A place of uncertainty and fear. A disputed place where one chooses not to sit for extended periods. In World War One, where trench warfare was common, the warring nations would sit and stare at each other from the odd comfort of these dirt-flavored walkways. At times they could be miles apart, other times it was as close as giving your noisy neighbor the finger from across the street. Turn your stereo down, ass-face, your Ranchero music is giving me audible Chlamydia.
Eventually someone would build up the courage or blood alcohol content to venture across this unsightly and unpredictable landscape to either conquer the opposition or to surrender to them, leaving their fate in the hands of others. Although it is only human nature that if one wishes to wander through No Mans Land, they'd like to bring a few buddies along...preferably heavily armed with tank support. Such is life when you see Mr or Mrs Rebound in some random night club wearing clothes a few sizes too tight and a maybe few years out of style (2000 n' Late) dancing like a drunken bobble-head doll and surrounded by “friends” yelling loudly eat at each other to no avail over poorly remixed house music, eventually stumbling outside to either text the baby-sitter that you'll be a little late, finding your way across town to an opposite sexes musty apartment that wreaks of cold scrambled eggs and wet towels, or you'll find yourself crying and stuffing your chipmunks over by the taco truck, whilst being tagged in a dimly lit photo that you'll see the next day on social media showing your running mascara that at 2am looks more like Celtic war paint as you use the last 2 percent of the battery life on your iPhone 12S-TD to hail an Uber driver. Where'd all your “friends” go? They disappeared over an hour ago after texting their drunken booty-calls and left you wandering down the street past that awful karaoke bar. When it comes to open mic-er's choking out Billy Joel over a beer stained microphone, I treat karaoke like a Nazi treats the Holocaust, I pretend it never happened.
Now your in the middle of crossing the No Mans Land of life and your support staff is dissipating one-by-one, so another commonly practiced tactic is by simply lowering the complication of your hairstyle (chopping it all off as I've heard a few over-wrinkled housewives say) and settling down with the first not yet obese person you meet in which the relationship consists of a monthly semi-hard dicking that lasts exactly 27.35 seconds, like rubbing a cheap hot dog against unpainted drywall. Good luck at your next bake sale...your kids will hate you in time.
Like a Hipster with a Beards only coffee shop, here's another popular tactic trending on the Twitter of life...the fitness craze.
I've been through it and I only look back on it shaking my head, every bodies a coach, competitor, nutritionist, do this, eat that, cycle this, take a selfie and show off your critically acclaimed cooking skills consisting of poorly seasoned ground turkey with overcooked rice and broccoli turning your stomach into a Wynton Marsalis Jazz session, not like I can't locate this ingenious concoction on 42,000 other pages, clearly you thought of it first. Stop telling me “the struggle is real” you unoriginal quote machine. I didn't know you made fitness fortune cookies on the side (actually not a bad idea). My true struggle is how many glasses of cheap red wine I'm going to consume while having a Love/Hate relationship with my Netflix (Where's all the good movies!?). Now your entire wardrobe consists of overproduced Indonesian plastic gym-wear cus you cant afford any other clothes, nor can you fit into your old clothes cus “that was the old you” and now you wanna look active and somewhat shapely to attract someone with similar hash tags on instagram. “Hey, you workout here?! So do I! Let's workout near each other and later on grab a protein shake, confess our love for peanut butter and then if our endorphin's are still flowing, rub our sweaty mushy bits together as we continue to seek revenge on our past lives. In the words of the ever so insightful George Carlin, “Fuck you.”
I'd rather not discuss Jesus Freaks or cat lady syndrome today, so lets move ahead...
As we try harder everyday to stand out from one another and cross this section of uncertainty, we end up following the patterns of others to the point where we look and act no different as a Honda Accord does from a Toyota Camry. It'll get you from point A to point B safely...from the womb to the casket with 7 airbags and anti-lock brakes. So do we sit in our original trench out of complacency as you live vicariously through the Real Housewives of Saudi Arabia or do you force your way into another trench and take on a “new” lifestyle that has already been adapted, mutated and copyrighted by so many others before you, whilst ditching everything and everyone that was associated with your past life. I don't have an answer for you, I'm just trying to shake off the writing rust and get my thoughts on paper before someone else writes something similar and calls me a thief. As for me, I'm not going back to old trenches, they're all either blown up, too small, or taken over by less than favorable parties. I also will not seek out new trenches, not worth my time and energy to be hopping into these overpopulated dugouts filled other poor decision makers. Nope, instead I'll put my flag right here for now between the trenches in what others see as the most dangerous area of a battlefield, but as I currently see it, it's like standing right in the middle road, when all the traffic has swerved to avoid you and passed into the distance, for those few moments, call me crazy, it's rather peaceful.
I have more thoughts on this concept, but I'm totally craving a Latte and a Burger right now....
