I Am A Failure

I am a failure.

"Who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?" -- Hunter S Thompson

Opening any written work with a quote is some hacky bullshit. It's a soft workaround to the fact that you really don't have anything to say; the impotent dick of intellectual property. Which is exactly why I chose to do it, because like I said before, I am a failure.

I'm still not sure when I first realized it. I've felt the creeping doubt settling in for a long time. The excuses have become weary and strained, aging strippers that can no longer hide the wrinkles with concealer and dim light. The justifications don't even sound good before I open my mouth to speak them. I always assumed I was destined for greatness. There was an arrogance to that, I guess. To me. I'm not sure I ever straight up said it to anyone, but there was always a presumption that I was somehow better than everyone else. If only the world were a meritocracy, I'd moan to myself.

No. It isn't the justifications and the excuses that are tired and weak. It's me. I just refused to accept that for a long time.

"Chris In Real Life"

ACT ONE

FADE IN:

EXT. NEW HOME DEVELOPMENT - DAY

Chris is standing on a sidewalk in a new luxury subdivision, in front of a half completed house. Behind him are piles of discarded lumber and a few loose rocks on top of that weird black fabric they put down to protect the environment or some shit. Stretching out in front of him are the golden hills of El Dorado, CA. They look very much like a nostalgic, loving painting of Rohan. It is almost so picturesque that it physically hurts when our hero realizes he spends the vast majority of his life building houses he will never be able to afford.

CHRIS

Fuck.

Alright, before you get worried this is going to be a depressing diatribe where I just waste a half an hour of your time whining and exclaiming "WOE IS ME!" like I'm some poor son of a bitch living in the Old Testament and constantly getting shit on, let me assure you that it is not. It's just necessary to really hammer home that no matter what else comes from any of this, the circumstances as you find them are my fault. Not fate. Not society. Not a cruel temptress of destiny that promised me the world and a blow job then turned around and shit on my chest. It isn't corporate greed or the ultra wealthy or Republicans or communism or socialists or Occupy or #blacklivesmatter or Twitter.

Just me. Little ole me. A perfect personification of "unrealized potential". Heh. I guess I've still got a little bit of that arrogance going for me. (Ed. note- This is the part of the essay where Chris is beginning to feel a little tipsy from the promised 'Whiskey' portion of the title. Read: this is where this will probably get good)

I'm not alone. Part of the reason it was so easy to shift blame onto anybody else is because it's a really fucking popular thing to do right now. Look around; there's a million college grads pointing out the inequalities of the system. And the other part of that equation is that they're totally fucking right. The system totally is broken, guys. Don't think I've changed my tune on that. Hell, it would ruin everything if I had, because one of the topics I'm most looking forward to writing about is corporate greed and how nobody is nearly as pissed off about it as they should be. Don't worry, though. That's not this post. This post is an editorial. Meaning it's my favorite thing to write, because it doesn't need facts or proof or any of that bullshit- I just get to force feed your stupid face with things I think. I'll warn you before I write that post, because if you're reading this you're probably also one of like 10 people who I know from Facebook or Twitter and I'll add a disclaimer when I selfishly advertise my shit on your timeline.

But that's not why I'm a failure. That's not why I'm 29 and live with my brother. That's not why I let the bank repo my BMW. That isn't why all of my relationships with women fail. It certainly isn't why I make less than twice minimum wage and constantly have to make choices between putting gas in my ridiculously inefficient Bronco or buying breakfast. It certainly isn't why the rear window on said Bronco hasn't rolled up in months (holy fuck. Fucking months). It isn't why I'm overweight. And most importantly of all, it isn't why I realized I pretty much wasted my 20s and haven't accomplished anything that anyone will care about.

God damn. I'm almost 30. And what, exactly, do I have to show for it? A couple of mediocre poems and a boat load full of good memories. It could be worse, but it could also be a lot better. And this is where we're finally getting to the point. Accountability. I look around and I'll be brutally honest with you; I don't see it anywhere.

I certainly don't show it, and I'd be a hypocrite if I didn't mention myself first.

I don't see a whole hell of a lot of it in my peers. In fact, I waste a lot of time mining the growling depths of social media. I traverse reddit threads like a goblin hiding in the Mines of Moria. I scale the toxic, barren, unforgiving, unimaginably fallout ridden Hellscape of Facebook comments. I clumsily stumble across the badlands of Twitter.

Turn back. There is no hope, there.

Corporations and politicians certainly don't exhibit any of that shit.

So, what? In 2015 nobody is beholden to the consequences of their actions? Oh, except for felons. And not just any felons. Only the ones who go in for drug offenses, really. Guess what? That's another topic I want to explore in depth, so I'll leave this as a cheap one off comment for now.

And that, friends, ladies, gents, and in-betweens, is why we're here. I decided that I'll hold myself accountable if no one else will. And I'll hold everyone else accountable, too. Because fuck you, that's why. If you know me, you've probably heard a dozen different ideas I've had for what I want to do when I grow up. Well, I'm god damn grown, so I guess it's about time I chose one and followed it through to the end.

The only thing I can come up with that combines the only thing I've ever been any good at- writing -with the lifestyle I want to live- travel, temporarily becoming passionate about a topic before moving on, working from home, livable wage (maybe?), etc -well, it isn't perfect, but it's journalism.

So I gotta write. A lot. That's why I have a blog now. At least once a week, I'll release something new. Something long form (I fully intend for this to be the shortest piece I post). A researched essay or editorial. They'll probably suck for a while. I'm rusty as shit when it comes to writing. Seriously, look at this prose. It barely even qualifies. Also because I'm really not that experienced in writing anything nonfiction. I write stories and poetry, for fucks sake. I mean, I wrote an essay sophomore year once. About love. Which is hilarious, because at 29 I'm the least qualified person you've ever met to give relationship advice so you can take a wild stab at how bad that shit was when I was 15. But people read it. High school girls read it. I can't get anyone to read anything longer than 3 lines NOW, and I've got 14 more years of experience.

SHIT. I could've written Twilight. Then I wouldn't have to deal with any of you assholes. Sigh.

Anyway, I am a motherfucking failure. This is important. I tell myself that every morning, because for my whole life everyone wanted to try and force me to believe I was some kind of special snowflake. Well guess what you over sensitive fuckwads- I'm not. And neither are you. You know the only people that are special snowflakes? They're people that actively do things that MAKE them special. They weren't born that way.

If all you want out of life is to go to work, go home, eat some mac n cheese, watch TV, then do the same exact thing the next day, the next week, the next month, the next year, the next decade... if you want to live the same year 75 times and call that a life? More power to you. I think the world needs a lot of those people, probably. Shit, what the fuck do I know about the world?

But that isn't special. That's normal. Not good or bad or up or down or cosmic unicorns playing sweet riffs. Normal. Then if you take normal and subtract some of the comfort and add in a little alcoholism and procrastination, you've got failure. A failure. Me.

I'm a failure. Because I am the stereotype of a "millennial". The guy everyone is bitching about. That's me. Because this is not the life I intend to live.

I am a failure. But I will not fucking die this way.

(See? You just started watching the movie about the plucky underdog. Like Dodgeball. This is act one. Hop on, bitches. See you on the other side.)