Searching for the Young Soul Rebels
04/24/2006 01:47 a.m.

More mixed metaphors, platitudes, and clichés from the depths of my battered breast! (Pretty dramatic intro., eh?)

This isn’t a journal for the kids, and the material within isn't appropriate for delicate women. It is only for the stoutest stock of female peasantry. (Oddly, my pollsters tell me I am most popular with babushka and brogue wearing survivors of WWII occupied Poland. These gals are a bit long in the tooth.).

One thing that I would like to say, which I have never said, and which I have never heard anyone else say, is this: In a vague and abstract way, I have been afraid pretty much the whole time I have been here.

For those of you who find it difficult to simply stay on this planet, I think I can understand. Of course, lucky me, I have always held a small ember of optimism or just enough cowardice or wonder or that thin thread of sanity or hope or what ever the hell it is that keeps me plodding along on this one way trip to Goofyville. I will likely see this thing through, whatever it is, in my own half-assed fashion.

See what I mean? This journal isn’t for the faint of heart, even though the journalist is so faint of heart he could keel over round the corner of the next comma. But there is more! (There is always more.)

I work for a corporate titan! Of course, our satellite site is but a barnacle precariously fastened to the hull of a steaming streaming tanker.

High ranking, spit and polished Corporate Leaders visit us quarterly for “town-hall meetings.”

They dance and smile and twirl to the tune of growth and acquisition while planning to pummel our competition to submission. Heck, two of these Leaders recently worked for the very firms they now plan to pummel. I’m certain these Leaders did the very same dance while in their employ.

I think back to Wachovia, my former employer, and how they swallowed a small banking corporation in Richmond, Virginia back in 1997. I was sent there for two weeks to aid in erasing that entity from the face of the earth. So carnivorous. So Darwinian. In 2001, Wachovia (the 17th largest bank in the U.S. at the time), was swallowed whole by First Union, leaving the poor old city of Winston-Salem busted, raped and bleeding. What the hell is going on here? (Is someone skimming the cream?)

At the next town hall meeting, I want to say, “Excuse me, Sir. Sir, can I be real here? Why are we doing this? What greater good do we serve? Please sir, you are clearly of the best and brightest, and you must search your young rebel soul. To put it quite simply, why?”

Today at work, I could tell I was getting mentally tired because my verbal censor cut out on me. After hours without uttering a peep, I told Frank, the guy sitting across from me, that I was considering having “Zeig Heil” tattooed to my forehead. Frank is such a piss-poor listener that my remark never even registered. Everyone wants to talk, but who wants to listen?

Not Frank. He merely grunted. What does all this blather mean, dear reader, and why am I such a willing blatherer?

Do you know any of those people that laugh at every lame-assed-would-be-joke that any half-assed-would-be comedian makes? If you are such a person, please consider ceasing. It is a weak-kneed behavior of those desperate to be liked.

Frank and I were briefly discussing the Duke Lacrosse Team/Stripper rape scandal that has currently captured the interest of our great nation when Frank remarked, "Gangs often take on a personality of their own that differs from the personality of the individual members resulting in sub-human behavior."

I said, "Yes, like the Central Park Jogger." (Several years ago, a woman jogger was pointlessly attacked and beaten by a gang of young boys in New York City.)

Harriet, who was listening in, breaks out laughing. Puzzled, I explained that there is nothing funny about the Central Park Jogger.

"Oh, I thought you were joking," she weakly explained.

There was no joke in sight. Harriet laughs at any and everything. She seems to assume everything is supposed to be funny.

And you there Mr. Flick, please stop the barrage of knot-headed jokes (Yes, Mr. Flick, this last line is for you.). Perhaps it is you that has created Harriet’s expectation. It won’t bring you more love. You do want to be genuine, don't you? Who the hell are you? Shed the veneer like the snake skin it is!

Musical phases pollute me like an oil tanker braking up off the Alaskan Coast. It coats my every thought, move and or groove.

Dexy’s Midnight Runners. I can’t get them off my mind. Oh, you too? Me and you. Cutting edge, dear reader (Sing "Too-Rye-Loo-Rye-Ay"). So I wander around the hallowed halls of Corporate America with “Jackie Wilson Said” playing on an endless loop with all of those "tood-a-lang-a-langs" rolling across my hollow noggin like golden bands of sunshine.

Yes indeed, I too am searching for the young soul rebels.

Raymond Douglas Davies of the Kinks, Richard Butler of the Psychedelic Furs, and, believe it or not, Dexy’s Midnight Runners will all be releasing new collections in 2006 (Dexy‘s Midnight Runners hasn‘t released an album since 1986. Kevin Rowland, the lead singer, apparently suffered through years of depression and drug addiction. He did release an ill advised come back attempt in 1999. On the cover, Kevin wore women’s clothes. Tragedy every which way I turn!) Ahh, but these blessings fall like white soft skin petals from the boughs of Bartlett Pair trees on these blustery spring days, here in the south.

…tood-a-lang-a-lang tood-a-lang-a-lang
I’m in heaven, when you’re smiling…

Why don’t you try a few of those tood-a-lang-a-langs for yourself, beloved reader? It is wonderful.

Nighty night, you crazy assed soul rebel, you.






I am currently Clueless
I am listening to They Might Be Giants