Non-fiction / The Hopeful Malcontent

He didn’t know what he was doing, though he rarely felt he did. There were instances of confidence, but they were certainly more fleeting than the insecurities that seemed to rest more easily in his daily disposition. Privately he thought most of his actions appeared odd, though this might’ve been a senseless timidity, with which he was quite familiar. Internally his motives were, as a whole, vaguely understood. His confidence was indeed lacking; sometimes he felt as if he went and looked for things to obliterate any self-assurance he might’ve acquired accidentally. Furthermore, when he was lucky enough to believe he was worth a damn, this thought was beset by a creeping inevitability that this temperament was soon to be remedied.

At his worst he opined that life was simply an obligatory chore, and few (if any) could avoid the unbiased suffering of youth. And rightly so, for such hardships build character, without which a person would be doomed to catering flatness, to one-dimensionality; or, as Trey Parker put it, one would be “about as interesting and special as a wet carrot”. Therefore, in keeping with humanity he was, at times, unhappy. Instead of altering his habits to achieve a higher quality of life, he entertained simpler solutions.

Chemicals, he’d say. The chemicals in my brain are unbalanced, and that is the cause for my unhappiness. The society in which he lived had a brilliant solution: pills. He rather disliked the idea of taking pills for such purposes. Pills, they said, would balance those chemicals, removing the cleverly disguised discontent. Pills, he thought, were utter nonsense; not in the sense that they did not work, but more so that he did not think they were necessary. He alone had the ability to alter his own chemicals, and he alone would be the one to do it. Besides, he inherently mistrusted such things, especially when such things were still in the lower stages of human understanding. However, his disdain for pills was not sufficient in getting himself to “balance” himself toward some conceivable end. A goal, he surmised, that was also misguided. The idea that one needed to be balanced in the first place seemed questionable, and this too helped convince himself that there was, in actuality, nothing to be done.

He thought of his family. Truth be told, he did not think of them enough, let alone confide in them, let alone speak to them. There wasn’t a particular reason as to why (not that he was ready to admit, that is) except that it simply wasn’t part of his routine—the hurdle was overcoming the tedium, which he, paradoxically, disapproved of. Perhaps if he did, the lingering tension of the day-to-day would wither, and with it his absurd ideas of magic pills. Rather, his synapses fired with knowing precision to preconceived ends, and his adulthood continued to fester with a measurable amount of adolescent ambivalence.

When caught in those rare instances where he found himself spending “quality time” with his own blood, he soon realized such a phrase did in fact have merit. His distaste for voluntarily finding himself in such situations seemed silly and obtuse when confronted with the benefits which were, admittedly, quite illuminating. More so, it seemed to be one of those things that had the ability to instill hope. Maybe it wasn’t much, but it was something, and most people, he felt, simply needed that something to preserve their contentment. In all honesty this sense of belonging was indeed an ephemeral epiphany, though it was more than that. Those moments were preserved in the incongruous crevices of his mind, hinting at a worthwhile purpose to his life that he seldom seemed to remember was there—the trick, he assumed, was defeating the numbness.

In a very general way, he thought his brain simply had different ways of working, or not working, which affected his daily life. Such things were difficult to describe, and after attempting he quickly began to doubt its legitimacy. Even so, there were some things he felt were true that perhaps no one was capable of wording, which he supposed was where a large portion of “the arts” originated. How boring and uninspired would works of art be if everyone was understood? This, he felt, was a valid rhetorical question, though one that had undoubtedly been asked before, and perhaps with greater efficacy.

Art, he decided, was the embodiment of a delicate abstractness, of intangible cruelty, and of some vague question of misunderstanding that begged to be answered. Subjectivity, thankfully, held great sway in this regard and disallowed any sweeping semblance of meaningful artistic cohesion. However, this bias for experience also seemed to limit the availability of achieving immutable excellence as a species. Though again, what would life be—how boring and uninspired would art be—without constant struggle?

On many dull and meditative nights his inadequate brain tried to make sense of things, pulling from nowhere some of his random, semi-realized contemplations. Appearance was more important than the message being conveyed. Superficiality weighed more on the minds of people than did the state of the world. The ability to concern ourselves with that which does not concern us was quite disconcerting—but how did he know this? How could he, of all people, know anything? His assumptions were many, with no evidence to back up his claims—in short, his methods were vastly unscientific, and thusly, lacked a greatly-desired soundness. The same longing, he assumed, for that of an artist.

Frankly stated, he knew not what others thought because he simply did not ask. He did not feel he had a place in the world because he did not seek it. His design was flawed, and therefore he judged and calculated the flaws of others, as well as himself, as queer comfort for his own obscured apathy. This, at least, he was sure of.

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