I Don't Freakin' Believe It

by Smoot

"I wish I was a little bit taller, I wish I was a baller,..."

In some Canon commercial, after a long, flashy series of tennis forehands, backhands, and other shots, Andre Agassi turns to the screen and says, "Image is everything." And, as much as Sprite will have us believe otherwise, in this world, image is everything.

You talk to any respected authority figure, i.e. a parent, older relative, a guidance counselor (gag), or someone like that, and they will say, "No, dear, it's what's inside that counts." And, to a point, they're right, but they're just as wrong.

In a perfect world, all that would matter would be the person inside, and what showed on the exterior would just be a ornament on the person's lovely inner self. In a perfect world, everyone would like everyone else, if they did, for who they were. In a perfect world, hypocrisy would be unheard of.

Yeah, and in a perfect world, comics would be a quarter, Leonardo DiCaprio would be banned from film, and Jim Carrey would be world-renowned and loved for his unique and graceful approach to acting. But we don't live in a perfect world. Comic prices are rising, DiCaprio is famous and cheered, and Carrey isn't given his due, and we all know he should.

But more importantly, no one cares about what's underneath. More often than not, the side that someone shows the world isn't the side that is shown to themselves. People put on a show. I'm guilty, I'm one of them.

Everyone has their own reasons for acting the way they do. One of my best friends, Derrick, is often brought to trial by people who think he's changed and that he's not the same that he was before. He usually blows them off in vintage Derrick fashion. The story behind that is, quite simply, Derrick decided to put on a show. He did a few things differently. Underneath, he's the same guy who talks to me, jokes with me, and humiliates me with his trumpet playing versus mine. He hasn't really changed, just starting acting differently.

I got called on it recently, because I wasn't acting "like the Matt that [they] used to know". This happened right after I dropped the school play, apparently that move was the catalyst. I got blown up at, and my "huge ego" was brought into play, and that was the reason that me part was given to someone else, because it just brought me back down to earth that someone that could do the part better than me could've gotten the part instead of me. And that the crowd I was hanging out with was kinda corrupting me, and that I was acting weird, and unlike myself.

No one really wanted to hear what I had to say in rebuttal, and the group that I hung out with, the ones that said it, are moving on pretty easily, easier than me, but I hang on too long. But I'm also stubborn, and I haven't changed. I'm still the same guy. I just got sick and tired of being timid and hiding inside myself all the time and always being nice to everyone and getting crap in the end that I decided, "Hey, let's switch character roles here", and acted different. I just got some self-confidence, and a bit more sarcasm. A big problem with them in particular, though, was that I decided to drop my charade of always being funny and joking on everything and trying not to let real feelings show at all, because they said I could be open and share what was on my mind any time I needed. ...guess they got tired of someone actually expressing sadness for hard times. Incredibly hard timnes, as of late, and when the joking stopped with them, I guess my appeal as a companion faded too. But you can't change the past, can you?

Image is everything. Bottom line, image is everything. A few people may care about the real you, but make sure you kow what you're doing before you drop the charade. Learn from my experiences.

-Smoot

Past rants:
November 9 -  Fanficcers' Depression
November 27 - "May You Live In Interesting Times"
December 16 - Fanficcer's Pride