a lot of the little blog-survey things (and i DO remember back when they were called Surveys or Quizzes rather than Memes, which is a horrible misuse of the word and I only make it worse by doing it myself) ask about relationships, and I’m never quite sure how to respond to those questions, So i usually respond with a joke.
My thoughts on Vesper’s poem sum up my last relationship in all the detail I want to go into here. It was long-distance for a while, then it wasn’t, then we discovered that we were very different people than who we used to be, then it ended. but that’s not what this babble is about. it’s about asking about relationships.
What the fuck are you meme-writers trying to do, make people feel inferior just because there are more important things in their life than trying to convince someone to spend lots of time with them and make with the genital rubbings on a semiregular basis? Now, this trick doesn’t work on me. I’ve been there, I’ve been convinced that being in love with someone was something important to put a lot of time and energy into, and i used to do the same damn thing and tell all my friends how much better their lives would be if they were in committed long-term relationships. Oddly enough, they fell for it, so I suppose I should try convincing them to run around in crop circles with magnet-covered colanders on their heads now, just to see if they do that, too
I have learned from my mistakes. you see, a relationship requires another person. You know those low opinions you generally have of most people, the ones where you think that most people are stupid and crazy and violent and the world would be better off without them? You know how you think that those things don’t apply to someone just because you love them, that they are somehow exempt from displaying everything you hate about people just because you’ve swapped juices a few times? You’re wrong. That other person, they may be in the room with you now so take a good long look without them noticing, they’re just as capable of everything you hate about people as that jerk who cut you off on your morning commute or those horrible little unsupervised goblinoid children turned loose in wal-mart because their parents don’t want to throw money at proper daycare.
You do not need to be in love. You may think you do, but this is deception. This is a lifetime of cheesy lovesongs coming out of every radio and probably half the albums in your collection having programmed you to think you need to be in love. Why? Who would orchestrate something like that? Advertisers. the whole field of advertising was invented by Sigmund Freud’s nephew, based on the pro-american propaganda efforts he spearheaded during World War I, to sell you things by appealing to your feelings rather than having to actually make a better product than their competitors. The first step is to make you feel bad about yourself, and the next is to convince you that whatever they sell will cure that.
Step 1 is not in the commercial itself. It’s in everything else, to make you feel inferior because you are not in a relationship or even actively seeking one, and then step 2 comes along to tell you that yes you CAN be more attractive if you buy this or that brand of toothpaste, yes you can pose moronically in the company of attractive members of your preferred gender if you shop at our clothing store.
I say unto you, my readers, don’t give in! Do not let THEM tell you what will make you happy! decide for yourself! experiment! I’ve found that I can get as much happiness from a good batch of Overmanwich Sandwich and a dvd of old Pete and Pete episodes as I ever did from any relationship.
