Black Bloc Party

I happen to have a step-cousin who is in his early-20s whom I have not seen for a good few years. I never particularly cared for him and the majority of my memories of him involve a runny nose and the constant smell of shit. This past weekend he hopped in his compact second-hand car and drove to Toronto, the big city, TO, tdot, where dreams come true, bedbugs run rampant from mattress to mattress, and a Starbucks is only a brick's throw away. Why? To partake in the G20 protests. His rationale? An overarching "hatred" of cops–apparently those law-enforcing sons of bitches have it in for him and always write him speeding and parking tickets. RISE UP AGAINST OPPRESSION!

I am not too sure (nor do I care) if he successfully rallied against his oppressors or was a martyr for his cause and faced 8-hour detention in the makeshift chainlink fence prison near Eastern Avenue. Essentially, my step-cousin sums up what these G20 protests were really about: suburban middle-class white youth with a penchant for violence due to constant video game playing who came to demonstrate unrest with their own pathetic lives by smashing windows, spraypainting that circle A symbol thing, wearing clever bandana-hoodie disguises, and stopping for a hot dog on the corner.

Calling themselves the Black Bloc, these "protestors" embarked on my fair city simply to engage in directionless violence and destruction, as this was the closest they could ever get to a real-life Grand Theft Auto: riot police, cop cars on fire, disregard for the rule of law. Yes, there certainly were some socialists/environmentalists/whateverists who participated in protests, but I think that those who truly stand for a cause (not just "fuck corporations," "America sucks," and the like) have at least a slight understanding that nothing is accomplished in our democratic society through violent uprising. Such acts of wanton destruction may be effective in weak states with poor government aparatuses, but not here.

Ultimately, the Black Bloc descendended upon Toronto to protest nothing more than the monotony of their own pathetic lives. Time to get back to your parents' basement, losers.

Mom,

I swear, I've tried to be an alcoholic

Fuck is it ever exhausting

What is this: existing without trying or knowing or caring

just stand still

just stand still

just a standstill

Being rather than living

Reading avant-garde internet protocol

You sound so eloquent in zeroes and ones

But in real life ever after,

A punchline that falls flat

A single crease on a brow

A day I swear I'll remember to remember

But I can't–I only lived it

I want to love you

online

Egads, that's punny!

From the Globe and Mail: "U.S. discovers 'vast mineral riches' in Afghanistan, giving people even more reason to blow the place up."

Life is oh-so serious, guys

Seriously.

At this moment I encapsulate Generation X

Not a bland Pepsi commercial

Not a guilt-laden AIDS concert

Rather, an out of style hat with feather and all

The one I gave her the night she reached the apex

I don't want to ride behind you anymore

I can pedal faster

Your rear blinker an irritant

Your stubbornness a detour

I don't want to stoop before the Queen

Spaced out words trickling off my tongue

Elongated vowels tickling my lips

Remember when we shared those vowels, those words?

Now we lean away from each other

Opposing kickstands

Tangled chains

Blinking lights

Blinking lights

With nothing more to say than guffawed nonsense

"So um yeah um okay um sure um yeah"

Don't fucking wear my hat

Don't fucking rewrite my words

Don't make me another character in your edited script

We lean away from each other

Bearing the brunt of 20 failed relationships before

I'd rather not see you at all

BBM me the deets for Grandpa's funeral, Mom won't text me back

I have an iPhone

Oh shit, right, our family isn't platform universalized yet

I'll just tell Mom you lost your phone, she'll understand

kthnx maybe snag some pics

We say what we mean I believe it, I do

We mean what we say, the reversion is true

But what happens when we mean too much to say?

Not enough words to express how we feel

A flip through thesaurus pages to synonymously convey

the apex of thoughts, emotions;

hearts and minds and abdominal instincts

We travel on backroads with outdated maps;

Old fashioned sentiments our only guide

So accustomed to lonesome travel that when we pass another

we crash into them simply to feel something, anything, everything–

but only in an instant.

Blink and it's gone.