I hate happiness.

Many people think I am happy because I smile all the time. Fact is, my mouth is just shaped that way. I guess I am generally happy, but I am usually secretly facing inner turmoil as I stress and worry about everything and always expect the worst to happen. I like expecting the worst to happen, as if I set my standards low enough I will never be disappointed in life. But even when I should be extremely happy, all I can think about is the fact that the happiness will not last forever. Right now I am EXTREMELY happy beyond happiness. I want to skip through the streets singing upbeat Broadway theme songs doing cartwheels and twirling my purse while exclaiming, “wweeeeeeee!” And on occasion I will partake in one or all of the above activities. But every time I feel the urge to prance about with glee, I realize that some day the wonderful man will leave me, the people I love will die, my friends will leave the country, my favourite band will break up, the nicest coffee mug will smash, the delicious bread will get mouldy, the scentful candle will melt, and so on. The sun might come out tomorrow as Annie says, but the next day the sun might detach from its axis and plummet into the earth killing us all. If I stop to smell the flowers a hornet might fly up my nose and sting my brain erasing all my memories. I might look through rose-coloured glasses, but the glass might shatter and stab my retina, forever destroying my ability to see.

I realize that I should just appreciate what I have at the time and not fret about the fact that some day it will all be gone. I should live in the moment and take life as it comes and go with the flow and other various clichés. But I would much rather just control things and decide my own fate. If our minds were controlled by computer chips like they will be in the near future, I could simply program certain people to love me eternally, and others never to die. I could also program those I hate to die horrible, horrible deaths. And then I could program the police to not lock me away after I commit said murder.

The world would be a much better place if I were an orphan with a hideous deformity. I would be unloved, so would have nothing to lose. I would be unlovable, so could never be hurt. And I could probably just work in a factory and make some good money so I could eat delicious meals often. If we were all robots with arranged marriages and were programmed with absolutely no feelings the world would be a wonderful place. No one would ever feel pain-pain-pain-pain (unfitting desperate WestWorld reference) . . .

Being happy makes me so miserable. All these years I thought Grumpy Bear was the one who still had to learn a lesson, but really he was the leader! He was the only one who knew what was going on! He is the messiah. Bow down – bow down to your new leader. Wait – how were the Care Bears born? There’s Grams Bear and Hugs and Tugs, but there is no Gramps and everyone else appears to be the same age. Are they all related? If so, how did Hugs and Tugs come to be? No wonder Grumpy Bear was always so mad. He is clearly living in a sick, sick society of multicoloured bears. I should have seen it. Why didn’t I notice the signs earlier?!

I have decided to start a petition to remove the Care Bears from television. Our children should not be watching such smut. If you want to sign it, email me and I’ll add your name to the list. Together we can do this! We can save the future generations! Don’t you care? Don’t you care about your own children? What’s wrong with you?! You self-serving sadistic ignorant bastard.

What the hell?

One day, not all that long ago, I was in dire need of undergarments. So I went to one of the fancy little underwear stores at the mall to peruse a selection that offered comfort, quality and style. I made my way into one little hut and began to glance about. I came upon a table with a sign that said 3/$15. This deal seemed acceptable, so I began to assess my options. Now, this store had a very clever plan. They had a fine oak table, upon which the underwear was kindly laid in pristine, straight rows. Row one, the row farthest to the left, was a row of size small. The row was arranged according to colour, the top inch of each pair visible so one did not have to partake in an unclassy rummage. Next to this row, in the middle, was the size medium row. On the far right, the large row, and on the shelf below sat the extra-large pairs.

For all of you who have been dying to know since you met me, I usually invest in size medium. So, I stood gently prodding the medium row for the colour and style combinations I enjoyed. As I was happily searching, a sales representative obligatorily approached me from the side.

“Can I help you find your size?” she asked.

I clearly did not need help, as I was clearly looking through the medium row, so I responded, “no – I’m fine thank you.”

But instead of walking away like a regular disgruntled sales person should do, the woman hesitated. She made a slight motion, as if she felt she should leave, but then remained, gazing upon me. She made a hesitant move, then a hesitant sound, and then blurted,

“Well . . . are you looking for size extra-large?”

My eyes stopped scanning. My torso slowly rose. My head slowly turned to the left. I affixed my eyes into contact with her eyes. My hand let go of the size medium it was holding, letting it fall to the table in a repulsive crumpled heap. I opened my mouth and paused.

“Nnnoooo.” I said clearly.

I turned back to the table, made a disgusted face, and abruptly left.

What the hell?

Paper

Think of all the paper we use. Every day I am given useless sheets that I drop directly into the recycling bin. My floor is covered in paper. I have binders full of paper. Imagine if someone had come up with a different invention instead of paper? Perhaps the paper inventor had various designs and finally decided on the blank white sheet. Perhaps his other design was a wooden sphere you could chisel or a bucket of quick drying mud you could etch. But instead we have these thin crunchy little rectangles that slice your finger and get all bent and get strewn about. Why must they be rectangles? It would be more aesthetically pleasing if they were round, and then there wouldn’t be the dangerous corners. They could at least be square – that would make folding and origami easier. And how ridiculous is it that we have envelopes. We have invented a secondary piece of paper to contain the original piece of paper. Why isn’t paper just naturally also an envelope? Think of all the time and money we could save!

Right now I am writing on a fake piece of paper. Paper is so important that they have even created fake paper in form of a computer. No offence to us, but why the hell is what we say and do so important that there be this much documentation? I personally feel kind of ripped off as a human. In the past they could only write on chiselled rocks with quill pens so no one bothered to keep any records. But think about how much they’ll know about us in the future! Somewhere, some child will find my politics essay locked in a shoebox and will marvel at my intelligence. Think of all the people who lived in medieval times who we will never know existed! Their existence had no meaning. But we all have 65247621345 documents we have had to type and write along with videos and pictures of ourselves that will one day be in a museum for the kids to see on their boring field trips. Except their field trips to the museum won’t be that boring, because they’ll have robots making hot chocolate for them on the way there, and then at the museum the information can be directly implanted into their minds. Plus the children will all be dolphins.