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It was something that Charles had always known. Look at magazines. Women’s magazines were all about feeling something. There was advice on how to feel pretty, how to feel love, how to feel happy, all sold to you by making you feel like you were none of those things. Men’s magazines, on the other hand, were about making money, going places, having sex with beautiful women, and eating rare or bloody things. Passions, not emotions.
America was a great deceptor. Land of Opportunity. Golden Mountain. Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. But inside those pretty words, between the pretty coasts, was this: Miles and miles of narrow-minded know-nothings who wanted no more out of life than an excuse to cock their AK-47s and take arms against a sea of troubles.
America wanted to think of itself as a creator, but all it could do was destroy—fortunes, families, lives. Even the railroads needed the Chinese to come and build them.
Laugh and get depressed. Get depressed and laugh. What else was there to do?
No one looked that attractive from below; that’s why short people should never be allowed to be photographers.
What is that strange skill that allows us to doze through an unknown route and wake up at the correct station?
