Holidays, Gravestones, and the Destruction of Life as We Know It.

Yes, I know the 4th of July is gone. Thank the heavens. I have a thing about expendable holidays. I think Americans are a little too liberal with their celebrations and after Mother’s Day, Labor Day, Father’s Day, and Memorial Day I’m pretty fed up by the time the 4th comes around. Besides, it’s the beginning of the HEAT in Dallas that will last the rest of the year. A friend from up north wrote and said she hopes the heat wave will pass soon. I told her it will… in February. And though I love fireworks I’m not really into standing around watching things explode surrounded by drunk, smelly, obnoxious, sweaty rude strangers. What is it about the 4th that brings out the inner “Deliverance” hillbilly in most people? Ugh. Oh, well, God bless Americana….

As for all the celebs dying lately, you know these people had to go sometime. It’s not like it’s the fucking Black Plague or anything. Anyway, I’m all for thinning the herd. And who best to go than fucked-up celebrities? I don’t care what you think about Michael Jackson’s legacy, the dude was a fucking ALIEN. And the universe, or at least our solar system, is a lot safer with him moving on… And if I hear Man in the Mirror one more time I think I might choke myself. Carradine was the strangest. I mean, what’s a 70-year-old man doing hanging from a pole in a closet with rope around his genitals? Ah, never mind, I don’t really want to know. Sounds like the beginning of a Tarantino film to me. As for Farrah Fawcett, poor thing. What kind of karma would you have to pay to have something eat you alive from the ass outward? (ah, no snickering out there, please…) She should have married Ryan O’Neal when she had the chance. As for Steve McNair, that fucker deserved it. I mean, cheating on your wife with children at home is one thing, but fucking a psycho-billy 20-year-old WHITE GIRL is like kneeling in front of a subway train begging to be run over. Stupid. Motherfucker. Karl Malden was one guy who I’ll miss. Good actor. And who the fuck really cares about Billy Mays, except maybe his family? I mean, really, do you people watch THAT much television to have actually bonded with the spokesman for Oxi-Clean?? Come on. NO ONE made a stink when Dave, the guy from Wendy’s, died a few years back. What misplaced priorities… And Ed McMahon will be missed, surely. What a recognizable voice and face of the Tonight Show long before Mr. Potatohead Jay Leno and Conan O’Brian stepped up to the plate.

I was talking to my dear friend about the glut of social media conferences offered out there by these self-proclaimed gurus lately. The reality is you people need to get a fucking job. And your new career choice of ‘media guru’ is appalling at best. I saw an advertisement that said for ONLY $695 you can come and be part of a MEDIA EVENT in Chicago. No, airfare is not included. Nor hotel. And I’m sure alcohol is not included either. That’s just to get your pimpled ass in the door. And why? To listen to a LIST of “media professionals” talk about how social media is changing the world. Seriously. In many ways you all are simply prostitutes, making money off the delusional, ill-informed, and under-exposed. Now more than ever the adage stands true: those who can, DO. And those who can’tTEACH… social media. You’re all a bunch of snake-oil salesmen to me. Actually, I take that back; it's unfair to the snake. At least I can jack off with snake oil…

Are you ready for the truth, children? Wait for it… Ok, here it comes. Sitting down, lovers???

ATTENTION WALMART WRITERS:

Social media and the internet has DESTROYED our way of life.

It has destroyed the economy for media professionals (and by that I mean REAL PROFESSIONALS who actually PRODUCE CONTENT, not the mommy-bloggers nor the gurus who are raping people for the right to regurgitate the same information that can be found on everyone else’s blog). The Internet itself has crippled the human race sexually (by the introduction of over-the-top porn), socially (by alienating us from real human contact), and psychologically by giving us delusions of grandeur by feeding our egos three squares a day plus snacky-snacks in between. We are all now OBESE MEDIA GLUTTONS.Technological freedom has truly become our slavery. The thing we cling to the closest is what is destroying us. By embracing this quantum leap in communication technology, as much as you hate to admit it, we have doomed ourselves. And every time I read one of you people’s aimless, cutsie blog entries I realize that I am the Omega Man surrounded by the living dead. And I’d rather shoot myself in the head than be one of you.

I am a writer. Like Milton. Like Chaucer. Like Henry Miller. Like Lovecraft. I have life experiences (and some prejudices) which far exceed most of you and I’m able to communicate my thoughts and stories in appealing diatribes that entertain, educate, and inform. I do intense research even in my fiction to make sure that it is viable and not some convoluted shadow of truth that my sick ego just happened to deem real. And what isYOUR work based on? What are YOU writing about? Most of you aspire to be the Rachel Ray of social media when your characters (meaning your personas) are less than human, more of a stereotype, an amalgamation of humanity , than a true representation of the many facets of the human psyche, really.

What I’m hearing from potential publishers is that the market is totally FLOODED with self-help/internet marketing/mommy-blogger-fueled projects. Thank GOD that is not what I write. However, my question to you all is:

What in God’s name do you Cretins possibly have to write about??

It’s not like it’s one long Twitter post, folks. A book is a BOOK. Like Moby Dick. Like Catcher in the Rye. Like Altas Shrugged. What most of you guys do barely makes a decent crank phone call or grocery list much less a serious contribution to the human legacy. Seriously, it reminds me when Non-Linear Editing systems came en force to the market about 5 years ago and people who bought them, coupled with a decent digital camera, immediately called themselves filmmakers. Now, I’m not going to shit on the ‘less is more’ philosophy of filmmaking, but let’s be real:

Just because you own a Ferrari doesn’t mean you can drive it

Possessing the technology tricked these people into thinking they had the insight, the nuance, the story-telling skills, the gift of creating dramatic tension when really all they had was a cool new toy that they didn’t have the desire to really learn to play with correctly. Same thing here. Now that EVERYONE has a blog and enough free time to post the most mundane things they do in their lives, they think people really give a shit. The worse part of it is that you people are actually getting readers. And it shows more about the diluted tastes of the internet masses than your wicked prose skills, believe me.

There is one thing I get from reading the glut of blogs out there simmering in the ether: most of you people are not individuals. You would be NOTHING without other people. You live and work and love and fuck and breed and write and educate and create by COMMITTEE. All of this activity is not a literary wave sweeping the nation, it’s a world-wide fucking support group for geeks, a global 12-step enabling program for breeders and over/under-sexed ignored souls to flourish their egos and get their 15 minutes of fame. You people are delusional. And you know why you all are having such “success”? Because your readers are JUST LIKE YOU. Great pretenders. And that therein lies the problem… Personally, I would rather have one intelligent reader than an army of mental invalids licking my ass. Just saying…

Social media is a tool that must be used with some amount of responsibility. A Tweet came out a few months back saying that Jeff Goldblum died. The poor guy had to go on a talk show to prove to the world he was still alive. It’s amazing how gullible you people are. The more I think about it, the more I believe the atmosphere is totally ripe for another Orsen Wells to rise out of the mist and fabricate something AMAZING to scare the quantum shit out of all you people. Maybe not alien invaders but SOMETHING to shake up our self-righteous and juvenile society. Turn the world inside out, if you will.

I have a brilliant friend of mine who I used to be in a band with over a decade ago. Somewhere during our rise to recognition (and we were good, too, you mothers. It took a while but we were definitely on to something…) he decided that he wanted money instead of fame, left the act, and started singing standards for a living. Now that he’s making 100k+ a year as a glorified wedding singer, I think it's safe to say he’s probably miserable. All he wishes for is the chance to do something of VALUE, something creatively redemptive that will fill those enormous holes in his soul that his wife, his son, and all of his “adoring” fans will never, ever fill: artistic integrity. Remember what I said 20 years ago, dude: You cannot have your cake eat it too. Street cred comes from paying the piper, not paying him off… I will always love my friend but I have realized that he and I are simply natural enemies.

I suppose you could say I’m smug in the knowledge that I have spent my life fighting the good fight, not giving into the temptation to dilute my essence and go the way of the masses, trying desperately to please everyone and succeeding in pleasing few, least of all myself. Yes, I’m a 43-year-old grown ass man who lives like a college student but in many ways it’s kept me young and hungry. Not to trade stocks or currency to make money without ACTUALLY WORKING or any of that shit. No, it’s made me still hungry enough to chase that illusive dream of personal success. And regardless what anyone tells you, personal success does not always equate with financial success. Therefore, I am fortifying my efforts to find a literary agent to represent me as a talent. I WILL be published within the next two years and will live ENTIRELY on my own merit. I can’t even imagine getting married, much less having children, when there are scores of goals I still have yet to reach. And as selfish as it may sound, those goals are more important to me than all the dirty diapers and vomit and stuffed animals and drunk wife episodes under the harvest moon. At least I'll die knowing that, even if I never make it, that I never gave up, that I put my money where my mouth is, and I lived the integrous life of an artist to the very end. And even if I am never remembered when I pass like so many celebrities that have come and gone, I will know that my time here was pure and untainted by the stigma of humanity: settling for something less than what I deserve.

Ok, I’m done. I don’t feel the need to coddle you today. You are grown-ups. Supposedly. I’m off to do battle with the world. A fight I am more than happy to engage in…

JC