I'm back.
I want nothing more at this very moment than to flinch. I long to give my position away with a snicker, or a sneeze; anything would do. Normally, I have no inhibitions about this matter. I do as I please. Right now, however, all I desire as if my entire life depended on it is to ruin this perfect moment. To destroy this façade. I pray for this release.
My wife turns her head and glares at me, pushing my initiative back, and motions towards the television set. “Why can’t we be more like that?” she asks, referring to the married couple on the screen. “She can give a look, and he just ‘knows.’”
I don’t know, I answered honestly, why aren’t we more like that?
“Because they’re reading from a script. Nothing is that perfect.” She turns back towards the light from the television and frowns, and then relaxes her face back to complacence.
Perfect is artificial, I tell her. Flawlessness is manmade. We just haven’t gotten it right, yet.
The couple on the television shares a full-mouthed kiss, with no spit running down anyone’s lips, with no tongue showing at any time (although the use of both is fully implied), and no bumping of the noses. They’re just the right height, and the heads are tilted with a geometric beauty that gives the woman’s hair the ability to fall back enough to not obstruct the kiss, but not enough to muss the straightness of her blonde locks. It’s as if they were casted for this moment alone, and who knows how many takes it took for the kiss to look honest enough for the target audience at home to cry.
Perfect is a dozen re-shoots of five seconds of material.
I tell my wife that there is a company that makes a gloss for real flowers to look as shiny as fake ones. I tell her that there is a Heavy-Metal music group that has a vocalist that screams his lyrics in monotone. I tell her a Wonder-Bra does nothing but make real breasts look fake. There is whole movement out there that intends for real life to look just as good as the impostor.
The couple on the television, I tell her, take the reality of marriage and give it the spin of no mistakes. Even the conflicts are staged on television. Nothing can go unresolved. Nothing can stay inconclusive. Even the characters that disappear are cleverly written off. Even the divorces and the murders are told with an uncanny resolve.
Yet, I’m sitting on the couch, clenching my jaw, waiting for something to happen to break the mold. I’m hoping for a sneeze to come on, or a burp or some flatulence, anything. Sure, I could force myself to burp, but then it’s scripted. Even I want to be surprised.
My wife stares intently at the set, allowing herself to be absorbed in the world that is being sold, despite her annoyance at my growing impatience. It’s not like she can’t feel it.
“What?” she turns and punches me in the arm. “What’s your problem?”
Rubbing my arm, I reply that I’m not up for much television.
“Why don’t you go write something? You’re always saying you’re going to go write something, but you never do. When you do, it’s few and far between.”
I realize that I really don’t want to force myself to write. I don’t want to plan it. It won’t be honest. It becomes too mechanical. Some goofs created a dance made to imitate the motions of a robot. I can’t write rehearsed without feeling like I’m going to be laughed at, I tell her.
Perfection is a party-favorite that mocks the immaculate gyrations of a limited creation.
She snubs me and turns her attention back to the married couple on the screen. Before the husband is able to explain himself to his wife why he put the turkey in the dishwasher, a commercial comes on for eyeliner that supposedly extends your eyelashes past your nose. Something watertight that a run on the beach won’t make it run, even with the spray of the ocean. I ask how long they had to wait to shoot that commercial so that just the right amount of clouds were in the sky. Too many clouds would have caused a problem with the lighting of the shoot because there would be too much white, I say.
Perfection is timing footage for days in a near-tropic environment instead of using a backdrop on a stage.
We don’t want reality to be what it is. We don’t want to see the cow being slaughtered. We don’t want that lover to leave a note on the dresser and never come back without telling us why. We want a perfect world so badly, that we’re willing to not only create it, but then find a way to make the truth look just as good as our version. Egotism at its finest.
We wait for opportunities to force our ideas and idiosyncrasies onto reality and plan our upgrade for a future release. We expect to make our drama the primary existence and smother the plain, cold truth in front of us.
I don’t want my wife to agree with me when I tell her that perfection is illusory, but the plain and raw fact of it all is that she does. When she looks at me with a shrug, she confirms what I already knew but was afraid to admit: real life is just not as good as what we can make up, so we dress it in drag to parade it around for a reaction. For drama. For effect.
Perfection is a full-grown hairy man tucking his penis between his testicles and into a tight pair of underwear and wearing a skirt that barely suppresses the lumps.
The couple on the television reappear, and within minutes, a neighbor brings over a turkey because their plans with their family fell through, and they have no one to share it with. Everything is solved. My wife resigns herself to the camp of the episode, but isn’t left with the same taste in my mouth as I wish that I could just sit and write what I wanted to write. She just moves on to the next show, while I’m stuck in the same one. Every episode is a miniature reality that pushes an imperfect reality further away. Every station is a collection of realities that leave their imprint.
Episodes of the Bachelor and The Real World make living with people you don’t know a happy adventure with resolvable conflict instead of a predictable catastrophe that ends in lawsuits. COPS makes your believe in heroes again instead of feeling the fear of criminals going unpunished. Survivor diminishes Lord of the Flies or Alive.
No one gets hurt. No one dies. No one gets eaten.
Perfection is glorification of the good memories.
Perfection is selective viewing.
Perfection is the highlight reel.
I stand up and stare down at my wife in my best “I have something important to say” pose. I start my diatribe. The best moments of life come out on accident, I tell her. They aren’t rehearsed.
“So what stops you from writing, right now,” she asks, raising her eyebrows. She folds her arms, and lifts her chin just enough to make the focus more on her lips and less on her eyes, giving her inquisitive stare a slight squint. She’s just as good at this as I am.
I stop for a brief moment of clarity, and even surprise myself. I tell her, because I want to write, and that’s enough to make me stop right there. Why should I write when I want to, when all it does is force me to create something from a pattern? It’s so easy to stay in the box when you’re writing something you haven’t planned out. You want the ideas to make sense. You have no time in your head to rearrange everything to a greater design.
“Then don’t,” she spits apathetically, “but don’t complain or talk about it when you’re not going to do anything.” She slouches back down into the loveseat that dwarves her, and returns to her show.
I start to retort for a brief second, but instead, put away the finger that I was going to use so formulaically, and remember that shows like Jackass make you believe that you can get away with that gesture without any repercussions. In reality, making a life-sized model of your parents humping in their front yard can get you shot by your neighbors. They don’t just stop and stare. They call the police. They accost you for subjecting their children to having to see such a thing at the age of 3.
Perfection is a 30-day sentence in prison passing briefly in a three-minute montage.
My wife notices that I stopped myself mid-phrase, and rolls her eyes. I go to my bedroom and start to write for the first time in months.
My wife turns her head and glares at me, pushing my initiative back, and motions towards the television set. “Why can’t we be more like that?” she asks, referring to the married couple on the screen. “She can give a look, and he just ‘knows.’”
I don’t know, I answered honestly, why aren’t we more like that?
“Because they’re reading from a script. Nothing is that perfect.” She turns back towards the light from the television and frowns, and then relaxes her face back to complacence.
Perfect is artificial, I tell her. Flawlessness is manmade. We just haven’t gotten it right, yet.
The couple on the television shares a full-mouthed kiss, with no spit running down anyone’s lips, with no tongue showing at any time (although the use of both is fully implied), and no bumping of the noses. They’re just the right height, and the heads are tilted with a geometric beauty that gives the woman’s hair the ability to fall back enough to not obstruct the kiss, but not enough to muss the straightness of her blonde locks. It’s as if they were casted for this moment alone, and who knows how many takes it took for the kiss to look honest enough for the target audience at home to cry.
Perfect is a dozen re-shoots of five seconds of material.
I tell my wife that there is a company that makes a gloss for real flowers to look as shiny as fake ones. I tell her that there is a Heavy-Metal music group that has a vocalist that screams his lyrics in monotone. I tell her a Wonder-Bra does nothing but make real breasts look fake. There is whole movement out there that intends for real life to look just as good as the impostor.
The couple on the television, I tell her, take the reality of marriage and give it the spin of no mistakes. Even the conflicts are staged on television. Nothing can go unresolved. Nothing can stay inconclusive. Even the characters that disappear are cleverly written off. Even the divorces and the murders are told with an uncanny resolve.
Yet, I’m sitting on the couch, clenching my jaw, waiting for something to happen to break the mold. I’m hoping for a sneeze to come on, or a burp or some flatulence, anything. Sure, I could force myself to burp, but then it’s scripted. Even I want to be surprised.
My wife stares intently at the set, allowing herself to be absorbed in the world that is being sold, despite her annoyance at my growing impatience. It’s not like she can’t feel it.
“What?” she turns and punches me in the arm. “What’s your problem?”
Rubbing my arm, I reply that I’m not up for much television.
“Why don’t you go write something? You’re always saying you’re going to go write something, but you never do. When you do, it’s few and far between.”
I realize that I really don’t want to force myself to write. I don’t want to plan it. It won’t be honest. It becomes too mechanical. Some goofs created a dance made to imitate the motions of a robot. I can’t write rehearsed without feeling like I’m going to be laughed at, I tell her.
Perfection is a party-favorite that mocks the immaculate gyrations of a limited creation.
She snubs me and turns her attention back to the married couple on the screen. Before the husband is able to explain himself to his wife why he put the turkey in the dishwasher, a commercial comes on for eyeliner that supposedly extends your eyelashes past your nose. Something watertight that a run on the beach won’t make it run, even with the spray of the ocean. I ask how long they had to wait to shoot that commercial so that just the right amount of clouds were in the sky. Too many clouds would have caused a problem with the lighting of the shoot because there would be too much white, I say.
Perfection is timing footage for days in a near-tropic environment instead of using a backdrop on a stage.
We don’t want reality to be what it is. We don’t want to see the cow being slaughtered. We don’t want that lover to leave a note on the dresser and never come back without telling us why. We want a perfect world so badly, that we’re willing to not only create it, but then find a way to make the truth look just as good as our version. Egotism at its finest.
We wait for opportunities to force our ideas and idiosyncrasies onto reality and plan our upgrade for a future release. We expect to make our drama the primary existence and smother the plain, cold truth in front of us.
I don’t want my wife to agree with me when I tell her that perfection is illusory, but the plain and raw fact of it all is that she does. When she looks at me with a shrug, she confirms what I already knew but was afraid to admit: real life is just not as good as what we can make up, so we dress it in drag to parade it around for a reaction. For drama. For effect.
Perfection is a full-grown hairy man tucking his penis between his testicles and into a tight pair of underwear and wearing a skirt that barely suppresses the lumps.
The couple on the television reappear, and within minutes, a neighbor brings over a turkey because their plans with their family fell through, and they have no one to share it with. Everything is solved. My wife resigns herself to the camp of the episode, but isn’t left with the same taste in my mouth as I wish that I could just sit and write what I wanted to write. She just moves on to the next show, while I’m stuck in the same one. Every episode is a miniature reality that pushes an imperfect reality further away. Every station is a collection of realities that leave their imprint.
Episodes of the Bachelor and The Real World make living with people you don’t know a happy adventure with resolvable conflict instead of a predictable catastrophe that ends in lawsuits. COPS makes your believe in heroes again instead of feeling the fear of criminals going unpunished. Survivor diminishes Lord of the Flies or Alive.
No one gets hurt. No one dies. No one gets eaten.
Perfection is glorification of the good memories.
Perfection is selective viewing.
Perfection is the highlight reel.
I stand up and stare down at my wife in my best “I have something important to say” pose. I start my diatribe. The best moments of life come out on accident, I tell her. They aren’t rehearsed.
“So what stops you from writing, right now,” she asks, raising her eyebrows. She folds her arms, and lifts her chin just enough to make the focus more on her lips and less on her eyes, giving her inquisitive stare a slight squint. She’s just as good at this as I am.
I stop for a brief moment of clarity, and even surprise myself. I tell her, because I want to write, and that’s enough to make me stop right there. Why should I write when I want to, when all it does is force me to create something from a pattern? It’s so easy to stay in the box when you’re writing something you haven’t planned out. You want the ideas to make sense. You have no time in your head to rearrange everything to a greater design.
“Then don’t,” she spits apathetically, “but don’t complain or talk about it when you’re not going to do anything.” She slouches back down into the loveseat that dwarves her, and returns to her show.
I start to retort for a brief second, but instead, put away the finger that I was going to use so formulaically, and remember that shows like Jackass make you believe that you can get away with that gesture without any repercussions. In reality, making a life-sized model of your parents humping in their front yard can get you shot by your neighbors. They don’t just stop and stare. They call the police. They accost you for subjecting their children to having to see such a thing at the age of 3.
Perfection is a 30-day sentence in prison passing briefly in a three-minute montage.
My wife notices that I stopped myself mid-phrase, and rolls her eyes. I go to my bedroom and start to write for the first time in months.