Pouty McSnibbler

 

I’m thinking of a name change, and that one sounds about right.

Remember when your mom used to comfort you when you would come home from school in tears, upset because you didn’t get the lead role in the school play? Instead of Romeo, you landed the role of a tree or shrub. What would your mother tell you? “There, there. It’s alright. You just be the best little shrub you can be.”

Somewhere along the line, my life took a turn. I watched the years fly by like so many cornfields. It feels like my journey is almost over, but I am miles from anything resembling a destination, and there’s nothing on the horizon.

I’m sorry, mom. I never lived up to my potential. I’m not a writer or a famous musician. I haven’t traveled much; I’m not even well read. I am nobody. Just a pouty snibbler. And I know what you would say: “That’s alright, son. You just be the best little pouty snibbler you can be.”

I am a multi-layered complex of façades and defense mechanisms. Beneath this ragged, slightly off-putting exterior, unshaven face, downcast eyes and slumped shoulders, there is a layer of semi-congenial engageability. If you wave to me, I will wave back; speak to me nicely, and I will respond in kind.

But before you go thinking you have found some heart of gold, keep digging. You will reach a layer of steel-reinforced concrete. This too is a facade. See how easily it crumbles when you pick at it?

The next layer is a bit more tricky: a titanium-plated hardened tool steel shell, the final protective shield which guards the living tissue of my heart. It has evolved over the years to make my heart impenetrable, impervious to heartbreak and betrayal.

The only way in, short of nuclear blasting or high powered lasers, plasma cutters, etc., is through a hidden door which is always locked. I possess the only key, and it is locked in here with me.

It’s OK though, really. You don’t want in here anyway. It’s pretty dark most of the time and mostly barren. Dank and dingy too, not the clean sparkling marble fortress of spartan repose that you might imagine.

And though it feels like it should be lonely in here, the place is actually quite crowded and alive with conversation. Demons and ghosts from the past, the many abandoned and unused former personas of mine, all swirl about in a stew, bumping into one another, merging and congealing to form the personality that I call myself.

The junkyard gate is locked, and snarling dogs patrol the perimiter. But if you look closely, you'll see that their tails are wagging. They can't help it; it's in their nature.

They are dogs, after all, and deep down they just long for someone to throw them a bone and tell them "good boy."

I wonder if Hitler's mom ever told him, upon hearing of his desire to become an evil tyrant, "Well, then you just be the best little Nazi you can be."

I still have an image of the world's most despicable dictator taking a moment or two, between issuing execution orders or invading a country, to pet his favorite kitty cat. And not a fucked up, evil cat, like Doctor Evil had, either, but a genuinely lovable furry friend, who saw past the atrocities into the one spark of light that exists at the innermost core of all beings.

I think babies see that. They haven't yet developed the filters or the mental constructs with which to classify other humans as good or bad, beautiful or abhorrent. When I am in the grocery store, as repugnant and decrepit as I may appear to the adult members of my species, a person from whom one does their best to avert their eyes, these tiny sentients look upon me with fascination and delight.

OK, I'm rambling at this point, making value judgements in a self-important voice. It's what I do best. That and snibbling in a pouty manner. That'll be my title from now on. Pouty Snibbler. You have to give me that; I've earned it. I may plagiarize a few song lyrics here or there, but Pouty Snibbler is mine, all mine.