Living Pleasantville Hell

I'm in Hell. I think Hell may be nicer, for sure warmer.

I thought this as I drove home tonight, stomach clenched, nauseous, wondering if it was possible to have an out of body moment and have your soul drop through leaving your physical body out smiling, gurgling and pretending that things are just swell in Hellville previously acknowledged as Pleasantville.

I am bouncing off my bubble's walls, and the soap scum skin is starting to wear thin and shrink, making my trajectory tighter, more painful and infinitely less bearable. I've been living in clutter, the clutter of Christmas, the clutter of life, the clutter of ghosts of years past. I keep cleaning, arranging, moving, knowing full and well that no matter how hard I try, it's a mess, a hellacious mess that I just need to sweep into the dumpster and start over. The house is never going to be clean, it will be when my mind is clean, but my mind is soaked in a pail of soggy, brown, dish water blowing concentric bubbles that continue to encase me.

I went to dinner last night, perfunctory, felt like I should, a brief moment where I may have had fun. Outside looking in, it was Desperate Housewives mashed up with The Real Housewives mashed up with a show tune from Les Miserables, further mashed up with Leave it To Beaver.

Truth is, I really don't flipping care what you do, what you want, what you like and what woe is betiding you because if you thought to peer out of your little existence amidst the country clubs, the posh cars, the sniveling children, the square footage, and the best of the best of the best that you can possibly buy of shoes, bags, husbands and divorces to display, you will realize that you are nothing. That substance has molded, is rank and gone to reside somewhere in your 350cc left breast implant, tummy tuck or been sloughed off on your last chemical peel.

I am so tired of the charade, of pontificating on the woes of divorce and lack of men, rich men, to further pad your 5 million dollar home, how bored you are to play tennis everyday, how aghast you are at the incestuous sex lives of your neighbours that you secretly covet, off all the people in their Barbie world with their Barbie toys, the world that you whine incessantly about but would never dream of leaving, your ecosystem of waste and shame and privilege, wrapped up with the golden bow, sparkling smiles, shiny kids and purring hummers. I am just sick as a drive home, wondering how, why, where, and when did I go wrong, how did I end up here, filleted and gutted into a life I don't want, a baby that I would happily throw out with the bathwater.

Of course, it's my fault, I followed the yellow brick road, I veered to the path less trodden but I second-guessed myself and veered back when I should have stayed on the dirt path. I thought I needed Sleeping Beauty's castle, and I never saw the thorny bushes till they pierced right through. I made the mistake, let the rosy glow of materialism and perfectionism cloud me, let my guilt dangle the carrot in front of me, do the right thing, play with the shiny toys, have tea with Barbie. When I was little I used to dismember Barbie and pretend to sell her off as chicken pieces at my marketplace. I should have known better.

So now what? What do I do with the toys, with Ken, with Skipper, the Dream House, the accessories, with the glut of Mattel cluttering my life? They sure are pretty, all lovely, and hollow, aching, and everywhere. EVERYWHERE. Everywhere my head spins and I bounce off the walls and it's still there no matter where I turn, what I hide, where I clean. Or leave, but I can only leave so much, and all the everything just sits there waiting for me like that horrid plant from Little Shop of Horrors, ready to gobble me whole and then spit me out and eat me again and again and again as long as I keep coming back. It keeps me skinny…