By Anton Martin Smith antonsmithwrites@gmail.com
“Two Times Out of Many That I annoyed the Female Kind” (A Laugh)
Category: Uncategorized
To All The ‘Wild Bill’s’ Of The World (A Poem/Prose)
By Anton Martin Smith antonsmithwrites@gmail.com
You are talking to someone you know.
Another person is nearby.
They try to introduce you this ‘new third party’ – let’s call him ‘Wild Bill’.
I’ll come back to Wild Bill in a second.
Now a partially half-well-adjusted-adult generally does this as an introduce-ee:
They muster at least a quarter smile, aim it towards those they are introduced to, & and emit at least a passably pseudo-cheery hello.
But No No No! – this is not always so!
In small towns throughout the cosmos, namely Earth – this skill is often missed.
Yes, our smalltown Wild Bill – instead of acting like a partially well-adjusted adult who knows how to say hello –
Decides he would rather look like he is at a funeral,
Looking at you cadaverously, without an once of good humour,
As frozen as an iceberg, while his tiny mind ticks over.
Wild Bill is trying to figure out whether you are worth talking to,
He’s hoping he might have known you for a minimum thirty years, but has temporarily forgotten.
Because Wild Bill knows that dealing with an entirely new person from scratch,
The ‘blank page’, if you will –
Is a bridge too far for him – in fact it is far far far far far too far for him,
& thats still putting it lightly.
For his fragile quadruple bubble wrapped ego can’t handle it.
For hidden deep in the recesses of his psyche – he knows if he does this – his cover will be blown.
He’d rather treat the ‘blank pages’ of the world poorly & so come across like a total hick,
Than risk actually being seen.
It is simply the price Wild Bill is more than willing to pay –
For he can stay comfortably unseen, invisible, without ever experiencing any stressful growth pangs,
& who cares what some total stranger thinks of me anyway, he tells himself.
Of course, I’m not hating on the Wild Bills of the world –
As it is always a fool’s errand,
To judge those who know not why they do as they do.
Especially as we are all like Wild Bill in some ways, or at least some stage in our lives.
But in saying that,
It’s bloody annoying when it happens to you all the same.
Unfortunately there is no polite antidote to it, other than to steadfastly not get sucked into their abyss.
This of course takes great practice.
One day I will rudely confront Wild Bill like this:
“Bill, Bill, Wild Bill – oh when will you learn to say hello properly for god’s sake?”
To which Wild Bill will probably reply stony faced:
“Not in this lifetime stranger”.
And then if I’m really lucky – a mutual disarming chuckle & will break out across these dusty windswept savannahs –
Finally allowing me & ‘The Wild Bills’ of this Earth to see eye to eye.
It’s a rose-tinted romantic hope, & as such, I won’t hold my breath.
So, all that is left to think to yourself about Wild Bill, is this:
Wild Bill – may one day your wounded soul find restful peace, with all your undue fears long gone.
You are now a-hoppin’-skippin’ & a- jumpin’ through the clouds with unremittent gay abandonment,
Greeting every otherworldly evanescent stranger you meet along the way like a manically happy labrador,
Who has just now seen his long-term owner & best friend, whom he had mistakenly thought was long dead.
God speed to you Wild Bill.
My “PSTD” poem has been updated/improved….(a note)
Hi there HAPPY FRIDAY!
My latest poem has been updated – & definitely improved. Here is the link
https://antonmartinsmith.com/2025/08/12/my-so-called-ptsd-life-a-poem/
I’ve made it more reflective of how (in those dark few years) I felt when I was thirty five & living in a big foreign city (Melbourne). Melbourne is just like any of the dog-eat-dog big city, but it pretends to be a fluffy cat instead. Isn’t it weird how cities – usually big gnarly ones – delude themselves with some fake arsed-rosie-false-city-hall-marketing-a-fied image of themselves? Of course the ‘super serfs’ in these cities – the ones with ‘good incomes & alcohol’ like to pretend they are rich – but we’re onto them aren’t we! These types are at least good to write about. I guess people (other than the totally downtrodden – who see the truth becasue it’s kicking them hard daily) in big cities (like Melbourne) want to hide the fact they are, for the most part – living in mostly ‘just another run of the mill hamster treadmill’.
But then again, this self deception is normal behaviour for a human, a city, a nation. The brain (or culture) has to create a world which is inhabitable for its owner (s), & it will happily lie to its conscious layer. People (or a culture/society) would rather go insane that to recognise an unpalettable truth: A Big Western City – Like Melbourne Australia – Is At Best A ‘Polished Turd’.
All this makes me want to dress like a serf & haul a giant placard down Bourke St, then stop when I’m in front of MYERS DEPARTMENT STORE & hold up the sign that says:
OH THE DEPRESSIVE GLORY OF IT ALL!!!
IT’S ALL A GAME!!!
CHEAP THRILLS WALLOW SWEETLY,
IN THE RICH HEARTY SOILS OF:
MELBOURNE CBD STYLE NIHILISM!!!
SCREW THE CORPORATE PIGS!!!
(ok I’m too lazy to actually do that).
I will keep this short & quit whiel i’m ahead (behind?) – so enjoy the updated version of the poem!
‘May the creativity live with you’
Martin Anton Smith (aka Anton Martin Smith)
P.s. The ‘main image’ of the poem was created via ‘Grok’ AI – the people of Melbourne may recognise the background as “Flinders Street station”, & the cities flagship newspaper. It’s quite a good image.
“My so-called PTSD Life?” (A Poem)
By Anton martin Smith antonsmithwrites@gmail.com
Do I have PTSD?
Is the question I ask of myself daily.
And If you’re reading this – I bet you do too.
Did I reach a point at 35 when the until-now-buried, seeds-of stress-all bloomed?
Before that mid-thirties limit, my youth could smother it all,
Like some cyborg-ed cold-hearted futuristic bounty hunter.
But then at that critical year in life’s age,
I must had been once again pushed another infinitesimal millimetre,
But this time, time & space had run out.
Now I was found myself finally pushed right up to & teetering over the precipice,
Of that cliff that was designed for me, & people just like me, long, long ago.
Teetering, thereby when the next trauma hit – (likely disguised a pretty human female),
It would send me careering downwards to ‘bottom-cliffs-ville’ with no parachute, & no recourse.
Then when you hit the ground, youth has suddenly gone forever, & the world has changed.
When you look up from the splat-point, you now may as well be seventy.
All the good things that came to you so easily have now evaporated.
But as the years post impact rolled along this “PTSD” has given you wisdom.
And you realise it’s cut that ‘fake-hard-but-easy’ old world away from you,
As a butcher cuts off a line of fat from a steak, & then whacks it, you’ve been made much better .
Ahhh ‘PTSD’ & AGE – heavens secret gift for your aged soul.
And in truth you probably don’t even have “PTSD” – merely some cheaply made imitation.
But each night you’ll raise a glass to the comfort of it all just the same.
Just like the two billion of others just like you,
Who are also convinced they are uniquely sad.
And we all unwittingly raise a glass nightly & in unison to each other,
As we sit in from of our computer screens,
Forever mourning the sudden death of our own past lives.
I have updated the last Prose (a helpful note)
The newer version of “Life is a Catch-22 problem” should be funnier, & you should read it like it’s been said by a stand-up comic.
Enjoy!
“Life Is A Catch-22 Problem” (A Prose Poem)
by Anton Martin Smith antonmartinsmithwrites@gmail.com
The problem with being an intellectual, be it faux or otherwise,
Is that you can’t but help be trapped into negative thinking.
This is because ‘intellectuals’ want to understand ‘The World’,
Or should I say Need to understand The World –
And,
If you haven’t already noticed,
The world always but always, has a lot more problems than solutions.
This is why all in all, having ‘brains’ is far more of a curse than a blessing.
Yes – ‘The Garden of Eden’ orientation is correct:
Ignorance is (for all us distant dystopians) unfortunately – bliss.
Yes – ignorance of the unnecessary is natures ‘go to strategy’.
So – should we should ‘act dumb coz that’s natures leaning?’ – I hear you ask?
Well, that’s a tricky one – as ‘Nature’ is also often a beast in itself –
It will happily sacrifice the few for the good of the many –
With no tears shed.
Our indulgence in the unnecessary is why, by 2025, the only ‘true thing’ happening here on Earth is:
THE FABLED ‘CATCH 22’ Scenario – summed up with this dictum –
“You’re damned if you do & you’re damned if you don’t”
Now I could tell you the real solution to this – & forgive the vulgarity – this very “poopy sandwich” –
But then again, my latest money scamming psychiatrist has diagnosed me as ‘anally retentive’* –
And the prior souless shrink before that one also diagnosed me as ‘a narcissist’ –
And the one before that as a ‘compulsive liar’.
So I will respect their judgement –
So I’m not going to contradict those fine-living parasitic assholes, & tell you the answer to the aforementioned,
‘Life is a Catch 22 problem’.
But I will tell you what my suddenly retiring fourth-last-dodgy-money-grubbing-psychiatrist told me in my & his & my last session:
“You’re on your own buddy”**
With this casual undiagnosticly inclined in-passing phrase, he was inadvertently the only shrink ever who had ever told the truth, in the history of psychiatry.
And now my friends this prose must end unsatisfactorily –
But luckily, as always the only one who suffers is the reader/listener –
I the writer will scoot by the seat of my pants as always, & end up reaching for a well chilled beer from the fridge.
& Amen to that!
*This topic of anal retentiveness makes my mind wander – I wonder if it’s acceptable for a plumber to speculate on a customer’s bowel motions?
**This line should be said in a weird American accent.
P.s. I apologise for this bastardry, so badly disguised as a poem. All those cranks I’ve been seeing must be rubbing off on me. But I guess I should take that as a compliment.
“London 2038 – The London, The P.M. , & The P.A Episode 3” (A story – Work in. Prog)
By Anton Martin Smith antonmartinsmithwrites@gmail.com
Yes, as I was saying – Arthur B. Pertwee was a totally different person from Britain & England’s PM Twotimer. It was very important that this was the case. Given the fact that Pertwee was the one who had the unpaid, undeclared, unadvertised job of saving England from Twotimer. Pertwee had , seemingly out of the ‘goodness of his own heart’ saved England from Twotimer’s as regular as a swiss watch, & forgive my crassness for effect – his fucking awfully thought out ideas.
As the declining returns that are the history of England & Britain post World War 2 prove, It never works out very well when an idiot is responsible for another idiot not making & installing their idiotic plans. Dear reader, it’s certainly worth a few direct comparisons between the man-boy Twotimer, & the real-man-in-every-sense Pertwee – the contrast is of course quite extraordinary.
Where Twotimer was rash, Pertwee was considered. Where Twotimer would slug back seven drinks back to back like the alcoholic he probably was, while at a uniquely important state reception, Pertwee on the other hand, would sit all night on a single glass of wine – for unlike the Twotimer, he had long the understood social risks of not doing this. It was no accident that Twotimer was still known by his old oxford pals ‘Sir Glugmeister’. Where Twotimer would shout down the wait staff, Pertwee would thank them personally for their excellent efforts & slip them a sensibly sized tip. Where Twotimer would spout off buzzwords from outdated social & economic theory to fool people into thinking he was knowledgeable, Pertwee actually knew about the economy, both from his ex-private-sector based life experience & from his often concerted & targeted diligent observation & research.
Where Twotimer would usually forget to comb his straw-like mop of blonde hair, or have a shower or brush his teeth, Pertwee’s personal grooming was reliably impeccable. Where Twotimer had cheatingly often paid someone else at Oxford to sit his narrow entirely non quantitatively orientated degree course consisting entirely classics exams, Pertwee had gained genuine straight A-plusses, all off his own back, in a multidisciplinary course that was laced with many difficult mathematically based subjects. Where Twotimer has had countless scandalous extra marital affairs, Pertwee was a on the whole a confirmed bachelor. A lifelong bachelor who had a few very good lifelong females as confidants, with perhaps two of them also doubling – but never during the same time period of course – as once-in-a-while-lovers who never asked more that was wise to ask for or expect.
Forgive me dear reader in laboring the point, but it’s worth it to underline the fact that Twotimer was a badly disguised bufoon, while Pertwee was the obvious-to-everyone-who-saw-or-heard-him – model of the gentrified intelligent man.
Pertwee would make a great the poster boy for the bygone period of history which was the true height of the modern enlightenment based western world. To illustrate the differences it is worth telling the reader or listener of a recent but very common themed private conversation between the two.
“Ah Pertwee, I don’t know how you do it! Keeping so ice cool all the time! I’m such a lusty fool, even though I’m now fifty, my loins have a heart attack every time a bit of skirt floats in front of me. I’ve tried of everything & nothing works. Nothing can stop my forever teenage boy libidinous ways! it’s outrageous Pertwee! Sometimes when, as the Australians say, when I’m atrociously toe-ie all it takes is that the woman in my crosshairs to have hair not much longer that a foot long, is of age under forty-nine, wears those clicky-clacky-high-heels, has a dress cut perhaps only a centimeter above the knees, & then she sends me her crooked-world-weary-smile from a hundred feet across any long stately room! Oh dear Pertwee! The pain of it all! These as yet undealt with constant erections that pop up are driving me mad! I’m sure the Chancellor of the Exchequer even saw one through my pants once! In fact, I think he looked a little to long for a married man, if you ask me – makes me think Nordston bats for the other team! – but I digress…where was I ah yes, my insatiable redder than red red-bloodedness!. I mean I try my best to disappear of to the lavatory where I can do my best schoolboy methods to make them go away – but Pertwee, I tell you what! when you’ve half way through a dryer than the Sahara desert, long-winded economic discussion with those boringly dunderhead heads-of-state & their long list of advisor’s slash Ministers slash entourage’s, sometimes it’s impossible for me to sneak away for a quick diddle to stop the crooked walking if you catch my drift!”
When Twotimer drew towards the end of this particular ‘why am I so teenage-horney all the time’ themed theatrical spiel, he always looked at Pertwee with open pleading hands and with a blank schoolboy face. He was waiting for the wise, soothing Pertwee reply. Like as if he was an alternate version of Oliver twist saying ‘please sir I’d like some more’, knowing that Pertwee in dishing out the soothing verbal sustenance he desperately needed, wouldn’t ever shout at him ungraciously – he knew Pertwee would effectively say ‘More – of course my dear boy – eat up’. Like Twotimer’s performance, Pertwee’s closing reply was as always almost exactly word for word the same:
“I am aware of your various emotional afflictions Sir – I mean you tell me a version of this story daily – often in fact twice a day, & every now and then three times a day – but this is no complaint of course Sir – don’t ever think that I’d openly criticise for no good return. As I always say Sir, & I know you don’t mind me observing – the problem with this kind of thing is that it stems from a dark hidden recess of your psyche. It’s love & acceptance that you are at heart dying for – not a flash of boob, or a hearty display of leg flank. Don’t worry Sir, I’m making it my personal mission to one day get you to learn to love yourself, as hard as that may be. This ridiculous over-sexed nightmare that you are forever sleepwalking inside of – is not entirely your fault – if in fact, your fault at all. You acquired this behaviour in true adaptive fashion, simply as a survival mechanism, if you will. In its wider form, your overall outlook & behaviour profile is a coping mechanism that enables you to stave off complete emotional collapse. I mean it’s not your fault you had near absolute zero love & affection from either of you parents, particularly your cold diplomat & businessman father. As I keep telling you – & I don’t mid that by the way, that’s why I’m here – this problem of yours is so common in the halls of power in England & Britain, & indeed certain patches of the privilidged world itself – ultimately it’s a wider boarding school syndrome type of affliction that you have. One day Sir we might even safely beat this motley assortment of afflictions than haunt you entirely. Peraps our combined efforts will one day leave you almost completely free of this type of emotional pain. Pain that spills over, nay manifests so freely into your daily affairs in the way you outline with words & show in your erratic self destructive, self-sabotaging behaviors”.
Pertwee was always careful to add a certain ‘unfounded optimism ofthe chances of improvement’ into the equation. Privately of course Pertwee was highly skeptical that anything more than a cosmetic improvement in Twotimers emotional & behavioural life was ever possible. But he knew it was prudent to keep up an attitude of ‘overt hope’ towards Twotimer’s at heart deeply fragile ego. Some might assess this as a pig-headed refusal to look facts in the face – but this would be to ignore, as the American’s say the realpolik of the situation. Pertwee knew if he didn’t add some sugar frosting now & then, Twotimer wouldn’t get out of bed at all for acute depression, & he himself would be ex-communicated from his crucial, albeit clandestine, job – & then where would England be? It would go from the current state of ‘stable but fading grandeur’ to ‘collapsing anarchic tatters’ in a matter of weeks. Pertwee’s sugercoating would sdefinitely stay, & for good reason.
With this typical kind of adult-to-child conversation I’ve outlined above, Pertwee would always end his considered, owl-wise-words with a certain look over at Twotimer, looking squarely into his angling downwards, a little too-close-together eyes. It was the kind of look that a school principal might give when he charitably & once again spared the forever un-reformed naughty schoolboy who’d again re-appeared in his office. Saving him from any real punishment for his schoolboy crimes. At this point Twotimer would always defect with positive sounding bluster:
“Ah Pertwee, alas you are as always lamentably one thousand percent correct! I was never loved! Woe is me! I should probably be embarrassed now shouldn’t I? Here I am as the Prime Minister of a former glorious empire, & I still have these horrible situations that are essentially wide awake wet dreams! it’s a unmitigated travesty dear Pertwee! What are we going to do with me!? Ah I despair Pertwee! I’m truly truly cursed! But I think you are a bit wrong with your assessments – I did have some love as a child – remember my little dog Eccles? I’ve told you about him haven’t I? That was the sweetest little dog ever Pertwee! Whenever I had been crying my eyes out all semester long at Eton, I always cuddled up to fluffy little Eccles! Ah that helped magnificently Pertwee – it really did – don’t underestimate that Pertwee! I mean why can’t a boy get emotional love from his beloved pet? Surely he can!”
Even though the two had almost the exact same conversion daily, Twotimer could never quite accept that Pertwee was right about him in not ever receiving the unconditional love he sorely needed from his parents as a child. This was why he was the way he was in the world, & it explained his low self-esteemed internal dialogue. In the various repititions of the conversation, occaisionally certain phrases from above were forgotten, but the dog story was never left out. There was always but always in these ultimately entirely therapeutic conversations, the appeal to the fact he had a lovable fluffy dog called Eccles to cry away too as a palliative to his total lack of parental love as a child, and to combat the standard Etonian boarder stresses. Twotimers memory of fluffy happy Eccles was, like Pertwee himself, a constant tonic always on hand.
Pertwee as always ended with these same themed words, similar each time in fact almost to the letter.
“Well, let’s just pick this up again later shall we Sir, I’m sure we’ll reach a breakthrough on that matter one of these days – that breakthrough will come when you finally allow yourself to see the true darkest moments you had as a child. You’ll see them for what they are, without at all blaming yourself. As glib as it has become to say – one day you’ll learn to love yourself Sir, & I’ll darned well be there when it happens too”.
At this point Pertwee always made sure he smiled a little at Twotimer. On the face of it they were big words aimed at the boy-PM, but he had had long had Twotimer’s complete trust & confidence – for such a long time now that he knew their was no chance of any real offense, or ill feeling breaking out about the deeply personal matters Pertwee brought up. This being the case, it would be a lie to say that Twotimer didn’t feel a little embarrassment. Pertwee could see it easily as he could read him like a book, & new exactly who he was right down to his bones. That’s an understatement – he knew him down the level of his cellular dna.
Twotimer in a final retort to release his slight embarrassment, would always then ‘shut the book with a mighty clap’ on the particular daily revisited conversation in question by saying:
“Pertwee – god! – how long has it been since someone gave us a cup of Earl Grey? We’ve been standing around lwarbling like a couple of empty handed fools for at least an hour and ah half! Where’s the help when you need them most – god save us Pertwee let’s find some ourselves!”.
Then that was exactly what they did. They both walked over together & sourced the Earl Grey tea’s, pouring it for themselves at the nearest refreshment table. Once both standing there with full cups of tea they sipped away not saying a peep for the four point five minutes it took them both until they reached the bottom of the cup at the exact same time. Of course there was a final in unison Ahhhh sound – the universal sound signifying contentment.
(End of Part 3….tune in soon for the next edition, coming very soon)
“You’ve been Vr’d” (Prose)
by anton martin smith antonmartinsmithwrites@gmail.com
Funny how a “loss of social status” can send people into depression & worse.
That “social status” was all an illusion anyway.
Anyone with really high “social status” is essentially just a character in a VR movie.
A loss of “social status” really just means the VR goggles came off
A Corporate Career in a big city means you are an avatar in a VR game similar to “The Hunger Games”.
When you are young & about to pursue a ‘corporate career’ remember this –
Mussolini himself said that Fascism should really have been called ‘corporatism’.
& you don’t want to follow the (very) Ill Duce’s lead (again) do you?
If you do then I’m afraid I’ll have to announce in hushed tones
“You’ve been VR’d”
Update!: My latest short story (About Talking Olives) is at proto-writers first-final-stage draft!
Hi there, this is a quick note to advise that the latest short story (link below) has been gone through a reasonably heavy edit last night, & will be hopefully somewhat ‘improved’. Last night I sat down & went through it all ‘from go to woe, fixed say 90% of the issues.
It’s now quite long at 4700 words. This story is was written in ‘stream of consciousness’ mode, so if the length means its a bit ‘rambling’ – then all the better. I guess at some point it might be paired back to 4000 or 3700 words, but that’s all for later judgement.
I wrote the story because I just thought I’d something, & I just started with the fact I like to buy expensive olives at the deli (only about $6 worth once a week). The only spoiler I’ll divulge is it features at least one talking olive.
Anyway I won’t stay here long, I have to go & do some carpentry – I’m working on refurbishing an old kitchen cabinet.
I hope you have the time to read the short story.
By the way feedback is always welcome via comments or email.
Catch ya later my olive & non-olive eating rascals!
Martin A Smith
“Underestimated Olives” (A Short Story)
By Anton Martin Smith antonmartinsmithwrites@gmail.com
“The soon to be critically acclaimed writer went to the mount of olives”.
Scratch that – it’s sounds far too bombastic, I realised.
“The up & coming, unheralded writer, went to the deli for his favourite olives”.
Scratch that – that sounds to stock, I thought.
“The self-deluded would-be post midlife crisis blogger went to the supermarket for those delicious olives”.
Scratch that – it’s all a bit too ‘comedic’ sounding, I theorised.
“He was professionally invisible, beleaguered, half stoic, & now ‘pushing fifty’. He liked to buy tasty-ish deli olives that he could barely afford”.
Ok, let’s go with that – after all, self-deprecating, hang-dog type characters are all the rage right now – & perhaps always have been, I concluded with confidence.
So, now that opening line was done, I went to get the olives. The Green, & sometimes Black Olive was my current shall we say – snack penchant. I was lucky today as they were on sale – but more to the point -what the fuck is a guy like me buying expensive upper-middle-class olives? But then again they could be faux ‘Rock Star’ rider olives. They could also be ‘the last bastion snack of a doomed man’ olives. The narrative always has flex.
But lets for arguments sake say they are upper-middle-class olives. To say that might seem weird – but what can I say? – I had always been a class conscious guy. Experiencing poverty as a child makes you like that for life – even if you get rich one day. That’s how someone with one hundred million dollars can genuinely think that they are poor. They’ll look at the guy with two hundred million dollars. When they get two hundred they look at the billionaire. Comparing – It’s a nasty nasty affliction we humans have. Sometimes I’m no different to anyone that does that.
HOW DARE I BUY MIDDLE CLASS OLIVES!, said my overly harsh inner voice.
Is that my Superego or my Shadow speaking?, I overthink to myself.
I think it’s my Superego – If it was my shadow I’d probably be thinking shoving them up some retired mean schoolteachers nose. Jung won that round, too bad Sigmund – better luck next time, said my brain
I was standing in front of the perspex counter, looking at the trapped olives. The large square container at the deli had one quadrant that had far greener & fresher olives than the rest of it. Clearly they had been given ‘pride of place’ by the deli manager. The sad, tired looking ones in the container housed the half decaying olives. My mind observed the following factoid:
Those are the unlucky ones, the ones raised by divorced welfare single olive parents who were pharmacologically challenged (thanks to their selfish forcebly assigned ‘Auschwitzian prison guard’ krank-olive-doctors no doubt!).
Sure, I kinda had a soft spot for that ‘motley crue’ lot, those ‘distressed olives’ in that lower-east-side of the bowl. But tastebuds are tastebuds after all. So feelings aside, I used cold logic & bought the ‘good ones’ from the upper-east-side of the bowl.
I guessed that ‘oasis quadrant’ that housed the privilidged plump olives, was the upper-east-side real estate which housed the olive-kids & their executive-career-olive-parents (that were still together for the kids). They all hung out safely-all-together in that corner where they were well nourished, warm & ‘planning for their inwvitable golden futures’.
I guess you can tell with all this psyco-babble that I’m projecting. My class riddled ‘olive world’ is analogous to my ‘human world’ – I guess you think I’m just a madman huh?. It’s a fine line my dear reader – a fine line. And anyway since when does a madman either a) admit he’s a madman; or b) know he’s a madman in the first place? Of course such foolish solipsism can be like candy to the troubled mind – but now that I’ve been around the block, at least now I know that. Now back to concrete reality for a second or two.
So, the happier than you would expect deli lady scooped the comfy-upper-class-olives out from what they thought was their safe ‘partially gated community’. She put them in a oh-so-shitty cheap wafer-thin container as is normal these days. Then she put a price sticker on it. Then she put the whole thing in a plastic bag, because she knew that the crappy plastic container was sure as anything going to leak or break in two. Those snobby complacent olives sure must have got a ‘rude awakening’ just now, I thought as I walked to the checkout. Was that that just ‘tall poppy syndrome’ talking?, I thought about my thought. I could tell you about my thought about my thought about my thought – but that would be overkill.
Five minutes after the as-usual payment to the partialy confused, slightly crosseyed & almost grumpy checkout lady, I was back my rental studio. It was a nice walk home. I heard only two screams, one gunfire shot, & one gateside yapping Shih-Tzu dog. Pretty standard stuff. So I sat on the old couch & put the stuf on the coffee table. I pulled one of these formally privileged upper-middle-class olives out of its cheap ass plastic container, somehow it hadn’t broken or leaked.
Call me crazy, but my mind told me it was now time to talk to the olives. Hey you! – don’t judge me, we all have to blow off steam in our own way – & hey, it’s totally safe & harmless. I couldn’t help but think of that old cartoon charachter called Popeye. I started talking to the olives sitting there in front of me in the now open lid container ‘in character’ as Popeye.
Sorry me’s olives – but you have suffered a big fall in your socio-economic status’s – you are about to be eatens by this aging nobody, who mays not even make the footnotes’s of history, even if he lived for one thousands of years!
Then of course, I did the obligitory Popeye laugh you know the one that has all the consecutive ‘ugs’.
Now it was time for the bilateral human-to-olive trade talks to begin. I had waged the opening gambit with my Popeye schtick, & now was time for their right of reply. Of course I didn’t expect an olive to start talking at all.
I could now hear the olive, held securely between my thumb & forefinger, scream at me loud – well, loud for an olive. It was about as loud as is a baby bird does when it peeps at its mother to feed it. The words it spoke were surprisingly clear. The olive talked in a clipped, slow, & earnest tone, kinda like how people talked in those old black & white Hollywood movies – I think they called it a continental accent…its reply went like this:
“That’s ok you fool – don’t you remember what was said on the mount of olives – of course all us olives cannot ever forget that – for obvious reasons. Be happy in your meekness, you may still yet inherit the Earth!”
That olive’s words almost brought me to tears. I could be emotional simetimes. Age does that even to the most hardened barnacle. In fact, I was almost so moved, I was about to plant it so it might re-generate. But then I realised they were pitted olives – there was no seed to grow. I was way too hungry anyway for such shennanigans anyway. So down the hatch did this seemingly polite & probably golden-rule-obeying talking olive go. I threw it up high & it came down straight & hit my tongue. It was screaming all the way too. That poor olive’s potential trade talks were now over.
I thought to myself – should I go see a psychologist? Should I call a doctor? After all, surely this was all a hallucination – who had ever heard of a talkign olive?! I had, like everyone else these days, been overly stressed lately. Maybe I was finally finally going mad. Too many late nights, too many books, too many screens. Dare I break my now a decade old rule & consult one of those quack doctor goons?
Then I answered myself in true the scar-tissue remains fashion.
No don’t trust those fuckers – those mainstream medico narc sellouts! Docs! Psycologist! Counsellors! They are probably the reason your seeing & hearing talking olives in the first place – what with all those anti depressants, those benzo’s, those Elvis like-qualuudes & uppers-in-disguise-as-medicine they once shoved down your throat for three decades! We’ve all been their bloody mules for way too long! All of us zombified just so they can impress their social climbing walking dead fellow mortician-in-disguise friends! All so they can live on the poncey hill! We are their unwitting mules god damn it! Mules!
I took a few breaths & calmed myself down. Sometimes I got a little carried awaywith thoughts of social justice. That was the angry young man still in me. It’s also easy to still sometimes go off like that when you suddenly find yourself middle-aged, as every one my age does. And he sentiment was correct – most doctors sold out long long ago. I was wise to be doc-weary. I assume the olive community are much the same in their sentiments towards their olive-doctors. Now that I’ve broken the ice & started talked to them, perhaps they’ll sympathise.
Ok yeah, I get it – after than last paragraph I must sound still like a real madman, but I’ll say it again – it’s a fine line between madness & genius. And yes, you are right – all madmen like say this. I’d rather be ‘talks to olives mad’ than be ‘works nine-to-five in an office chicken coup for forty years mad’ anyway. Normality is a much worse form of madness than anything I ‘ve got.
I decided I won’t worry about the talking olives, or my accute but also hopefully only temporary psychosis – whichever of the two it was, I couldn’t be sure – or perhaps it was even both. They were really talking olives and I was a really halucinating insane person. I thought to myself:
I’ll keep just this inoffensive, totally anodyne, largely humorous potential ailment to myself. I mean many rich bastards would pay a lot for the chance to hear talking fruit! Why not just keep listening? After all – that fucking olive gave me some great advice! It’s all in the privacy of my own home, I mean rental. Maybe there really is more confucious-like ‘olive advice’ on its way? There’s only one way to find out.
I took another one out of the nasty plastic bag encased, cheap plastic container, held it up between thumb & forefinger about a foot from my face. I looked at it intently with my over used, small-font-addled, squinted-dusty-eyes, & waited for this new olive to talk. All of this was all so much fun!
One minute passed – not a peep. Thats ok, having adhd had always made me impatient – but I was self aware about it. As the ancient stoic philosophers had said – you gotta know thyself. I told myself I’ll just steel myself & wait longer! I waited five minutes, which seemed like an eternity – I was about to put some muzak on to help combat the boredom, when I finally I heard something – this time it was a deep baritone voice.
“You know, you human beings are total losers – you should never have moved away from hunter-gather society – that was how your supposed to live”.
I was relieved to hear these second olive’s words that I punched the air like I was at a old-timey rock concert, & let out a small repressed ‘woo-hoo’ as my muted celebration – muted so that I didn’t frighten the olive into silence. Maybe olives were a bit skittish like cats were. After all, I was a giant of a giant to something as small as a talking olive – surely they’d go all ‘fraidy cat’ easily. I then asked the olive to elaborate on its words. The olive seemed happy to talk on.
“Well my human friend, the hunter-gatherer system was designed so that the Earth was like your totally free, always well-stocked supermarket. You all happy, hairy & wiffy loinclothed-folk just walked around & took what you wanted – you didn’t need to go to a third party & ask for a job, so you could get a few pieces of paper, or digits on a screen. You didn’t then have go to fourth party who will, if they like you enough, then give you an wilted olive – or a cold-store strawberry or whatever. And that’s all if you have enough paper money or screen money for that days inflated price!. Look human man! – that madness can’t work well – & its not supposed to either! I don’t know why most you enslaved worker-humans have put up with all that malarkey for so long! – its ignorant! cowardice! wilful blindness!”
Wow, I thought to myself – this one really is a genius! I’m beginning to have great luck with these wise talking olives! They are paying out wisdom like no tommorow! What were the chances! Soon if I keep plucking out new olives, maybe I’ll get one that will really really really blow my mind! – like one might tell me if time travel to the past is actually possible! They might tell me the sci-fi dream of how to build a time-machine! I now thought of all the best potential answers to all of Physics, Science & History’s most intractable or squashed questions. I listed them in my mind, one after the other.
…Yes modern day humans have been genetically interferred with by the Pleiadians one hundred thousand years ago…Yes Lee Harvey Oswald was a CIA asset….Yes Jesus was actually the son of God but he got well sick of carpentry…No of course we never went to the Moon, not with those deadly Van Allen belts…Yes the ‘gerbil story’ about Richgard Gere was a total fabrication, it was actually a mouse…..Yes the Pyrimids were made using cast limestone…Yes the big bang theory that the universe came from a quantum fluctuation is total horse-shit…
This was all ultra-exciting to me, a so-called over-thinker. All the biggest questions slash mysteries slash conspiracy theories answered! Yes with this container full of possibly more than Einstein-smart-talking-olives, I may have found something akin to Socrates meets Pandora’s Box meets the Ark of the Covenant! I couldn’t contain my exitement but I was also distracted. I dropped this new Socratic olive onto the floor. The talking olive didn’t like too see such clumsy exhuberance, or should-I-say, ‘flagrant olive abuse’.
It started to yell profanities at me. This time it changed how it sounded – just a little. the voice was still deep, but it sounded just a bit more like a New Yorker this time.
“Fuck you, you dopey human asshole, fuck you, you damn smelly cunt, I tried to help you & this is how you repay me!!?? I’m down here on some fuckin’ crusty dusty matt with rogue peanuts, popcorn, m&m’s, potato chips, used skidmarked undies, mega-dirty socks…& what’s that – that looks like a pubic hair! A pube – a bloody pube! How dare you treat a genius, highly educated upper class olive like me like I’m one of those yellowing scumbags in the lower-east quadrant of the supermarket deli bowl – have some respect! Don’t you know who I am for crissakes!?”
Oh well, I thought to myself. This reminds me of what Jung said about a persons dark side – their ever present ‘shadow’. Everyone eventually will show their ‘Jungian shadow’ in public – there deepest darkest flaws & desires…..even a would be upper middleclass, philosophically gifted, highly educated, super high IQ , sentient deli olive.
I left him there while he kept spouting off at me like an ex world war two sailor – I fifured he’d soon grow tired & shut up. This was dissapointing. It discouraged me. I decided to quit while I was ahead. These olives while clearly geniuses were also way too volitile. You can’t ever truly have one without the other. I’d had my fun, & now it was over. If I didn’t end all this sillyness now, It would only get worse. My mind then went juvenile or at best sophomoric with typical catestrophic thinking:
Maybe the next olive would shove itself up my nose. Maybe the one after that would try jump all the way up my ass!. Some people out there might even like that! What if I like that! Hell! – maybe the one after that would attempt to go into the eye of my penis! – & what if I like that too!. Then not long after after that, it’ll get even worse – eventually one of those little fuckers would offer me a never-ending, nine-to-five job, with ever decreasing real pay & benefits, & sit me next to a bunch of highly-urbanised-soul-destroying-passive agressive-living-Big-Pharma-sponges-filled-with-anti-depressants-&-anti-anxiety-pills types.
Then I had an even more dark dark thought indeed.
Maybe one out of those hundred odd olives is a psycopath olive!….it might try to do away with me!…it might try to choke me into oblivian! It would, after all, be the perfect ruse! Who would suspect anything suspicious when they hear someone died from choking on an olive! I mean, it’s so common it’s a cliche! I can’t let any of that bad stuff happen…I won’t let that happen…I just can’t let that happen!.
So I decided the only thing to do was to ‘pull the band aid off’ quickly. I had a quick & nasty plan. I’d order a pizza & put the rest of them genius but also potentially murdurous olives out of their misery. The plan would be that I’d tell them the pizza was just “a nice bed for them to rest on”. They’d then go out relatively peacefully as they sleep, as extra topping getting that gets crushed by the deadly jaws of my grinding teeth. If somehow I swallowed one alive whole, my stomach acids would make short work of them. It wasn’t the perfect plan, but it’s all could come up with at the time, at short notice, with limited resourses.
The plan wasn’t fulproof of course, but plans under pressure are rarely anywhere near perfect. At least it was A plan. It was the plan of a either probable madman who thinks olives are talking to him, or a realpolitik plan of a suitably worried, now middle aged, finally sensible, totally sane man, who had had the bad luck to be the first person to talk-to-the-smart-but-could-be-deady-olives. I told myself:
Yes the plan ain’t perfect, but you know that saying – ‘don’t let good be the enemy of perfect’ so the ‘olives-fall-asleep-to-their-demise-on-a-faux-bed-of-pizza-plan’, will just have to do do.
Now that I’d thought my way to that pragmatic decision, I felt slightly better. But I could also npw suddenly hear them all shriek in horror collectively as they awaited their fate in their shitty plastic dish-home. The olives sounded like how people panic before they stampede suddenly out of a room with some real or imagined threat in it. It was like they all suddenly somehow knew their fate. I had the worrying realisation:
But I hadn’t said any of my thoughts out loud – not even a murmer! – so this could only mean that they could read my thoughts, these are not just genius-could-be-deadly-olives – they’re genius-could-be-deadly- telepathic olives! Man these olives are not just smart – they can harness the supernatural! Imagine that! Reading my thoughts!
Dispite the olives’ screams, & the shock that they were also mind-readers, I was about to still go with the ‘go to plan’ & dial up the pizza man. I mean what was I really that worried about? The olives after all had no arms or legs – they couldn’t go anywhere, grasp any weapon, and also I was much much bigger than them by well more than four orders of magitude. I’ll just tell them that they are much mistaken about my pizza plan, that their mind-reading telepathy is way way off due to the electric storm happening outside, & what they just really need is to rest on this comfy warm custom made pizza bed that I’ve kindly organised.
As I was lifting my phone to seal their fate, a knock at the door came. I ignored it, thinking they’d soon lose interest & walk away.
Bang Bang! Open up!
I ignored it. I stayed as still as sleeping cat – and quieter. I was worried the olives would scream for help. For some reason they didn’t – they must have been slightly shocked.
Bang!..Bang!..Bang..Bang,,Bang!.
The knock rang out ominously. I ignored it agian. Now I was pissed off. I just wanted this olive-murder-via-pizza-plan to play out without hassle, without a hitch. I wanted to be left alone again. I wanted my simple boring sans talking olives life back.
I just wanted for those alternatively talking silver-toungued-devils & then foul-mouthed-little-bastards to be dead. Given the risks that their intelligence & supernatural abilities showed, I now didn’t care a jot for their company or any of their cosmic or society shifting revelations. i just wanted my old, imperfect, life back. This stuff was just the sensible thoughts of prudent risk management.
I was now lazer focused. I now only wanted the transactional company of the pizza delivery guy at my door with the pizza in at most half an hour. Whoever was rapping on the door was a stick in my spokes of my no-more-talking-olives plan. Then it got worse – there was now a much bigger almighty racket.
CRASH! SPLINTERS! DOOR BROKEN INTO SMITHEREENS! TWO GUYS IN BLACK CAME IN LIKE A FLASH & LIFTED ME SQUARE OFF MY FEET!
One of them spoke up with a clear confidant authoritarian voice, with a slight hint of otherworldiness thrown in to the accent.
“Hey man, answer you fucking door why don’t you! – We have just had an instant report hit our screens from a series on anonymous sources coming from inside this address – the report says you’ve been casting disparaging opinions on the gracious unquestionably good pharmalogico-medico-banking-mass-slave-I mean-mass-employment-system here on Earth…how dare you try to ruin what you..er..I mean what we’ve all worked for centuries to as perfect as possible!”.
The Guys in Black worked fast. My resistence was too slow, too futile. They dragged me with my heels dragging out to their unmarked sleek late model black car, parked around the side street. I didn’t bother to make a scene, I didn’t struggle, I didn’t yell, yelp or even squeak for help. I just did the ‘dead weight’ thing as they both struggled to drag me from behind with my feet dragging.
While being dragged, my brain wasn’t firing so good. I could only think of what the bad hollywood movies had told me all my life. As such, I mentally prepared myself for a long arduous night in some small poorly lit interogation room, where nothing I said would be accepted, I’d at least get a black eye & a kick to the shins, a punch in the gut, until I inevitably caved in under the pressure. I didn’t want that, so I’d have to get my brain firing again & come up with some wild better-than-excellent mega persuasive explanation. I thought to myself forlornly:
Man those little green fuckers are good….real stratospherically good….perhaps far too good to be true!…they somehow must have telepathically called the Guys In Black in!….I’m either a totally insane fool who thinks olives are speaking to me, or I’m a victim of an elaborate secret service hoax…or maybe these goons are from some off-world planet!
They buddled me up unceremoniously in the back of their seek longer than long, shiny tinted black sedan. Then I either had an epiphany or some more accute but hopefully temporary psychosis – it could only be one or the other. Then suddenly I went from utter-super-scared-dejection to the ebullient happiness of outright-revelatory-elation.
I had jsut realised this was the best fun I’d had in over twenty years! It’s funny how it took some talking olives slash temporary insanity slash being the subject of a secret service slash extra-terretrial intelligence invasion operation to admit to myself the cold hard brutal truth:
My life had become far too boring for too long, & I really should be getting out more.
With this epiphany, I didn’t care what would happen in my external world – no matter how rediculous. What would be is what would be. It was only my internal peace that mattered. The horrible interrogation would be fine. The philosophically talking & worldly but bad tempered olives now resting or plotting alone together happily on my couch would be fine. The possibly deadly Guys slash Aliens in Black driving me somewhere horrible to be beaten to a pulp would be fine. If all this was a elaborate halucination brought on by temporary or permanent psychosis, then that would be fine. If things wouldn’t ever be fine at all, and that was it for me – then even that would be fine too.
In a nutshell, I tend to agree that these green olives must be very good for you – in the end. Especially the too ego driven, far-too-smart-for-their-own-good talking kind. They are the best! I mean thanks to them, here I was face down in the back seat of a mysterious sedan having an amazing life affirming transformative transfiguring epiphany! Still even so, it is also true that these Guys In Black kidnapping me there in the front seats still made me a least a little bit hell-of-a-nervous. But I guess these talking olives, be they the black morphing kidnapping type or green genius type, have all got to stick together.
We people could learn a lot from them for sure, I thought to myself calmly. Then one of the Guys in Black piped up from the front seat.
“Hey I think your wrong pinkskin, I don’t think your types will learn nuthin’ from us – after all, haven’t you heard that ancient saying of yours – you can’t reason with a madman? Now stop thinking so much, it’s hurting my ears!
I didn’t let the harsh words totally ruin my new love-filled mental plateau. Still face down in the back seat, I had the very calming & ego-less thought.
Hey it was high-time we here on Earth had a change of ownership anyway! Call me crazy, but why not be led by super-intelligent talking mind reading, body morphing olives? They couldn’t fuck it up any more than we have anyway! Maybe that;s why we were here in the first place – to welcome them & give them the keys! Ahhh….call me crazy, but I reckon we do need an Olive-Revolution!
Suddenly the long black car came to a type-screeching halt. One of the Guys in Black, was now standing there with the passenger car door wide open looking sheepish. He intimated with his hand that I was free to go. I didn’t bother asking questions or hanging around. As I walked away I thought to myself,
Oh well, I guess sometimes the authorities either make a mistake, or do the right thing – their only either humans or talking olives after all. Nothing in this universe is totally knowable – it’s written into the ‘uncertainty principle’ equations. I’ll just have to wait for the history book to be written – they’ll probably call it “Of Olives & Men” no doubt.
As I walked home I felt something in my tee shirt pocket. It was either a few of bland uneaten deli olives in a shitty plastic deli bag, or it could have been those oversize ‘all natural’ anti anxiety meds I’d misplaced earlier in the week. Given all the drama, I decided I didn’t want either of them. It was all too risky. Sometimes in life you gotta just trust your gut. . . or do you?
The End
Anton Martin Smith Writer 