their parents never knew. Everyone just fucked their way out of love. Or got really fucked over it. Sons and fathers and daughters and mothers, all in a room trying to finish a meal together while trying to make sense of the arrangement. I love you, ma. I love you, papa. I love you, beta. Familial, Romantic, Aesthetic tryouts with therapists or pillows or ropes bearing the pressure to write its climax, one that feels like holding someone’s moist, puffy palms and telling them it’s okay or it’ll be okay or something like that. Hey, I’ll make a show about it. I’ll write a book about it. I’ll write a poem, some music, some art that this other person will consume and feel significant, probably for one minute and nine seconds.
It’s not a different story, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t count.
