Fashion? You seriously want us to worry about fashion?

Heard on NPR yesterday…some fashion guru babbling about how she hopes, as we come out of the pandemic, that people begin to put more thought into what they wear. Her area of expertise isn’t just fashion, but fashion with history and a story.

Whiskey Tango Foxtrot does that even mean?

Her thoughts were that perhaps we could only wear clothes that had a special story attached. Maybe Mama gave it to you before she died. Maybe we wore it the night we met Frank Sinatra and he commented on how cool it looked. Maybe it had belonged to Great Grand MaMa and we repurposed it to fit whatever we have going on in life.

Really? This is what you hope mankind is thinking about coming out of the pandemic?

600,000 Americans died of Covid but maybe their loved ones can set aside their grief long enough to stroke your fashion ego. And maybe the 33.4 million (as of this writing) who’ve had Covid can set aside their sickness and focus on your need to fill time on NPR.

Maybe all those people whose jobs disappeared in the economic crash, or whose businesses closed, can forget about paying their bills long enough to realize how brilliant your suggestion was; that all they needed was a fashion guru to tell them how to process their grief and anxiety over the details of their sad little lives to get all better.

I thought: wow, not gonna hear anything quite so artistically pretentious again for a while ’cause that’s some serious navel-gazing.

Until this morning on 1A. A terrific show that is usually about things that matter.

Today, it was some chick who produced a show called Broad City. During the conversation, and I didn’t hear all the conversation, just about 15 minutes worth, when the host told her it was a good show, the creator agreed and said, “It changed the world.”

Uh…what?

Are you fucking shitting me? Changed the world? She offered no data for this bold statement other than that she and her creator/partner had changed the “fem” conversation.

I don’t even know what that means. There were lots of buzzwords around her fem comment and I felt like I had been dropped into the middle of a militant 3rd wave of feminism ops planning session.

The kicker? I’m a pretty smart guy, quite the consumer of fine art in its many guises, and I never heard of her show. Soooo…changed the world?

Did. Not. Even.

Both of you shut the hell up. I can’t even begin to imagine anything more First World Privilege than those two comments. THIS is the kind of shit, the kind of moronic comments that make regular people who’re busting heavies every day to make the mortgage payment and get medicine for the baby and keep the car running one more week, roll their eyes and dismiss art out of hand and thus have no issues when their local school cuts music funding or art classes or creative writing programs.

Ain’t no regular people got the time to pick and choose their clothing based on what story it tells and sure as shit no TV show ever changed the world.

Fuck off and get a real job, discover what real sweat, real contributions, real accomplishment, feels like.

http://treyrbarker.com/2019/10/03/2506/

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And now there is one….

Two days ago, Kathy Barker and I had to make a decision about two of our three Canine-Americans…Tripp and Tango.

Tripp and Tango

Old age, arthritis, a stroke, lack of appetite, balance problems, eyesight, maybe a touch of bad hearing, worsening conditions all around. What had once been a full energy romp to the top of the hill, an excited look at everything visible from up there, became a slow, creaky walk downhill. And having been down this particular road before, I simply couldn’t let their quality of life deteriorate to the point of agony because it somehow made me feel better to keep them longer.

The only solace I can take in the whole day is that those two hairy baboons, who spent their lives together, somehow managed to get low together.

It has been horrible since. The house feels quiet and empty, not as warm, not as fun, not as bright.

There is little smile that Tango and Tripp lived until almost 17 and 16 years old in the face of an average lifespan closer to 12. Nor is there much smile that medications managed to help Tripp to another three or four months. Yes, I had much more time with them than many people get with their animals, but right now, that simply bounces off my heart. Someday, maybe soon, it’ll be different but not yet.

Book is still here, though she, too, has lived beyond averages. She is still energetic and still grins constantly, but she is slower of foot and heavier of heart than in the past.

No one has yet said, “They’re just dogs…they’re just animals,” though they will. We all know those people exist and I have no patience for them. They do not understand and, barring any sudden life change, probably won’t understand. Even if they laugh and smile when a puppy cocks its head hearing a new sound, or when a kitten falls off the bed and stares at you as though gravity is a cruel joke, those people will never completely understand what it means to miss the sloppy emotionalist of dogs or the heavy pant directly in your face when they’ve been running outside with you and want to go even further.

So the next few days will be ugly, and there will always be a void in my heart after that, just as their is for all the animals I’ve lost, though nothing comparable to the void of the people I’ve lost (Gramma S, Joe K, Sean M, Todd M, Mrs. C, Ranty Buff, Tom P, Ed B, Melanie T).

But having been down this road before, I know where it will eventually take me.

Friends of Strays….

 

 

 

http://treyrbarker.com/2016/03/14/2323/