I read a series of books about what it would be like if Revelations actually happened as written. If you cut out all the preachy crap, it was a pretty vivid description of the end times. It'd make a good 85 minute flick.
After reading the previous post, I'll add my take on the subject. See, rebellion is something that I and my sister have been around alot by the choices we've made. You can't be involved in the arts and NOT see this stuff. Like I said, I have geeky friends who grow up and like stuff like tattoos and odd piercings and shaved/dyed hair. Whatever. It was for them.
It's not me. For a number of key reasons, it is not now nor never will be me. But that's me and only me. If you want it, go nuts. It's your money.
I chose to rebel in plain sight. I like dressing to fit in, blend in. What's going on in my head is far more rebellious an existence than any outward showing. I sometimes speak my unfiltered mind, take people to places I've only imagined. That place is the razor's edge of creativity and insanity.
The view's okay, but the drinks suck.
Maybe it's because I did something that many people didn't approve of at such an early age, or maybe it's because it's more mainstream. Maybe no one really cares. But I'm so used to the doing something that disappoints feeling that I now own the action- I embrace it. No one ever 'approved' of anything I did except school and work. It's not that they didn't -actually- approve, they just never communicated that sentiment. I know I didn't invest myself in hobbies and activities where the end result was someone else's approval. When in music, I was just happy if I made it through the pieces and I hadn't screwed up.
Only my parents ever said "wow, nice report card." College drove that home- I was only a number, found on a dot matrix printed sheet after every test. No one swooped in to help, no one at school or anywhere other than family cared if I passed or failed. No one other than family cared if I got my Ph.D, or was unemployed, or had to work 70 hours a week...
Youth may be about rebellion, but it is inelegant. Crude. Arguing for the sake of argument, and not for a real intelligent reason. The reasons for rebellion are rarely considered, but that's the point. The reason people didn't get tattoos are numerous, but do those still apply? We expect the 20, 30 year old to sky dive. We shun the 40 and 50 year old, because they're supposed to be serious and have families. We celebrate the 60, 70 year old- "oh, they're so "alive!" But what's the difference? You can take rebellious actions at any age.
Ever notice that we're only really truly concerned when people rebel for others, as opposed to for themselves?
But whatever. Point is that rebellion is very much a normal part of life. I would offer that you start to die- really die- when you have stopped rebelling in any capacity. And if you never rebelled, I would offer that you never truly lived.
But please don't call it body art. That's so inane and vapid a description that you should swallow a bullet. Most people that get such are incapable of their own creativity or expression and they pay to advertise someone else's. I know my sister has more creative power in her pinky than just about anyone- but the sullen goth, emo, metalhead, cam/scenewhore, fanboi/grrl, or other trendy wastes of DNA just don't, and they realize their entire existence will be summed up by some bored dude in a rural tattoo parlor. Sad.
11 February 2011
09 February 2011
Rebellion Is For Grownups
Today was revelation day. That's revelation with the lowercase 'r' because otherwise we'd be dealing with biblical-type stuff - if you believe that.
I've done some very odd things in the last year and some. I wouldn't assign these actions to the mid-life crisis category although I can see they fit in that category as well. Shortly after my 40th birthday, I got a tattoo - during my first trip to Vegas. (that's 2 - tattoo and Vegas).
Yesterday, after giving it years of thought under the "Oh my god, I would NEVER do that category", I merely got up during lunch and drove myself to the tattoo and piercing parlor and had my left nostril pierced with a tiny stud and my navel pierced with a not-so-tiny stud. I really haven't told anyone. I guess the cat's out of the bag now. (that's 2 more.)
Non sequitur - neither one hurt more than having blood drawn. To me. I realize now that I am extremely pain tolerant. I will address that another day.
I spent the majority of my life looking at the people who did those things as reckless, dangerous, scary, rebellious...all of the things I had heard from my parents and authority figures all my life. The society I grew up in preached things like that were scandalous. Nice girls didn't do any of those things. And so, that was my perception as well. Deep down inside I found the forbidden intriguing but I pushed it quickly out of my head, knowing that I would be judged by people. Judged negatively. My parents would be horrified, disapproving. I was worried what people who didn't even know me would think of me. Deeply worried.
I know that my parents (my mother) will probably roll their eyes over the piercings and STILL I get nervous.
I grew up living in fear of disappointing my parents; disappointing authority figures, disappointing everyone really. It's one of my biggest faults. Cliche but true; if you spend all your time trying to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. And you certainly end up not pleasing yourself.
Tattoos and piercings are more common now thanks to celebrities and athletes who have numbed the shock value by making them mainstream. I think professional athletes are practically required to have multiples of each. Also, a generation of young, more brazen and cavalier people have made it commonplace. Off the top of my head I can't think of anyone I know in their 20's and teens who doesn't have one or the other.
Youth is all about rebellion. The most rebellious I was as a teen and in my 20's was arguing with my parents. I never even considered what I thought about anything. I accepted my parents' point of view as gospel and went on my merry way. I stayed that way until my early 30's.
Yeah, I get it, I'm a real late bloomer. But I have a tattoo and am considering another. I have multiple piercings in my ears - de rigueur for girls who were in their teens during the '80's. And now the tiny stud in my left nostril and the somewhat larger cubic zirconia stud in my navel join them. Maybe someday I'll regret it. Right now, I love it.
The lifelong church lady voices in the back of my head still cluck their tongues and try to make me feel guilty. But I wanted it and I did it.
Tattoos and piercings are not a big deal anymore to anyone. That isn't the point. It doesn't make me cool or edgy, because everyone does it. Yeah, strippers have tattoos and piercings; but I also know lawyers and doctors that do, too.
As painful as it is to admit, by the time someone my age gets around to doing something daring, it stopped being daring years before.
The triumph to me was that it was my decision and if you don't like it; I don't care.
Only took me 41 years to say that and really mean it.
I've done some very odd things in the last year and some. I wouldn't assign these actions to the mid-life crisis category although I can see they fit in that category as well. Shortly after my 40th birthday, I got a tattoo - during my first trip to Vegas. (that's 2 - tattoo and Vegas).
Yesterday, after giving it years of thought under the "Oh my god, I would NEVER do that category", I merely got up during lunch and drove myself to the tattoo and piercing parlor and had my left nostril pierced with a tiny stud and my navel pierced with a not-so-tiny stud. I really haven't told anyone. I guess the cat's out of the bag now. (that's 2 more.)
Non sequitur - neither one hurt more than having blood drawn. To me. I realize now that I am extremely pain tolerant. I will address that another day.
I spent the majority of my life looking at the people who did those things as reckless, dangerous, scary, rebellious...all of the things I had heard from my parents and authority figures all my life. The society I grew up in preached things like that were scandalous. Nice girls didn't do any of those things. And so, that was my perception as well. Deep down inside I found the forbidden intriguing but I pushed it quickly out of my head, knowing that I would be judged by people. Judged negatively. My parents would be horrified, disapproving. I was worried what people who didn't even know me would think of me. Deeply worried.
I know that my parents (my mother) will probably roll their eyes over the piercings and STILL I get nervous.
I grew up living in fear of disappointing my parents; disappointing authority figures, disappointing everyone really. It's one of my biggest faults. Cliche but true; if you spend all your time trying to please everyone, you end up pleasing no one. And you certainly end up not pleasing yourself.
Tattoos and piercings are more common now thanks to celebrities and athletes who have numbed the shock value by making them mainstream. I think professional athletes are practically required to have multiples of each. Also, a generation of young, more brazen and cavalier people have made it commonplace. Off the top of my head I can't think of anyone I know in their 20's and teens who doesn't have one or the other.
Youth is all about rebellion. The most rebellious I was as a teen and in my 20's was arguing with my parents. I never even considered what I thought about anything. I accepted my parents' point of view as gospel and went on my merry way. I stayed that way until my early 30's.
Yeah, I get it, I'm a real late bloomer. But I have a tattoo and am considering another. I have multiple piercings in my ears - de rigueur for girls who were in their teens during the '80's. And now the tiny stud in my left nostril and the somewhat larger cubic zirconia stud in my navel join them. Maybe someday I'll regret it. Right now, I love it.
The lifelong church lady voices in the back of my head still cluck their tongues and try to make me feel guilty. But I wanted it and I did it.
Tattoos and piercings are not a big deal anymore to anyone. That isn't the point. It doesn't make me cool or edgy, because everyone does it. Yeah, strippers have tattoos and piercings; but I also know lawyers and doctors that do, too.
As painful as it is to admit, by the time someone my age gets around to doing something daring, it stopped being daring years before.
The triumph to me was that it was my decision and if you don't like it; I don't care.
Only took me 41 years to say that and really mean it.
06 February 2011
How do you do, indeed?
I'm the younger sibling. Because she set the time frame based on me, I'll say I'm a certain age. I had a different midwest experience, leaving when I was 12... from being picked on as a nerd in a rural elementary school to being picked on as a nerd in a "big city suburb." It's nice to know some values truly are American. But I came out okay, mocking derision aside.
I attended the same college as my older sister, starting the semester after she graduated, and "doing my thing." Like many 20-something guys, I was a huge sports fan. Always loved hockey- started watching it when ESPN made it to our rural midwestern hovel at the tender age of 8- and grew to like or tolerate the rest. My zeal for sports has calmed a bit, though.
I am an Alpha Nerd. I have a Master's in Chemistry, I can still fill 90% of the periodic table by memory. I am a gamer. Not just video games, but the tawdry, freeform variety that involve sweaty, obese men with neckbeards that can quote rules and probabilities of events in an amateur attempt to be Rain Man. You might say "You mean like Dungeons and Dragons?" I would respond... "roll for initiative. it's on."
This is not to say I am completely socially inept. Just enough to struggle with events and issues that the average human being takes for granted. Mostly because I dislike anything that's popular.
I've had a bit of an arrested development- got married at 32, had my first child four years later. Ended up making a career out of the desperation of simply finding a job for awhile. For 8 years I still don't understand how I made money doing what I did. Now I don't understand how others do.
I am pretty relaxed as far as personal politics go- as long as you don't tell me what to think, I won't tell you where to go- and that's served for some time. Occasionally people will try to get me to change my thinking. This is when they realize I can be... difficult. I really, honestly don't care about "what side of the aisle you're on." Unlike many of the mouth-breathing, adderal-addicted, generic simpletons that graduate college but can't find China on a map or a chinese restaurant on the internet I can actually argue both sides of a political issue. I do this to induce apoplexy in the weak-minded.
I also like jello.
And much like my sibling I am also a faceless, nameless drone in the buzz of our nation's capitol. I truly revel in this, though. I feel no need to stand out. The less people know the better. Becoming a father has made me truly understand my general worth, or more appropriately worthlessness. I don't exist to be a person, I exist for my wife and son. My joy is irrelevant anymore.
I am here because my sister- the woman who shares my parents, 13 years of my life, and many other things- asked me to and to show that despite having the same DNA donors you can have two human beings as dissimilar as we are... or at least, dissimilar is how we are able to sleep at night. It's when we'll start to accept the similarities that will come out of this interwebz dokument that revelations will be made, gasping will be heard, a giant crack will occur in a glacier, and as the tower of jade topples in front of us we will run through a grassy field and realize the meaninglessness of existance.
I attended the same college as my older sister, starting the semester after she graduated, and "doing my thing." Like many 20-something guys, I was a huge sports fan. Always loved hockey- started watching it when ESPN made it to our rural midwestern hovel at the tender age of 8- and grew to like or tolerate the rest. My zeal for sports has calmed a bit, though.
I am an Alpha Nerd. I have a Master's in Chemistry, I can still fill 90% of the periodic table by memory. I am a gamer. Not just video games, but the tawdry, freeform variety that involve sweaty, obese men with neckbeards that can quote rules and probabilities of events in an amateur attempt to be Rain Man. You might say "You mean like Dungeons and Dragons?" I would respond... "roll for initiative. it's on."
This is not to say I am completely socially inept. Just enough to struggle with events and issues that the average human being takes for granted. Mostly because I dislike anything that's popular.
I've had a bit of an arrested development- got married at 32, had my first child four years later. Ended up making a career out of the desperation of simply finding a job for awhile. For 8 years I still don't understand how I made money doing what I did. Now I don't understand how others do.
I am pretty relaxed as far as personal politics go- as long as you don't tell me what to think, I won't tell you where to go- and that's served for some time. Occasionally people will try to get me to change my thinking. This is when they realize I can be... difficult. I really, honestly don't care about "what side of the aisle you're on." Unlike many of the mouth-breathing, adderal-addicted, generic simpletons that graduate college but can't find China on a map or a chinese restaurant on the internet I can actually argue both sides of a political issue. I do this to induce apoplexy in the weak-minded.
I also like jello.
And much like my sibling I am also a faceless, nameless drone in the buzz of our nation's capitol. I truly revel in this, though. I feel no need to stand out. The less people know the better. Becoming a father has made me truly understand my general worth, or more appropriately worthlessness. I don't exist to be a person, I exist for my wife and son. My joy is irrelevant anymore.
I am here because my sister- the woman who shares my parents, 13 years of my life, and many other things- asked me to and to show that despite having the same DNA donors you can have two human beings as dissimilar as we are... or at least, dissimilar is how we are able to sleep at night. It's when we'll start to accept the similarities that will come out of this interwebz dokument that revelations will be made, gasping will be heard, a giant crack will occur in a glacier, and as the tower of jade topples in front of us we will run through a grassy field and realize the meaninglessness of existance.
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