Shoes

Don’t worry. Everything’s fine. Nothing is spoiled. Hey, I like your shoes. Are they real leather? Where did you buy them? Were they expensive?

Haha, you bet I might buy myself some! Shopping’s cool; I like to own things. They’re mine. Nobody else owns me. Plus I’m expressing myself. I’m chequered, all green and blue squares… smooth. Did I tell you I have an iPod? It’s because music is, like, my life. All Time Low are my favourite band. Their lyrics really speak to me, because I’m different too in the same ways their others fans are. Plus their lead singer has, like, really pretty eyes.

I was watching the news yesterday. Er, I mean not by choice obviously. Someone put it on and I ended up seeing it. How about that murder case? Isn’t it, like, a sad indictment of our society… or whatever. I don’t care about anything, man.  I maintain an ironic detachment. Caring is so 1990s.

Yeah, that flood’s all sad and whatever, it’s probably global warming or something maybe. Thanks Al Gore. I am an environmentalist.  I say I recycle but secretly I only do it if it requires literally zero percent more effort than just chucking stuff in a normal bin.

My hair straighteners cost me £120. I bought them because I want to dishevel my hair in a tidy way; I put a lot of effort into making it look like I haven’t put any effort in. Sometimes I carefully cultivate stubble of the right length and in the right places to suggest a disregard for convention. It’s so important not to look like you’re trying.

£120 sounds like a lot, but they’re a good brand. Brands are cool. They let you associate yourself with a set of images without actually having to justify that association. Little icons, all clean lines and blocks of colour; I pay for personality to conceal the one I have but don’t want to show.  I have some Ralph Lauren cologne because I’m classy. You don’t want to, like, be an advertising billboard though. It is important to be discrete. One of my Ben Sherman shirts has no branding on the outside at all. I paid £60 for it. I wear my anti-consumerist brand on my sleeve.

A person should be judged by the things they own and the things they lead others to think they think. I act like I am who I want you to think I am; thinking makes it so. I’m an actor. You write the lines by expecting, and I deliver them to satisfy.

I’m a real person. I buy things and they validate me; I tell myself when to stop being me because I know what you want to hear. I have all the things that I know make me happy; I am happy.

This blog post has been ironic and sarcastic. Phew, bullet dodged. Everything’s fine. Nothing is spoiled.