A 4am Ponder
It's a funny old game
I’ve always thought that the TV quote that sums me up best is Bart Simpson’s, when he says to Milhouse’s mother, “Tell me I’m good”.
It’s either that or Anne of Green Gable's’s “If you only knew all the things I want to say but don’t”.
It’s either one of those or some thing where someone in a TV show says something about constantly trying to think of a TV quote that sums them up. Because frankly finding a fictional character to encapsulate your personality is a lot easier than doing it yourself.
But then, why do I even want to do it myself?
I’m a list maker. I like making lists. I’m like the main character in Nick Hornby’s High Fidelity, except I’ve had much less sex and I’m unlikely to ever be played by Zoe Kravitz.
But I’m like him in that I like lists. Top tens, top fives, top fifties. Films, TV shows, books, cricketers, footballers, songs, animals. I love to make playlists on Spotify, on particular themes, or subject matter, or just try to match a particular mood. Sometimes I make a list that starts with a particular song and then I follow the recommendations in the hope that the sequence will produce a sort of organic harmony. Sometimes I delete a list and then make the same list again, just because I like making them.
That’s why I don’t mind things coming to an end. Sometimes I think it would be great if there were no more movies made, because then we could sit down and make a proper Best Movies of All Time list without worrying that we might have to amend it in future.
It’d be great if I could buy 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die and know that it wasn’t going to be updated. There are thousands of movies made every year. They don’t have a super strike rate but there’s always bound to be one or two slipping through every few years into the new edition. And if I have seen 200 out of the 1001, it’s a real drag to find out that a couple of my 200 have dropped out of the list, so now I’ve only seen 198. I’ve gone backwards just because of the remorseless progress of human culture, which hardly seems fair.
It’s the same with sport. If I’m going to select my ten best rugby league fullbacks ever, it would be nice if new fullbacks would stop popping up, forcing me to reconsider. I want FINALITY, dammit.
Has any TV character ever said, “I want FINALITY, dammit”? If so, that’s the quote that probably sums me up.
Of course, other people might disagree. In fact I know they do. Depending on who you ask, people will tell you that the quote that sums me up is something about being obnoxious, annoying, morbidly obese or painfully dull.
This bothers me, but not nearly as much as the fact that I don’t really know what people think of me. Some say that you shouldn’t worry about what other people think. That’s a nice thought but for me, that ship has sailed. There may be some tricks you can teach an old dog, but if anyone’s hoping to teach me to be oblivious to others’ opinions, I’m sorry, I just don’t have the patience or the muscle tone to do that at my time of life.
So rest assured, as you read this, or anything else I write, that it is coming from a place of fierce and nauseating desperation to impress you. I care deeply about what you think of me. And I’ll go to great lengths to be liked. Feel free to use this information however you like.
Dry Conditioner
I was never a fan of the concept of unconditional love, because I don’t see the point. What does love even mean if it’s unconditional. If you love me, but there is literally nothing I could do that would make you stop loving me, then you don’t really love me, do you - I am just a vessel into which you pour a sensation that makes you feel good.
Or is that wrong?
Because I don’t really think I want to be loved unconditionally. I want to be loved for who I am, and if I’m loved for who I am, it must be on the condition that I don’t stop being who I am.
I am loved by a few people. I am proud of that fact. But I hope they don’t love me unconditionally. If they do, I’ve got nothing to be proud of. I’m just a warm body to be projected onto.
I think I’ve always felt this way. I felt this way before things changed in my life, and people who used to love me stopped loving me. That hurt one hell of a lot. It still does. Part of me wishes they’d loved me unconditionally, and part of me thinks that the conditions they’d placed on their love had been less stringent - or that I had at least known what those conditions were, where the line was that I couldn’t cross.
But then, not crossing the line out of fear probably isn’t enough - the test is not crossing it because you don’t want to, right? That’s how you know the person you love, conditionally, is fulfilling those conditions.
If only there hadn’t been any conditions…but then, that’s not what I really want. In my best moments - the moments when I can see clearly a path towards being who I want to be - I know that it’s better to be loved conditionally.
It’s better that I be forced to prove that I’m worthy of love, than that I get to be loved no matter what I do, no matter who I am.
That’s the far more painful option, but for this stupid life of mine to mean anything, it’s the better one.
I think. For now.
The Weekly Plug - Choose Your Own Adventure!
The world’s least popular YouTube series continues, with part 2 of BEYOND ESCAPE! Please watch and leave a comment. Or at least click on that link so the Views number is not quite so devastating to my self-esteem. Yes, I’m begging. It’s my only option. C’mon…tell me I’m good.