​Among Aliens

Different languages are spoken in this room
Were dozens of us congregate
For a similar purpose.

They speak in riddles
Which I call lies
But when I speak my mind
They call it rude and blunt.

Bullying someone means you like them
Apparently…
Yet I don’t think
The others like me
Despite the spit balls
The tripping
The insults.

Those in charge say we are supposed to read
But my peers say that reading is for nerds
Yet I thought nerds were the ones who made things?
And made things happen…

Eye contact makes me uncomfortable
But I’m supposed to do it anyway
Even though when I do
The others show me how much they like me
Even more.

The lights don’t seem to bother the others
Nor the bell.

I just want to play with the clay in the corner
Molding it into the shape of a sphere
“That’s our planet!”
The teacher says.
I wonder
Is it mine?

It started out like any other day
Second week of my second year
Of high school
Second period
Math class
Going through the anguish
Of trying to concentrate
When still half asleep
Not yet used to the early days again
After summer
The announcement came in the last 5 minutes
of class
“Boys and girls, we have just received word
That there has been a terrible accident at the World Trade Center.”
An accident
I remember that wording specifically
None of us really knew what to make of that
A moment later the bell rang
And I got up to go to third period business class
Taught by Mr. Campbell
The most laid back
Hilarious teacher
Only a few year away from retirement
And as a veteran of the Vietnam War
Not one to take the silly dramas and trials
Of dealing with teenagers too seriously.
Upon entering the classroom
The television
One of the few active,
Non VCR/DVD player-only televisions
That happened to be in the classroom
Where we normally had class
By pure happenstance
Was on
Turned to the news.
We didn’t do any classwork that period
Watched the footage
Of the first plane
Followed by the second plane
Saw one of the towers collapse live
Saw a replay of the other one
The smoke growing and growing
We were all very confused
No motive or reason had yet been released
The casualty numbers were climbing
Two classmates from that period excused
Sent to the office
Where they could make phone calls
To try to find out information
About their parents who worked
In the city.
And Mr. Campbell
Standing there, arms crossed
Shaking his head
With a somber
Sullen
Saddened look
That I never saw on him before
Or since
“You don’t know it know,” he said,
“but this is going to be the day that will define
your entire generation.”
More than a decade later
I can only say
How right he was.

After spending several more minutes than I needed to
waiting for this customer to count the change in her purse
despite the fact she is 18 or 19 at most and
should not be counting 
pennies like a Grandma
and having to retract her order several dozen times
based on her extreme indecision
and ability to be completely surprised by items
that had been right in front of her face for five minutes
but she suddenly just discovered them
and had to have them
but then not want them 
I do my best to fight off a sign of relief as I hand her
her bags and wish her a good day.

As she takes a step towards the door, she pauses and turns around.
“Would you happen to have the time?” she asks.
I point above me, to the analog clock that has been there 
the entire time.
She stares at it quizzically, 
for more than a full minute.
 “Can't you just tell me what time it is?”
I look up to check on it.
“It's working, isn't it?” I ask.
“Yeah,” she says. “But I'm not good at math.”

One day I approached a mom and pop antique store
walking up the beautiful porch 
I noticed a large round spider web
intricate, complex, a work of art.
The owner of the shop came outside
both carrying some items for display 
and to greet me.
Noticing where my gaze was fixed she dropped her item
pulled back in fear and made a loud squeal
“Ewww!! Spider web! Look at that spider!” she pointed
at the nice sized little creature climbing up its habitat
towards a pair of mosquitos it had managed to catch.
“Get rid of it, get rid of it!” she screamed in as high pitched a voice
 as I can ever recall hearing.  
As she searched for some large object to use to attack
I grabbed a long string of the spider web, and disconnected it from the ceiling
which only made the woman scream more, calling me
crazy for wanting to touch it
I moved it to the side of the building,
without incident
towards a bush and set it down there,
far away from the entrance and the panicking woman
who had run back into the store.
After entering the shop and making a minor purchase
once she was fully collected again
“Thank you for killing that spider,” she said with a smile.
“I didn't kill it,” I pointed out “just moved it away from the front door.”
“Aw, you shoulda killed it!” she said a little less happy.
 I tilted my head and asked the question, “why?”
despite knowing I've heard this response before.
“Because it's a disgusting spider! Ew, they should all just die.”
I shrug, not wanting to press the argument further
knowing from experience that this will probably just make her angry
but as I leave I wonder,
I wonder if this woman realized that this little
harmless spider might have saved her
from two mosquitos carrying diseases
I wonder if she had given any thought to what might happen to the delicate balance
of the ecosystem
without spiders or other creatures
and then I thought and wondered why she had such
trouble tolerating this harmless little spider
who had been minding his own business
and why she seemed unable to handle its mere existence.
And then I realized that humans have a very long history
and a very bad track record in this department
whether it be the other hominids we wiped out for
us to gain supremacy of this planet
the Native Americans that settlers from Europe
couldn't share the continent with
all those people deemed “Just this or that” and easily disposable 
during the early 1940's.
The intolerance shown during segregation
or the fact the majority of the 50 states in the land of the free seem to be
as unable to handle the idea of same sex marriage as
that woman was able to handle that harmless spider sharing the world with her.
The spider that could not logically do any harm to her or her person
her shop or her way of life
and I wonder what it is about humans
so uniquely on this world
that makes us feel the need to wipe out
whatever it is that makes us uncomfortable.
Is this our primary function? Biologically?
For our fears to throw things out of balance?
Or are we just so uncomfortable with ourselves
so insecure in our own skins
so scared of the world around us
that maybe we secretly feel
deep down
that WE are the ones 
who do not belong. 

I am the first one to admit...there are plenty of problems with my generation.
I often find myself sick of the overwhelming laziness...the fact that so many of them think about  no one except themselves—never saying please or thank you, no respect for money, no 
responsibility, ADD up the wall. 
So many in their own little worlds, oblivious to everything going on around them...
conversations changing as rapidly as an internet
search engine...like this one time...at that place...
with that guy...
oh look, something shiny!

I'll be honest...
my generation pisses me off,  
and I say it.  
I say it often.  

But the one thing that pisses me off more than my
shortcomings of my own generation
is listening to a member of the previous
generations talk down about it.
Throwing words like useless, selfish, incompetent at us
calling us “the period, worst period, generation period, ever.”

Complaining about the lack of a bright future
thanks to us...
pointing the finger as if they are just
innocent bystanders.
As if we somehow just manifested out of thin air,
fully grown with all our faults
and they had no involvement in our development whatsoever.

 We didn't raise ourselves did we?
And for the many of us that did...that's problem number one.

For all our faults at least I can say MY
generation didn't raise the most useless selfish incompetent generation
ever...that was all you...

But that's bullshit.
Because there are good things about my generation.

You gave us the internet...but we made it better.
Social networking—the marketing of the future
the international connecter that allows groups and organizations that feed the hungry, help the sick, raise awareness for autism, breast cancer, woman’s rights, human rights, civil rights and every right, cause, purpose imaginable at our fingertips in an instant...that was us.

Our culture is the most diverse culture in years
because our friends are everyone, black, white, Asian, Hispanic, gay, autistic,
handicapped, blind...
we grew up together, we love each other.
And prejudice, while not completely gone
is a sickly 90 pound weakling in comparison to
the Arnold Schwarzenegger version of its past incarnations

We don't see the world by imaginary divided lines because on any given day we can be talking with friends from Canada, Mexico, China, last night I played chess with people from Italy, Spain, South Africa, Australia, north Korea, and I wished them all good luck and said good game whether or not I won or lost and no matter where they came from.  

And for what we lack in office etiquette and practicality, we are the most educated generation in the history of recent history because for every lazy member of this generation
you have someone who spent hundreds of hours in the books, doing papers, making
presentations, skipping the weekends with the friends, never going out drinking,
never playing video games, studying 6 hours a day to pass those tests and
graduate suma-cum-laude

only to be stuck in an endless job search back and forth, month to month, year to year
in a world where PhD’s drive taxi cabs
and when we dare to complain about any of this those same people who were the
ones who MADE us the promise that an education and following the rules meant
success now look down on us for expecting what it was that we were promised and
have the NERVE to call that “entitlement.”  

When I take a look at the world you left to us I see it as
overpopulated, underfed over incarcerated, under-employed-over addicted, non-compassionate, non caring, over militaristic, economically failing collapsible loan bubble leaving what used to be the land of opportunity the land of flipping burgers til you're 40, so I seriously want to know how the hell with that cracker-jack job on your track-record you have the NERVE to look down on us?

It's not our fault for why the world is the way it is today...
But I do admit, it is time we got off our
over-theoretically educated lazy asses
and actually did something to fix it
because let's face it
we have a lot of work to do.  

Remember baseball cards?
What the crap happened to them?
Internet…
1999—there was a card shop
hobby shop, comic shop on every corner.
Now? I have to go 5 towns over just to find one.
And it’s small,
Really small,
So small I can’t get by the fat guy in the superman sweater
On my way to the batman rack.
I don’t mind so much, because I know that’s the only
Rack he’s ever going to touch.
But where do you buy cards now?
Target? Walmart?
That’s no fun!
My dad owned a card shop back when
Yu-Gi-Oh Nerds
Starwars Customizable Card kiddos
And Magic The Gathering Gatherers
Would throw away their allowance,
birthday, and Christmas money
In exchange for small pieces of cardboard.
I was never that stupid
I got them for cost!
Cuz my dad owned the store!
I’d buy whole boxes
Sort them out and ran a side business
during my lunch hour!
In elementary school I’d trade them for twinkies
By high school I got cold-hard-cash!
I would convince these kids that a 50 cent
card was worth 5 dollars! And this was before the internet!
What did they know!?
I’d forge autographs to jack up the price
I bought my first car
cause of my clever con-artistry.
And now, my empire has crumbled.
No one wants cards anymore
They want facebook credits
And instant downloads
I can’t get those wholesale!
And even if I could, they’d have no resale value whatsoever.
And you can’t forge an autograph on a fart app for your I-phone.
You’ve ruined my personal economy Internet.
You ruined it!
Now I gotta get a job…

My childhood was filled with the wonder that was
the Mighty Morphing Power Rangers
When the fever of nostalgia for a time long gone hits me
and hits me hard
I find myself indulging in my old VHS tapes,
DVD sets
and searching the Internet to relive the wonder of the early episodes
and I see...

I see the evil villain Rita Repulsa
and I see many a thing wrong with her evil plots.
Why the heck does she only send one monster at a time?
Why does she only attack the one city of angle grove? The one the power rangers live in?
And why does she always make her monsters grow when she should know the Megazord
is just going to spank them?

I see two bullies, Bulk and Skull
who would about as effective as two red hot chili peppers
trying to melt the ice caps if they ever tried to be bullies an actual school.

I see very harmless evil henchmen in the form of the Putti Patrol who never seem to attack anyone other
than the power rangers
and could probably be beaten up by a poodle.
And of course I see no sign of any police or military during any of these conflicts at all.

Breaking the fourth wall, I see and laugh at at the horrible editing, trying to splice together all that stock
footage from the Super Sentai show in Japan,
I see unrealistic action,
I see bad lighting
I see monsters that are OBVIOUSLY puppets,
I see horrible plot-holes,
ridiculous logic,
And the opening credits that happen to be one of my guiltiest pleasures
After all these years I still can't help but get up and dance to.

And yet, I see more...

In every episode
I see an unlikely group of a dancer, a jock, a cheerleader, a geeky brain an exotic overachiever
and later on a bad boy as best friends, in a very politically correct fashion.
And I see them all...working together.
I see them at the Youth Center teaching classes to children
I see them at school, organizing drives to save the environment,
I see them starting multi-cultural food festivals to raise money for playground equipment
I see them designing floats for parades for world peace
I see them working to improve their minds, bodies and spirits, by helping their community,
helping others, and working together for a better tomorrow.

And now,
I look at the shows on television...and I see...
Better and more realistic giant robots
better graphics,
greatly improved fighting choreography
scarier villains with more worthwhile plots
better logic
better video editing
better sets, props, lighting,
with far, far, far
inferior
spirits.
I see none of the somewhat naive yet hopeful encouragement of the 90's to
go out and be part of something better.
No push to help each other, or our communities.
In so many cases, I see no substance at all.

How could we have advanced so far
in every way imaginable
so much since then
and gone completely backwards in the one and only way that really matters?

What happened to the mighty morphing power rangers?
What happened to working together to save the world?
What happened to looking towards the future for a better tomorrow?

What happened?