I spend a lot of time in an office: World Headquarters – but spend most of my time in a sunken reading chair, reading, and more importantly, sitting on my fat ass. I am on the Vonnegut workout plan, which is, do pushups whenever you have creative stasis. I also have a mustache that I am very proud of and might someday actually deserve to bear (but by the time that I make that reconciliation, I will probably want to shave). In other words, I’m in spiritual debt. As usual. A great distraction and occupancy of 99% of my brain. OCD. Integrity. I laugh with myself, not at myself, but soon the laughter will quiet down and I will be left with little explanation for why I am such an underachievement. Fuck potential. A girl who graduated from high school in 2019 just published a book. Now I know how silly it is to claim to have written anything before you graduate from college. Trinity Lemm. Look her up. I look forward to reading from her before I die.
It is best to read the best competition.
Still, I agree that there is such thing as sacred idleness, but it is unhealthy for any poet, savant, writer, and thinker. I should take up drinking. At least then I would have a reason for doing nothing. The sauce of something elusive. I am like a hammer. I just stomp nails. I just try to force a square shape into a circle hole. If life becomes mundane there is no conflict to address. Thus, no reason to live. I am not a sadist, but I deeply believe that hardship is what makes great people. It is the difference between a boring conversation and one that has meaning. Perhaps there are shallow friends of mine that I enjoy their company, but it is the ones with difficulties defining their lives that I love. It is so much better to be in the shit with someone. And I, like a prince and cast away from society, writing in my basement, looking forward to tomorrow, writing poetry, running, bleh, I make myself sick. It is always easy to root for a success story, but more importantly, it is best to recognize a failure. Recognize why we still get up in the morning when we can’t face the mirror. Perhaps this is hell. Paradise.
Ben Bonkoske 