Anywhere But Here

Being a fairly proactive person myself, when I've had enough sleep and enough to eat, there are few things that piss me off more than complainers. Now, I understand venting--if you're stressed and you just want someone to validate that the next 72 hours are probably going to be rough, and after my "man, that is rough, I'm sorry" you pick yourself up and go do your papers or your friend's wake or whatever. What I don't understand is complaining--mindless, pointless negativity with no end in sight, about things you can't control or change.

Especially about your city. This happened a lot in my hometown--people blame all their problems on the area. We were podunk, no good, hillbilly, the kind of people who drive tractors to school and proudly park them by the road. The people who served us $3.75 coffee at the coffee shop were small minded. Our families didn't understand us, our thoughts, our desires, and it was all because we were from a farm town. The town was useless, the people useless, just dust to kick off our feet as we ran away. I'll admit, I was one of those people. Granted, I was sixteen at the time and thought I knew everything, but I was still one of them.

I grew out of it. I'm not overly fond of some of my family members, as I've written about before, and my town definitely has its downsides. But for better or for worse, it's my home, and I can never change that. I might as well suck all the good out of it I can, because there's a lot of good there.

It really pisses me off when people are negative about Cleveland. Partially because I want to press my cheek against this city at least once a day, but also partially because we're at the point now where we have a choice. You didn't have to go to college/take a job in Cleveland. You chose to come here. So why the fuck are you whining so much about it? Cleveland's not responsible for the weather, your grades, your parents, your boyfriend, your health, your mood, your workload, the weight you gained, the lack of good movies to watch, or your boredom. We had, in our comics class, another guest speaker who was a native Clevelander who did independent comics. Aside from being a complete and total indie snob as well as being angry and dismissive of ALL OTHER COMICS BESIDES HIS OWN, he talked a lot of shit about Cleveland and how it sucks a lot in general and especially for comic writers/artists.

I'm sorry? Superman? American Splendor? There have been tons of comics that started in Cleveland, comic writers and artists that came from here. Cleveland is a great place to be into the creation of comics. You just have to not be so god damn negative.

I really think Santa said it best, in this quote that is in my AIM profile so I see it every day:

clevelands not for everyone, i understand that. but how do you expect this city to be anything if all that is going on is people walking the streets with their heads down, mumbling about how theyre not somewhere else? how are things supposed to change if everyones life goal is to move away?...do you think if you leave here that a different city is going to hold your fucking hand and do all those things for you? that there are different forms of the human condition? one for cleveland and one for new york?

I've had people tell me their lives would be so much better if they were just in New York or Seattle or Chicago or anywhere but here. People seem to think that the New York Subway holds miniature Disneylands at the end of every stop, and that the Cleveland public transit 1) doesn't take you anywhere and 2) is too difficult to figure out. Here's news: If you're depressed in Cleveland, you're going to be depressed in New York. For different surface reasons; because your cost of living is too high, because you can't find a good Chinese place, because the elevators never work.

One of the very, very few lessons I've learned in life is that you are either content with your life or you are not. External things can offer you minor perturbations from your norm, but in general, you control how happy/content/satisfied you are. You don't like Cleveland? Either move away, or shut up and find something to like.