Thursday, May 24, 2012

Hurdy-Gurdy

We're all monkeys dancing to the hurdy-gurdy, and the organ grinder is turning the crank. Flash your best simian smile, tip your tiny hat and dance a jig as the music fills the street corner. Maybe if you're fortunate, a passer-by will throw you a coin or a peanut.

Maybe you slave for 20 years with your head in front of a computer screen, typing like an idiot savant on quaaludes as the band blasts notes in your ears. Your spine curves forward, your chest hurts, yet you continually peck at that keyboard like making love to a woman.

You continually do this because if you don't, you'll die.

Writing is how you conquer your fears, how you stop the bullies, how you deal with an insane, nonsensical world.

It's a coping mechanism, you crazy monkey.

Scamper up a tree, hang by your tail and fling your poo at those who deserve a faceful of feces.

Writing is respectable work for sociopaths, slackers and poverty-stricken dreamers who believe their words have impact.

To the average meat-eating bed-blooded American, writing is a fool's folly. It is mental masturbation for pseudo-intellectuals and ne'er-do-wells and socialist finks. To the masses, writing is a waste of time and a ticket to the poorhouse.

Yet monkey continues to dance to the beat, shaking his little monkey ass off. He dances until his feet bleed and until he passes out from exhaustion. He dances to entertain the slack-jawed yokels who can't dance.

The organ grinder turns the handle, which requires no skill. He stands idle and takes the money from the adoring crowd.

The monkey does all the work, sweating and getting arthritis and stumbling without a break.

Yet in the end, the money receives the applause, not the dullard cranking the hurdy-gurdy.

No comments: