Perhaps my shaking hands have deceived you. Maybe it’s my gentle nature or my soft voice. My hesitation when I stepped forward. You seem to misunderstand me, so allow me to clarify:
I do not. Need. To be Saved. I am no damsel. I am in PAH-LENTY of distress, but you can take your white horse and speed in the other direction of Fuckyourselfville, population you and the horse you literally just rode in on. My hands shake because I OD on caffeine every day. My nature is about as gentle as a Nova documentary where a crocodile eats a wildebeest in a single snap, my voice is only soft because it is tired from screaming at the wind and howling at the news and pleading with my already democratic representatives to bring back common fucking sense and decency. My hesitant step is navigating rocky terrain with a titanium knee. And distress? That’s as soon as I open my eyes, friend. Distress is the baseline. I am fucking DOOMED. And I am wrapping it around myself like a warm We’re Fucked blanket. Mm. So cozy.
What, you thought someone was coming? You thought you could light a signal flare of Faith in Humanity? Perhaps a brush fire of Star Wars trailers and happy porgs would alert someone that we’re collapsing in on ourselves? You thought, maybe, a magical creature with compassion and empathy would swoop down, take us under its magnificent, ombre wings that somehow have articulated fingers so as to gently cradle us and carefully wipe the dirt and the ash from our brow and whisper in a forgotten language that we magically understand that our nightmare is over and we’re safe now? Cause that’s the most plausible scenario in our getting saved. The one with the talking bird with the finger wings. That’s the most likely to occur. Nope. It’s just us Doomed folks, uselessly battling our fate and looking for a glint of shining armor. Stop that. You look stupid.
Come into the blanket, friend. Thing is, you’re already here. You’re shuffling around in a bathrobe, screaming at your computer and obsessively checking your phone for horrifying updates. Accept it. The faster you know you’re doomed, the better off we will all be.
We are about to be annihilated in a nuclear war because of Twitter. Our president thinks he invented the word “fake.” We all just paid our Vice President to protest. Dreamers. Las Vegas, Charlottesville, Puerto Rico, STILL Flint, and St. Louis. Do you feel like rocking yourself in a corner yet? Sure you do. And I just listed locations. The only way out is through. I have accepted my fate as a member of the Doomed. And I gotta tell ya, it looks amazing on me.
I stand before you, a serious threat. I’m a middle aged woman who’s had a lot of sex solely for pleasure, and is bleeding profusely out of her unregulated vagina. Right now. The only way I could be scarier is if I weren’t white. My right to my own body, to birth control, to cancer screenings, to terminate unwanted pregnancies, to vote, to speak, to exist on the internet, to have emotions, to walk alone, to seek justice against assault, to not be blamed for rape, to not have my clothing policed, to find heroes, to gain weight, to take up space...is constantly doomed.
It is highly desirable, all these things I have. White, rich, Christian men desperately want to take them away.
Doomed is sexy. No one flocks to the saved guy in the movie. “Oh, look in his eyes. He’s just so...in love with Jesus and stuff!” “Ooooh I bet he just sat down and waited for rescue. Mmmmm...helpless and flaccid.”
No. Dark eyes, haunted stare, constantly hunted. That’s what everyone wants in their bedfellows, and sometimes their lunch. We are a disgusting people.
But but but - isn’t being saved what we’re fighting for you ask, because you’re Josh Zagoren and you wrote this in the lobby just now? NO, you puppet wielding, charming word genius, we are fighting to solidify our status as Members of A Doomed Populace. So that we can be reminded of the odds we overcome every single minute of every goddamned day.
DAMN that’s hot.
I’m an actor and a writer for a living. DOOMED. But that makes it so much sweeter when I actually get work and run home to my family, all cozied up in our hovel, and tell them we can have ketchup with our crackers tonight. Not saved. Just keeping the hunter at bay for another moment, resting from the chase to eat, sweat rolling down my arched back, arm muscles taut, breath quickened from excitement and fear, chest rising and falling in anticipation of the next moment to take flight. See? I JUST MADE KETCHUP AND CRACKERS SEXY. I also made myself stand like this and that’s kinda weird.
No one is getting out of here alive. Life. Not tonight, that’s on you. But truly, every moment is potentially your last. We are ALL doomed. Think of the freedom that bestows. What a precious gift. I don’t mean like, “baby in a flower from an Anne Geddes photo” kind of precious. I mean you can get out of shit now. “I cannot come to your performance art piece about the evils of shellfish. I’m doomed and I like shrimp.” “I’m not flying out for Thanksgiving this year because we’re all doomed and Uncle Marty is a racist gun humper who thinks kneeling during the anthem is against veterans. I will not waste my time nor my appetite for mashed taters. Good day.” Embrace your newfound freedom. You are doomed. Go and do as you please!
Step and speak and shake however you want to, because the Saved - which is code for rich white dudes - will try to take it from you. Be sexy. Be doomed. Get doomed in the bathroom with someone later. Be doomed with your loved ones and let the saved twist in the wind. The ones who were charged with saving, protecting, and serving have failed us, so fuck them in the face. And then their policies will force them to have horrible little face babies with no funds to care for them and no schools to teach them how to be better faces so the cycle will continue forever while WE, the doomed, get sexy and free all the way to glory. This train is bound for sexy doomed glory, people. It is on its way to freedom. For we are all doomed together. All aboard!