Entry from Saturday, March 29th 2008
What’s wrong with being Homer?
I was browsing through a handbag forum yesterday and stumbled upon a thread ‘how do you afford your bags’. There’s this one american lady replying ," Prostituting, organ selling, human trafficking.". Of course if was meant to be a joke and people are laughing at her reply. Then there’s a russian girl replying angrily, " How can you guys joke about those things. You are all so uneducated.". And they started bickering.
A : " Hello! Harvard grad here!"
(well, these ladies actually have those high-end jobs, doctors, lawyers, paralegals,etc,so I won’t exactly call them uneducated :D)
After a long heated arguments, it turned out that this russian lady’s neighbor had to sell her kidney to feed her children and pay off debts.
A : " It’s a joke. Stop taking it so seriously and you’re in a HANDBAG forum where we are allowed to be shallow."
R : " Are you all going to laugh if I make jokes about WTC, obesity, or Bush’s policy on Iraq?"
– Silence –
At this point I started to laugh with irony. It’s so obvious that people can only laugh about issues we don’t have to deal with, and when faced with our own issues, we get touchy and judgmental like the second lady accusing the first lady of being uneducated and the first one who can’t laugh about her own issues. But can we really laugh at our own ’scars’? Should we try?
Things are always better said than done. Someone told me yesterday that I am materialistic and that I ask my boyfriends to buy me expensive things. I was kinda pissed off. For the information, I don’t have any sugar daddy (though I really wish I had one, LOL). I do own those bags, shoes, etc, but I bought them with my own hard-earned money. (*cough-and parent’s-cough*) and never asked my dates or boyfriends to buy me those.
According to Merriam Webster dic, materialistic : a preoccupation with or stress upon material rather than intellectual or spiritual things.
Speaking of materialistic, I love my little ‘worldly possession’ but I also do care about global warming, and other things going around me. I always try to save energy, I seldom watch TV, turn off all the electronic devices, I turn off the water tap when brushing my teeth, etc. You can say I’m stingy, but I really try to cut my CO2 emission.
I was thinking why I got angry about this subject, is it maybe because deep down I’m ashamed of my extravagant way of life, or ashamed of those shallow people out there (which is being represented so well by me), or is it because people judge me wrongly though I have to admit there’s no smoke without fire?
After some thinking (don’t get me wrong. It doesn’t take me long to do some thinkings, since I only have the brain capacity of Homer *Simpson! not the Iliad-greek-poet* and the concentration capability of a poodle.) Hey, no offense to all the poodle-lovers out there. I realize I was angry because I think too highly of myself and I can’t accept that other people don’t think so too. And now I try to accept the fact that I’m not that cool and smile at the comment with ease and (still) irony.
Apropos Homer, I took a how-stupid-are-you test yesterday. And yes, I am as slow (or stupid, in other word) as Homer Simpson! I don’t know whether I have to laugh or grimace. But since grimacing is said to be accelerating the aging and wrinkling process, and I’m not that smart as well, I think I should laugh at my own stupidity, shouldn’t I? What’s wrong with being Homer anyway? He maybe is slow but at least he has a good heart. (eh, does he?).
