“Writing an article ? “
I just put that away message up.
“Writing an article ? “
That should get a huge response. I mean, the brilliance of it, the sheer splendor of the wit. It’s amazing. It really is. Writing an article ?
It’s got that simplistic beauty to it. Like a sunset. Like a rose glistening with dew. Like the gentle rippling of the ocean. It’s soothing. It’s to the point. It sucks a gently rippling amount of ass.
I’m sorry. I mean, I’m truly sorry. My away messages suck. They’re shit, crap, poop, even ? dare I say it? Fecal matter. They have become quite possibly the most depressing things in the world.
I can’t write them. I have lost the ability to write a damn away message. I settle for crap like this.
“Writing an article ? “
I actually convinced myself the “dot dot dot” was clever. I actually convinced myself that those three little dots made the whole thing absolutely hilarious. Ha ha ha, three little dots! Oh Lord, we are funny. Fuh-nee.
It’s pathetic.
Things weren’t always this way. Oh, there was a time when things weren’t like this. A time when lines and lines of dazzling brilliance and vaguely sexual wordplay flowed like sweetly dripping honey, like it was nothing.
Women and children would lie down and weep at the glory of them. Needy souls walked barefoot for miles to kneel down before the poetic bliss of my away messages. I was a God. OK, maybe not a God, but ? quasi-God? The Diet Coke of God? Some sort of mystical creatively-facial-haired elf-type guy? I might go that far.
But the point being, I was the master. I was the freaking man. I’d just sit down and type something in this careless offhand way, and it was magic. Everywhere I went I was adored. People I’d never met before grabbed me on the street, literally grabbed me and thanked me.
“You’ve changed my life ? “
Wild-eyed strangers grabbing my arm.
“Thank you ? thank you ?
I was the little yellow notepad at the end of the rainbow.
And then it all just started slipping away. One day I just woke up and I realized it was gone. I couldn’t quite do it anymore. And I started getting scared, nervous, weird. I’d lie awake at night staring at my ceiling, trying to think of away messages. I’d zone out in class desperately searching for the most astounding and breathtaking eight words the universe has ever beheld.
I stopped going out. I couldn’t do anything without wondering what people would have said about my away message for when I got back. I started losing friends. And I couldn’t blame them. I mean, without the away messages, what was I?
Nothing.
I’d stare at that damn box for 10 minutes, trying to think of something. I’d stomp around my room swearing at myself. I started contemplating atrocities. Blank away messages, stolen away messages, stupid Chinese proverbs. I was just putting up links to the Onion after a while.
I was just letting myself go idle. Oh, I forgot to put up an away message … really. I started building a little stable of saved away messages. I beat them to death. I’d leave the same one up for three or four days, until literally everyone I knew would mention it.
And it’s like anything else?when your life is going to shit, everybody else’s is just going great. All my friends, everyone on my buddy list, were floating blissfully through a great renaissance of away message excellence. I’m putting up things like, “At new south.”
I broke. I couldn’t handle the pressure. It was too much. I let everyone down. I ruined the one good and pure thing in my life, my away messages. I pissed away a magnificently glorious gift. And now I’ll just put up a few words, coupled with some oh-so-clever “dot dot dots,” and leave it.
And I’m OK with that. I mean, I’ve come to terms with it. I just miss the attention. I miss the cheering crowds, the flower-petal-laden walkways, the women. But I’m OK with it; I guess I could use a hug or something every once in a while, but really. I’m OK with it all. I swear.
I mean, just a few hugs and I would be great. Anybody? I am soliciting hugs here, people. Not for my dazzling cleverness, or my astounding wit, but just for me. Maybe just a little hug? I mean maybe somebody out there wants to?
Oh wait! I just got a response! Woohoo!
“An article?” it says. “What’s it about?”
