I like to think (when I send money--though these days, who my age is doing that?) that those who receive it spend it celebrating. Drinking with friends or buying themselves a new something they've always wanted. In fact, as proof, my very own parents forked over a couple hundred dollars toward the DSLR Nikon D60 I've been wanting since my freshman year, and declared I could spend it on nothing else.
Well when push comes to shove--I shoved myself right off the edge of leisure into the world of "fixed expenses" as soon as I walked across the stage and gave the dean a hug. Sorry Mom & Dad, but security deposits, rent, utilities, gas and food are the only things anybody's money went to.
So here is my thank you note to all of you:
Dear Friend,
I call you my friend because of the note I am writing you, perhaps you'll want to sever any permanent family ties with me and just call me a friend. You sent money for my graduation which in short means only one thing at the moment to me: "You are an island of reality in an ocean of diarrhea."
That diarrhea is the economy, in globalization and colonization. In internet excavation and totally fucked up taxation. In the putrid fumes of America shitting on everyone else, we have no where left to shit but on ourselves. We tried and are still trying the deserts of the Middle East, but let's be real. All of that religious sand up our asses is really not something we were/are/will be prepared for. I sit here thinking, thank all that is good we are the 99%, perhaps NOW we will have our first meaningful conversation about class in this country since class was founded here much earlier then 1787.
The island. The island is you, the over 20-somethings. Remember just 10 years ago when buying a new bicycle to put under the tree wasn't something you needed to consult with the budget for? Or perhaps if you did consult the budget, it was because you had just bought the new Honda Odyssey Minivan? Now the newest mini-van is actually a hybrid mini-SUV. If you answered yes to any of those questions--you'd probably qualify as the middle class back then. Now, you're not so sure are you? Does that meaningful, well-planned retirement to travel the world look so concrete? Island, oh island, don't you know? Haven't you known all this time that your American brothers and sisters in the city and beyond the suburbs have been living with your nervousness since their great ancestors immigrated here many generations ago?
I ask you, island, keeping me afloat so graciously to recognize the solidarity in yours and my experience. In our anxiety. In our hope. In our power to change.
What am I doing now that I have a degree, you ask? I work in a beautiful Wine Cellar. With clients that are so wonderfully nice. They are also very wealthy. No, not wealthy. They are rich beyond belief my friend. Their Aston Martins pull into the parking lot unworried that their doors will get dinged by the Porsche and Lamborghini beside them. "Deliver it to my compound later in the week, will you Jimmy?" they ask the gentleman that for 20 years has worked tirelessly hauling cases of wine here and there because they cannot fit them in their tiny sports cars. The tips are sweet, Jimmy defends, sometimes they offer me food off the grill. Sometimes they're not there at all... he remarks thoughtfully.
That is what it has begun to feel like, hasn't it? That the rich are not there at all unless you look very carefully for them. Perhaps it's because there are very few so fortunate. They can barricade, isolate and treat themselves from the hardships of the friends and family they once knew. We are those friends and family, island.
I keep calling you island. But perhaps that is the wrong geographical feature, you are more like the ocean aren't you? And the island of diarrhea seems rather small--in comparison to an ocean, don't you think?
WE are an ocean of reality around their island of diarrhea,
Lei
Lei
P.S. Thank you.
