We're All Robots

This morning I heard Miranda Lambert's newest single "Little Red Wagon" on the radio.  It pushed me over the fucking edge.  It's one of the worst songs that I've ever heard, the worst case of the homogenized, commercialized, plastic, unoriginal pop music, mass production factory offerings.  I wanted to smash my fist through the radio, snatch the recording microphone away from Miranda and fling that motherfucker into the god damned frozen Maumee River.  Trust me, there are bottom feeding carp in that fucking river, that can record more original music, than anything being produced for mainstream radio.

As my blood pressure settled back to its normal pre-hypertension levels, I began to observe the world around me through a different filter, a new theoretical philosophy.  What if we aren't capable of original thought?  What if somehow, in the course of evolution, we've become programmed to think and act in a certain manner?  What if the crazy, fundamentalist Christians and the whack-o conspiracy theorists were right and the world government has secretly implanted a computer chip in all of us?  Once upon a time, I would have never subscribed to any of these theories, but now it's the only thing that makes sense.  It's the only thing that can possibly explain the total lack of creativity, the death of originality in our world.

What good is it, to be a free people, when we mindlessly follow whatever is crammed in our faces?  This is a fact of evolution; humans have become increasingly lazy.  It's easier to wake up everyday and just simply go about our daily routines, than it is to make an effort to form original thoughts.  Americans go to work.  They come home and sit in front of televisions, that subscribe to cable services, that predetermine which channels they can watch and which ones they can't.  They watch bullshit programs that are basically the same as every other program.  At any given time, there are at least 14 police/detective programs airing in circulation.  As of 2010, there have been at least 320 different reality television shows.

In the course of a week, the average American will spend 22 hours and 24 minutes on social media sites and five hours and 42 minutes reading.  We are coming full circle as human beings, transitioning into cavemen with great technology.  In the near future we'll simply use 12 different Facebook memes to communicate, while we sip our fake sugared diet colas, eat our 800 calorie fast food burgers, while we watch the 76th different spin off of CSI.

Wake the fuck up people.  Stop buying shitty music just because the radio plays it.  Stop watching stupid fucking reality TV shows, just because it's easier to sit our ever expanding asses in a comfortable chair and be entertained than it is to actually pick up a fucking book.

A few weeks ago, I wrote about the imminent death of the arts.  Art is fucking dying because you keep spending your fucking money on Taylor Swift singles, on Thomas Kinkade prints, at chain restaurants, on whatever ad Facebook conveniently places in your news feed.  Art is fucking dying, because original thought is dying.  Original thought is dying, because we've allowed ourselves to become fucking robots, simply consuming whatever is put in front of us.

The lack of originality drives me fucking insane.  It is the single most hated thing in my life.  Whenever I feel like I'm stuck in a rut, or routine, I will go out of my way to do everything different.  I'll take a different route to work in the morning.  I'll listen to a different radio station, to different music while I'm at work.  Or I'll shut the music off while at work, and try to engage my coworkers in intelligent conversation.  That only works if I can convince them to talk about anything other than football.  The point is, that too many people, for far too long, have followed a routine, until we've allowed our world to become routine.  What good is living in a free country, when we all mindlessly follow the man?

I am and always have been attracted to anything that is different.  You know what first caught my attention when I met my wife?  Besides the fact that she's exquisitely beautiful?  She's different.  She's a contradiction.  She's creative.  She reads books.  She's everything that I've ever craved in life.  In fact, we spent most of our first date talking about these very things.  Yes, this will embarrass the hell out of her and she'll stubbornly disagree with some of it.  Also, she makes really good meatloaf.  I'm talking the best meatloaf I've ever had the pleasure of eating.  And, I love her.  And, this is my column and I don't have an editor (she usually helps edit, but we'll surprise her with this one.) Anyway, she's uncompromisingly unique, and I love that about her.

Fight back against mindlessness.  Put the super sized diet cola with the fake sugar down.  Do something different, anything different.  Don't do something just because everyone else is doing it.  Think for yourself.  Be yourself.  Fuck everything else.  Unplug the fucking microchip.  Stop being a goddamn robot.  Go forth and think.  I know it's hard sometimes, but the entire course of our future world depends on our ability to do it. 

*Writer's note:  After she read the column, she did have a few pertinent editing tips and I have followed her advice.

I was gonna....

I was going to write a great blog tonight, full of words that made my readers feel things.  I spent a lot of time at work, thinking of different topics.  Instead, I opted to write my wife a letter.  Yes, you read that correctly.  I wrote my WIFE a letter.  I got married last Saturday in Las Vegas.  It was one of the best moments of my life. 

My wife and I had a conversation earlier today, that prompted the need for a letter.  Although many people say they enjoy hearing me speak publicly, I have always felt more comfortable communicating through the written word.  I try to write her a letter, or a poem, at least once a week.  Writing allows me to gather my thoughts, put them on paper and edit them, so that I say what I'm trying to say, before delivering the communication. 

I have read a lot of writers decrying the dying art of letter writing.  Emails, text messages and instant messages, have all but killed off the need for letters.  I concur with these writers.  I believe that writing in any form, strengthens my technique as a writer. 

I have made a commitment to myself, to work on my writing, for at least one hour every night.  This is a tall commitment  for a man that works 60+ hours a week in a factory.  Working on my writing involves writing and editing poetry, writing and editing short stories, working on my novel, writing this blog column, sending poetry to publications in an attempt to get published and of course, writing letters. 

A lot of famous writers also mention the need to read, if you desire to be a writer.  In addition to this commitment of writing for an hour a day, it is also important that I read.  Reading is likely more important for a writer like myself, than for many other writers.  I am not a college educated writer.  That is sometimes a disadvantage for me, but can also be an advantage.  There are writers with college degrees, who have smoother technique and are better at punctuation.  Conversely, working in a factory, having unique life experiences, is to my advantage.  Due to the lack of formal writing education, I feel that it is more important for me to read than it is for other writers.  What greater education is available for a writer than reading?

Working a hectic factory schedule, limits my free time.  It takes a certain amount of discipline to write and read, when I'd rather be doing other things that involve relaxation.  It means that I have to make some sacrifices.  I rarely watch television.  We don't have cable anymore, because we don't watch a lot of television in our home.  Time spent watching TV is time that could be used for reading and writing.  I don't watch as many movies as I'd like to.  Sometimes I stay awake later than I should, because I'm writing or reading.  These sacrifices are all worthwhile, as long as I write.  I'm well aware that if I am to gain acclaim as a writer, that I'm going to have to exert more effort than others who have more time available. 

I don't think that one form of writing is more important than the others.  Unless it's writing letters for my girl.  That takes precedent over anything else that I write.  I need to work on my novel more, but poetry is easier to write.  At the end of the day, it's only important that I have done enough writing collectively, that I can feel comfortable calling myself a writer. 

In other news, I received a rejection letter the other day, from a publication that rejected my poetry.  They did however, call me a lovely badass, which is awesome.  They also wrote that they enjoyed "my voice in the poems" and that they particularly enjoyed one poem more than the others.  I also received an invitation from another publication, to write a guest blog.  The publication, an online magazine, said that they would love to publish some of my poetry in their poetry corner, in the same edition that features my guest blog.  So some of my writing time later this week will be spent working on and submitting an idea for a guest blog.  This is a huge step for me as a writer and will help get my work out to a wider audience.  The late night hours spent reading and writing are paying off.  Stay tuned for more, from your soon to be, slightly more well known, angry writer. 

Art on Life Support

Kurt Vonnegut wrote in his book Palm Sunday, that free enterprise was killing literature.  He was right.  Our schools are eliminating art, music and theater programs.  Publishers are publishing less novels.  Short story writers have very few places available to publish their stories.  Poets, the scourge of the literary world, have no one left to buy their poems.  Art, in general, is on life support.

I can't pinpoint exactly when the arts became ill.  I suspect that illness began somewhere after the hippie movement.  The Hippie lifestyle filtered into the mainstream and a cultural appreciation for the arts filtered into commercial profits.  The profits birthed a rush of mass appeal that began to smother individual creativity. The illness progressed during the '80's and into the 90's.   Sure, there have been some bright spots mixed in there; some Kurt Cobains, Chuck Palahuniuks.  But the arts slowly became more and more diseased, dying from a lack of true self expression.   

Consider this:  How difficult is it for an artist to live, supporting themselves on their art alone?  How difficult is it for a writer, to just be a writer, and not have to work in another occupation to make ends meet?  I often wonder how many great artists and writers never get discovered, because they are too busy trying to make a living and don't have the time available to develop their talents? 

While discussing this topic with my lover, she pointed out that everything today seems manufactured and not created.  The masses have opted to spend their dollars on entertainment over creativity.  Music is commercialized.  Many new music artists are selected for their looks and appeal, rather than their creative genius, because appeal sells albums and selling makes profit.  Perhaps the Buggles were right, video killed the radio star.  George Strait nailed it when he sang Murder on Music Row.  Rock and Roll?  Hip Hop?  Country?  They all sound like commercialized pop music. 

That's just music.  I suspect that money is what is killing the arts.  Kurt Vonnegut pointed out that today's publishers don't want to publish an author's first novel anymore.  It's simply not cost effective.  But how is an author supposed to develop into an author, if no one is willing to bet on those first novels?  How is a musician supposed to sell records, when the industry won't sign them because they don't have the right look?  One of my favorite country/folk/americana artists is a man named Hayes Carll.  He's a brilliant singer.  His voice is raw, raspy, different than anything you hear in mainstream music.  How is he not famous? 

How is Honey Boo Boo an American icon?  Kim Kardashian?  Paris Hilton?  How is it that one in every 20 American homes contain a fucking Thomas Kinkade print?  Kinkade's art exemplifies everything wrong with mass produced art.  I find it dull, boring and unoriginal, which often seems to equal mass appeal.  

Recently in the midst of the City of Detroit going through bankruptcy, there were threats of auctioning off the paintings in their art museum.  This, more than anything in recent times, caught my attention.  What a travesty it would have been if a museum full of treasures, would have been sold off, piece by piece, to private collectors. 

So the arts are on life support.  My question is, what are we as a society, going to do about it?  It is becoming more and more obvious, that government dollars are not going to be allotted to the arts any longer.  It is more important to spend 50 billion dollars on theoretical warplanes that don't work.  So it's up to us. 

I don't have all of the answers.  It's difficult for me to be disciplined enough to keep money in my savings account, let alone be financially astute enough to develop a workable economic plan for saving the arts.  But I think I have some ideas.  Why don't we challenge ourselves to spend money out of our own pockets on the arts this year?  Instead of buying manufactured made in China crap as birthday gifts, why don't we instead buy paintings from local starving artists?  Why don't we buy self-published books from local writers?  How about tickets for the local opera house, the local repertoire?  Why don't we include local open mic poetry readings in our regular date nights with our lovers?  Go see local musicians playing in local bars?  Visit local art shows? 

I'm open to ideas.  If you have any, I'd love to hear your feedback.  The arts are too important for our generation to be the ones that let them die on our watch.  The arts are on life support.  Are we going to stand back and watch the plug be pulled, or are we going to pitch in and breathe some new life into them?  The choice is ours. 

Factory Life

A bonus column for my seven devoted readers.  I started writing this a few weeks ago, after being challenged by my friend Ron White, to describe how I get through a day of work.  If you don't know Ron (he's a freelance writer in Florida, not referencing the comedian) you should.  He's a stellar writer and a beautiful man.  I was going back over some aborted posts and decided I'd share this, despite the fact that I wasn't fully satisfied with the direction it was going when I wrote it.  



The bell sounds at 5:30 a.m. signaling the start of the shift.  The assembly line lurches forward and the production day begins.  This is my 18th consecutive day of work.  It will be five more days before I have a day off.  I have worked an average of 58 hours every week this year.  Earlier in the spring, I once worked 61 consecutive days. 

I build rear suspensions for the Jeep Cherokee.  There are seven job stations on my side of the line.  We have 51 seconds to complete each job cycle.  Most of the seven jobs are simple.  There are two that are more difficult and are despised by my coworkers.  Even the simple jobs are taxing. Doing the same thing over and over again, for two hour periods, is a brutal process.  When the line runs well, and it almost always does, it is difficult to even find a few seconds to sip your coffee or bottled water.  You often find yourself pleading with the universe for a few moments of downtime, just so you can collect yourself, stretch and chug some Gatorade. 

We rotate jobs after every break,in an attempt to prevent repetitive motion injuries.  Carpel tunnel is still a major health risk in our industry.  As I type this column, there are occasional shooting pains in my left hand.  Outside of repetitive motion injuries, I struggle with aching and arthritic knees, exacerbated by standing on a concrete floor for 10 hours a day, seven days a week.  The skin on my hands is perpetually dry, often leading to painful cracks around the joints of my fingers. 

A 10 hour shift can be excruciating.  I tend to start most days with a positive mindset, but it is difficult to maintain for the duration of the day.  I've done each of the seven jobs, thousands and thousands of times this year, so many times that I could almost do them in my sleep.  My mind wanders frequently.  In fact, the more my mind wanders, the easier it is to get through my work day.  It's the days that I feel a little off, or am frustrated with any aspect of my life enough to focus on it, that I feel stuck and am unable to escape the mindless tasks in front of me. 

Music is an absolute necessity for me to survive these exhausting shifts.  I created a Spotify account and readily fork out $10 a month for it.  I'm constantly browsing the App's music library for new and undiscovered music.  On any given day, I'll flip from Eminem to Bob Dylan, from Merle Haggard to 50 Cent, bluegrass to classical to metal to folk.  There isn't a music genre that I won't explore, all in an effort to escape the reality of my work. 

I've also learned the art of sending a text message in between job cycles.  Being able to stay in frequent communication with my significant other throughout the day, goes a long way towards making my shift bearable. It sometimes takes me four or five minutes to complete a text message, but hearing how her day is going, makes mine easier to get through.  Plus she's extremely witty and we sometimes have more in depth conversations via text, than we do in person. 

We get two 15 minute breaks, a 30 minute, unpaid lunch and two 10 minute breaks.  There isn't much time to rest on these breaks.  The nearest smoke shack is about 100 yards away.  I smoke a cigarette, use the restroom and often grab a coffee or water refill and a snack, all in those precious few minutes of break time.  Using the restroom is crucial.  I can't just walk off of the line and use the bathroom whenever nature calls.  There are days when bodily functions fail to follow the break schedule.  This requires goading our team leader off of his chair, so that he can replace me on the line for a few minutes. 

Some days are easier than others.  Some days are just brutal from start to finish.  It's not glamorous, but I take a certain amount of pride in working hard for the pay that I earn.  I fully intend to become a professional writer some day.  Until that day comes, I'm prepared to spend my days building Jeeps and coming home to pen snarky poems and perfect sentences.  After all, over 20,000 people applied for my job when I was hired, and there are thousands and thousands of other folks who wish they had the opportunity that I have.