Nothing really matters

by Roxane Hudon

I am sitting in my big living room, the part that is empty. The big TV sits on the other side of room where we painted words on the walls. “You guys write poetry?” asked our Italian landlord. I nodded. Of course we don’t write poetry, that’s Janis and Bob and Rufus and Edith. We’ve got nothing new to say. I’m looking at the walls that are bare and I want to paint different versions of Mickey Mouse all over the walls. I think this is a really good idea. Only because I really like drawing Mickey Mouse, or because he/it is the only thing I can draw. Mickey Mouse and spirals and cubes. I’m dumb and I’m poor. Two nights ago, I watched a film called Mega Shark VS Giant Octopus. It was about a mega shark and a giant octopus. They fight in the end. Three nights ago, I watched an episode of a cheerleading show called Hellcats. The most controversial thing that happens includes a cheerleader taking antibiotics when she breaks her arm and another one being shunned from her Christian family for going to a secular school. It’s really dumb. I’ve watched 5 episodes. Everyone I know is complaining about money. That’s what people do. But, really, if we really wanted it, we’d work harder. But, we don’t really want to do that either. I’m reading Patti Smith’s Just Kids. It’s fantastic. I wish I lived in those times and in that place. New York City, 60s-70s. I’m sure I’m the only one. On Christmas Day, I drunkenly argued with my family that I was different and that’s why I didn’t know how to monetize anything. I promptly apologized the next morning. My friend Michel always says that he’s “forever 12”. I think I’m forever 14. It’s okay. I like thinking that actually, I’m quite complex, but no one really gets it. Maybe my musical taste has improved a little, but secretly, I still wish I was Scarlett O’Hara in the Shire. So, really, I am forever 14. Hopefully, I’ll never grow out of my tendency to storm out of rooms crying. My friends will be my friends until they stop thinking it’s a little endearing. None of the lights in my room work. Few lights in this entire apartment work. My Italian landlord says that kids these days are lazy, he says that they don’t realize that the Italians came here with nothing and worked their way up. He talks a lot and he thinks that we’re poets. He could tell by the way we were nodding at him. My head hurt from the nodding. I wish I could do something meaningful. It all feels impossible sometimes. No one wants to pay for anything and everybody wants to get paid. I’ll watch another movie instead and I’ll stop writing while listening to Leonard Cohen, because it’s depressing and really doesn’t mean anything at all and I’m rambling as usual. I’ll blame it on this book I’m reading. I want to write about artists complaining about money. It’ll come. But, for now, I just wish I was Ricky Gervais and hope that my roommates don’t mind if I draw Mickey Mouse on our walls. 2011, day 18.