Corporate America

I’m back from work now. I left at 5h07 pm, right in front of my boss. I felt guilty for leaving so early, but I need a life, and I was anyway the last in the office except for the Valley Girl, who’s either got something to prove or is just plain busy, I just don’t know which. Perhaps she was very late again today, she was sick yesterday anyway, so I guess she’s not shining so much. Perhaps they freaked her out because of her day off, and felt the need to work overtime tonight. I don’t care.
I need to talk about something else. My dear literary forum on my website. It has been an unexpected success over the years, despite its name which includes the words Crowned Anarchist in French. Maybe this planet is ready for something more than conformism. Well, it was the oldest php programming ever, and a good Samaritan decided to help me migrate to a better version. And today was the inauguration of the new forum. I’ve been reading the statistics which were unavailable until now, I almost fell from my chair. At a time when I was considering shutting the damn thing off, since it makes my website go over its limits every month. Have I got no sense of marketing? I could reach all this people within seconds to let them know I exist! Surely they know I exist, they’ve been spending years on that literary forum. This is the forum that saved Science Fiction in the French world, as I can see that the most popular threads are about just that. And yet, none of these French bastards have a clue about the English side of my writing, I bet they would be surprised to learn that my life in English has been entirely dedicated to Science Fiction, and Theoretical Physics. Of course, nothing I have ever written in French is about sci-fi, no wonder none of them contact me. Is it possible to be overly popular as an author, and yet, have no clue, because no one takes the time to contact us to let us know? These numbers are so amazing, surely these people know I exist? Maybe all the signs that were pointing to me being a successful author in French are true, maybe I just don’t know about it. This is also very sad, to have such an impact, and yet, not know anything about it. And yet again, what sort of impact can I really have when everything is in French? How I wish I was born English… I can only imagine the real impact I would have had on this world. Maybe everyone would have stopped breathing to hear me speak, every damn time I wish to say something. I could stop the world in its track, make them think some more, before adhering to more stupidities that no one ever can find accommodating.
As it stands, I am a nobody, at the very least in the English world. In the French world, I just don’t know. I cannot calculate my popularity using simple marketing equations. I may be known and recognized beyond dreams, in the whole French World, and yet, not be rich because everything is online on my website except my last two published books, and who would want to buy them, when apart from those missing 1000 pages, I have 50,000 others for them to read until they puke all over the place reading them?
I have a few books written in English now, maybe I’ll have a real impact eventually. I’m waiting to be sacked from my job to put everything online, waiting to make sure none of the people I dealt with in the past, I will ever need to deal with again in the future. Nothing will stop me then. Maybe it even could provide me with a reason to exist?
I love to pretend to be something, to be pretentious, just to motivate me to continue in this mad world. I’ll take anything, anything to prevent me from committing suicide. That’s how low I really am. So I will not spit on any hearsay about me being a real and recognized writer, even if the hearsay barely reaches me. I’ve always been thinking that unless it is happening on a massive scale, it is insignificant. And yet I understand that nothing happens on a massive scale without a big publicity machine. So to reach some kind of recognition outside of the publicity machine must already be something, something desirable, something significant. Perhaps I am reaching out much more than I believe. I have all the signs, the messages from fans, why can’t I believe it? Mystery. I am no Michel Houellebecq, the most famous French writer in the last 50 years, even if I know for certain now that I inspired him a complete book. He made it, everywhere, even in English, with what I would qualify of boring novels. Even if at least one of them was inspired by me. His Atomic whatever. So why can’t I? Break all frontiers and be heard? It seems that it is mostly the life I’ve been leading that interests them, that inspire them, and yet, that’s mostly what I am talking about, so why should I be surprised? What about all those other books I have written, what about them? Have they read them, they did have any sort of impact? Oh God, I’m already drunk tonight, I’m sure you could tell.
It’s not enough, it far from being enough. I need ultimate power, complete mainstream access. I need to feel that every time I open my damn mouth, it has a huge impact! Everyone listens, and then continue with their lives with what I said in the background. Maybe then I will be able to change this world for the better, save humanity somehow, or have I read too many sci-fi books?
Reading my books is no entertainment, since most of it is not fictional. It is painful, I know that, as painful as it has been for me to write them. Perhaps it is through entertainment that a message could really reach out. Which means only one thing, I’ve got to get the thinking machine going, and then, somehow find the time and motivation to write fictional stuff about whatever it is I wish to communicate to the lost ones.
Oh God, I’m gonna be sick again, and I’m working tomorrow. I have a list that long of things to do to prove to my Manager that she can get lost for the next two weeks without worrying about me. She said this morning, get all that done by tomorrow, I said no, Friday. She said no, tomorrow. So now I’m laughing, nothing would be done by tomorrow, and I don’t give a shit. You cannot ask for the impossible and expect it the next day. Get me an assistant, or two. Your two other assistants appear to be doing nothing all day, while I am sinking here under so much work. The Sweet Chinese Girl even got annoyed with me today, when I noticed that she had nothing to do. Is she going to turn into a Master Bitch too? Is she only waiting until she gets her chance? Possibly. That could be another interesting test on human nature. One that I cannot perform, since I’m not in control of giving her more responsibilities.
Are we all just Master Bitches in the making? Waiting for our turn to make the life of everyone else a misery? I might soon find out, if I have to create my own company. We’ll soon then find out if I can too become the Master Bitch of my employees. In the name of money, of richness, of freedom.
Oh God, get ready, I don’t intend to fuck around, I’ll have all these processes ready for you to be unable to escape your miserable existence in no time. You thought you could doss around being on my payroll? I’m not the government, I don’t have billions to waste. I’ve got to get rich soon, or else, there would be no point to exist. I need that freedom more than anything, and I will find it one way or another. Fuck you! Fuck you all!
I’ll be as merciless as the next dictator. I’ll make you understand that making me rich, is the only option in this world for you. And when will come the time to get rid of you, I’ll make you regret to even be alive, I’ll make you want to kill your kids. Mark my words. Because this is where this world is now, I’ll bring you to the brink of insanity.
It is after all my experience so far. How could I do any differently than what I’ve been experiencing in the last 20 years? I can’t! So brace yourself, you’re up for quite a ride. I’ll destroy you. I’ll make you make me money, or else, I’ll turn your life into such a living hell, you’ll never know what it you. You’ll play the game, I’ll screw you mentally, you’ll see. I’m ready for it. Got to get rich… I depend on you, no chance of me doing the dirty work, you’ll do that for me, you’ve been hired just for that, sales, ah, the word itself kills me. Sales.
Something I believe I’m not cut up for this. Perhaps if I don’t have to be the one selling things, it would not be so bad. Perhaps if I am only the one collecting the profits, it would be my salvation. God, I sure hope so.
I’ve not said much to the so-called Cool Spanish Boy, because I could not, and yet, it seems to have sunk in deeply already. Today he was buzzing around me, like a real diva. He’s so gay, it is ridiculous, no wonder at the first hint of it from me, he jumped into the boss’ office to stop it all. It must fry him to look at me, who does not even look 10% queen as he is, to be so openly gay.
Sometimes I think I must be the only openly gay guy working in the whole of Los Angeles. They’re so backward, it is unbelievable. They are still all living a lie. We’re in America after all, the most backward country I have ever lived in, in my life. You would think differently, but I’m telling you, arts in America, ideals coming out of America, do not reflect society. All the gays here are still in the closet, they still marry and have children, and maybe, have sex on the side. It is so sad, I can hardly believe it myself.
I’m pretty convinced that I would not need to do much to get the Spanish Boy head over heels all over me. He is so easily impressionable, I don’t care if his friends are so high up in society. They’re still inaccessible as far as he is concerned. I am accessible, I’ve made it in his eyes, if I can only show him, that will be it, he’ll be in love. And I’ll be stuck again with one more lover that I will not know what do with.
I’m already in love, with a man, in the most unsatisfying relationship ever, one who does not even believe in me. My potential, my abilities to make our dreams come true. I’m a lunatic in his eyes, just like I am for my whole family. Despite having already succeeded beyond the doubt, the point where no one could even dare to doubt who I am and what I’m capable of, of what I can become.
And yet, they’re the biggest anchor in existence, they convince me that despite all that, I’m still nothing and will never be anything. Bastards. Hommes de peu de foi. I can’t even say that I will prove them wrong, I did, and that was not enough. There’s no hope for them. I’ll never prove them wrong.
So perhaps what I need now is one cute Spanish Boy, blinded by the artifice of it all. Yeah! He might be the only thing that would keep me in Hollywood after all. If he falls in love with me, and there’s no reason why he should not, then that’s it, I’ll fall in love too and I’ll never leave the damn place. Fuck everyone else.
Is this not what I need after all? My biggest fan in my bed? Who loves me for more than just my body? My personality? Whatever that might be? Is this what I really need? God only knows. I don’t care anymore where this life brings me, I’m just sailing, the wind brings me where perhaps it is that I need to be.
Maybe I’m just imagining things here. Maybe I’ll never have the Spanish Boy in my bed. And to be honest, this is not very important to me. He’s probably much more desperate to have sex than I am, that’s for sure. I want him at my feet instead, I want him to talk to his little important friends in Hollywood, about how great I am, about how I can change people’s life, just by being me and different. A marginal, an Anarchist.
And yet, this is ridiculous, and cannot really motivate me. Because I don’t care for these other people. I don’t know what I want, ultimately, I think I want nothing. Perhaps to die, or find myself alone somewhere, that perhaps I want.
The truth is, the Spanish Boy is insignificant. He is not important, not where I am now, not at the stage my life is at right now. Maybe I’m only 33, but I feel I’ve reached the end of the world many times over. I feel I’ve reached the limits of my existence, and there’s nothing to be found beyond. I’ve done it all, I lived it all, all that was possible to live down here. And nothing else is to be expected.
I need much more to satisfy me, to make me happy. Much more, that does not even exist. And hence, there’s no hope for me. I’m condemned already, and no cute little Spanish Boy could change anything to that. I guess this is the price to pay for being a philosopher, even when we’re not. Just what I said, there’s simply no hope.
And the poor Spanish Boy, was so desperate, for me to talk about him in my books. As if somehow that would give him the immortality he seems to be craving for. That same feeling I don’t get myself for immortalizing all those people I meet and things that happen to me.
If you were so desperate to leave any mark on this world, would you not pick up any old computer and write? I guess it is not given to everyone to do so. And also, it is not given to everyone to feel like this is the end of the world, a whole purpose of life, of being, a reason to exist. Why expect others to make sure the world will remember you? When you could yourself make sure this happens, if you’re serious about it. I guess living in Hollywood screwed his mind. Made him dream beyond belief, that he could reach out to the world somehow. Poor him, that is only way right now to reach to the world, is through me, and I don’t give a shit about him.
Well, not quite true, is it. I’ve been talking about him for a few pages now. In what seems like will be the longest book I have ever written, also the shortest of time. Desperate times call for desperate measures. Getting drunk every night to tell the misery of one self. Where are my own hopes? My own desires, in this life? I think it is all dead for me, while for him, it is just being born. He does not even have the excuse of being young, he is almost as old as I am. Where his energy and hope come from then? All the hope I ever had, has been long dead. Perhaps because I have already tasted what he is so desperately looking for. Perhaps because I know none of that brings any sort of happiness, while he lives I ignorance of all that. Maybe I should not shatter his illusions. Maybe I should make him believe it is greater than anything he ever experienced. I should tell him I am exploding all over this world, that every expectation is just being fulfilled, the sign of greatness. And let him chew on this for a while, fucker! If he had seen everything I have seen… my God, he might just wish to die, in the understanding that it only makes one life more miserable.
He’s already dreaming about me, about all these places I have been and lived. Europe means everything to him. He’s never been there, he might never go, so he feels like anyway. Barcelona, Roma, Prague, Budapest, Paris, and what else, even London perhaps. How miserable and small can you be, even when you lived in Hollywood all your life? Not getting anywhere anytime soon… poor bastard. So I guess Los Angeles is not the heart of this world after all. Europe is, from the look of it. But it’s not, not from my point of view. God, nothing is the heart of the universe from my point of view. Not until I finally get out of this solar system altogether.
He feels like I am up to something great, I feel the same. I’ve been for years. And yet, it seems I’m far from it. Perhaps because I did not even try in the last few years, to reach the English world. Feeling happy just to write about it, not being worried about getting published. Maybe it will all explode in the next few years, maybe I’ll die forgotten. I don’t care anymore, one way or another. I’m way passed that shite. Which might explain why I did not even try. Being worried to even put it online from fears of freaking out people I don’t even give shit about. They certainly deserve anything that could happen to them as a consequence of me writing about it. Are they afraid that their true nature will suddenly be known to all? I bet they’re not. I am. Fears of reprisals or whatever. I should not care about any of it. I will eventually put everything online for the world to read and judge. Judge me. Destroy me. And I am also beyond that.
I sincerely don’t know how far I will reach out in this lifetime and beyond. This would sound ridiculous if I had not already written so much, that I feel every time, that these are my last words before I die.
When would be a good time to die, I ask you? Now, I feel. And therefore, these might be my last words. I certainly wish it. Or do I? I’m not sure. I don’t know. Maybe all of this has been a pointless exercise, a pure waste of time. If this is so, so be it. I can live with it, I can die with it. I’m beyond caring. Who cares about any legacy one can leave after his death? One who never produce any legacy but still wish he or she had. If they had, they would not care anymore, it would become meaningless.
Becoming immortal is simply not possible. One will succeed for five millions who will try. Are you really that one who will succeed? Well, maybe I have exaggerated the odds a bit. One will succeed out of one billion. Because it is clear you have more chance of becoming a millionaire through buying a lottery ticket. And who cares anyway? Is it not great for you to think that you are writing what could become immortal? Is that not enough? It is for me. And again, don’t trust me, I’m already talking from beyond, I know I am immortal now, I already had quite an impact underground, and I know it is only going to grow from here on end. So I’m lying to you. I’ve already made it, even if I die today. I know I’ll reach out beyond belief, because I know what it is that I have written about. I’m not blind, I’m not stupid. I’m surprised the impact is not larger, but that’s just it, it will become it in time, it will crush everything in sight. That was my purpose, it is powerful, meaningful, and I am only talking about my poetry here. Even though I never claimed to be a poet, I never thought I was. And yet, I’m leaving here something quite revolutionary. That so far, up until now, I’ve been the only one reading. A revolution in the making, better if it happens after my death, while I was wondering if this was not just the biggest waste of time.
I think it is time for me to die. Will I have to kill myself? Can’t destiny arrange something for once? Maybe one of you will find in their heart the courage to kill me? You have my benediction. I can’t stand this life anymore, feel free to shoot me at any time. Anything, even a knife would do. I can’t stand this life anymore, I can’t stand what it stands for. I just want to not exist anymore. Not AIDS, which will make me alive for another 20 years, maybe more. Not a high level of platelets, which might actually not kill me in the end. I want a quick death, instant, right now. Feel free to do it, I exonerate you. I have absolutely no desire to continue to live in this world.
I wish I had the courage to kill myself, because then, I would have realized my biggest dream in life, my ultimate objective. You would think this was easy, I have a bad feeling that I might never die, that I might bury you all, and simply cannot live with that thought. There’s nothing here for me. I want to die. Life is worth nothing in this world, everyone dies just like flies, and yet, I’m still alive. What’s going on? I must be at the wrong place at the wrong time. Just my luck. Maybe I should go into the army or something, get right at the front, this war will be mine, I’ll die trying, to do whatever, needs to be done, for me finally stop to exist.
I have no reliable way to die right now, how sad is that? Maybe I should organize a conference on the subject: how to identify the best way to die and succeeding. I bet it would be the greatest success of all time. I should have thrown myself over the Topanga Canyon, while I had the chance, while I had that car. No I’m condemned to pay to get it repaired fro reversing into a fucking yellow pole. I should have destroyed the damn car when I had the chance.
I can see it now. I will plan my death carefully, I will do it. It is no longer a case of reaching that conclusion when I’m dead drunk. It also needs to be violent, I need to somehow be crushed, electrocuted, whatever. How can I best achieve that?
How unfair it is now, to lure that Spanish Boy to this so-called great life I have, when really, I have only one desire, the one to end it all. I think I’ll stop everything tomorrow morning. There’s no need for him to reach the point I am at any time soon. Let him dream, let him hope in a better world. Today he was complaining that we had too many keys to open all these doors at work. He said it made him look like a janitor. Only a Spanish person, or Mexican, would ever thing that having too many keys could project the image of being a janitor. So I shouted: what’s wrong with being a Janitor, hey? I would love it. It tells what’s going on in his mind. Where he really comes from in his mind. Somehow, I think I would not be thinking about suicide now, if I was just a Mexican janitor. And for him, it would mean his death. This whole world depends on perceptions, on where you were born, in which conditions. I don’t know where I was born, in which condition, in which country, so for me, it all meaningless. I don’t give a shit.
And this is the end of this book. I have nothing else to say here. My life has got to change in the next few days, there’s no other way, this is how destiny works.
Make no mistake, I feel you should die too. I’m not going to do anything about it, feel yourself lucky. But if I don’t die anytime soon, I might just do something about it. And you will have to search very hard to find out why, as I don’t even understand the why myself.
Without knowing, without planning, without believing it, I’ve become the worst anarchist there is. No one will top me, I am The Anarchist. As in my mind, you’re already all dead. I’m no fool. As I know that none of you ever existed in the first place.
21 April 2006
That’s it, I told the Chinese Bitch I was leaving at the end of next month. After a two hours excruciating two hours meeting discussing their lack in confidence in me, when I feel that I have never worked that hard in my life. On top of it I have the Director on my back today, he’s has taken a big bit and he does not want to let go. He is on the path to try to get me sacked, he does not know yet I already kind of given my resignation.
After that, the Chinese Girl suddenly understood that she would be blamed for my departure, I could see the panic in her eyes. After trying to frighten me with: we will sack you unless you improve, it was: you’ve got to give it at least a year! It seemed very sudden for her, she does not understand that I have trying to give it a try, and it’s been a long time that I was thinking that even if I had no plan to leave to get back with Stephen, I would be now at the point of leaving anyway, because it’s just too much and there is a limit to the kind of bullshit I am willing to suffer for a job. And once again I am left to try to survive the few hours before the end of the day, and spend my Friday night drinking myself to death to decompress from that living hell.
I told her I was not happy here, that I had reach the point of depression and thinking about suicide. Can’t believe I even told her that. Fortunately for me, she went through the same thing when she was in Hong Kong, separated from her husband, how she was depressed then and threw herself in her job double full time. I told her that I admired her, that I thought she was the most efficient employee I had ever come across in my life. I also told her about her rough edges, I told her everything. Just to get her off my back for a few more hours, and that is still too much to ask, since the Director is still working hard on this Friday to cause as much problems as I can, when I have so many deadlines with the first conference, the admin of it all, a gigantesque amount of work to be done by Tuesday. What other choice did I had today, pushed in that corner once again? The worst ever corner I have reached in my entire career?