Toxic Simplicity (Britney and Me)

I could quickly become as crazy and hysterical as Britney Spears simply by reading the news. World news, national news, celebrity news, all has merged into a manipulated parasitic mess. It is a cynical lens through which I gaze, with little hope in sight. On a pattern like this, by daylight, there is a lack of sequence, a defiance of law, that is a constant irritant to a normal mind. The color is hideous enough, and unreliable enough, and infuriating enough, but the pattern is torturing.

I hit my head against walls. I tear my hair out. Or did I shave it off? My job has made a fool of me, the thought sends me reeling with longing toward a toxic simplicity, some post-apocalyptic time of wandering, scrapping for food, creating fire with sticks and shelter with branches. I crawl into the walk-in closet where I am the best mother in the world. And I give it up. Don't leave me! Don't go! ...I must say what I feel and think in some way--it is such a relief! But the effort is getting to be greater than the relief.

I need to test my meddle. Personally, I believe that congenial work, with excitement and change, would do me good. But what is one to do? Things can get out of control so quickly, and any small change can send life reeling toward chaos. Hysterical, I need to be tied down. It's for my own good. My husband calls the authorities he is worried about the gun that he gave me as a gift, when he loved me. He is concerned for my well-being and is knowledgeable about my psychological state. He is rational, he knows best. My man ties me down, he drives me away with sirens blaring, he tells me everything's OK, he checks me into the hospital, he gives me drugs he calls me "baby" he calls his lawyer, he changes the constitution against me, he is the school principal, he is the president, he is the doctor he is the father, The Man, my lover. I live onlyto please him.

I have removed the silicone implants, I have sworn off botox and willed myself to face torture before being the life of the party. Three hundred men could not stop me from leaving this place. If this is Britney's fate, this is my fate.

"Good-bye. I am leaving because I am bored." -George Saunders
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(all italicized quotes from Charlotte Perkins Gilman, The Yellow Wallpaper (1899)