It Can't Go On

I was driving home and heard the “press conference” on the radio. I listened, I laughed; I was talking out loud, alone in my car.

“Jesus Christ.”

“Holy shit.”

“He’s nuts.”

“What an unstructured asshole.”

I caught myself and chilled out, focused on the road ahead.

I’ve heard a lot of crazy talk in my life; I’ve been guilty of it myself when I was drunk, coked, angry. I tried to convince people of shit I didn’t believe. It never worked. I was raised to doubt myself and had to work on self-esteem, honesty, and the clear articulation of thoughts. I’m still working but I heard a guy today who doesn’t have the ability, or need, to reflect.

He has never had to use words, so he sounds clumsy and stupid.

If he wants a banana he points to the menu and somebody brings him a banana. If he wants to get laid he grabs someone by the pussy and sometimes he gets what he wants because he’s a wealthy celebrity. If he needs a new tie he sends some schmuck shopping. He’s probably never talked to an auto mechanic in his life.

And here’s what I heard today.

He believes he is really, really smart. Super smart and funny and charming. It’s an unwavering belief. Christ, you can hear it in his tone; condescending, patronizing, cocksure. He will continue to sneer at average people, to laugh and ridicule you and me and anyone he views as weak: poor, old, disabled, sick, uneducated, marginalized.

 He’s convinced that he is vastly intelligent and knows more than his critics, absolutely convinced, not because he’s educated or he reads a lot or has been a close observer of life.

Nope, he believes it because it is his birthright to be smarter than everyone else.

Who, in his small, power hungry, needy, money-worshiping life has ever reproached him?  Everyone laughs at his jokes. He lives in a private world where normal interaction is rare and alien.

But he thinks he’s wildly smart. Uses words. Has ideas. And though he couldn’t articulate it, he may feel that he is Chosen, an ubermensch, godly, a separate and higher species, “The Rich”. Complete delusion. Out of his fucking mind with narcissism. Irrational. Fucker can’t even pretend to care. He doesn’t have to. It can’t go on. It can’t last. It just can’t.