It was just another night in the browser; a few naked boys and girls, a story by a long dead Englishman, a mordant Dorothy Parker poem, and my client’s administrative site, which was supposed to be finished weeks ago. The slow curl of a cigarette in the ashtray. It was one of those forgettable nights, the ones where a wet, heavy apathy is illuminated with infrequent flashes of a white hot, distant fear. Nothing special to remember, the night she wandered into my diary.
Now, I get all kinds in here. The usual daily kos lineup. A few regulars I hang out with. People who want to talk for a living, and people who do talk for a living, and people who live to organize, and people who used to live to organize. Famous authors, politicians. The usual seedy mix of educators and intellectuals, Byronic enough to want to change the world; conflicted enough to try to do it on the internet. The brilliant, the crazy, the terrifyingly effective and the useless, the famous and the elegantly lost. Usually, no matter what they tell you...trust me when I say this...they only want one thing. They’ll do anything to get it, and it’s never enough to have it once. I figured her the same; livin’ by the sword, always finding the next rec just in time. Just like me.
She was sort of a chubby blonde chick, round and too tall in black hipster clothes. Some of the blond was gray. Sat down at my table and didn’t say a thing for a moment, just stared. I offered her a camel, and she took it, lit up, blew out slowly. She looked strangely familiar, but I couldn’t place her. For some reason she reminded me of Rodney on Stargate Atlantis. This could be trouble, I thought. But there was something else...I let it go.
She looked at the smoke from the cigarette, following it with her eyes up to the ceiling like a bored cat. "I’ve lost my idealism." She said. "I mean, I hang around here and stuff. But it’s always the same crowd. I like everybody plenty, they’re smart, they make me smarter, it’s not that, it’s just..."
I looked at her. "So what’s the proposition, darlin’?" I asked. "Art? Science? The urgent and leveraged politics of the day? Some outrageous fascist act by our government? End of the world? Tell me a story." I smiled. I had read that chimpanzees about to be eaten by lions always visualized bigger lions. I did not think this was true, but I tried to visualize Fran Liebowitz anyway. I always do. "Or is it..." I paused, looked around, whispered conspiratorially "the personal as political? Honestly..."I sighed (it’s always good to sigh after that word)"...it’s what I do, well, best. Insofar as there is a best. Of course." My voice turned briefly cold, professional. "I don’t deconstruct fully. I’m sorry."
"Oh yeah. I know that." She smiled. "I’m the kind of girl who mostly does her homework." She took another long drag on the smoke. "And here’s the deal. These people are attempting to define a movement to reclaim the democratic party. They have the ear of the powerful, right now. This is vibrant stuff! Our time as it happens!" I couldn’t tell whether she was serious or not. "But here’s the thing, hon...honestly..." and she sighed..."I just don’t know. I mean...the fundamental question is always about redistribution of power and wealth. Always. And things don’t look good."
I ran with it. "The Berlin wall always comes down; but Gorbachevs give way in time to Putins; Havels are replaced by Klauses; begin with revolution and end with the terror, or just some expedient powerful bastard, doing expedient things on the upturned faces of the poorest and least powerful. Sure. " I said. Nothing new there. "And we will reach...a carrying capacity. A geologic scale die off! In our lifetimes!" I looked at her gray and smiled ruefully. "Or part of it, anyway. Still. Kickin’ seats. But not much hope."
She looked at the pile of nonprofit and NGO want ads next to me. I squirmed for a minute. "Not any money there. No way." I said. "It’s about survival. It’s about hanging on to the very bottom of the financially effective creative class, and getting my ass out of dodge. The liberal mind is best served by being able to afford medical care. I, I, I..." She snorted. "So will you take the job?" She asked. "Well, one of them if you can get it, anyway." I looked at her...odd...oh right. Nobody else could have wandered in, on a night like tonight. "I’ll think about it babe."
"See you on the rec list." She said. I snorted, and watched her wander away. Just like me.