*while stirring sauce into the pan*
You're young. Smart. Gifted even. You dedicate yourself to an ancient craft... theatre...classical music...dreaming....
You train...10,000 hrs.. continue at higher education. Study with the finest minds...hone your craft...set positive examples in front of your...heroes...eyes on the prize.
Graduate...cast about...land somewhere. You start earning actual money for this craft...paying rent out of dreams. And then...plague.
...everything shuts down...you think...ok...it's only going to be 60 days...maybe 90 days...I can struggle...i can hold on...i can hold on...through no fault of my own i am in the middle of a pandemic...i can hold on...maybe some help?
...your gov does not help. In fact...your gov suggests that help will make you lazy...who me? Lazy? You did what you were told and now you're being told you're a freeloader...a blue state handout. And then your friends start dying....help?
...maybe they're peripheral friends, maybe a few are close...you hear stories...this one is sick..that one is sick...you remember the AIDS crisis...you think of the Black Plague...bring out your dead... and then people start breaking down...evictions...unpaid bills... unpaid mental health crisis on top of a pandemic...you cast about for work...but no one is hiring...unemployment hotlines are busy...for weeks you call and can't get anyone...and then you can't get paid...
you wait...please...help...the gov rolls its eyes and sighs...'ok...we'll give you...$600. Normally this would be an insult but you're really desperate. You'll take it...you'll take anything.
Your rich classmates have gone curiously silent...they've retreated back to their parents homes...upstate...cottages...some post relaxing pictures of their pandemic while you're holed up in an apt with sirens wailing all hours....a next door neighbor dies...someone commits suicide...ppl start stealing from CVS. CVS locks up its deodorant and soap.
You burn through the $600...a drop of water on a hot skillet. Vapor. Summer...it's been more than 90 days...ppl are going out again...experts are warning this will make things worse this will drag everyone down. But enough ppl don't care or they're tired...or don't believe. Hot girl summer. They heard it was a hoax...and they want margaritas with friends...hot girl summer...another wave strikes...experts say this ensures the winter wave will be the worst...help? An emphatic no.
...high school bullies run the gov...no nerds...no fags...no artists. fuck blue states... Suffer...we are doing fine..that's what you get for...dreaming. Suffer. They suffer too. In fact the red states suffer more than the blue...but they take comfort in the fact that you are suffering...that is the painkiller. That is their balm.
...you don't even bother asking for help...you sit amidst death and poverty and disinformation...numb. You hear about Hunter Biden's laptop and laugh bitterly...250,000 ppl are dead...it's the fall...we're talking about Hunter's emails. And his cocaine problems...ok...sure...you laugh...yeah...
...more friends die... covid... suicide... stress... isolation. Loneliness. Ppl die in boxes...tiny zoom boxes and cubicles and curtained ICU's....ppl die in boxes. one out of every 1000 Americans...box dead. Majority of white ppl want 4 more years...only blk ppl and asians...and latinos rage against the madness in overwhelming numbers...floods.
...end of this burnt husk of a year....help? a tiny squeak of a voice from the void. Gov sighs...okay...$600 maybe. Maybe even before the new year...something resembling hope brightens in you...it's not enough but it's something...and then the emphatic response comes back. No...of course not. No...hahaha... suffer...merry Christmas... suffer... haha...no...good will toward men...suffer...no...are you crazy...you should've been a banker...you should've killed your dreams...fuck your talent..fuck your gift...no...look crazy...you look mad...demented even...no...merry Christmas. Suffer.
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