Bliss Is Ignorance
If anyone in the past eight years, up until maybe six months ago, were to be asked what my main life goal was, I am sure the resounding answer would have been "to get a Jeep". I am not sure there is a single thing I have referenced more in all that time (and trust me, I am the king of repeating myself).
A year and a half ago, the plan was to use my tax return this year to put a down payment on one. Something brand new, completely loaded and loved with the kind of anticipation only years and years of waiting could culminate. I am not sure I even knew what I was doing eight or so years ago when I paid that thing off and decided to get rid of it as soon as I could because it often times seemed possessed with a mechanical demon. (Little did I know, the car I got to replace it was ten times as evil and had a more severely vengeful death.)
As I’ve said a million times before, I did have a genuine human affection for that Jeep and all the memories it gave me. There are few things in this world that ever helped to make me feel more individual, and cool amongst the roadways full of sub-compacts and boring sedans. It was truly a love/hate relationship equal, if not surpassing, anything I have had since involving another human being.
After ditching it’s replacement, that damned Le Baron, I got my Cavalier simply out of necessity. I cared nothing for that car and from it’s demise that is apparent. I never wanted it; felt like a lemming driving it and cared nothing about it when it sat on the streets of Chicago throughout the winter of 2003 immobile. So much so that the back tire did not even spin when I started it up and moved it because of street cleaning one day.
All I ever wanted was another Jeep. I cared nothing for my future education or potential careers. Nothing seemed as important to me or more of a symbol of success to me than the day when I’d get behind the wheel of a brand new Jeep and pull out of the lot for the first time. My one ex was so fearful of that potential day, that he would attempt to dissuade me from the fantasy as if he was afraid any memories with him would be immediately replaced. I can’t emphasis how important that goal was to me.
But, whatever happened in the past six or eight months has changed all that. Whether it be maturity or depression I cannot say, but it seems more like fun youthful memories than any possible future joy. It’d just be a financial vacuum. An outrageous price tag; unspeakable gas costs; potential maintenance nightmares. It would be a cash vortex.
That being said with complete sincerity, I have to admit I was still annoyed when Dearest just came over here and told me, because he couldn’t get the second condo downtown he wanted, that he just bought himself a Wrangler last night and was finalizing the paperwork tomorrow. I was annoyed because for one, he thought it would upset me that he got one, when for all he knows, I am still "longing" for one of my own. It annoys me that my pay here sucks, yet he seems to have so much cash floating around he can purchase everything from boats and condos to a second car.
Now now; I know he is much (much) older and has a degree and all the tens of thousands of other reasons why he has money and I don’t. It’s a childish thing to even let bother me and I admit that fully. I felt he was somewhat rubbing it in my face though; especially the way he’ll turn around and threaten to fire me because I choose not to screw up my finances anymore by getting a new car and instead only put in 40 hours a week because of train and carpooling schedules. Whatever; that is a tired argument too.
I am bothered by my own reaction to all this. I am not sure if I am tricking myself into thinking I don’t want the things I used to or if I have changed that much that I’ll never again be able to find happiness in monetary things; happiness in anything really since I seem to be more preoccupied with death and the end of the world than anything else these days. Have I scolded myself internally so much for my past mistakes that I will not allow myself simple joys and fantasies. Maybe fantasies that involve temporary pleasures are a dead road to me now.
Could I just be a miserable person? How horrible if I was. It almost seems a fine line between what I’d consider enlightenment, and misery.
Aside from the usual annoyance of having to interact with him, seeing Dearest happy about this purchase repulsed me in a way that went beyond him and encompassed the whole of humanity and it’s neverending quest to fill it’s blackened void with any purchase or pleasure it possibly can to try and make that ever-present emptiness go away.
Know what I’d take over a Jeep today, at 3:02 P.M.?
- A couple new pairs of pants
- Interest in reading ANYTHING
- The ability to get on a plane tomorrow and travel Europe for six months
- The focus to sit down and actually write something worth something
- To go back in time and get to be a Goth skater punk in high school
- A full nights sleep for a week
- An extra 15% in my paycheck
- A world where 12-year-olds aren’t killing other kids and reality TV doesn’t exist
- Some fricken motivation
- All my hair back
- A life with some significance that’s not going to be obliterated when I die with a potentially fucked afterlife because I didn’t choose one way over another
- A body shaped like a V and not a U
- All of my ignorance back
Somebody just hit me over the head with a fucking frying pan please.
A year and a half ago, the plan was to use my tax return this year to put a down payment on one. Something brand new, completely loaded and loved with the kind of anticipation only years and years of waiting could culminate. I am not sure I even knew what I was doing eight or so years ago when I paid that thing off and decided to get rid of it as soon as I could because it often times seemed possessed with a mechanical demon. (Little did I know, the car I got to replace it was ten times as evil and had a more severely vengeful death.)
As I’ve said a million times before, I did have a genuine human affection for that Jeep and all the memories it gave me. There are few things in this world that ever helped to make me feel more individual, and cool amongst the roadways full of sub-compacts and boring sedans. It was truly a love/hate relationship equal, if not surpassing, anything I have had since involving another human being.
After ditching it’s replacement, that damned Le Baron, I got my Cavalier simply out of necessity. I cared nothing for that car and from it’s demise that is apparent. I never wanted it; felt like a lemming driving it and cared nothing about it when it sat on the streets of Chicago throughout the winter of 2003 immobile. So much so that the back tire did not even spin when I started it up and moved it because of street cleaning one day.
All I ever wanted was another Jeep. I cared nothing for my future education or potential careers. Nothing seemed as important to me or more of a symbol of success to me than the day when I’d get behind the wheel of a brand new Jeep and pull out of the lot for the first time. My one ex was so fearful of that potential day, that he would attempt to dissuade me from the fantasy as if he was afraid any memories with him would be immediately replaced. I can’t emphasis how important that goal was to me.
But, whatever happened in the past six or eight months has changed all that. Whether it be maturity or depression I cannot say, but it seems more like fun youthful memories than any possible future joy. It’d just be a financial vacuum. An outrageous price tag; unspeakable gas costs; potential maintenance nightmares. It would be a cash vortex.
That being said with complete sincerity, I have to admit I was still annoyed when Dearest just came over here and told me, because he couldn’t get the second condo downtown he wanted, that he just bought himself a Wrangler last night and was finalizing the paperwork tomorrow. I was annoyed because for one, he thought it would upset me that he got one, when for all he knows, I am still "longing" for one of my own. It annoys me that my pay here sucks, yet he seems to have so much cash floating around he can purchase everything from boats and condos to a second car.
Now now; I know he is much (much) older and has a degree and all the tens of thousands of other reasons why he has money and I don’t. It’s a childish thing to even let bother me and I admit that fully. I felt he was somewhat rubbing it in my face though; especially the way he’ll turn around and threaten to fire me because I choose not to screw up my finances anymore by getting a new car and instead only put in 40 hours a week because of train and carpooling schedules. Whatever; that is a tired argument too.
I am bothered by my own reaction to all this. I am not sure if I am tricking myself into thinking I don’t want the things I used to or if I have changed that much that I’ll never again be able to find happiness in monetary things; happiness in anything really since I seem to be more preoccupied with death and the end of the world than anything else these days. Have I scolded myself internally so much for my past mistakes that I will not allow myself simple joys and fantasies. Maybe fantasies that involve temporary pleasures are a dead road to me now.
Could I just be a miserable person? How horrible if I was. It almost seems a fine line between what I’d consider enlightenment, and misery.
Aside from the usual annoyance of having to interact with him, seeing Dearest happy about this purchase repulsed me in a way that went beyond him and encompassed the whole of humanity and it’s neverending quest to fill it’s blackened void with any purchase or pleasure it possibly can to try and make that ever-present emptiness go away.
Know what I’d take over a Jeep today, at 3:02 P.M.?
- A couple new pairs of pants
- Interest in reading ANYTHING
- The ability to get on a plane tomorrow and travel Europe for six months
- The focus to sit down and actually write something worth something
- To go back in time and get to be a Goth skater punk in high school
- A full nights sleep for a week
- An extra 15% in my paycheck
- A world where 12-year-olds aren’t killing other kids and reality TV doesn’t exist
- Some fricken motivation
- All my hair back
- A life with some significance that’s not going to be obliterated when I die with a potentially fucked afterlife because I didn’t choose one way over another
- A body shaped like a V and not a U
- All of my ignorance back
Somebody just hit me over the head with a fucking frying pan please.