Days I'm Owed
I want the time back.
I want every ounce of energy spent raising my hand. Every crease carved into my brain from memorizing the dates of the accomplishments attributed to the dead white guys that adorn our currency.
I want every knee-shaking moment at the chalkboard, every embarrassing delivery of a wrong answer, and every oak-tag project I handed in that year returned to me.
I want the entire year back. The whole of my third-grade experience. I want the days spent dividing the classroom into the different branches of government. The melodies from the Schoolhouse Rock! episode about how a bill becomes a law. I want apologies from the principal and all the teachers.
The things I’d do with that time. More hours out on the pavement, scraping my knees. More afternoons learning economics by rummaging through the bottom of my backpack, looking for change. More time spent getting my bike stolen. More time getting bullied. More hours training for the harshness ahead.
More time spent learning that there are no checks and balances.
I want to rewind to sitting on the edge of my bed, guitar in hand, fumbling through the chords of some Zeppelin or AC/DC song as my fingers struggle to fret the notes. I want my mother to walk into the room and say, “You can stay home from school today, and every day this year, for that matter. All you need to know is that it is, and always has been, about money. How much you have is how much you can get away with.”
And she’d pat me on the head, and I’d wring out a chord, feel the distortion fill the air, and know everything I’d ever need to know in life.
This is perfect. It’s all a lie. We have no respect or appreciation for anyone that doesn’t have money. Once you make enough of it it regenerates. All worries and pressures are extinguished if you have the money. We don’t care about what good someone can contribute to the world. We worship the dollar. If you don’t have it, you’ll slave for your entire singular existence away. I’m 41 and staring down the barrel of a gun needing to work another 30 years at least. I never did anything wrong but I feel like I’m living out the consequences of poor decisions my parents and their parents made. It’s easy to think hmmm maybe I should just check out now because the next 3 decades will be spent as a capitalist slave.
I always chuckled as an adult looking back when someone was voted “must likely to succeed”. We equated conformity with success, and many of those people can’t conform to adulthood.
The ability to persevere and relate with people are among the strongest factors to be “successful”.