“I Have a Friend…”: Observation of Others that Hit Home

So I was listening to some “wholesome”  music that is worthwhile in its description of the ennui of modern eros, and this story came to mind (pardon the initial commercial on the video).

Who wouldn’t like a pretty girl to call your own?

Most young men wish to meet that sweet pretty girl who could meet him on an equal level of moral character, but these days it is more complicated as if it were ever easy in the first place. If you wish to meet the girl schooled in Jane Austen, it is more than likely she has read the novel in terms of reading the structure of the story as one which sets up the scenario as the question of male power and female counter-power as they  fight themselves out over any and all persuasion. It is the power of persuasion anyway.

Despite the parabasis of speaking to “dear reader,” each of you takes that direct advice on a layaway basis. If whatever is desired sits in the warehouse without making payments toward any ownership, then at least you had the fun of believing that each of you could eventually, someday become an owner—even if niether of you ever made that final payment.

It is probably true that Miss (or Ms.) Austen always already presented the case in that cynical of a manner, but nowadays such cynicism requires the acceptance of a tattoo to boot. Nowadays the tattoo is an emblem of important individuality that the young suitor must accept in and on his beloved. It is no different than the innumerable “sexual experiences” she has had before meeting you.

Besides you are no better. Apart from the few (or several) easy drunken lays that you have had in the past, you are no different than she with her  “tramp stamp” on the small of her back. You are lucky if that is the only ink she has. But you too have had your share of anti-social/social behavior of drugs and violence. Who are you to judge? You too probably have a tattoo too.

It’s a match made in the heaven of bodily ink art.

Even if you are both bluffing on the history both of your equally shady pasts, you both have seen plenty of porn on the internet, and considering the amount that is actually out there and easily available, you can guess that she he seen the same amount as you. It is best not to speak of the circumstances surrounding why either of you have seen such things.

You and she pretend to be in a Jane Austen novel, and this is a “noble lie” all pointing to the good, but knowing the depravity of yourself as you do, you begin to wonder of the “virtue” of what you call your significant other, especially when you look at that tattoo peaking through the bottom of the back of her her shirt as she speaks on the phone to an “ex-boyfriend.”

But you’re in a relationship and it is important. Self and other—even if it is significant, that significance can become tenuous with the slightest emotional difference. After all, you were only together for the most superficial reasons, e.g., you liked each other’s looks, or even better you both really liked fried chicken and country music. A relationship is a pretty weak basis for anything.

Despite the fact that both of your families really liked each other, when you broke up it was as amicable as could be. Yes, it happened that due to the screaming, the neighbors called the police on the night you broke up. But that was simply what all couples do when they fight.

So if not a Jane Austen novel, it’s more like a Raymond Carver short story. The passions were directed more to the everyday matters of what it meant to survive. It didn’t meet expectations that you had aspired to what you thought was greatness. So be it.

The end of American ambition might very well be the trailer park.

Yet, you always have your books! If you are lucky.