the answer to hatin’ on everyone
21 August 2007
In college, a "fine arts" class was required to fulfill part of the school’s core curriculum. One could take an art class, like drawing or painting or some shit; an art history class, a music class, or a theater class. Since I consider myself a musically-inclined person, in my first semester of my sophomore year I opted for a music class – at 9am every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
Not surprisingly, I dropped out of the class after one session. Not, primarily, because it was so early (although this was certainly a factor), but because in that first class the professor had us singing – actually fucking singing, at 9am no less – scales. Though I loved and still love music, I was not about to wake up at 8:30am three times a week to sing do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-da in front of a bunch of strangers.
I took some other non-arts class that semester instead and the following semester five buddies and I signed up for "Introduction to Theater" in order to knock out the fine arts requirement. I was a little apprehensive about theater because, well, theater is for gays and crazy chicks. But successfully nestled in the back of the classroom in my cocoon of buddies, the class went just fine. I actually grew to like it and saw it as a nice break between laborious history classes. Also, I wound up getting a beejer from some chick from the class a year later, which was totally sweet.
One of the plays we read in this class was Moliere’s The Misanthrope. The play is about this dude who basically doesn’t give an F. A guy that he knows wrote this terrible poem and rather than say it was good to be polite, the protagonist says it sucks. Hilarity ensues. The main character eschews politeness and social convention because he doesn’t want to play nice, and in the end goes off and lives alone in a cave somewhere. I think.
I enjoyed the play, in no small part because I could relate to the character in certain ways: we both don’t like poets, we’re both don’t like French people, and we both fall in love easily. But I didn’t realize the extent to which I would become a misanthrope many years later.
******
On Friday night, my friends Jeremy and Brian came over to my place and we drank 23 bud bombers between us while pre-gaming (bud bombers, remember, are 16 oz cans of beer). We then went out to a local bar to meet some friends. Within 45 minutes, I had pulled an Irish Exit – pretending like I was going outside to make a call but then leaving the bar and going home. I couldn’t stand being there.
On Saturday night, my friends Jeremy and Brian and I went over to Hoboken to our friend Brendan’s place for a BBQ. It was incredible; cappicola and fresh mozzarella for appetizers, then half-pound burgers stuffed with bacon and cheese. The four of us drank 49 bottles of beer before going out. I was able to last longer than 45 minutes at the bar, mostly because I was marooned in Hoboken and it wasn’t feasible to return to Manhattan without Jeremy and Brian. So I took comfort in the Golden Tee machine and didn’t so much as look at anyone who I didn’t come to the bar with.
Because of these and other examples, it has become apparent to me that I hate other people. I’ve always had an inkling that I disliked being around people I didn’t know, but I’m finding that as I’m getting older, this "dislike" is growing into something like "rageful passion."
When I’m out at most bars, I look around and immediately think that most everyone is a douchebag. This is probably because I’m insecure. I don’t really know why I feel this way and, to be honest, it concerns me. Do I feel not up to par with the open-shirted former frat boys doing jagerbombs? Am I sad because I’m not as cool as the I-cut-my-own-hair hipsters? Am I resentful because I realize that 99.6% of the women in the bar have little interest in talking to a man with an unruly beard who smells like cheap whiskey and whose only claim to fame is his uncanny ability to joke about how small his penis is? I think it’s all of the above.
But whatever the cause, the bottom line is that my misanthropy is seriously affecting my social life. After the events of Friday night, which found me retreating from the bar faster than a black man escapes the responsibilities of fatherhood, and Saturday night, when the only things that kept me from immediately running back to my apartment were a video game and the Hudson River, I realize that something needs to be done. I have two choices.
1) Do cocaine.
I do not like cocaine. I feel that if you are over 25 and do cocaine – and you are not rich and/or famous – you are gross. Cocaine is gross.
But on the other hand cocaine is awesome. And it would certainly help with my recent bouts of misanthropy; if I had been coked up on Friday night, I probably wouldn’t have left the bar in 45 minutes and instead would have stayed until the lights came on, dancing and having scintillating conversation all the while, which would invariably continue over diner food well into the early morning hours. Instead, I went home and quietly wept to myself in my shower. So doing cocaine is option one.
2) Start a social club.
I kicked around the idea of owning my own bar on here before, but there’s one obstacle to that problem: owning a bar would cost a lot of money and I don’t have money. So there’s that.
On Saturday while barbequing, Brendan, one of my more ambitious/entrepreneurial friends (which isn’t saying much) brought up the idea of a social club. Basically, he suggested we rent a loft space and fill it with a bunch of cool crap – sweet stereo system, big screen tv(s), video game set ups, etc – and a bar. Brendan, Brian, Jeremy and I, the four at the mini-bbq, would be original members, and each of us could invite five other peoples to be members. For a fee – maybe a few hundred dollars a month – each member would have access to the place at all times, at which he could chill out, watch a game, have a beer, smoke a joint, etc. The membership fee would cover rent of the space, upkeep, and keep the bar stocked.
Well.
I really, really like this idea, for many reasons. First and foremost, it’s more social than the four of us sitting in my apartment slamming beers (not that there’s anything wrong with that), and much less annoying than going to bars packed with douchebags. I think it’s the latter that’s so appealing to me; the ability to control who I spend my time with and around is very exciting and possibly arousing for me.
If I were rich, I’d have everyone close to me live on a complex. In the middle would be my home, a modest but tastefully luxurious house in which I’d live alone. To the right of my home, would be a large house filled with all sorts of fun things like a movie room, music studio, batting cage, etc, in which ten or so of my closest friends would live. On the other side of my house would be another modest but tastefully luxurious house in which my wife and children would live. The rest of my family would live within an hour’s drive. But maybe the complex would be hard to find, so they wouldn’t come out there unless they really needed to. Also, the complex would have some sort of Sex Pit or Intercourse Shed, probably in the back of my house. I’m still working with the architects on this.
But until I hit the lottery, my mega complex is only a dream. The social club, however, is fairly attainable. Say monthly rent in a modest loft is $3600 a month. If our little social club had 24 members paying $250 each, that’s $6000. That remaining $2400 a month should cover the cleaning, stocking of the bar, and other miscellaneous costs (cable, internet, etc), with enough leftover to help offset the initial costs (TV’s, sound system, etc). For the record, we’re not talking about a social club with oak paneling and hot 19 year old bartenders pouring from $70 bottles of scotch; more like a bunch of friends sitting around in a half decent loft with nice enough stuff that no one will pee on. Really, with most of my friends, that’s really all you can ask for.
I’m sure that this idea, like all of our ideas, will die soon, if it did not already die when Saturday evening ended. But I’m going to obsess about this for at least a week, and anoint this the true cure for my misanthropy.
(And also I’m going to play the lottery - I owe the architects $21,000 as a consulting fee for my Complex of Solitude. I hope they have bad lawyers.)
Not surprisingly, I dropped out of the class after one session. Not, primarily, because it was so early (although this was certainly a factor), but because in that first class the professor had us singing – actually fucking singing, at 9am no less – scales. Though I loved and still love music, I was not about to wake up at 8:30am three times a week to sing do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-da in front of a bunch of strangers.
I took some other non-arts class that semester instead and the following semester five buddies and I signed up for "Introduction to Theater" in order to knock out the fine arts requirement. I was a little apprehensive about theater because, well, theater is for gays and crazy chicks. But successfully nestled in the back of the classroom in my cocoon of buddies, the class went just fine. I actually grew to like it and saw it as a nice break between laborious history classes. Also, I wound up getting a beejer from some chick from the class a year later, which was totally sweet.
One of the plays we read in this class was Moliere’s The Misanthrope. The play is about this dude who basically doesn’t give an F. A guy that he knows wrote this terrible poem and rather than say it was good to be polite, the protagonist says it sucks. Hilarity ensues. The main character eschews politeness and social convention because he doesn’t want to play nice, and in the end goes off and lives alone in a cave somewhere. I think.
I enjoyed the play, in no small part because I could relate to the character in certain ways: we both don’t like poets, we’re both don’t like French people, and we both fall in love easily. But I didn’t realize the extent to which I would become a misanthrope many years later.
******
On Friday night, my friends Jeremy and Brian came over to my place and we drank 23 bud bombers between us while pre-gaming (bud bombers, remember, are 16 oz cans of beer). We then went out to a local bar to meet some friends. Within 45 minutes, I had pulled an Irish Exit – pretending like I was going outside to make a call but then leaving the bar and going home. I couldn’t stand being there.
On Saturday night, my friends Jeremy and Brian and I went over to Hoboken to our friend Brendan’s place for a BBQ. It was incredible; cappicola and fresh mozzarella for appetizers, then half-pound burgers stuffed with bacon and cheese. The four of us drank 49 bottles of beer before going out. I was able to last longer than 45 minutes at the bar, mostly because I was marooned in Hoboken and it wasn’t feasible to return to Manhattan without Jeremy and Brian. So I took comfort in the Golden Tee machine and didn’t so much as look at anyone who I didn’t come to the bar with.
Because of these and other examples, it has become apparent to me that I hate other people. I’ve always had an inkling that I disliked being around people I didn’t know, but I’m finding that as I’m getting older, this "dislike" is growing into something like "rageful passion."
When I’m out at most bars, I look around and immediately think that most everyone is a douchebag. This is probably because I’m insecure. I don’t really know why I feel this way and, to be honest, it concerns me. Do I feel not up to par with the open-shirted former frat boys doing jagerbombs? Am I sad because I’m not as cool as the I-cut-my-own-hair hipsters? Am I resentful because I realize that 99.6% of the women in the bar have little interest in talking to a man with an unruly beard who smells like cheap whiskey and whose only claim to fame is his uncanny ability to joke about how small his penis is? I think it’s all of the above.
But whatever the cause, the bottom line is that my misanthropy is seriously affecting my social life. After the events of Friday night, which found me retreating from the bar faster than a black man escapes the responsibilities of fatherhood, and Saturday night, when the only things that kept me from immediately running back to my apartment were a video game and the Hudson River, I realize that something needs to be done. I have two choices.
1) Do cocaine.
I do not like cocaine. I feel that if you are over 25 and do cocaine – and you are not rich and/or famous – you are gross. Cocaine is gross.
But on the other hand cocaine is awesome. And it would certainly help with my recent bouts of misanthropy; if I had been coked up on Friday night, I probably wouldn’t have left the bar in 45 minutes and instead would have stayed until the lights came on, dancing and having scintillating conversation all the while, which would invariably continue over diner food well into the early morning hours. Instead, I went home and quietly wept to myself in my shower. So doing cocaine is option one.
2) Start a social club.
I kicked around the idea of owning my own bar on here before, but there’s one obstacle to that problem: owning a bar would cost a lot of money and I don’t have money. So there’s that.
On Saturday while barbequing, Brendan, one of my more ambitious/entrepreneurial friends (which isn’t saying much) brought up the idea of a social club. Basically, he suggested we rent a loft space and fill it with a bunch of cool crap – sweet stereo system, big screen tv(s), video game set ups, etc – and a bar. Brendan, Brian, Jeremy and I, the four at the mini-bbq, would be original members, and each of us could invite five other peoples to be members. For a fee – maybe a few hundred dollars a month – each member would have access to the place at all times, at which he could chill out, watch a game, have a beer, smoke a joint, etc. The membership fee would cover rent of the space, upkeep, and keep the bar stocked.
Well.
I really, really like this idea, for many reasons. First and foremost, it’s more social than the four of us sitting in my apartment slamming beers (not that there’s anything wrong with that), and much less annoying than going to bars packed with douchebags. I think it’s the latter that’s so appealing to me; the ability to control who I spend my time with and around is very exciting and possibly arousing for me.
If I were rich, I’d have everyone close to me live on a complex. In the middle would be my home, a modest but tastefully luxurious house in which I’d live alone. To the right of my home, would be a large house filled with all sorts of fun things like a movie room, music studio, batting cage, etc, in which ten or so of my closest friends would live. On the other side of my house would be another modest but tastefully luxurious house in which my wife and children would live. The rest of my family would live within an hour’s drive. But maybe the complex would be hard to find, so they wouldn’t come out there unless they really needed to. Also, the complex would have some sort of Sex Pit or Intercourse Shed, probably in the back of my house. I’m still working with the architects on this.
But until I hit the lottery, my mega complex is only a dream. The social club, however, is fairly attainable. Say monthly rent in a modest loft is $3600 a month. If our little social club had 24 members paying $250 each, that’s $6000. That remaining $2400 a month should cover the cleaning, stocking of the bar, and other miscellaneous costs (cable, internet, etc), with enough leftover to help offset the initial costs (TV’s, sound system, etc). For the record, we’re not talking about a social club with oak paneling and hot 19 year old bartenders pouring from $70 bottles of scotch; more like a bunch of friends sitting around in a half decent loft with nice enough stuff that no one will pee on. Really, with most of my friends, that’s really all you can ask for.
I’m sure that this idea, like all of our ideas, will die soon, if it did not already die when Saturday evening ended. But I’m going to obsess about this for at least a week, and anoint this the true cure for my misanthropy.
(And also I’m going to play the lottery - I owe the architects $21,000 as a consulting fee for my Complex of Solitude. I hope they have bad lawyers.)
