Covet

Does the world try to tell me if I just had a mile head start that I’d be that much farther ahead by now? What even would a head start look like when the goal is… What, death? There’s no finish line, you just keep going. I just keep feeling like I can’t make it because it’s too late, which I know, I KNOW, is not true at all. But what even are my goals here? Just get a regular job? I was thinking this morning that the boomers had an advantage because they were trying to discover themselves while being able to easily get a job / money. Money really is everything, isn’t it? Well it’s not actually everything, it just makes all the little things easier which is such a thing. I heard someone say once “sex isn’t everything, but it is something” in regards to relationships, and I think there could be a similar saying with money, but maybe more along the lines of “money isn’t everything, but everything needs money” or something like that. Just sitting here in the coffee shop (Peet’s) and overhearing a young person talk to someone (family friend? neighbor?) about how she graduated recently and has a full time job lined up. It triggered something in me that made me feel defeated or like a failure. But I can’t just sit here letting myself indulge in these thoughts because her path has absolutely nothing to do with mine. Her interests and how she views/shapes the world have got to be completely different from mine. And what, if I lived in that world of privilege where the world told me what I’m good at and what my position should be what would my thoughts and motivations then be? I don’t think there’s any version of myself in the infinitely many different universes who would ever not be constantly questioning his/her surroundings. I just heard her say she’s 22. I used to be 22, I think. Had to put in headphones to try to tune it out, but can’t tune out my own thoughts, not without drugs or something… I don’t do drugs, but I think that’s why people do them. Drown their thoughts. // For a while I was writing letters every day. Saying the things that I thought you’d want to tell me, but not knowing, just having backwards one way conversations with myself. You start at the end and work your way backwards, I think that’s how all thought happens. Could the end be nothing? Was the beginning? We can’t get over our obsession with that. // Do you find yourself listening to the first thing that shows up when you open your itunes? I think that’s how my last.fm profile ended up with such a high number of scrobbles for Andrew Bird. I don’t even have any Andrew Bird downloaded anymore, but it would still be overshadowed by Aldous Harding in this alphabetized climate. Funny to think of alphabetization contributing to a cultural climate, but when you really stop to think about it, it absolutely does. Right? How do you know your place in the world if you’re not shaped by the understanding of where your name comes up during role-call? Okay, apparently it’s “roll-call” but let’s just pretend that in this scenario it isn’t and then I can make some big swooping generalized hypothesis about how role-call defines the roles we play or some bullshit like that.