Welcome.

There is really only one kind of person in the world, the misanthropic kind. There are varying degrees of misanthropy, sure, but it all comes back to one simple truth: everyone is an idiot and everyone is an asshole, and usually they’re both at the same time.

I am no different and neither are you. This is not because you necessarily do bad things or think bad thoughts or vote for bad people or don’t vote at all. This isn’t because you shop at KeyFood instead of Whole Foods or because you frequent Barnes & Noble instead of The Strand. You could be as green as Ed Begley Jr. or as orange as George Hamilton, it doesn’t matter. You’re a human being and you suck and you hate other people even though you may not think you do.

Allow me to explain…

You’re walking up the steps from the subway. You are not in any particular hurry, but you don’t like to waste your precious time all the same. You may be early to meet a friend or late for an appointment, but that doesn’t bother you at the moment because you are stuck behind the slowest fucking person on the face of the fucking earth and you can’t get around them to walk up the steps at your own, reasonable, non-stop motion, sloth-mating pace. This person must be dying or decomposing standing up because no one can possibly be this annoyingly slow. The pace of your stair blocker and current life ruiner is not simply lethargic or lackadaisical, this is deliberate. This person is an idiot because they don’t know how to ascend a flight of stairs in a considerate manner and an asshole because they are wasting your time, apparently on purpose. You reach the top of the steps, finally, and are relieved to find there is still some daylight left. You stick-and-move around your new-found opponent, and resume your regular pace, the pace of humans. You might huff a little, or not, and maybe it will all be forgotten by the time you decline your first yoga flyer on the corner, but nonetheless, you have encountered the worst of humanity and the worst has won.

Now, again, imagine you are walking up the steps from the subway. You are moving at an average clip, quite reasonable for someone in no particular hurry but who doesn’t like to dawdle. Behind you, a huffy figure jostles and accelerates to pass you, but is unable to. You feel their body surging upwards behind and under you, their disgusting, hot breath on the back of your neck, their shoes attacking your heels every now and again in a panicked dash, a desperate attempt, for the top. You wonder, this whole time, what the fuck the fucking rush is. Just relax, you fucking jerk, and we’ll all get to the top together. That’s where I’m going too, by the way. Chances are, in an all out sidewalk race, I’d smoke your ass and leave you panting in the dust. That’s efficiently I move from one place to the next, no wasted gestures or movements. I am progress, I am flux, I advance steadily. So calm the fuck down, you fucking bastard and get the fuck off my fucking feet.

And there you have it. There is no difference between “what’s the rush?” and “what’s the hold up?” except who is thinking it.

You’re an idiot and you’re an asshole. Simultaneously. But at least everyone else is too.

This is perspective. This is your life.

This is Café Select.