I hoped writing would help me deal with what the heck is going on. It has helped to a great degree, but there looks to be no end to the civil unrest on display and egged on for whatever gains. Instead of leaving well enough alone, I’ve decided to double down on my efforts to calm the cat fight taking place in the pit of my stomach.
I typically don’t sweat the day-to-day goings on outside my little universe, but you can’t help but do so with what is happening in the USA and around the world. I can barely keep up when there’s two sides to an issue. Now there’s just short of a kajillion sides to this particular issue the last I counted. All claiming they are right. All wanting…actually I have no clue what anyone wants. That part never seems to be discussed logically ahead of time. The only thing I’m sure of is Person A wants exactly the opposite of what Person B wants.
So if it pleases the court, I offer up this meme of Captain Jack Sparrow as some of the soundest logic EVER.
As I was looking at the meme, it dawned on me – Everyone Is Crazy…in a good way…actually in the best way possible. All you have to do is admit it. Admission of crazy helps eliminate the crap. Eliminates the caveats. It would be “Love Trumps Hate”. Not the current “Love Trumps Hate, so start loving my views or I will boycott everyone and everything you ever cared about.” It would be “All Lives Matter”. Not the current “All Lives Matter, except refugees heading my direction, death row inmates, and basically everyone with an opposing view that I don’t need to make my Starbucks”. In a nutshell, it helps people practice what they preach.
Crazy does all this by allowing you to take that all-important step back. You look before you leap. You see above the fray. You say nothing at all if you can’t say something nice. Crazy makes it easier to see both sides of every story, no matter how unpleasant it may seem. Crazy allows you to understand it’s alright to disagree. It’s fine if there isn’t one universal right answer to every question. There’s Sweet AND Savory. There’s Coffee AND Tea. There’s Country AND Western.
Trouble only rears its ugly head when people think they’re not crazy (see Politicians, The Media, Religious Literalists, Actors, etc.). Common Sense goes right out the window. Self-Importance rises to unimaginable heights. The laws of physics themself seem to break down. When opposing groups of crazy deniers meet, cooler heads rarely prevail. As sophisticated as everyone thinks they are, these battles at best turn into good ‘ol fashioned school yard name calling contests. They’ll call each other Commies. They’ll call each other Elitists. They’ll call you Crazy. So beat them to the punch. Admit you’re crazy and diffuse the whole situation.
Rumors are out there Lady Gaga is going to politicize her Super Bowl performance tonight. Boy I hope she doesn’t, and it’s not because I don’t like her. She’s a great performer. A great singer-songwriter. One of the best voices in the world. I hope she doesn’t because it is a classic no-win situation. Even if she just gets up there and passionately exclaims “water is wet”, the Dry Water Coalition will immediately start boycotting every Wet ‘n Wild in North America. The People For A Dryer Tomorrow will flood (pun intended) the airwaves with an endless, mindless stream of impassioned soliloquies.
Denying her craziness will all but guarantee that her stance, whatever it is, will fail to start a civil dialogue or anything else productive, no matter what the spin doctors say. It will more than likely continue the pissing contests which are more popular than Beer Yoga and Beer Church. It will give over a billion people an excuse to add the word Uppity to the front of her stage name. No one wants that.
Lady Gaga, please don’t upstage the commercials. Please don’t upstage the game. Take your cue from Pink Floyd’s 1979 album “The Wall”. When did Pink tear down the metaphorical wall that closed him off from the realities of the world for decades? Not even 5 minutes after he realized he was “over the rainbow” crazy. The truth set him free and he lived happily ever after. Or the judge with his face on his butt ate him. Actually, the ending is not so clear after the wall comes down.
Most importantly, don’t go through with it if for no other reason than tonight I’m going to have an ungodly amount of chips, dips, meats on sticks, and Natty Light in me. As soon as you get on your high horse, the fully clawed, feral cats already in my stomach will start their royal rumble. The results won’t be pretty.
You’re better than that. You’re something crazy.
Postscript: Lady Gaga gave one of the best performances in Super Bowl halftime history. She took the high road, showed patriotism, and just killed it. So proud of her.