list and sarcasm

we live in a world where okay is never okay and a lifestyle dictated by list after list of things to do and not to do.

it's tiring.

recently, i've been catching myself being drawn to quarter-life-crisis essays and books. almost all my social networking accounts are littered with angst and rants. i literally have to consciously remind myself to be good vibes about the little things i find fault in. i can easily name ten things i'm irked with right now. and i can give you ten more reasons why i hate each. it's not healthy when your life's default is to find unhappiness in the supposedly happy little things (no matter how banal they are). it's not healthy that you start your day with a deep heave dreading - and subsequently hating - what the day has for you. neither is it helping that you don't really end your day the normal time normal people do. i think the sun sets at six for a reason. and i'd like to believe the working hours were set around that time too for probably the same reason. rest.

but at this time and age when time is never really enough and everything calls for multi-tasking, when do we make time for rest?

i blame sarcasm. i blame these lists.

i hate how our default is to give the world bullshit. a whole lot of the things around us can be so much simpler if only we gave each other a little less bullshit. acting tough is never tough. nor is trying to walk the talk when the talk to begin with is flawed. because when you think about it, walking a crooked line straightly isn't exactly walking straight. but here we are following the world's advise down to the letter. it's a dog-eat-dog world out there. that's what they say. but we're not even down to the level of the dogs. i'd like to believe we're a little more complex carbon-based beings. so why the hell must we subject ourselves to the same rules? i heard there's such a thing as compassion and understanding and a little hint of benefit-of-the-doubt going around lately. but i also heard it's running low. it's running low on belief. it's probably a little hypocritical that these things are coming from the all-time cynic boy himself. but when cynicism doesn't even cut it anymore, what else do we have to hold on to? we've all been down the they're-gonna-try-and-diss-you-when-they're-done-with-you road. and we all know it's ugly. but when was the last time you took the other route and actually failed?

i'll probably laugh at myself two to three weeks (or even days if not hours) from now reading this. i would probably think that i've finally gone to hippie-ville thinking everything's gonna fall into place eventually. what i'm trying to say is the world is a horrible place. but if you give it a little trust, it'll probably throw some back at you. wishful thinking, i know. but the quintessential line of garbage-in-garbage-out most probably applies. give the world crap and it spews garbage. tons of it.

over the years, we've fed the world tons of crap. but the thing that's been gaining steam the most lately is lists. shitloads of lists. ever heard of the bucket list? the things-to-do-before-something list? the black book list? and all these other lists we try to live our lives by. who the fucking hell said i need to do all these things? and why must a better life be governed by numbered tasks that have yet to be completed by anyone successfully anyway? i've been reading essays and speeches here and there and all i got from them are new lists. things i have to do to be successful in life. things i have to be for a happier life. lists of places i have to go to before i die. lists of things to do in these places i have to go to before i die. seriously. why must i be in ten million places in a span of sixty years (that's wishful thinking again, of course) when all i really have to work with is my small little corner of the world? i already have more than enough to busy myself with, much more think about all the other things i'm missing out on. and when i finally get one aspect of my life taken care of, i'm most likely to find another list that'll claim to make my life a better one.

so really, when will the lists end?

if you think about it, these people, these people of the lists, have they ever really lived a gainfully accomplished life? do they live to see the places and do the things they've laid out in their lists? did they love and made love the way they said one should? did their other half liked the way they loved and made love the way they said one should? and even if they did, did they live to be a hundred years old atop a cash-cow of a company? i don't think so. because their list missed something. or that they claimed that was all they wanted anyway. probably yes. probably not. but one thing's for sure, they ran their life to the ground having to think they needed to be one way just so their lives would walk their "straight path". the "better" path.

again. walking the crooked line straightly is never really walking straight.

we even go along our lives piling on to the longest list we have. the list of names. but never a list of people. always just a list of names we knew. list of names we thought we knew. and if we're ambitious, names we wanted to know and wanted to galavant with. ever went through your phonebook asking yourself why you have the numbers of all these people? why did you ever keep that number of the guy that called you randomly asking about some favor? you didn't need to know his number. he did. but you kept it anyway. thinking it's probably good for keep's sake. another plus one in your list. but what for? i doubt he'd go to your wake after things go crazy that one night you decided to go past one-eighty in the highway. or that he'll check up on you and see how your day went. but there you are. saving it.

seriously. what for?

i'm tired. and i'm exasperated. tired about thinking how i should make my list work. and how tough i'd have to make myself seem so the world doesn't eat me alive. truth of the matter is, i don't even have a list. i just have a heart filled with sarcasm and angst enough to last the rest of my future lives. and this angst has been fueling my anxiety for the lack of a list. the lack of a line to walk crookedly - or straightly, whatever is more apt. i run the risk of giving myself a one-liner to live by with the nearing end of this entry. but really, i have none. all i do know is that i have to keep moving forward wherever the hell this is taking me. sarcasm or none, i know i know what i feel. at least to myself, i owe that much honesty.

i hate that tomorrow, i wake up to unending lists of to-do's and a mob of sarcasm bombarding me from every corner of the world.

but for tonight, i sleep and leave tomorrow to chance. as do i, the rest of my "line".