Patriot
Well, it's been quite a while.
Updates: the books that I talked about in the last post still haven't come in the mail. Oh, well. I've worked a lot. In fact, I truly haven't had a day off in...8 days, and it will be 10 before I do. I say that I TRULY haven't had a day off because I did have one day off: the day that I came into work with excruciating dental pain and left early to go to the dentist. That's right, it's root canal time again. I'm not going to detail my dental miseries. They're far too numerous. I DO have all my teeth and a good smile, but my molars are the problem. So, with any luck, I'll be going in for a root canal on Thursday. Oh, and the final update: I'm typing this entry from my new laptop.
It became apparent at the end of the semester, as it does at the end of every semester, that a laptop would be incredibly helpful for me. Having to type a bajillion papers and having no place to do it on campus because everyone else is typing a bajillion papers is very annoying. I don't do my best schoolwork at home, I never have, and now I'll be able to do it anywhere that my battery power allows.
I snateched my lappy as the last one from my local Circut City on the last day of its rebate. This was three days ago. Yesterday, when I came home from work, Thom had connected it to the internet and I proceeded to install: ZoneAlarm, AVG Antivirus, Spybot, AdAware, OpenOffice, Firefox, and Winamp. You can imagine that, by the seventh program, I was just a zombie, "Yes, I accept the terms, next next next finished." Oh, and I didn't pay a single dime for any of them, thus giving a big F-you to Microsoft office, Windows Media Player, Norton AntiVirus (the biggest recepient of the F-you) Internet Explorer...and a bunch of overpriced spyware programs that I don't know about.
Things are going just fine, and I'm settling into the Lappy quite well.
Now for the part of the post where I actually think about stuff.
Well, being against this whole war, the Bush administration, and the white supremecists patriarchy that gave rise to them, I have tended to pretty much ignore every July 4th since September 11th. I've also had shitty food service jobs, so I've worked every one, too. Tonight, we closed at 9 instead of 11, and we closed quickly and got out before 9:30. Thom is still at work, so I had nobody to view the fireworks wtih, but I had to view them, since I live about 4 blocks from where they're set off. So I parked my car and walked up the street and stood around watching them surrounded by many other Americans and listened to everyone offer their critiques of the fireworks and thought about this all as I stood there.
Nietzsche once said that the patriot is the enemy of mankind, or something like that. I totally believe that. However, the anti-patriot is probably the enemy of mankind, too. As I stood around with perfect strangers, I realized that hating America, or Americans as a whole, is pretty stupid. Firstly, "America" as a unified entity doesn't exist. It never did, and it never will, so why hate it? Secondly, just like in America, every other place has it's unfortunately high ratio of self-righteous assholes, so it's pointless to hate Americans because they're Americans. It's true, we're the assholes with the most power, which makes us dangerous. But believing that there's some village out there in Vietnam or something where assholes don't exist is an equally pointless dream that many Americans who are ashamed of their fellow countrymen believe in.
I say this: if I want to practice all this shit I talk about love and compassion, I'll have to practice it on Americans, because there's no one else around me. Thom is an American, and my mom, who is really the most down to earth, saintly, real people person I've ever known, is also an American. Everyone I love is an American, so is everyone I hate. The patriot IS the enemy of mankind because he loves something that doesn't exist and hates everyone else for not loving it like he does. I'll be the opposite. I'll love all the people, and start with Americans because they're what I have to work with.
So, with that, for the first time it, what, 4 years: Happy 4th of July.
Updates: the books that I talked about in the last post still haven't come in the mail. Oh, well. I've worked a lot. In fact, I truly haven't had a day off in...8 days, and it will be 10 before I do. I say that I TRULY haven't had a day off because I did have one day off: the day that I came into work with excruciating dental pain and left early to go to the dentist. That's right, it's root canal time again. I'm not going to detail my dental miseries. They're far too numerous. I DO have all my teeth and a good smile, but my molars are the problem. So, with any luck, I'll be going in for a root canal on Thursday. Oh, and the final update: I'm typing this entry from my new laptop.
It became apparent at the end of the semester, as it does at the end of every semester, that a laptop would be incredibly helpful for me. Having to type a bajillion papers and having no place to do it on campus because everyone else is typing a bajillion papers is very annoying. I don't do my best schoolwork at home, I never have, and now I'll be able to do it anywhere that my battery power allows.
I snateched my lappy as the last one from my local Circut City on the last day of its rebate. This was three days ago. Yesterday, when I came home from work, Thom had connected it to the internet and I proceeded to install: ZoneAlarm, AVG Antivirus, Spybot, AdAware, OpenOffice, Firefox, and Winamp. You can imagine that, by the seventh program, I was just a zombie, "Yes, I accept the terms, next next next finished." Oh, and I didn't pay a single dime for any of them, thus giving a big F-you to Microsoft office, Windows Media Player, Norton AntiVirus (the biggest recepient of the F-you) Internet Explorer...and a bunch of overpriced spyware programs that I don't know about.
Things are going just fine, and I'm settling into the Lappy quite well.
Now for the part of the post where I actually think about stuff.
Well, being against this whole war, the Bush administration, and the white supremecists patriarchy that gave rise to them, I have tended to pretty much ignore every July 4th since September 11th. I've also had shitty food service jobs, so I've worked every one, too. Tonight, we closed at 9 instead of 11, and we closed quickly and got out before 9:30. Thom is still at work, so I had nobody to view the fireworks wtih, but I had to view them, since I live about 4 blocks from where they're set off. So I parked my car and walked up the street and stood around watching them surrounded by many other Americans and listened to everyone offer their critiques of the fireworks and thought about this all as I stood there.
Nietzsche once said that the patriot is the enemy of mankind, or something like that. I totally believe that. However, the anti-patriot is probably the enemy of mankind, too. As I stood around with perfect strangers, I realized that hating America, or Americans as a whole, is pretty stupid. Firstly, "America" as a unified entity doesn't exist. It never did, and it never will, so why hate it? Secondly, just like in America, every other place has it's unfortunately high ratio of self-righteous assholes, so it's pointless to hate Americans because they're Americans. It's true, we're the assholes with the most power, which makes us dangerous. But believing that there's some village out there in Vietnam or something where assholes don't exist is an equally pointless dream that many Americans who are ashamed of their fellow countrymen believe in.
I say this: if I want to practice all this shit I talk about love and compassion, I'll have to practice it on Americans, because there's no one else around me. Thom is an American, and my mom, who is really the most down to earth, saintly, real people person I've ever known, is also an American. Everyone I love is an American, so is everyone I hate. The patriot IS the enemy of mankind because he loves something that doesn't exist and hates everyone else for not loving it like he does. I'll be the opposite. I'll love all the people, and start with Americans because they're what I have to work with.
So, with that, for the first time it, what, 4 years: Happy 4th of July.
posted by Emily @ 9:28 PM
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