Look:
More death and destruction. On TV, obviously.
Only this is the worst one yet, the most gruesome, uncomfortable competition I’ve ever made myself suffer through. Worse than football. Worse than hockey. Worse than golf even—for me, the viewer. Even worse than crocodiles sneaking up on poor, parched zebras that may or may not know death is waiting in the water, but they’ll die if they don’t drink, so they take their chances. Something’s going to get them, sooner or later. This is worse, because these are humans. And they’re well fed, intelligent and entirely willing to engage in the war of attrition that will leave all but one of them deposed and defeated.
The national spelling bee.
This shit is unbelievable. This is not something I need right now, but I can’t turn away. I’m a nervous wreck, watching these overtaxed adolescents putting their brains on the line just to make their parents proud. I can’t console myself thinking about the lucky kid who will eventually emerge the winner; I’m stuck feeling sorry for all the other saps that have to lose, one by one.
I’d help them if I could, but none of them can hear me. Then there’s the unfortunate fact that not only can’t I spell most of the words, I’ve never even heard of half of them.
I watch, and I wait, and think about all this useless beauty—the simpler things I turned the TV on for in the first place.
Who won?
I have no idea.
I can’t take it anymore. I don’t have any more tears to shed. I want to see who will win, but not as badly as I want not to see that second-to-last kid lose. I won’t watch the close-up on his parents committing Hari-Kari as the cameras roll. I can’t handle it. I turn it off.
*Excerpted from the forthcoming novel Not To Mention a Nice Life. Click here for more info.
P.S. I mean…
