An Inhuman Condition

These are a few pieces of flash fiction from the Blue Valentines lot that were off subject or unrelated.

City

The place is just a pit. Nothing important seems to happen there, but nobody seems to realize it. People have this romantic view of the city, and it doesn’t make any sense. Sure, businesses and art, commerce and culture – whatever. Those things exist in the minds of people, and that’s the only spot where they have meaning. The only thing the city has is a lot of people – it’s the sum of all the parts. So nothing is special about the place per se. I don’t think there’s anything about the geographic area that inspires. I’ve been there; it was a very intense hue of “meh.”

The people are cold – and they would have to be to survive there. The temperature drops, snow falls by the foot and it still finds the time to have monsoonesque rain. I think there must have ben a border mix-up somewhere because all my calculations show a place so miserable should rightfully belong to Indiana. Don’t get me started on Indiana.

The cost of everything is artificially inflated. The place breeds aimless tourism and spending. The streets downtown are impossible to traverse by car and swell with shiny stores selling everything a person can be swindled into wanting. If there’s a void in you, they will shove a fucking widget in it and put it on credit. I think the broke fucks back home might have been able to afford their mortgages if cities like this didn’t manufacture American dreams.

But again, none of that has to do with the place itself – the thing you’d find on a map. That’s all coincidental. The city is precisely what it’s been crafted to be. If the people didn’t want it, it would be something else. Like every other pit of misery, people manufactured it. It’s all in their minds as some collective delusion of life.

I’ve seen it suck in creative people: actors, musicians, writers, dancers. They hear about it, visit it, they see people with the same gifts and think the city will make them successful. I can only imagine it’s the same lure you’d find in Los Angeles. I’m still convinced it’s just a clever plot to keep a regular stock of potential waiters and dishwashers when the city spits people out.

And what happens then? Do you move back home and start a family? Do you make some new life and adjust your dreams to fit into the city? “Well I decided to teach part time and keep my job at the bistro to make ends meet.” I think the phrase “my priorities changed” is a synonym for “my dreams are dead.” I know I’m a cynic, but that’s what I associate with the place – psychic murder.

But hey, you gave it a shot, right? Now it’s time to settle down – AOL Keyword: Settle.

And if you get that reference, you’re probably old enough to be settling down. I hope you got all that living done in the past. There won’t be time for it with all those new obligations.

Fucking Chicago.