And I wished it would make it all go away, that I would just calm down and it would all seem less important somehow.
But it isn't.
Even though I've been so careful to try and avoid anything about politics and what goes on in the world, you just can't. You can pretend that the world is not there, but there it is. The waves crash against the shore of your consciousness in that relentless fashion.
I say the world, but what I mean is people. I got into an argument with an 86 year old man this evening who actually believed that rich people in the United States pay no income tax and that poor people, the bottom 50% actually pay most of the taxes.
I'm surprised that my head is not in millions of pieces scattered across a few square miles.
I guess I was supposed to have this encounter to convince me that we are definately on a sinking ship and that it's all going to fall apart and that only the prepared are going to survive.
There is far more to the whole conversation. I can't begin to go into it all. My antagonist has been thoroughly brainwashed to believe that "conservative" is equal to "evil."
I went for a walk.
I'm currently in a neighborhood in South Atlanta. It didn't take long before some slovenly black male with pants hanging down below his thighs was asking me for a handout. I gave him some cash. But I was in a mood that I can only describe as: "I don't care who I piss off right now, because if God takes my life right now, I have to be better off." So, I asked him about the pants below the butt cheeks thing.
He didn't know.
"So, why do you do it?"
"It's just the thing. Depends on who you hang with."
"No reason?"
"Whatevah."
So, what I thought was supposed to be some symbol of black rebellion against white conventional dress is nothing. The idiots who do it just do it. Or this guy wasn't going to tell me the truth because I was a white guy.
Truth be told, I was hoping this guy would take offense and tell me the truth.
If he told me the truth, then how freaking stupid are such black people in the United States? I know lot's of black people who must be absolutely horrified by such stuff. Just as I am horrified that people associate me with someone like Chris Christie or Mitt Romney when I use the term conservative to describe myself.
Really? You wear your damned pants below your buttcheeks to do what? What's the point of this? To show your ass? To show that you are asses?
I listened once to a great audio on modesty. This sagging pants thing was described as a sort of physically demonstrative challenge and sign of disrespect from young men towards the rest of the world. I'm not sure if all those who do so even think their actions through that far or intentionally, or if they are simply mindlessly following their peers - like those girls who send topless pics of themselves to passing flings with no regard for maintaining a reputation of decency. Either way, it is a sad, sad state.
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