Notes #28 - Give Me Liberty (Or Give Me Rock and Roll)
Notes From an Amateur Writer #28
GIVE ME LIBERTY (OR GIVE ME ROCK AND ROLL)
This Blog series is an exercise in creative writing. Sometimes expressed in short story forms, sometimes as a journal, or just my thoughts written down. This is my attempt to help coalesce my writing ideas and knowledge into usable form. It is a nursery of sorts for the stories that are on their way, or yet to be written.
Time For a Checkup
I had a three monthly checkup at the hospital today. It's part of my routine. I wonder sometimes about the number of hours I have spent in hospitals. And the number of needles I have received. I have no idea. I never kept a record. It would be in the hundreds. I still flinch at the experience. But it has become all so robotic. So routine.
There's a television in the waiting room. The happy smiley people are back. They're on TV. They're telling me things I don't want to know. Explaining things I don't care about. Filling my head with useless information. But they're happy smiley people, so I listen.
I'm mesmerised. I can't take my eyes off of them. Bright lights, big smiles. What are they saying? Something about terrorism. Breaking news alerts. Be afraid. I am afraid. I invite fear to take up residence within my brain because the happy smiley people tell me to. Now my brain cells are dying too. Welcome to hospital.
Trickle Down Economics
I pick up a magazine. It's glossy and full of pretty pictures. Pictures of happy smiley people. They're everywhere. They are like society's cancer. Spreading out and invading the world. Invading my world.
"Leave me alone," I tell them, "I don't need your cancer. I have my own thank you very much."
But they are happy smiley people and they look so perfect. Maybe if I read about their lives then perfection will creep into my life. Like a drip. Like trickle down economics. Maybe then I will qualify for the Z-list of happy smiley people. I practice my smile. People look at me with sympathy in their eyes. Or is that pity?
They think I'm dying. Code blue is announced. Nurses rush to me.
"What is wrong?" they ask me. I show them my smile. My forced, confused person smile. They talk amongst themselves. I can overhear them. I can hear the head nurse.
"I think he is too far gone," she says. "Did you see that smile? He'll never be a happy smiley person."
They wish me all the best and leave. I overhear something about a priest and last rites. Is my attempt at becoming a happy smiley person that bad? Am I doomed? Hospitals make me sicker, why do I come here?
The magazines tell me the secrets of the happy smiley people. About affairs, and heartbreaks, and financial shenanigans. Has the television been lying to me? Are those smiles painted on? Their lives seem worse than mine. Oh those poor happy smiley people. Someone should start a charity for them. Their lives are a mess.
I look back to the television. I know their secrets now, but still I watch. Mesmerised by those big wide smiles. Those perfect shiny teeth. Like soldiers all in a row, awaiting orders. Orders from the happy smiley people.
Rock and Roll
I want to grab the TV. I want to throw it out the window, rock and roll style. I want it to smash into smaller television pieces on the pavement below. And let the happy smiley people dissolve into the earth. Let them fade away. But I can't. Hospital TVs are bolted to the wall. "Rock and roll is dead," I tell the doctor. She just looks at me with sympathetic eyes. Or is that pity?
"Anything I need to know?" the doctor asks me.
"Give me liberty or give me happy smiley people," I say. The doctor writes me a script. I can't read it. I smile, the best happy smiley people smile I can muster. The doctor looks at me with pity. Or is that dismay?
All images used with permission, and sourced from Unsplash.com.
Thank you for taking the time to read this. If you liked it then please like, comment, and follow
@naquoya
Short Fiction:
Bang Bang You're Dead
I Have No Name and I Must Scream
The Last Book Store
The Judge
The Man In The Mirror
The End of the World [Part 1] [Part 2]
The Locked Room
The Gods of Love and War [Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]
Notes From an Amateur Writer blog series:
Notes From an Amateur Writer #1 - The Search For Inspiration
Notes From an Amateur Writer #2 - A Call to Action: Interacting With the World Outside of Me
Notes From an Amateur Writer #3 - Facing the Challenge
Notes From an Amateur Writer #4 - The Soundtrack to Grief and Loss
Notes From an Amateur Writer #5 - Music as a Catalyst for Imagination: Jimi Hendrix's Little Wing
Notes From an Amateur Writer #6 - The Stories All Around Us
Notes From an Amateur Writer #7 - Introducing Nomad [A Cyberpunk Mystery in the Making]
Notes From an Amateur Writer #8 - The House at the Edge of the World
Notes From an Amateur Writer #9 - Making Peace With My Kindle
Notes From an Amateur Writer #10 - Learning the Craft of Story Structure
Notes From an Amateur Writer #11 - Adults Sit at the Big Table, Children Sit at the Small Table
Notes From an Amateur Writer #12 - The Time I Won a Lego Competition
Notes From an Amateur Writer #13 - Learning to Fly
Notes From an Amateur Writer #14 - The Tucker 48: Face to Face With a Million Dollar Vehicle
Notes From an Amateur Writer #15 - When the Levee Breaks: A Story in Song and Words
Notes From an Amateur Writer #16 - Monty Python, Keanu Reeves, and My Case of Invisibility
Notes From an Amateur Writer #17 - Dancing With My Muse
Notes From an Amateur Writer #18 - Facing the Challenge Part 2
Notes From an Amateur Writer #19 - Telling Stories
Notes From an Amateur Writer #20 - Life Is Like a Box of Crazy
Notes From an Amateur Writer #21 - Writing Myself Out of Existence
Notes From an Amateur Writer #22 - The Finish Line Becomes the Next Starting Line
Notes #23 - It Is Sometimes An Appropriate Response To Reality To Go Insane
Notes #24 - The Happy Smiley People Ad Agency
Notes #25 - Some Days Are Full of Blah
Notes #26 - Stop and Smell the Future
Notes #27 - The Narrator and I
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Seriously, this one was...wow! I think those happy smiles must be copy pasted, but from where, surely no one can be that happy?
They are all mass produced in factories owned by the Happy Smiley Cult. Never been seen looking unhappy. Fake it until you make you. You can do it, fist in the air, etc.
That's what I'm going with anyway.
Sorry, mine's broken. Didn't order a new one. Don't tell.
It'll be our secret.
I think what's great about the world today is that the reign of the happy smiley people is on a decline. It used to be that what they dictate is law, but now a lot of diverse factions are coming to the fore. Sure, I get what you said about how they're so hypnotizing, as I have fell prey to them a bunch of times before. But, the time is now to stand up and claim what's ours, brother.
I really like how you're connecting all of the Notes. I haven't missed a single one, so it's a treat to have everything mesh together well. Not talking dogs in this one, but it's just as great. Rock and Roll is dead. Love ling, Rock and Roll!
No talking dogs in this one. I wonder when they will return? And cats. I think there may be some cows on the way. Not sure if they talk or not!
I just finished reading the biography of Jimmy Page so I had rock and roll antics fresh in my mind. TV smashing and hotel trashing. That was all floating around in my head while that TV was blaring its rubbish at me. It felt like time for some rock and roll!
If I can tie in something I discussed in a previous one then I like to do so. Whilst these are all stories that may have elements of exaggeration in them (no, surely not), they are based on fact. So they come out of what I do, or what I see, or even what I think. This makes it easier to have a common thread running through them, I find. Whilst practising story telling and writing.
Talking bovine! Now that's something I won't have a beef with ;)
Talking bovine, lazy bovine. I'm not too sure yet. But they'll be there. I steak my reputation on it.
Aha! Just keep grinding, mate. I know you're not only going to meat, but surpass all expectations :D
I could keep reading your comments till the cows come home.
Well done! It's rare to meat oh, wait I did that already someone with an aptitude for puns such as yourself, mate!
Mooooove along now, these puns are an udder disgrace.
Another great post, I like the "happy people" analogy, they are all over the place in every TV, in every paper and in every magazine, I tend to avoid the stories and the TV programs if I can.
Thank you. I don't own a TV anymore. Haven't for a couple of years now. So when I am forced to watch one I really notice it. It seems so alien to me now. Which got me thinking about it's impact on me and my thinking.
I often think that I will watch less television, I know that i should and I have cut down a lot on it over the last few years.
But well done you for getting rid of the TV!
If I hear of a high quality tv series then I see if I can find it online. Or purchase the download. I am currently watching The Handmaid's Tale via an Australian online streaming service (SBS). To me this is like reading good quality fiction. Without having to wade through the parts of tv that I don't like (most of it).
Crap can be addictive and time consuming. There is a lot of it on the internet, so I still have to tread carefully. But having no tv these days has made a difference.
I think the thing is that it's easier to pretend you happy than have to spill your guts. When someone asks how are you doing our natural responses to say doing great everything's fine.
Of course. I do that too. I guess I am referring more to the happiness industry more than anything else. Celebrity culture.
Absolutely you're right about that, my mind was just following a tangential path.
If a tangential path calls then by all means follow. Treasures can be often be found.
I should have also added to my last comment - I was probably also exploring my own obsession with the happiness industry and celebrity culture. It's influence over me and my own thinking. It's fuzzy, but it's there.
@naquoya got you a $1.61 @minnowbooster upgoat, nice! (Image: pixabay.com)
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