I was talking to an old friend recently about a certain international event that has got everybody all lathered up of late. He mentioned that he had been talking the matter over with his wife for several days, and she brought up the point that this particular incident had potentially dramatic consequences, not just for Pakistan, but for Israel. My friend then asked me for my opinion on the subject. I was quiet for a little while, and I answered,
"Possibly. We'll have to see."
Profound, I know.
The fact of the matter is this: I live in America. I don't live in Pakistan, and I don't live in Israel. My father is from Israel, but we don't live there, and my family doesn't live there. In my world, small as it is, I care about what and whom I emotionally connect with. There are people of Irish descent in this country who've never set foot in Ireland, but belong to organizations (they'd probably spell it "organisations") like "Celtic Connection" (they'd probably spell it "Connexion") and, whenever something happens in Ireland, their ears perk up.
When shit goes down in the Middle East, I am relatively unfazed. Sorry. I just can't help it.
International news in general interests me, of course. Like a good Jewish Volvo driver, I read the NYT online edition every day. And by "read" I mean "scan the headlines of for stories that might potentially interest me." However, I am not someone who gets his rocks particularly off over espousing my views on what's going on in Tibet or the Congo. Do I have views on these subjects?
Sometimes. Not always.
Oftentimes, I feel far too ill-informed to formulate a view or opinion, and I would feel silly discussing something about which I am not grossly informed and/or semi-ambivalent about.
Why would I bother? To sound smart? I kind of think I'm smart already. To hear myself talk? Meh-- kind of nasal.
I guess sometimes I'm just too damned practical-- too fucking micro-- to engage in heated discussions about international affairs. I wish I was the sort of person who enjoyed getting all animated jawing about Egypt or Syria, but I'm just not. The people in these countries are going to do what they do whether or not I offer my view around the chart-room table. I'm not going to impress anybody, or move anybody, or gain anything out of chewing the fat about the value of the euro on a Thursday afternoon. I'd much rather talk about issues surrounding my job, or the challenges we face in every day life.
For me, the smaller the issue, the better. It's something I can conceptualize, something which with I can wrestle and, not only that, something I can (possibly) do something about.
Maybe that's what bothers me so much about fervent discussions about international affairs. What is going to change by talking about it? What is it going to matter what I think? Easy: it's not.
To that end, my wife and I are not the sort of couple that engages each other in spirited debate on matters of politics or happenings in far off places. Sometimes I wish we were that sort of couple but, mostly, I don't.
I think it's great if you're in a relationship where you can fight like James Carville and his wife over politics and then have romper-room-style sex afterwards, but that's just not us. We do our best to figure life out together, and it comes with complexities aplenty, that's for sure. Because we both listen to NPR very frequently, by the time we get home and back into each others' arms where we belong, we're so sick of the daily news anyway, who the hell wants to rehash it all in the dining room or the kitchen.
Besides, we pretty much know how the other one feels about most news stories anyway, even before they happen.
Showing posts with label talking out your ass. Show all posts
Showing posts with label talking out your ass. Show all posts
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Say What You Want
I miss being a precocious child.
I'm pretty precocious now, but it just isn't the same when you have 5 o'clock shadow and nosehair.
I think that, when you're college-aged, you're reasonably intelligent to grasp the idea that there are going to be precious few times in your life when you are going to be able to behave like a total asshole and face relatively few repercussions-- unless you have sex condomless with the wrong chick or throw up on a campus police officer-- and, knowing that, I think that most college kids make sure that they live it up a little because they're aware that they're going to have to settle down and grow up.
You know, at least ten or so years after graduation.
When you're a young child, even a precocious one, you don't really have the intellectual foresight to appreciate how lucky you are that you're a small child and you can say pretty much whatever you want. And, yeah, you might be sent to your room or remonstrated sternly by some D in a sweatervest, but, basically, nothing's going to happen to you.
Like the time my sister was giving me a hard time on the front lawn one beautiful summer's day, and I had had enough of her.
"Oh, go dip your vagina in duck sauce!" I yelled at her, at age 8.
We must have just had Chinese food.
What is even funnier about this situation to me now, looking back on it, was not that I said that to my sister, loudly, in the open space of our front yard, but that my sister then had the courage and lack of embarrassment to report, verbatim, what I had said to our parents. Truthfully, if she had told me to go bathe my penis is hoisin sauce, I don't know that I would have been able to repeat that to my parents.
Oh, it was a good life.
In fourth grade, when Ms. Curly asked me what would I have done, had I been one of the bears who found Goldilocks sleeping in my bed, I said,
"I would have decked that straying son-of-a-tulip."
I think I was just repeating a phrase I had recently read in a "Bloom County" cartoon from the book "Night of the Mary Kay Commandos." Ms. Curly, obviously not a fan of Berkeley Breathed, was not entertained. While displeasure spread over her face like Parvovirus, she didn't throw me out of the room. She just harshly said my name as her eyes bugged out, making her look, I remember thinking, just like Bill the Cat.
Then there was the time in sixth grade where I made a film about the Loch Ness Monster, investigated by an fictional policeman from Scotland Yard named "Constable Clitoris." Thanks, Monty Python.
Amazingly, no phone call was placed to my parents' home. No letter from the principal. No disciplinary action. The Precocious Child wins again, remains unscathed, and lives to fight another day.
It was a good life, really.
Did I appreciate it then? The shield of immunity provided to the precocious child? No, I did not. Now, the only way I can say whatever I want is pretty much what you're looking at here. And, in one respect, that's okay, because there ought to be consequences for going around shooting your mouth off and being inappropriate in the company of others, in the public sphere-- on the front lawns of America. You can't expect people to work in an environment where people are telling their bosses to go dip their vaginas in duck sauce, for example. That just wouldn't work. But I do miss that freedom of the tongue.
Of course, this freedom returns, pretty much as it was, when you reach old age and you can just blame everything on dementia. At least there's something to look forward to.
I'm pretty precocious now, but it just isn't the same when you have 5 o'clock shadow and nosehair.
I think that, when you're college-aged, you're reasonably intelligent to grasp the idea that there are going to be precious few times in your life when you are going to be able to behave like a total asshole and face relatively few repercussions-- unless you have sex condomless with the wrong chick or throw up on a campus police officer-- and, knowing that, I think that most college kids make sure that they live it up a little because they're aware that they're going to have to settle down and grow up.
You know, at least ten or so years after graduation.
When you're a young child, even a precocious one, you don't really have the intellectual foresight to appreciate how lucky you are that you're a small child and you can say pretty much whatever you want. And, yeah, you might be sent to your room or remonstrated sternly by some D in a sweatervest, but, basically, nothing's going to happen to you.
Like the time my sister was giving me a hard time on the front lawn one beautiful summer's day, and I had had enough of her.
"Oh, go dip your vagina in duck sauce!" I yelled at her, at age 8.
We must have just had Chinese food.
What is even funnier about this situation to me now, looking back on it, was not that I said that to my sister, loudly, in the open space of our front yard, but that my sister then had the courage and lack of embarrassment to report, verbatim, what I had said to our parents. Truthfully, if she had told me to go bathe my penis is hoisin sauce, I don't know that I would have been able to repeat that to my parents.
Oh, it was a good life.
In fourth grade, when Ms. Curly asked me what would I have done, had I been one of the bears who found Goldilocks sleeping in my bed, I said,
"I would have decked that straying son-of-a-tulip."
I think I was just repeating a phrase I had recently read in a "Bloom County" cartoon from the book "Night of the Mary Kay Commandos." Ms. Curly, obviously not a fan of Berkeley Breathed, was not entertained. While displeasure spread over her face like Parvovirus, she didn't throw me out of the room. She just harshly said my name as her eyes bugged out, making her look, I remember thinking, just like Bill the Cat.
Then there was the time in sixth grade where I made a film about the Loch Ness Monster, investigated by an fictional policeman from Scotland Yard named "Constable Clitoris." Thanks, Monty Python.
Amazingly, no phone call was placed to my parents' home. No letter from the principal. No disciplinary action. The Precocious Child wins again, remains unscathed, and lives to fight another day.
It was a good life, really.
Did I appreciate it then? The shield of immunity provided to the precocious child? No, I did not. Now, the only way I can say whatever I want is pretty much what you're looking at here. And, in one respect, that's okay, because there ought to be consequences for going around shooting your mouth off and being inappropriate in the company of others, in the public sphere-- on the front lawns of America. You can't expect people to work in an environment where people are telling their bosses to go dip their vaginas in duck sauce, for example. That just wouldn't work. But I do miss that freedom of the tongue.
Of course, this freedom returns, pretty much as it was, when you reach old age and you can just blame everything on dementia. At least there's something to look forward to.
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