where did the despair go?

I'm 29 years old

I was 19 to 23 from 1999 to 2003.

When I was that age.

Everyone around that age seemed pretty consumed with a nice existential despair.

Everyone dwelled on the misery of human existence and had a lot of fun with it.

We grew up listening to Kurt Cobain and Tupac complain endlessly, watching the The State and the biggest problem our president had was his blowjob situation.

We had 9-11, Bush got a little crazy, then we had two wars in a short time.

It was a pretty demoralizing time.

But there were still jobs.

There was still money.

Gas prices were still around a dollar and cigarettes were around 2 dollars.

It was still pretty cheap to live for a young adult.

Considering gas and cigarettes are two of the main things young adults buy.

There were also little cell phone use.

So if you are 19 through 22 right now reading this

subtract like 20 dollars for cigarettes and like 15 to 20 for gas per week and 40 for your cell phone and see how much money you have.

Also we were convinced there would be jobs and the federal government had money, now the government has no money.

Now kids talk about jobs constantly.

They are sitting around dwelling on the existential meaningless of society anymore.

Now it is all about employment, future shelters and food.

It seems when I sit with my girlfriend and her friends that they are having a very different life experience than what my friends and I had.

I don't know what that means exactly.

I don't know if it is good or bad, it just shows that life has changed.

Kendra Grant Malone has a poetry book

Kendra Grant Malone wrote a poetry book.

It is called chasing pigeons makes me feel more powerful.

I've always loved her poetry.

I just read it

it is the best thing I've read in a long time

I feel really intense right now.

I felt like I was reading a secret note.

One time way back

in the day

when i was a junior in high school my girlfriend, a girl i was with a long time after that note

gave me a note

it described how she was molested and how horrible it was

the note was a secret

and i never told anyone about that note

I feel like these poems Kendra wrote, is like that note

a secret

I feel like if Kendra or anyone would say what was contained in those poems in group conversation, it would not be appropriate

There was definitely nothing appropriate about those poems

Any rational human being would be too embarrassed to discuss these

but that is the job of the poet

to me anyway

I've met Kendra and I would describe her

as

"on edge"

yes, true

Today I read this blog post

and

thought

yes true

Today is Bloomsday

Bloomsday is the reminder I have to remember when my brother committed suicide

which was today

I think 6 years ago

2004.

I woke up early and did algabre with a crazy polish ex-commie

then i came home

and showered

i didn't shave

I'm scuffy for political reasons

Then I drove back to the campus and went to the math tutor

She taught me to find likeness or combine them or something

Went to bernice's moms and ate eggs and hotdogs mixed together

Finished my math homework at the kitchen table

read 70 pages of Weber on the couch

and then

weed whacked

then got a sun tan

i keep thinking i should contact another humans and go somewhere

but i don't know if i want to talk

i don't want to think of things to say

and i don't want to have to reply

to what is being said to me

i don't think

as of today

any topics need to be discussed out loud

I feel like i should get flowers and drive them to my brother's grave

but i don't feel like driving

it is like 20 minutes there and i'll have to get gas and that will cost like five dollars

i don't have any money for flowers either

I don't want to go there alone either

It doesn't seem right to be there alone

There is a diary queen near the cemetary, maybe my friend Biz will be there and she always says interesting things.

Maybe i could go to the yankee kitchen and my first girlfriend will be there, she is tall and sad, divorced with three kids.

Okay, I'm going to do this.

I'm going to leave my house

I don't have any money for flowers

but maybe i could like

kick his grave or something

and try to act like a brother

or something.

I don't know what I've done

I live in Youngstown

I think I wouldn't have lived here so long if it wasn't for the internet keeping me connected to things outside of youngstown.

I believe the internet maybe failing me now.

I don't have any friends here besides my roommate

and i think it has been like that for several years

i think i am lonely

like actually lonely

and not like

being poetic or something

i am not even being sarcastic

which is really hard for me not to be

I have friends now in Kent ohio

which is like an hour away

the friends in kent

make me feel more lonely than normal when i'm here

in youngstown

it reminds that i have not had friends in a long time

after i am done with this post i'm going to read The Peloponnesian War, who the hell reads that besides lonely people

if i wasn't lonely i would read something mentioned on bookslut or HTML giant.

Because I would talking to other people and i would want to have things in common with them to talk about

i think i am reading The Peloponnesian War because i know i am alone and what does it matter what i read

I don't think reading The Peloponnesian War will make me a better person.

I wrote an actual story today

which has made me feel really weird

I haven't written a story in a long time

i tried to write some flash fiction and then went to shit

nobody even wanted it

the last like five things i've written have been rejected

Youngstown doesn't inspire me anymore

nothing is coming

i have new ideas on things

i believe if i had something to write

it would be worthwhile

i don't think that makes any sense

i want to move somewhere where i will have friends

There has been a lot of fucking "LIFE PLAN" talk lately

going on IN MY FUCKING FACE

and I think

I want to move somewhere

where I have friends

this might be the first step to LIFE PLAN

baby steps

UPDATE three minutes later:

Probably not.

The Oil Spill

I wrote a really nice fancy post on the oil spill.

But then I deleted.

What is worth to have a fancy oil spill blog post.

I don't know.

So I will write this one.

The sad thing about the oil spill is that when we look at it

when we will stare at the oil spilling out of there

is

that our Reason failed us.

The Enlightenment, The Renaissance, Locke, Kant and everybody that has written a book post the black plague has declared that REASON is awesome.

Well

we all are looking at that oil pouring out of there

and then we look at our car

then we look at the plastic garbage can and the plastic cell phone and the plastic computer

and wonder

When Rome fell the people started to think, "Maybe all this conquering and violence leads to more conquering and violence, this isn't working."

When the Black Plague ended in 1350 people started to think, "God failed us. What do we do now?"

I think people are looking at that oil pouring out of there and thinking, "Reason has failed us. What do we do now?"

Oh this is so sad.

INTERVIEW ON BOOKSLUT

read me

Ameica, The Warfare Country

Last semester I took a class called International Relations, in the class I read in the text book that America is a warfare country. I thought, "Hmm, are we?"

Today in a political science class with eight people in it, we were talking about the Afghanistan War and Iraq War.

The teacher said, "We went to Afghanistan to get Osama Bin Laden."

I said, "Wait, we took over a WHOLE country to get one person. That sentence sounds so weird to me, 'we took over a whole country to get one person. That doesn't weird to any of you?"

They just fucking assaulted me, saying I was weird and insane for thinking such a thing.

Then I thought sitting there

What if it phrased

"A country took over another country, toppled its government, completely fucked up another's country's shit for one person."

"What if Russia took over America, destroyed it government to find one terrorist."

"America took over Afghanistan to find one person and didn't find that person."

Then Iraq occured to me

"America took over Iraq to get weapons of mass destruction, they didn't find any."

"One country took over another country because they thought they had something that they didn't."

Now when I think about these wars in terms of why Bush said they were fighting them, they are fucking pointless.

We spent a lot of fucking money and killed a lot of fucking people for no fucking reason.

If we go strictly by Bush's statements and reasons then they are pointless.

Now I just read Hans Morgenthau's Politics Amongst Nations and Kennth Walts Man, The State and War which concern Balance of Power politics.

If I interprete those wars in terms of Balance of Power politics they do have some meaning if I also apply Plato's Noble Lie to them. And if I also apply America's belief in Manifest Destiny, that they should bring democracy to the rest of the world and the International Relations Liberal View of Wilson that democracy creates countries that don't fight wars. And the Marxist view that capitalist countries take over smaller underdeveloped countries to get cheaper resources.

The logic becomes this:

Balance of Power View: America took over Afghistnan and Iraq because they were the last two remaining powers in the middle-east countries that two out of three countries that were against America. If Ameica could take over Iraq and Aghistan than they would have only one enemy left Iran. Iran would be isolated and have no power at all.

Luberal View: If Iraq and Afghanistan could be turned into democracies then they would be like America and Europe and be friendly.

Marxist View: America could took over Afghanistan and Iraq because those coutnries were not responsible concerning their oil infastructure. American and the other coutries involved want a lower price of oil because they knew that Saudi Arabia would soon be unable to flood the market anyitm time it wanted. Which came to be true, Saudi Arabia can no longer flood the market with oil.

Now that Iraq and Afghanistan are taken over then the west and China can send new wealthy oil companies that can suck oil out of their lands and put the oil on the market reducing the price of oil.

I don't know if this interpretation can justify the wars, but it DESCRIBES them.

I mean

it makes sense to me that the country that uses the most oil would want to control the nations with the oil.

I mean if you asked an alien from Mars, "Who do you think would have the highest interest in taking over oil producing countries?"

The alien would probably reply, "The country using the most oil?"

But what fucked with me most was the fact that everyone in the room thinks it is normal that one counry takes ove another country to get one person.

Everyone was fine with it.

Which says to me that I am surrouded by war hungry people that love war and do not care for the reasons or causes of it.

They just believe in it

They believe what the government tells them.

I'm not saying there is a conspiracy

I'm saying that the govenment is probably made up of Americans who are also of the mindset that, "war is okay even if we don't have the best reasons for spending lots of money and killing lots of our fellow humans."