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Sunday, August 3, 2008

Finally a Normal, Insanely Odd Blog

So is anyone else around here sick and tired of reading about me being sick and tired?

I am feeling pretty good today and trying to get things back to normal around here. I've cleaned house today and have generally felt normal. I have the house to myself for a few hours so I have been surfing for music online and came across an old song that I used to love. It's a Marilyn Manson song. And I thought what a perfect thing to blog about! LOL! It's time to start writing about all the crazy shit I usually write about. And hey, we've been teetering on the edge of insanity all week...who better to talk about than the big, bad, scary, and insane devil boy, Marilyn Manson?

Yeah, I am a fan. Shocked? Ok yeah, at this point not much would shock you about me right? Well let me tell you why I am a fan. Because he is honest. You don't have to like it, agree with it, or even be able to stomach it...but let me tell you, he is the voice of an entire community of young people in this country. People like me who grew up surrounded by nightmares, poor, independent punks, the quiet intellectual ones and even the pretty young things on the soccer team living in the perfect suburban neighborhoods. He writes about the raw, gutting emotions of adolescence. The pain and doubts in your mind as you struggle with your screwed up life, wondering if you will ever escape. Those who are silently suffering from depression or other mental illness. Those of us with parents who weren't there, or incapable of parenting. Those of us with parents who tried to be the perfect parent or even just wanted to appear to be the perfect parents, but never once listened to angst in our hearts....So many kids grow up without any guidance at the crucial age of adolescence. I did. It created some pretty screwed up thoughts and doubts in my life as a teen. When I was 17 or 18, along came this artist who was just shockingly brutal, blasphemous, scary and controversial....I loved it! (of course) The Alice Cooper of my generation!

Now my hick town is full of metal heads and rock and roll lover's...but this dude was NOT creating fans among the coutry boy metal heads I grew up with. He was a little too poetic and cryptic for them....they needed sex, drugs, and rock n' roll. I hid my Manson fetish and spent many nights listening all alone to this voice who spewed his hatred for society and organized religion in that seductively evil voice. Now let me be clear, I didn't always approve of or agree with the things Mr. Manson has proclaimed in his music or elsewhere....but I loved the fact that he had the balls to say it. Kind of like my love for Larry Flynt, he is one sick f'ker, but damn it I like him! I have the same love for Ted Nugent - who I disagree with on almost every political issue LOL! They just say what they're gonna say and don't give a shit what you have to say about it!

So anyway, back to my rebelious teenage angst...I fell in love with Manson's first album called Portrait of an American Family It represented the inner turmoil of every American child growing up in homes where they were abused, molested, neglected and ignored. The kids who were being bullyed in school and in society. The kids disillusioned with religion as the reality of adult hypocrasy started crashing down on them. Those kids who were outcasts. Then Anti Christ Superstar came out...boy did that cause some controversy! Of course, I loved it!

His lyrics aren't for the faint of heart...some of them are down right sick...but they ring true in the ears of the angry teen. They are empowering and you feel less alone as you realize that somebody gets it. Somebody gets it. Now that statement isn't going to make sense to those of you who enjoyed a beautiful childhood, and God Bless you. And I need to add mine was not all bad I have very fond memories of things in my childhood...but there are nightmares that overpower those memories more often than not. And I became one of these angry, confused teens....Marilyn Manson was my Jim Morrison....

He was my first ever rock concert. It was awesome. There were churches protesting outside the arena, it was insane. At the time I was in a very vacant place regarding my faith and what I believed. I grew up in a fanatically religious home, but of course I was never one who accepted the spoon fed doctrine, I asked too many questions and did too much of my own research (why believe something if you don't really know why), I questioned sacred scripture *gasp*. I was considered rebellious and blasphemous! Having a mother who was mentally unstable didn't help this matter at all of course. I didn't know what I believed anymore...

Ok, so back to the concert...the big stink about this show was that Manson had been ripping up a Bible during part of his performance. That doesn't go over too well in the Bible Belt. There were TV news crews everywhere! I had skipped class to go and I was just sure my English professor was going to see me on TV and would know I lied about a family emergency! (I know..that was just plain bad...) So I snuck in a side entrance...

The show was amazing, the energy was wild, the theatrics were more than Alice Cooper could have ever imagined and the crowd loved it! Yes, he tore up the Bible. Did I cry about it? No. Would I cry about it today if I saw it? No. At that time, and even now, I celebrate that fact that we are allowed such freedom of expression in our country. The fact that he could display his contempt for organized religion and it's man made rules, or that a citizen can burn his flag in protest of the horrible decisions our government has made at times....these are true freedoms. And feeling free enough to do them, with little care or thought of the opinion of others is an awesome thing to me. Maybe I am weird....

Would I ever tear up my Bible? No....it has brought me far too much comfort over the years. Would I care if you tear up yours? No...do what you gotta do...cause I've been in that place in my head and in my heart...and I think freedom of expression is a treasured liberty.

Whoa...you got a soap box full that time huh? And probably about a topic you could care less about! LOL....I guess I'm back!

P.S. I considered adding Manson tunes to my playlist here...but I didn't want to scare any readers away!!! Ha! I wonder where the hell that guy has gone anyway....he'll probably die young...The most brilliant ones always do.

P.S.S. * a few hours later * Ok I added one anyway, it's one you can surely tolerate, probably the most sedate song in his repertoire

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