or,
Utopia’s Stunning Dose
of Pretense Is Quite a
Kick in the Teeth!
I’m certain that I’m missing
something terribly integral
here, but sometimes it’s nice
to just roll with these little
notions that seem so poignant
when they first creep into con
sciousness. Tonight I’ve some
how gotten sidetracked into del
ving into the heart of my con
flicted feelings about pretense,
for which, in my typical geminian
way, I’ve had a lifelong love-hate
thing, wherein I cravenly seek out
and at the same time have utter
contempt for the fake of it all.
Phony baloney is to my mind
entirely too prevalent, inescap
able now. So my next thought
is how pretense, in and of itself,
seems so often to me to either be
a class construct or a criminal one.
And these two particular avenues
into the swamp of surreality are,
whether or not one is conscious of
even traveling either route, anti
thetical to what I’d consider my
idea(l) of living well; they’re quite
problematic, downright cruel. Then
I remember that this living and being
NOT oneself is what “lies” at the heart
of theatrical, and of cinematic. This
thought, that my art form, or at least
the one to which I am indebted, the
one because of which I am still deeply
in debt, and that for which I (quite
proudly, I should add) have two paper
degrees, a fact for which I hold not
even one ounce of regret, is, at its
core, by its very nature, constrained
indelibly by a long set of rules on del
ivering in the most convincing way,
dishonesty. It is the art of being UN
real. So, with my brain duly evapo
rated, I decide it’s time to stave off
these all-too-dandy-and-overwhelm
ing thoughts, to hit pause on “big
thinking” until I’m up to it again.
And sure enough, I’ve got what I
at first think the perfect antidote
coming right up. For I can see right
here in my calendar just the thing: it
is time for the latest round with my
D&D team. RPG to the rescue! Yay
and hooray! And then it hits me, rising
like a methane bubble from my drained
brain’s last gasp of common sense! Oof!!
