Still Figurin' Out Who I Think I Am

This one's about an ant, hair, and dream purposes.

"You are an ant. You look like an ant. You live in an ant colony with other ants. You think like an ant, and you do whatever it is that ants do everyday. There is one difference though...you will have to write a blog entry like an ant. The prompt is...What do I like/hate about being an ant. Oh, and one more thing...write all of your responses to any other blog prompts you write on from an ant's point of view. Don't forget! You're an ant!"

Wow...good afternoon friends. Some of us have been impatiently waiting for brothernature's prompt for today's "Big Reveal" in his "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS"  Unofficial Elimination-Style Fundraiser Challenge...and this is the prompt we've been given. Huh...I almost have no words. Of course, a few minutes after I read that prompt, I was tempted to just go with the notion passed along by Joel as a rebuttal to my "All I need is a prompt" remark..."Here's your prompt...". I might've had considerable luck with that.

And we're on a new, reshuffled team that features everyone who's been eliminated, versus all the people who haven't been eliminated. I like that idea. Has it been chaotic? Indeed. I still have no idea who is actually on what team (and honestly, I haven't had a clue most of the month even though teams were posted in plain view in the forum...I just kinda went along for the ride), and I know some people are still bouncing ideas off each other for logos and mottos or whatever. I put in my two cents, and everyone seemed to be using different currency, so fuck it...here's my team allegiance for today and tomorrow:

Motto? We don't need no stinkin' motto
when we've got a cool ass logo.

Boom...done. Now, about this prompt...I'm sure some people are gonna dive head-first into it with all they've got and really get into the whole "Look at me! I'm a tiny dumb little ant!" routine, and that's fine. Good for them. More power to ya. Personally, I don't know if I can pull off that charade over two additional prompts and some music plus all the other crap I do in a typical Fivesixer blog entry. I'm having a hard enough time trying to conceptualize this just for the 30DBC portion.

You see, it's not easy being an ant. When you're practically the smallest moving thing on the earth that's capable of being seen by human eyes, everything is a mountain. The grass is a living, breathing mural of skyscrapers. Unexpected death is imminent; the fear of being crushed by something much larger is a birthright more so than an occupational hazard.

They say every creature on the planet has advantages and disadvantages in comparison to the rest; our size may allow us into the tightest of places and our strength is legendarily out of proportion against the few millimeters we take up, but what good is that in the grand scheme of things? It's not enough to resist the soles of shoes or the waters of everyday nature. Humans marvel at the sight of me hauling breadcrumbs with a heart that deserves the full loaf. A million of us may march and still never know the freedoms given to other species.

My home is the dust in your corners and the cracks in your sidewalks. The friendly sprinkle of rain on a summer day is a catastrophe, and Mother Nature doesn't have a Red Cross or FEMA to assist us. We're the true nomads of the world. We're ants. We may never be you, but we outnumber you, and we outsize you in the one category that separates the living from the dead: determination.

"Let's have a bit of flash fiction...a short story of no more than 50 words. Our topic is a hair cut or style gone awry. Did the stylist give you the wrong dye, or was talking on the phone and took a hunk out of your hair? Maybe the razor slipped and you now have a huge bald spot. Let's see what you can come up with."

Well, I'm not gonna count words, but I'll try to keep this brief.

My youngest brother had a few episodes in the early days of his life (we're 14 years apart) where he tried to cut his own hair. But only one little hunk here or there. And he'd get it good...real close, almost down to the scalp. Months later you could still see that something wasn't right where he'd taken to trimming.

I had a set of clippers for cutting my own hair, and one day he told me he wanted his hair cut short like mine. I took him out on our back porch and buzzed off most of his hair...really short. He was pleased, and he no longer looked like he tried to cut his own hair.

My stepmom came home that afternoon and looked a little distressed. She asked us if everything was ok, and we assured her all was fine and asked why. She didn't even notice Mikey's head. She just saw tufts of hair by the stairs of the back porch, and thought our dog attacked a rabbit or something along those lines. Took her a few minutes to realize it was her son's hair and not a dead animal.

"Let's explore dreams...do you believe that dreams are about things that have happened or are about to happen? Do you feel they have significance in your life? Or they simply amusement?"

I can tell you that from my perspective, dreams are not amusement. Not for me they're not.

In most cases they're twisted versions of various realities I once lived through, and oftentimes they're enough not only to wake me up, but also fill me with a sense of disappointed disillusionment.

Just the other day, for example, I dreamt that I was riding a really sweet BMX bike that also somehow was outfitted with a killer stereo system (I don't know how that would happen, and I was never one to pull off crazy trickridin' skills). I rode into the parking lot of a store I used to work at about 15 years ago, as if I was still working there, but no one recognized me or seemed to care that I was there. I left, and on my way home I had to pass a store my ex worked at (in real life they were about two blocks and about ten years apart). She was outside smoking with some of her coworkers, so I tried to go a different route around her building so she wouldn't see me...I was doing all these wild bunny hops from building to building like I was on some old Nintendo biking game, bouncing around. And somehow she still saw me, and started yelling at me, but I rode off through a field...and that's how I woke up. I felt guilty, like I'd done something wrong but didn't know at the time I was doing anything wrong. There was shame...and when you have trouble sleeping like I do, waking up under circumstances like that can really fuck with your head for awhile.

I guess you could say dreams have some significance, but they don't predict the future as much as they bastardize my past. For years I used to not be able to remember most of them when I woke up; as I've gotten older I wish I could forget them faster. They usually don't make much sense in the present other than to remind me of the things that have gone wrong in life. Maybe this is normal, and I'm complaining about something everyone goes through, but you never seem to hear others say they always have messed up dreams. I tried keeping a dream journal at the recommendation of my therapist, but he never brought it up again and every time I've looked back at it with intentions of mentioning it to him it's too depressing to bother.

So anyway, yeah...dreams. Not my favorite subject. If only there were a sleeping aid that not only worked consistently, but also ensured nice dreams...life would be so much more manageable then. Pharmaceutical companies (don't get me started on 'em) seem to have a pill for damn near everything else out there that ails ya, so much more so today than 20 or 50 years ago; imagine the killing they'd make offering a "Sweet Dreams" med. I'd seriously consider taking that, side affects be damned.

"The Soundtrack of Your Life" 

I'm not ashamed to have grown up as a teenager in the Beavis And Butthead   generation. Watching that show exposed me to different kinds of music I might not have paid attention to if they were just played on MTV (yes, back in the era of videos still being played on television)...seeing a couple of teenage misfits offering commentary over these songs in between sketches of the stupid shit they'd do added a different layer of entertainment that seemed fresher than someone just introducing a video or dropping a little bit of "Did you know..." trivia. And because I was an impressionable teenage boy, I thought they were funny as hell (if you like stupid things being funny).

I probably never would've gotten into Primus has I not seen the video for "My Name Is Mud" on Beavis And Butthead...although I wouldn't say I'm some kind of superfan or anything. I do know though that if you asked me to create a biographical cd, nine times outta ten this song would be on it...not because of its excellent bassline, but because there's a bit of an icky creep factor at play. I think we've all got a little bit of that in us, and when combined with certain people or situations it can come out to the forefront. Some might be more accepting of particular traits, while others may find them absolutely distasteful. No need to judge...I try not to, because if I took the time some people did judging others, well, let's just say they'd have to lock us both up if I told you what I really thought.

"My name is mud and it's always been
'Cuz I'm the most boring sonsabitch you've ever seen."
Lyrics.  

How do you not click on a link that reads "Convenient K-mart Ad Compiles Every Sneaker Brand Kids Hate"  ? I can definitely concur with the notion that back in the day, these were pretty much the only sneakers you did not want to be caught dead in.

I never worked in a record store (Borders Express doesn't count because we only sold a handful of cds, which were generally just one or two of the biggest new releases each month or so), and I really wish in some of my other jobs I'd have had the presence of mind to stash a notebook under the counter so I could keep track of some of the weirdest customer encounters   I've experienced. Forget a website slideshow or a blog; I'd probably have a book that's already been adapted into a cult-classic movie by now.

And finally, in case you're wondering (and if you're not, then maybe you are one) if you're a douchebag, here are the signs   you should be looking for. As always, what may be common knowledge to most of us can often be overlooked as nonsense by others.

Well, in my time-honored tradition of ignoring and/or skirting prompts, rules, authorities and other social directions, I believe my work here is done for this evening. Peace, so I've been told, and GOODNIGHT NOW!!