Friday, February 03, 2006
Kurt Browning's Gotta Skate!
So I've been wrestling with the tar baby of yet another birthday this week. As of just an hour ago, I was like- fuck it, it's my birthday and if I want to wallow in depression that's my what I'm gonna fucking do. So I flipped on the T.V. (the 'little trigger' on nihilism's revolver) and suddenly I'm looking at Kurt Browning wearing the wildest shirt and skating to this groovy jazz tune. Now Mr. Browning is a helluva good-looking guy. Receeding hairline, fair spot on top, keeps the hair short, but clearly not the shave of shame. No side burns, but a damn handsome man. At first I was apprehensive, thinking that the only time guys this good looking get on the television be when they act all effeminate - and the skating thing meant that all sorts of my rural, midwestern prejudices began to darken my views on him. Then he started to skate and blam!
First I wanted that shirt. White and satin, long sleeve dress shirt, with an irregular pattern of red and gold rectangles scaled over each other like some sort of modern art print. Too flashy even for a lounge singer, a man can only get away with this sort of 'look at me' foilage when he's in a spotlight at the center of an ice arena.
His moves were smooth, confident, and groovy in a way that channels the deep-throated howl of primitive masculinity. All the bullshit sarcasms I'm filled my mind with surrounding grown men and figure skating disappeared. This guy was a dancer, the caliber of a Fred Astaire. Watching him deliver a performance he so clearly enjoyed doing was at first amusing; soon inspirational. This qualifies as culture, as a subset of 'entertainment' that one really can imagine our forefathers' in an earlier, grimier, age enjoying - as something that elevated them above drudgery of their mundane lives and left them feeling energized to go back out there a do it all again. That bit of solance.
I've been thinking a lot about entertainment lately, most of the thoughts dark ones that keep bringing me back to death and life's meaninglessness. Like, I heard a story a few days ago about a family's whose regular nightly routine involves sitting around the DVD player and watching their favorite movies together. I thought, what a pathetic waste of a life, that's entertainment as escape. The whole world's going to fucking shit and you spend the majority of your free time watching movie's you've seen once or twice before. Even if you are not watching repeats, you can't claim to be a part of a society.
I think one of the things that changes when you get to be my age is that the unbelievable potential of life begins to wane for you. When I was younger I just felt like so much was possible and the world was such a great thing just to experience and exist within. Little direction seemed necessary as new situations and potential outcomes sprang up on a regular basis. Now I'm starting to get a feel for the rhythm of life, and realizing that this slow dance will come to an end. What sort of entertainment routines do I want to surround myself with? My twenties are over, judge them however I will; the cold hard fact is that I will never get to be in my twenties again. That part of my life cycle is over. When I get to the end, I am at the end.
I know I'm belaboring this point, but I'm a child of the video game generation. It was a shitty day in my world when I realized that there are no 'going back to my last save point' in real life. Every day you get pushed one step closer to the grave and you can never go back.
So like Kurt Browning, I've gotta move to the rhythm with confidence and style. I've got to embrace the kinds of entertainment that actually move me (particularily, when that movement is from depressed to rather peaceful) and seriously reckon with those that merely hold my attention. I still hold to that romantic notion that some culture is necessary to understand and participate in society, that it's good for you. Yet it can't all be entertainment, can it?
There must be a meaning to life aside from the hours you devote to working for some corporation and the off hours you spend getting entertained. Once I find that groovy satin shirt, I'm sure I'll be a lot closer to figuring it out.
Gotta Skate! 5 on Bravo. Aurelius out.
First I wanted that shirt. White and satin, long sleeve dress shirt, with an irregular pattern of red and gold rectangles scaled over each other like some sort of modern art print. Too flashy even for a lounge singer, a man can only get away with this sort of 'look at me' foilage when he's in a spotlight at the center of an ice arena.
His moves were smooth, confident, and groovy in a way that channels the deep-throated howl of primitive masculinity. All the bullshit sarcasms I'm filled my mind with surrounding grown men and figure skating disappeared. This guy was a dancer, the caliber of a Fred Astaire. Watching him deliver a performance he so clearly enjoyed doing was at first amusing; soon inspirational. This qualifies as culture, as a subset of 'entertainment' that one really can imagine our forefathers' in an earlier, grimier, age enjoying - as something that elevated them above drudgery of their mundane lives and left them feeling energized to go back out there a do it all again. That bit of solance.
I've been thinking a lot about entertainment lately, most of the thoughts dark ones that keep bringing me back to death and life's meaninglessness. Like, I heard a story a few days ago about a family's whose regular nightly routine involves sitting around the DVD player and watching their favorite movies together. I thought, what a pathetic waste of a life, that's entertainment as escape. The whole world's going to fucking shit and you spend the majority of your free time watching movie's you've seen once or twice before. Even if you are not watching repeats, you can't claim to be a part of a society.
I think one of the things that changes when you get to be my age is that the unbelievable potential of life begins to wane for you. When I was younger I just felt like so much was possible and the world was such a great thing just to experience and exist within. Little direction seemed necessary as new situations and potential outcomes sprang up on a regular basis. Now I'm starting to get a feel for the rhythm of life, and realizing that this slow dance will come to an end. What sort of entertainment routines do I want to surround myself with? My twenties are over, judge them however I will; the cold hard fact is that I will never get to be in my twenties again. That part of my life cycle is over. When I get to the end, I am at the end.
I know I'm belaboring this point, but I'm a child of the video game generation. It was a shitty day in my world when I realized that there are no 'going back to my last save point' in real life. Every day you get pushed one step closer to the grave and you can never go back.
So like Kurt Browning, I've gotta move to the rhythm with confidence and style. I've got to embrace the kinds of entertainment that actually move me (particularily, when that movement is from depressed to rather peaceful) and seriously reckon with those that merely hold my attention. I still hold to that romantic notion that some culture is necessary to understand and participate in society, that it's good for you. Yet it can't all be entertainment, can it?
There must be a meaning to life aside from the hours you devote to working for some corporation and the off hours you spend getting entertained. Once I find that groovy satin shirt, I'm sure I'll be a lot closer to figuring it out.
Gotta Skate! 5 on Bravo. Aurelius out.
