senescence for the individual, immortality for the group

a commonly crude nomenclature wielded by a large percentage of the population - primarily online - is one in which a negative thing is often prescribed to be "cancer." given that this is both an inconsiderate phrase given that cancer actually exists as a terrible and painful experience, and that this phrasing is often applied to things like "the video game didn't give her massive tits because cancer" or "i lost this video game because the other player is using a character who is cancer," both of which dramatically oversell the negative outcome of such results, one would have to be daft to not assume that stated nomenclature is rendered largely both meaningless and bad (do not make the joke).

one finds that there is an equally likely portrayed value, that, while not a pithy, rude phrase, conveys a sense of a slow, immaterial march towards death. that is; an entire house of popular culture, from music, to self-help literature, to tv, and more, commonly prescribes the idea that one must be constantly working at all times. this 'hustle' as it were, is key to acquiring the requisite money and standing to survive in the modern world, and said hustle never truly can be allowed to end if one wants to succeed.

what these two seemingly disparate ideas or phrases have in common is a stretch the present author, in this hereto notably infelicitous post, will make via a haphazard rendering of the english language and a medical discovery from the year 1961. it seems reasonable to conclude that the idea of working in perpetuity, until one dies, is actually a distinctly bad thing. that to suggest that exhaustion is essentially the normal state we must occupy in order to exist might be something that society at large should endeavor to avoid. some unfortunate 19 year old dude online might suggest that such thing is 'cancer' which would, while continuing to exist as a rather unfortunate and crude use of the term, be, at least in this case, nominally accurate.

of course, all of this is dramatically and fearfully destitute if the interpretation is not nominally accurate, but instead entirely accurate. given that cancer cells are the only human cells that avoid the hayflick limit, and that said societal value does end with an individual's death (after working nonstop), one might surmise then that the idea of working constantly will, like the immortal cells of cancer that are able to replicate forever, outlive the individual humans subject to said value; all of the latter eventually rendered obsolete, telomerase shortened, existence lost to senescence.

the fall before the pride

it was always the same growing up. maybe never overt, but there. a sort of boot-strap your way through life, never brag, never boast. no joy in who you are. it fit, in a way. you were without church but your parents were raised in very religious households, perhaps if they couldn't impart the gospel onto you at least they could impart other values. pride is a sin. in school your friends would brag during basketball games, you won thunder and lightning against the entire 6th grade once and in a game went off for over 20 points. one day at soccer practice josh told you were the best player on the team far and away.  you shrugged and thanked him sheepishly. it was just what it was. it was to be expected. you had to be good, perfect, beyond perfect, so why brag about what is expected? bragging was rude, callous, made others aware of what they were not or did not have. you remember the money that flowed into your hands for graduating high school, and your friend asked you what you thought, and you said you didn't deserve it for doing what was supposed to be done, and he agreed, he felt the same. you knew that carrots worked better than sticks, this was well backed by decades of research, but neither felt appropriate. you just were, and you shouldn't need a reward to be so. years later you'd try to square this with your politics. you still can't.

there is no pride to be had in who you are. certainly not in where you are born, nationalism a constantly absurd concept, you did not choose your home country from a video game drop down menu before you were spit out. you chose no traits, no characteristics besides what you chose over the course of your life, and choosing the right ones was just that - choosing the right ones, doing the right thing, and isn't that reward enough?

but maybe you went too far. you yearned internally for the clothes you wanted, the classes you wanted, a sense of desire, of acceptance, of someone, anyone to like you and the choices you made, to recognize it. you wanted a publication credit, a slip that said you graduated, something you could hang your hat on, and even if nobody saw it, perhaps that was for the best.

but it all fit. the lack of pride fit your parents, fit your privileged class, fit everything, and so it was the only path. you were whatever someone else needed you to be. when your friends carpooled throughout college and you always drove, you never asked for gas money. you mapped out the destinations and didn't even tell them you had, you put liquor bottles away while they slept, it was the right thing to do, and in their comfort, you found comfort as well, and that was fine. nothing you do should be broadcast, should be told to others, it should just exist, like you, quiet and studious, doing the right thing. pride is a sin.

in the years since, you have wriggled and compromised, or maybe grown, it's all postmodern anyways. the clothes you wear are your own now, the music you listen to your own, the books you read your own. you still want no credit for what is necessary, because everything is necessary at all times.

and so you found yourself in line under rainbow balloons on a warm, sunny summer day, wearing a rainbow tanktop and jeggings and looking all the world like you and your group belonged. and you guess that was always the hard part. belonging. you never belonged at the lunch table you sat at in high school, it was a necessity but you didn't relate to those who trade insults. you didn't belong at the job, at the house with your parents, you felt constantly subverted and shrunk yourself to fit. but there, in the park, it all was. people wearing anything, celebrating themselves, protesting against a system designed for thousands of years to kill them, and still to this day doing so. american flags decorated against rainbow flags, as if the contradiction wasn't obvious. you felt excited about who you were, pins and stickers and clothing that you struggled to wear up until the last year. you walked amongst a crowd that felt like in any other occasion could drown you and never felt unsafe. maybe it was the company. maybe it was the atmosphere. maybe you are still wriggling and growing a bit. maybe you just want to be liked.

but the internal dialogue remains. here are people that deserve their pride, their protest, their life. what do you deserve? you haven't received a raise in years, you haven't changed the world, you haven't graduated, you haven't been perfect. you can't will yourself to be proud, you can't will yourself a feeling that has repulsed you for so long, so you enjoy the moment and try to accept who you are, at the very least, because you have finally found those who have. with your wife, with your friends, in that crowd, who you were was good enough. the next morning, you tried not to look in the mirror and hate your body again, like always, tried not to look at your lack of accomplishments.

after your shower you noticed your pan sticker still on your shirt in a crumpled up pile of dirty laundry. the wristband hugs your wrist throughout the day as a reminder that maybe in an alternate timeline, some version of you who likes being you and wears it like a badge of honor exists, but you can't get over the feeling that it is undeserved. you admonish yourself for not cleaning as you sit on the couch reading something you could never write. this is who you are, and that is ok, and it doesn't need to exist for the world to see. nobody ever told you explicitly, but everybody always did; pride is a sin.

clean

you remember being called back to the bathroom because the sink wasn't quite clean enough. a spot of grime underneath and along the edge where the faucet met the hard counter managed to escape the futile digging of your fingernail-less attempts to dig it out, you had picked the keratin out every day since you were 5 or 6 years old. you'd joke that your fingernails are never dirty because they don't exist, peeled back to disfigured shrapnel. on weekends when you went away, you'd expect to come back to a room your mom had gone through and cleaned, prying open nightstand drawers and going through shelves. many an embarrassing grade was found this way by her. it was all under the guise of making sure your room - which wasn't your room, really, it was still your parents - was clean. when your 6th grade teacher opened up your classroom desk to show your parents during conferences that it was too messy you were driven to school early the next day so you could clean it, you didn't want to lose an assignment or forget to bring home a graded paper you got for your parents to determine if the grade was good enough (if it wasn't an A, it wasn't), at least that's what they told you about it when they told you it was too messy. jenny two desks over had a moldy burger in hers. the teachers didn't care about her though, neither did her parents, so there was nothing to clean. you'd be sad about this when you reflected on it later. clean is a state of class. in high school your mom would reach across and pop a pimple or fix your hair so your appearance was clean, unasked for physical contact your body naturally reacted to by drawing away physically, wondering if seeing her son pull away every time she reached out hurt her.

as you got older you wondered if it was about actually cleanliness, or perhaps it was really about control. the basement office at home your mom asked you to help organize had a betamax porn video in it your parents didn't 'clean' out, the used car you bought from them had an erotic CD in the glove compartment they didn't 'clean' out. the house of theirs is still pristine largely but then your mom sees the state of your car one day and asks if she can help clean it, if she can pay for someone to clean it, please, anything, it's too messy. either it is a judgement on you or an attempt to control the space you still occupy, who knows. as a kid you had a weekly schedule for when to clean the bathrooms at home, when to vacuum, it seemed like any other household chore setup but you suppose every house is different, you have yet to have had a single friend whose place is as clean as the space you occupied as a kid.

she still tries. cars, desks, she offers to come to your place where you live with your wife and clean it, she promises no judgements but you know that has never been true. every year she calls her mom and she comes down and they clean together, an entire house, organized and managed and tidy. like mother like daughter. your current place is full of post-wedding stuff and it is cluttered and you know the words that would escape her mouth walking through the door would be caustic and judgmental.

when you moved into your first place years ago you let your bedroom become a disaster. depression-aided apathy gave way to a carpet completely covered in trash and laundry and alcohol and tobacco stains, not a single speck of carpet showing. over seventy trash bags and two and a half weeks later one spring it was done. you surveyed the room before you. you were content with the state of it. your mom never would be. maybe the metaphor was there the whole time.