Monday, 02 November 2009

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  What is Really Going On

  I have a photographic memory.  I have an uncanny ability to not forget things.  This “talent” has been, for the most part, beneficial to me.  This single quality of mine is the only reason why I was able to successfully navigate my way through eight years of college tests and not forget songs by Glenn Lewis.  Unfortunately, this has also made me retain minute details about people I meet.  Just yesterday I was ordering a Caramel Frappuccino at Starbucks and I casually asked Audrey the barista if she was looking forward to Weezer’s new album, Raditude, which was coming out next week.  She gave me a look that was both of puzzlement and fear.  Before this point, the extent of our relationship was an exchange we had more than a year ago when I walked into Starbucks wearing a Weezer t-shirt and she remarked, “Weezer is my favorite band.”   My photographic memory has made me both a great test taker and a creeper.  I don’t know what to make of this dichotomy.  I have no redeeming qualities.

  Anyway, I said I have a photographic memory, but let me rephrase that.  I have a photographic memory for things that I want to remember.  I have subconsciously expelled (seemingly) random memories of people, places, and events from my past.  Most of my memories as a kid are vague and faint, and there’s a four-year gap between third and sixth grade where I don’t remember anything at all.  There are random gaps in my memories of college, most notably regarding girls I allegedly dated.  Recently I was reminded by a friend that I dated a girl named “Cheryl” for almost two years in the late 1990s (a time that, sadly, strikes me as the era of the rise of Limp Bizkit).  Two years is seemingly more than enough time to get to know someone, yet I can only recall random details about her:  1. She was short, 2. She was loud, and 3. She liked to say, “What’s really going on?” as a way of saying, “Hello,” “How are you?”, or “How come no one is talking?”  I suppose she liked to make up her own lingo.  This makes sense, because I was told she was from the San Francisco Bay Area.

  I suppose I can lethargically assume that these forgotten incidents have nothing to do with shaping who I currently am.  If they did, I would never know (because they’re forgotten!).  This makes me neither happy nor sad.  Coffee shop philosophers and history majors like to say that our reality is a product of our own history, but what happens when our memory is skewed?  Does our perception significantly diverge from reality?  If perception is different from reality, why would I want to know what is real?  What are the merits of living in reality, and what defines reality?  Is reality really important?

  Or, as my supposed ex-girlfriend would say, “What’s really going on?”

  In this day and age, the line between perception and reality isn’t clearly defined.  For example, I have a girlfriend who is under the perception that I’m good-looking and smart, mostly because I say lots of things she’s never heard before.  The reality is that I look like a foot (even when I smile) and I’m just very, very bored.

  What’s really going on?

  Because we are bombarded with so much information in this day and age, we are more politically and socially aware than we were in, say, 1985.  We are more apt to have opinions about things we probably shouldn’t have opinions about.  For example, the perception is that the Republican party is experiencing a resurgence, mainly because of newfound leadership in media personalities like Ann Coulter, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, and Rush Limbaugh.  The reality is that since 2004 when their popularities began to rise, the Republican party lost the majority of public office seats on a state and federal level, including the Presidency.  The Republican Party’s popularity is inversely proportional to the popularities of their supposed media leaders.

  What’s really going on?

  The perception is that Barack Obama is a left-wing extremist and socialism zealot.  The reality is that he’s a moderate.  He’s the most moderate guy I’ve ever known!  His support for a government-sponsored “public option” in healthcare isn’t as liberal as proposing a single-payer system and isn’t as conservative as doing nothing.   

  What’s really going on?

  The perception is that the Republican Party is the party of the Christian right.  The reality is that the Republican Party has historically been the party of fiscal conservatism and small government.  It was only within the last ten years that the Republican Party was infiltrated by Jesus enthusiasts who made the Republican Party their own by instilling their own dogma in policies.  True Republicans don’t care about dogma or ideals.  Today’s real “Republicans” are really Libertarians.

  What’s really going on?

  The perception of the Teabaggers in the Teabag Movement is that they have lost their country to an illegitimate President and a radical Congress that will turn the country into the United Socialist States of America.  The reality is that they didn’t lose their country.  The country is still here.  I’m standing on American soil right now.  The only thing they lost was a bunch of elections on November 4, 2008.  They’ve forgotten the fact that when you participate in a democratic election, there’s a chance that your side might lose.  They’re just being sore losers.

  What’s really going on?

  There is a perception that gay marriage is an immoral.  The reality is that marriage itself is neither moral nor immoral.  It’s amoral.  It’s as amoral as eating an apple.  Anyone should be able to marry anyone, even Lady Gaga.  Someone should be able to marry their pet donkey if they wanted to.  You might think that’s wrong, but that's your problem, not theirs (nor the donkey's).

  What’s really going on? 
  

  Reality is a void that is filled with myriad perceptions.

  What's really going on?
  

  I don’t know.  I’ve already forgotten.

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