American Way

Lately,

I've been remembering my childhood. Brisk walks to the convenient store with my older sister, empathizing with each other about middle and high school woes, drinking soda in the late afternoon and of course lounging back in front of the TV.

I think back to these days and almost curse myself for not doing more. I begin to wonder, did I take the long way and others found the right trails? I can't help out but believe so.

This issue of self versus external judgment is one that I've been battling for a while. Why can't I just look behind those who judged me in the past and embrace who I really am even AS people judge and always will judge me?

Is it because we live in a non-accountable society where industries rule our lives and personal order? I think about it. The 'American Way' is nothing but a lifestyle we choose to live in under this faux great power we call the USA. The lower to middle class jobs (the majority of jobs in this country) necessitate quick fixes to get through the days. Now, of course this is just my opinion and I am no expert but I see first hand that when you are in a job where you are not trained, empowered or encouraged to find your passion, you lose the means and the motivation to find balance in your life. Imagine this: I work 40+ hours a week as a waitress and I'm on my feet all day serving an array of human beings who for the most part do not care about my personal well being. My employer doesn't want me to slip below a certain level and I have to keep up the pace. I get paid a meager salary and prices are only going up. I can't afford healthy groceries every week. My apartment is falling apart and I can't even afford the right dental fixtures I need to stop grinding my teeth from the stresses of my daily life. I begin to budget for each day and only get frozen food and generic cereals and breads that do not have proper vitamins. I drink caffeine all the time. Have to be up at 5:30 AM. And this my friends, is the American Way. You can't live close to the diner you work at without paying hefty rent. You can't afford nice things but you'll settle for what's available and save the rest for make-shift insurance.

And this people, is a question of choice. The government and industries are not changing without our voice. Without the massive change in public voice and consumption, we will continue to ruin our future, investing in a false sense of power and mark of success.

Come AND SEE

I wrote this the other day, thinking about the Russian movie, 'Come and See'.

His voice pierced through the parched land like a thousand needles puncturing bones
They were no longer children
They were no longer explorers
They were simply disciples from a death-in-life existence.
An unknown soldier’s dying demand from his own private trench signaled their fuel
“Do justice children. And you will be more than man in this unearthly hell.”
Soon commandants were born and holes were dug.
Mothers went insane and fathers disintegrated in graves
Their time for revenge was now
Their lack of resources, no matter
Their small and fragile bodies were agile and robust enough on their own
They were through with it all
Their reticence no more
Their fear, a nonexistent suppressor of their own mission
Their commitment was now to fight.
To stand up against the oppressor by all means necessary.
The heavy hearts of many knew that bones would be dislocated, muscles would lose their purpose and eyes would be reduced to one or two daggering stones set deep into inflamed minds, and Yet
People would be buried, the smart, the old, the young and the elite, not a single soul would be granted g-d’s mercy.
This was just a ceremonious hell in a g-d forsaken world; that tore up the minds and souls, a disintegration of life.
And so it is, on that solemn pressing day, when the sun savagely beamed above their heads, when they reached the path of winding roads,
They jumped. 

Development

I developed slowly
I was always one step behind the mind's greatest discoveries--
Yet no one reminded me.
So I wandered deeper and deeper into the abyss
silently enraged by the lack of belief and understanding in my true self
I never found a niche
couldn't even process my own feelings of anxiety, fear and rage,
and Yet the crying stopped when words failed to talk more than the rich expression in my eyes
I wanted so much to have arms wrap around me
and tell me over and over again, that I was going to be okay. That I wasn't so strange
wasn't so skinny
wasn't so fucking weak
Yes I wanted someone to tell me I was beautiful--ON REPEAT.
Because beauty was what I knew so well
It was the reassuring mark of acceptance
after a long cry and sick feeling in my stomach---
that 'oh you look so pretty
after a long night of unfamiliar shelter.
Yes, the beauty of disguise made me sleep well.
So well in fact that I would win best in show.
Someone was watching over me because
I was given the tools I needed to find the attention I needed on my own.
Yet we all know that that shit is only skin deep.
Doesn't cure the hurt in one's heart
doesn't fix the broken memories of what may be laughter, fear or pain
doesn't stop me from remembering the unordinary nights when I felt so alone,  
when I find myself getting weak in the knees on a friday night as I remember the hazzy afternoons where i dug my fingernails into my mattress with the phone in my hand
because i didn't know what to do.
when I hid behind the door forgetting everything else
when I mechanically did as i was told the next day because I never thought to ask
what's this hole I feel I right here mommy?