Everything is Everyone's Fault-Even Yours!!!

Without gushing, let me tell you that the new White Stripes CD is way better than anything that is currently in your CD player. Unless of course you are listening to either the most recent Modest Mouse or the Beatles' White Album Disk One-in which case it is not better, but it is newer, and thus for the time being more enjoyable. I'd tell you all about my purchase of said CD, which included me fighting off ninjas, chop blocking bears, and ending a terrorist plot against just about everyone, but those details aren't relevant to the story or point of the blog. (Warning: Smug inside joke alert) And since My Brother tells me I fill my stories with too many needless details that don't pertain to the conclusion, I guess I'll just leave those out for now. A thousand pardons.

The last track of the White Stripes' latest CD is a work of pure awesomeness. Again, if I were fancy pants blogger, I'd put a link to the lyrics, but I won't. Go and buy the track on i-Tunes you cheap ass; it's called Effect and Cause. That's a little inaccurate because the 'and' is actually an ampersand, but I don't think that really makes a difference. The moral of the song: People shouldn't blame people for the reactions they originally caused. IE, I eat the last delicious lemon square. You, a diabetic in dire need of sugar, have a seizure. During which you knock into my table, spilling the black cherry Kool-Aid on my nice beige carpet. The song argues, and I agree, I have no right to get all up in arms about the Kool-Aid ruining my very expensive carpet because I directly caused the seizure by eating the delicious yet slightly unsatisfying lemon square.

You follow? Now let's apply this to a little life lesson I call: AllofUsAreRudeIdiots,Let'sHug. It sure is weird for a lesson to have both an apostrophe and a comma in one giant word, but man, life eh? Everyone, myself, you, your hero, EVERYONE is an idiot. Some are more so than others. Myself, I rank a three. Three on the idiot scale. What do you rank? I learned I was an idiot this week due to my life taking a strange turn and me becoming a cashier at a giant retail store. As I was ringing up the shoppers, some avoided eye contact with me as if it would give them eye cancer. Since everything gives you cancer nowadays, I won't flat out deny that that wouldn't happen, but I don't think it would. Some were mad just to be mad. "How is your day going?" I'd ask. "Grr Bah!" They'd say. "This is a good movie you're buying." I'd say. "Fuck you!" They'd respond.

Which got me thinking: normally, I'm that guy. I'm the guy checking out and avoiding eye contact and/or conversation with the shop clerk. I treat poor, honest working, minimum-wage earning people rudely, simply to avoid thirty seconds of meaningless conversation. Let me tell you why you should talk to cashiers. Cashiering is the absolute most boring job on earth. No one will talk to you. Also, because the cashier's sole job is to take cash or credit (quit paying with checks!) for items you don't really need, furthering your debts, and ultimately preventing your children from going to college, thus causing them to find a minimum wage job cashiering, they are hated.

Here's one of the several problems with everyone today, which I learned this unfortunate week I'm guilty of: Everyone is predispositioned to be angry and judgmental towards strangers. The cashier is a jerk. The waiter is an idiot. Etc. Etc. This causes most people in their actual, real relationships to have disagreements over simple issues that break down into people getting upset at how the other is reacting. What started as an argument over a lemon square, ends in a lawsuit over replaced carpet. What started as a hanging chad, ends in 50/49/1 (keep on trying Greenies) polarized divide of the country that so far has done nothing but cause more soldiers to die because politicians are using their lives as urinals in their endless pissing contest.

This caused me to come up with a theory last week: Everyone should smoke cigarettes together. No smoker judges another smoker. Its universally accepted as a filthy habit by all classes. This theory came to me when I was getting out of my car wearing a suit (coming from a jarb interview) and a guy smoked a cigarette on a stoop. I did the obligatory head nod, and he, in his stained white t-shirt, did not nod back. I was a suit; he was a cook. Now, if I were to whip out a cigarette and light up with him, problem solved. We'd be the best of friends. Unfortunately, I didn't and don't have cigarettes. In addition, it would be sad if the only way the world could solve their problems would be to smoke together. Though it did work in the sixties, when no one got mad at anyone for eating the last lemon square, because whoever did was so fucking trippy man. Also, in running this plan by My Med Student Friend, she regarded it as a generally terrible idea, no matter how much job security it would provide.

I've now developed theory number two. Everyone, when they are being an idiot, should hug the other person they are idioting. Obviously, everyone would need to be on board with this plan, as it would be awkward to hug a random person only to have them still be predispositioned for anger and judging. Think about it. Since there is absolutely no way for anyone to simply get along with other people and have a basic kindness towards their fellow man, I guess we'll have to hug. Since there is no way to stop others from getting angry at others for stupid shit they caused in the first place, I guess we'll have to hug. Since every time anything happens in anything it causes endless name calling and petty childish antics, all approved via the mass media mind you, I guess we'll have to hug. And since people seem to be okay with not taking any ownership in disagreements and bad behavior, always blaming the other person or making several excuses, I guess we'll have to hug.

So the next time you find yourself in the following or similar argument:

Staunch Conservative Republican: You silly liberal, we have to kill all the non-white Christians before they kill us.

Hippie Liberal Democrat: But we should like, invite them over for tea or something.

Just meet in the middle. With a hug of compromise.

Or, you could just be a decent human being. Your choice.