The teenage queen, the loaded gun;
The drop dead dream, the Chosen One
A southern drawl, a world unseen;
A city wall and a trampoline.
—The Killers, Read my mind
They’re not your memories.
—Noel Black, “Prophecies for the past”
So, you just turned twenty one, and have no idea where you’re headed to. Decided too fast what you wanted to do with your life and now you’re stuck. Everything used to seem so easy. At my age, Mom was just about getting married and two years later I would be on my way home. What the fuck is going on?
I remember studying being a lot more fun. Now it takes me forever to find pleasure in my reading and in the process of writing. It takes me forever to apply my knowledge and understand that, in some way, it helps me achieve something, even though I don’t understand what it is. It’s like everything became a competition and you weren’t asked if you wanted to participate or not. All I can remember is that my name was called and now they are waiting for my answer. Next you start feeling sorry for yourself.
My living days are counted by untouched pizza crusts left in the plate, by all the times I’ve stayed hungry to have more money to get more weed. My breaths are limited, just like the internet provided by AT&T. “Come on baby, let’s skip another Artic Monkeys’ song, let’s get to work”, he’ll say to you, but you won’t listen. You should, because it's Sunday and it’s getting dark and you have so much shit to do for tomorrow. You said to your best friend you wouldn’t miss yoga class, but fuck him, you’re so tired.
“You should write more”, he says. Why don’t I write more? I don’t know. I guess that lately it hasn’t helped in any way. I’m thinking of getting a new tattoo on my hand wrist: S.E.F.L. It stands for someone else feels lonely, but it could also be a very bad metaphor. A metaphor of my misspelled self.
Yesterday, Alejandro tried to fix my garden, and honestly, I don’t know if it helped. But surely he felt a lot better afterwards. I’m considering leaving this work incomplete and leave right now to watch a movie: one of my many dealers collaborated with the script.
Come on, reader, help, tell me! What the fuck are we doing?!!! TELL ME! WHAT ARE WE DOING? WHAT ARE YOU DOING? Does it make you a better person? Am I that bad of a person? I’m crazy, aren’t I? Yeah, go ahead, be silent. Anyway, who really says what he or she is really thinking? It would be lies anyways. At least know I would never agree with someone about his or her craziness.
Don’t remember my age, but do remember one of my family vacations where we went to Alaska. And I remember that everything was so pretty; the mountains, the snow, the animals, even car accidents seemed to be hopeful and calm. The cold could be intense, but not as intense as my parents’ gaze. Why would someone fight when there's so much beauty around? I never understood. But what is there to understand? People are blind, and it doesn’t matter how much you read or how much you write, or how fucking much you earn, you aren’t getting a better sense of life. You just can’t.
I would love to have enough money to keep buying groceries at Econo, but the truth is that Walmart is cheaper. And for me, and to you, now in the twenty-first century, what matters is how much money we are going to have left to spend on the drugs of our choice. On my Wish, Amazon, Ebay, Itunes or any other mobile applications I own. Screw you! Don’t say you don’t do drugs. What do you think coffee is, or acetaminophen is, or books? What do you think our constant attempts to forge a different reality are? What do you think movies are? A safe way to invest your money? You’re only exposing yourself to the other’s ideology, just as me. Just as you’re doing right now. You should stop.
I don't think I understood “Mr. Brightside” the first time I heard it. What makes himpart of the bright side? I’m thinking that there’s no such thing as bright side, only a carefully produced illusion, in a very secret studio down in California. Nobody can be so happy. Only pretend to be.
So about those pizza crust, they weren’t mine, I always ate mines. They were yours, and I spent my childhood counting the other kids pizza crusts, all those that I could’ve eaten and couldn’t. You see they weren’t mine. And you don’t touch things that aren’t yours, less are willing to eat them.
Once, I remember waking up early with the intention of bathing myself in the blood of recently born puppies. Yet, later on I understood that you just don’t do that, that that’s a terrible way to celebrate life. You celebrate life clean and dressed in white. No blood stains. Remember that, no blood stains on your way to heaven.
I remember always following instructions and being applauded for it. Now I lie.
I used to dream of my future. Now I wake up on a Sunday morning—still drunk—on my best friend’s bed. I go home, find myself with so much work to do and decide to go to Denny’s for breakfast. Then, I spend an hour listening to how my friends fingers smell as if he had masturbated his pancakes puppies. I know, what the hell? Anyway, I decided to try, at least to try to get things done. Because that’s what we do, we at least try or get someone else to try do it.
I like how we say we do people, we fuck and then believe we do. We do others. I did him, did he do me? Are we done yet? Are we close, getting there? Half way? Faraway doing us, together? Huh… I feel so alone. I think it’s better if I keep masturbating every 3 to 4 hours, at least it will keep me from missing. Maybe not. Maybe it makes it worse. What do you think?
Look, I know, this must be pretty fucked up. I don’t remember your face, but I know for a fact that I’ve smelled your perfume before, I have seen your size, I... I know you. I… You surely recognize me. I’m… I’m so... Sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m... I’m just… lost. I’m sure we know each other. Yes! We do! Right! We do? Please say we do… Look I’m just wondering, can we go home?
No, we can’t. Just as I can’t stop myself from hallucinating. There’s no way to save ourselves from bad people. The Avengers don’t really exist. Neither do you. I’m just making you up as I go along. My bad, life had to be so rough on you. I just want her to be less rough on me. But it’s not rough, a rough life is just a normal life. Maybe I can’t handle normal.
Who can? Who can stop people from being people? Who can stop men from being men or women from being women? Who’s being us, while we are too busy trying to attend to our “responsibilities”? Who am I? Am I you? Me, or just 801-12-5720?
Lista de imágenes:
1. Eric Klemm, "Sweetie #4", de la serie The Sweetie Project, 2008.
2. Eric Klemm, "Sweetie #5", de la serie The Sweetie Project, 2008.
3. Eric Klemm, "Sweetie #2", de la serie The Sweetie Project, 2008.
4. Eric Klemm, "Sweetie #1", de la serie The Sweetie Project, 2008.
5. Eric Klemm, "Sweetie #7", de la serie The Sweetie Project, 2008.
