Skip to main content

Bloggy Blog #6

   I've been coming across quite a lot of stories about people feeling the urgent need to honor their sense of privilege through various - and mostly idiotic - methods. Like the someone attacking crying about a coach for bullying because their son was on the losing end of a lopsided high school football game. Or maybe this story about parents suing a school because their precious snowflake went from getting A's in 8th grade math to D's in an honors (read: advanced) math class the very next year.

These stories take me back to the good old days, when parents really didn't give a shit about their kids. Well, I guess that's not entirely true. They cared. Just not enough to sue. Getting my ass beat in a football game builds character, they would have told me. Makes you humble. Going from A's to D's in the same subject at the next grade level meant I just had to stop fucking around and actually work. Not like my parents were going to help me with my homework anyway. Especially math. Stupid math.

The most personal experience I had with this sense of privilege came when I lived in Arizona. Phoenix, to be exact. Worse yet, affluent suburban Phoenix. Which, naturally, is where I worked.

Look at that. Rich-ass Scottsdale. Jerks. 

It was here I discovered precisely how the entitlement species works. I was in retail at the time, so those of you who understand the plight know just how much you had goddamn better utilize that sporadic and terribly short time off. So, I did what any almost-minimum-wage peon would do - go shopping. For what? Who cares? I had the day off. I needed things. I hightail my Dodge Neon to some adobe-style looking shopping center, which is a very highbrow look in suburban Phoenix. More than likely it was to someplace stupid, like Staples, where I needed both something, and nothing at all. Pens or some crap. 

Anyway, I'm pulling into the plaza, where the store I seek is at the other end. Like most suburban Phoenix strip malls or plazas or whatever the PC term is now, I have to roll on past the typical stores that make up such a property: coffee shop, nail salon, a daycare, and maybe a small nouveau taco joint. 

So, I pull into this plaza where I notice a gigantic SUV coming toward me. Cool, no big deal. It was inching along on the left side of an unmarked parking lot, I was on the right. Cool. Like most of the world, I just churn on through at my usual parking lot speed, which is 165mph. No, I'm kidding. It's probably ten? Fifteen? I don't know. Slow. 

Unless you're in a gigantic SUV, apparently. 

Because that's what she was totally supposed to do, gigantic SUV-driving lady decides to swerve left into a parking spot - at the exact same moment I began to pass her. Thankfully, I manage to swerve gently away to avoid her as she pulled into the parking spot. Alright lady. You're welcome.

But we weren't finished yet. 

I reach Staples, and find a nice spot where I can walk a little bit. Out of the corner of my eye I see someone yelling HEY, HEY! and power walking toward me. What the hell is this, I thought. It's gigantic SUV lady, about to lay into me. Give me a piece of her mind! She was whining and bitching about why I didn't stop and she had a baby in her giant SUV and wah wah cryface. Okay lady, let's go through the details. I was going straight. You were about to turn left without a blinker. Shall I go on? Naturally, I didn't say that. My response was similar to someone who just really didn't give a fuck, something along the lines of well you and your baby made it safely, didn't you? 

I proceeded to bury myself inside the store's clothing racks (okay so maybe it wasn't Staples) until this overwhelming sensation occurred to me that she might have slashed my tires or something dramatic. That never happened, thankfully. Because that would require labor. You know, work. Like a hard math class. And entitled folks don't do that.

Popular posts from this blog

Bloggy Blog #84

The first time I visited, I had to park across the street in the lot of an abandoned gas station. The lot itself went up a slight hill, and the station's sign would occasionally spin some slow turns whenever the town spirits wanted to have some fun.  She lived in a questionably constructed building on the second floor of this sleepy Revolutionary War town, adjacent to a craft store that was hardly ever open. In the basement sat a four-lane bowling alley and a small bar. It was by appointment only, which really meant the building's landlord had to be there to serve drinks and keep an eye on the action. I didn't get a chance to bowl down there, but seeing the construction of the building, this was probably a good thing. When she moved out of her place, part of the process involved placing a three-foot wide plank over the bowling alley basement stairs, in order to move big furniture out. Needless to say she left the heavy lifting to the moving experts.  The new plac...
Read more

Bloggy Blog #17

     From 2001-03, I called the northwest corner of Louisiana my home. My initial foray into the real world was met with a trip halfway across the country - a trip that consisted of a thirty-six hour bus ride (with plenty of transfers in sketchy towns in between) and a friend in Little Rock who took me the rest of the way to the Pelican State. Prior to this, my only moment spent in the state was interviewing for the position. That was early June, where I hopped aboard a couple planes and was whisked away to campus for hours upon hours of interrogation. The interview process wasn't really that bad, but what was bad was my ill-fated idea to take a walk around campus shortly after the interview ended. I was drenched in sweat upon my return, completely oblivious that the humidity there stuck around much longer than it did back in upstate New York. Regardless, I was in love. I was in love with this idea of continuing (starting, maybe?) my life elsewhere. The first few weeks...
Read more

Bloggy Blog #19

    I was, to put it mildly, an absolutely disgusting high school cross-country runner. No, disgusting is not slang for good. I mean bad. Real bad. A teammate - who wasn't a very proficient runner himself - often competed in what appeared to be casual street shoes or cross trainers. During some races I finished behind him. This happened for a variety of reasons, none of which have to do with him probably being a better runner than me. The most critical reason why I often found myself in the middle or close to the end of the pack of meet competitors is the fact that at some point during the races, I just stopped caring. I mentally shut down. Gave up. Waved a white flag. Why the hell am I even here? , I'd ask myself. Literally hundreds of runners have passed me already, and I'm barely halfway through. There may have been a race or two where I actually stopped running once we got into the woods and knew there was no chance of anyone seeing me. I'd walk a couple steps,...
Read more