I have often wondered about price when it comes to not only being a citizen of the world, but of a particular city where everyone is skeptical when something seems too good or better yet, for free. Gilded offerings often come with invisible price tags hanging on the outside of them, hidden from the oblivious, naive jerk offs who have told themselves that there will not be any consequences for this transaction.
Take for instance, the ooooh so beautiful city of Hollywood where there is such a breed as what's called Hollywood kids. Now these are not actually children although they often act like them. These are grown adults who wear Armani sweaters and live in neighboring trendy cities in LA where they have been funded by mommy and daddy for ages. These H kids don't have jobs, but rather live on the coattails of their parents as they live out their dreams. In reality, they are community socialites living like “rock stars”, known by local clicks and able to walk into clubs with free bottle service and barely a flash of an ID. They are hipsters- trendy, fashionable, and walk amongst those who dwell in silicone valley and in the pockets of others, materialistic in their tastes and their choices of friends. They have created a parallel universe where what they have dreamed has been materialized on a delusional small scale, like mini mansions.
These kids are one financial crisis away from being x-ed out of their social scene and will remain on the D-list for most of their careers. Now, there’s nothing wrong with living the lifestyle you choose, in the fashion you choose except, when the facade is damaging to the individual. These kids have been playing a role like an actor in a film, fabricating the person they have wanted to be. And, as the role has been rehearsed to perfection, over time the mask has become them. Suddenly, it is a mask no longer and the lines between who they are or strive to be and the mask itself, gets blurred. This is forgivable for a kid in their 20’s who is finding who they are but for a person in their 30’s and beyond, the chance to want more as an individual and the awareness of where you are going in life is blocked by this facade; because identity and self worth has become based on this disguise and now everything around the individual- sex, alcohol, superiority in any form, clothes, cars, jewelry are all a part of the person’s identity.
Take for example, the character I happened to run into at a local show in Santa Monica. Her skin was ebony, breasts up to her chin, black bob haircut wig, pinned down tight, voice resonating in high octaves, schooling me on Tres Locos and the local singer who had his fellow followers present him with the forbidden drink as he ate melted Reese's peanut butter cups from his fan's hands and compared the chocolatey goo in repulsive detail to acts of defecation. You could assume that this would have sent me running, but like a bystander of an amazing disaster I was stunned into auditory paralysis. She went on to tell me that she was upset because her authentic fur coat had been drenched by the numerous clumsy cups of brimmed alcohol and- did I know that all of her friends had big voluptuous, natural, Double-D breasts, as she presented me her pair like a badge of honor, clunked her Christian Louboutin boots with their glorious red trademark soles on the chair next to ours for me to gawk at, and proceeded to point out how her bedazzled jewelry was real in comparison to mine which she could tell, were not.
I felt instantly bewildered like watching a pig that could talk but I could not put my finger on what was troubling me the most. I realized a week later, I wasn't uncomfortable because I felt that I did not belong, I was uncomfortable because I was naively oblivious to the fact, that it was apparent to everyone else, that I did not belong. These socialites could smell an alien in their midst, an outsider, a misfit.
My needs for basic camaraderie had gone unfulfilled in an environment that was a safety net for these Hollywood kids to feel a sense of belonging. I experienced this feeling later on in the week with some of the dancers on DWTS at a local pub. Every person there knew I was not one of them, and that I hadn't paid my price of admission whether it was through social status or with monetary power in any form that would explain my reason for being there. And I will mention this as a brief side-note: women do get an admission card for sex appeal and looks but it ain't no lifetime membership. The currency of sex as an exchange for power, status, or money is a dangerous game for a woman to play, especially a rookie and has detrimental prospective costs in the aftermath. Anyhow, every person wanted admiration as desperate as the chump next to them, but each group expressed this in different ways, some behind the mask and some with a flash of something that gave them worth. Regardless of the method, these were all attempts to raise levels of self-esteem that were not there.
In that moment, I evaluated what gave me self-esteem and what gave me worth. Worth for me, comes from competence and mastery of my tasks, my skills, and my dreams. I suppose I want admiration as well and I will not deny that it gives one a sense of power or a feeling of accomplishment or control when one does receive it. And sometimes, friend's attempts to help like Adam B are a relief and comfort but I could never truly embody my confidence as a human being through unmerited hand outs because there is a freedom in accomplishing through persistence and independence. Choosing to accept money, nice cars, easy lifestyles and end up paying the price of those concealed price tags is not an option. The price could be a life filled with apathetic friendships, soulless relationships, selling oneself and giving up on one's worth, and becoming so jaded one is blinded by his/her possibilities and potential.
There is beauty in the struggle and the passionate desire to become more than what one is and to become everything that one is capable of being. The truth is that we are all “need junkies” with cravings that must be satisfied and should be satisfied. But, there are some things like paying the vital price of your ambitions that go far beyond the physiological and materialistic.
There must be truth somewhere in the hearts of these Hollywood kids, but as for me I shall be an addition through subtraction. I shall judge my acceptance of myself not by the things I have... but for all the things which I am not.
