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His Philosophy

show reviews
1. Immortal Lee County Killers, All Night, The Loners
Supersuckers Country Western Extravaganza, with Jessie Dayton

There are two types of people in this world: (1) people who want to be left alone and stay out of other people’s business and (2) people who love nothing better than fucking with the first type of people. All people are miserable, but the second type of people are less miserable because they can spread their misery around to poor shmoes who just want to get through life minding their own business. The first type of person, if he doesn’t find a means to deal with the second type, ends up in the loony bin, or drug addicted, or a recluse, or in a permanent sour mood, or a suicide.

Suicide is not an option for most of us. Most of the type 1 people have intense fits of depression but don’t want to inflict any hell on anybody by kicking the bucket. And even though 99% of life is shit, and I might be fucked in the head, but the other 1% is worth it to me. I look forward to the rare occasions of contentedness that I experience in life. And besides, I’m probably still scared of hell even though I don’t believe in it anymore. Catholicism has a way of imbedding shit into your skull permanently.

I think severe depression could be a genetic psychological thing. I had a couple relatives that attempted to end it, three that I can think of right off the top of my head. But they’re still here. But my up-close experience with suicide was when I was in high school and had a close friend that hung himself. He was a good guy too, a genius who liked to talk and talk and talk. We used to stay up nights smoking weed and talking about the big picture in a way that I can’t really do anymore. I couldn’t keep up with him most of the time because I was an idiot. I think he liked to talk to me because I wasn’t like a normal high school fucker who was happy all the time. Anyway in the end he got really depressed and openly wept at times and no one knew what the hell to do for him because he was smarter than all of us and especially the idiot hack shrinks they had at my shitty high school and he found freedom in death, I guess. It was about that time that I got really pissed at the whole American schooling system which ignores geniuses and heralds idiots. In my high school, as in most American high schools, you were either a sports star or vermin.

So anyway I wish he was still around so I could have some crazy fuck to talk about crazy fucking things with. I think in general there needs to be more of the type 1 people around, so here’s 10 alternatives to offing yourself, in no order:

1. Isolated Alcoholism – sure this probably isn’t the best alternative. But hey, it works for George Thorogood. If you think about it, the only thing wrong with alcoholism, other than brain and physical damage it inflicts on the alcoholic, are other people. If you holed up for one weekend a month with a couple bottles of shit in a cheap motel room and got ripped to the tits, there’d be no embarrassments, no apologies, no arrests. Although a drunk ceases to worry about things like that while drinking, so I don’t know what incentive might keep him in the hotel room. But there’s always the type of person that likes to really likes to lay it into you the day after, even if they don’t mean any harm. Even if you know you didn’t do anything that bad, there always someone who gets a kick out of making you self-conscious: “Whoa-ho-ho-ho-man! You were WASTED last night!” Then they get this worried voice, designed to make you nervous – “Shit man, you better go down there and apologize!” You can always just tell them to fuck off, but a well-rehearsed type has a way of imbedding that worry into your brain, even if the drunk KNOWS he/she didn’t do anything terrible. So, not being around people in the first place gives you some insurance. You can leave your mistakes in that motel room. Just watch out you don’t inadvertantly kill yourself with alcohol poisoning. Actually you should probably ignore this one and go on to number 2.

2. Become a Hermit. Hell is other people. Really, even if you get drunk alone, the type 2 is gonna accuse you of something when you come back from your weekend bender- like alcoholism, infidelity (if your type 2 is your spouse), murder, and/or membership in a Satanic cult. A type 2 can never, ever believe that you just want to get the hell away from humanity for a couple days. Such a concept is inconceivable to a type 2 mind, since they depend on other people to survive. But imagine the life of a hermit. Living in some weird little cabin on top of a mountain and hunting your own food and making your own wine and nothing but silence and the sounds of birds and babbling brooks and you can smell and look as bad as you want, and nobody can do anything about it. Think about the unbridled Freedom in that! I could only do it for a little while though. Because really, I like being social every once in a while. Other people, as hellish as they are, can be all right once in a while.

3. Temporary Isolation - So if you can’t go into full blown hermitage, take a vacation every once in a while. I mean think about it, why do you want to kill yourself? To get away from people, right? Well, instead of having God or Fate or whatever choose your afterlife, or total nothingness, why not make your own? Then when Type 2 starts coming down on you, take off for a while into temporary afterlife way out yonder somewhere. You’ll feel better afterwards.

4. Read books - A good writer who is as pissed about other people as you are is the best. Try Bukowski – he’s a definite Type 1. Most writers write because they are Type 1 people. Reading is such a great, solitary activity. TV, even if you watch it alone, is not solitary like reading. When you read you can go at your own pace and cast your Imagination onto the thing. Television is just a bunch of Type 2 people shaking their wang at you, all rush rush. Not solitary at all. Notice a pattern here? Yes, it’s the “get the hell away from people” pattern.

5. Write - Why the hell do you think I do this? I’m very hesitant to turn this into a profession because in the publishing of books you have to deal with plenty of editors and people that’ll fuck your work up and snotty critics and shit. So I’ve never submitted my shit to someone who will pay me, although I wouldn’t mind a little cash (see #9). Writing is also a solitary activity. You can be alone and talk to people at the same time, like Allen Ginsberg said. That’s about as good as it gets.

6. Move out of your parents house - I don’t know how my brother does it. He must be nuts now, but he still lives at home. He’s only 20, so it’s not like he’s as old as me. But parents are, by definition, Type 2 people. Even if they used to be type 1, they automatically become Type 2 when they have kids. Seriously, get a job and move out. Or don’t get a job. The moving out is the important part here.

7. Find other Type 1 people to make friends with - Hey they might kill themselves someday, but at least you have someone to hate people with for a little while. I’m reminded of that episode of The Simpsons where the Comic Book Guy got together with Agnes Skinner. That was reviling and beautiful at the same time. “Can it be any more orange?”

8. Sex with Prostitutes- I’m still of the opinion that sex cures everything, and what’s better for a lonely cynical person than no strings attached sex? The deal is cut and dry, there’s no work involved and there’s no emotion to it. They should legalize it, really. Not for me, or anyone who’s practically married, but for all the lonely, desperate fucks out there. I guarantee if we legalized prostitution there’d be less murder, less suicide, less drug abuse, less people abuse. Wear a rubber if you don’t want AIDS, but if you’re suicidal you probably don’t give a fuck anyway.

9. Make a whole bunch of money - Money is everything. Don’t believe all that romantic bullshit. Money can buy anything, including happiness. “Money can’t buy love” is just a bullshit saying to pacify all of us poor people. Actually, screw money. My goal in life is to be worth zero. What a great self-esteem I must have, eh? Right now I’m worth -$21,800 (that’s negative). Zero means freedom, but by the time I reach zero, I’ll probably still have about 20 more years on a mortgage payment. Life sucks so much sometimes it’s funny.

10. Listen to a good album in full - What’s good music? The sound of a good man feelin’ bad. The rest is pretty much cock-waving (not that that’s all bad). And I’m not talking about the depressing shit that’s popular on the radio these days: that is the music of an idiot trying to sound sad so he’ll look dark and deep and attract mentally ill women. No no. Morons don’t feel real pain often enough to write all those popular songs about it.

But when you put on a certain album and you know those songs were written because the fuckers were coming down on that man, and there was nothing else he could do but sing to ease the hurt in the pit of his stomach, and he’s singing like it’s his last song, and you know exactly how he feels. I think about the best thing one human ever did was pour out the contents of his soul into a song for another human to hear it and know there’s more than one of us trying to get through some hell.

email me sloov@hotmail.com