This will Go Down on Your Permanent Record
I went shopping yesterday -- my father is a generous man; he handed me a $100 bill after attending my play last week with instructions to buy myself a new pair of shoes and jeans while I was at it -- despite my better judgment at stepping into a mall during the weekend-after-Thanksgiving-consumer-madness. But it's true about staggering deals one can find in this weekend; I was able to come by two pairs of shoes and a pair of jeans for under $50!
While I was at the mall, however, walking about my business, I noticed, with no small amount of disdain, a group of teenagers loitering in the middle of one of the mall corridors posing and posturing like a bad hip-hop video. They were wearing all of their designer hip-hop label gear and paying far too much attention to how they looked than anything else that was going on around them. They would call out and heckle and caw to the shoppers walking by and something inside me bubbled up and boiled to the surface.
It was like all of my hate toward this new vapidness in our culture was personified in them. All of this posturing with none of the substance. All of the growing selfishness in our culture -- everyone saying something but nobody listening -- creating a "me me me!" civilization. And maybe this new generation of teenager is only a victim of this growing American philosophy which they grew up in but I wasn't thinking that rationally....
That hate and disappointment grew as I brushed by one of the worst of them and I shoulder blocked him from behind. Now, either he was off balance from the look-at-me-dance he was performing or I hit him with more force than I had anticipated but the end result is, I sent him sprawling into the cheap jewelry island display knocking them both over with a noisy clatter sending rings and necklaces and bracelets scattering out before him.
And I know I should probably feel really bad about that... But I don't. It was one of the most satisfying things I've done. I didn't even stop to look. I just continued walking on quietly laughing to myself.
I'm an asshole.
While I was at the mall, however, walking about my business, I noticed, with no small amount of disdain, a group of teenagers loitering in the middle of one of the mall corridors posing and posturing like a bad hip-hop video. They were wearing all of their designer hip-hop label gear and paying far too much attention to how they looked than anything else that was going on around them. They would call out and heckle and caw to the shoppers walking by and something inside me bubbled up and boiled to the surface.
It was like all of my hate toward this new vapidness in our culture was personified in them. All of this posturing with none of the substance. All of the growing selfishness in our culture -- everyone saying something but nobody listening -- creating a "me me me!" civilization. And maybe this new generation of teenager is only a victim of this growing American philosophy which they grew up in but I wasn't thinking that rationally....
That hate and disappointment grew as I brushed by one of the worst of them and I shoulder blocked him from behind. Now, either he was off balance from the look-at-me-dance he was performing or I hit him with more force than I had anticipated but the end result is, I sent him sprawling into the cheap jewelry island display knocking them both over with a noisy clatter sending rings and necklaces and bracelets scattering out before him.
And I know I should probably feel really bad about that... But I don't. It was one of the most satisfying things I've done. I didn't even stop to look. I just continued walking on quietly laughing to myself.
I'm an asshole.