Social Little Pill

            “Why are you so petrified of silence? Here, can you handle this?”  Jerry sang along to one of his favorite Alanis Morissette songs as he waited in traffic on his way to work.

            “Did you think about your bills, your ex, your deadlines, or when you think you’re gonna die? Or did you long for the next distraction?”  That was his favorite part of the song.  It caused him to reflect about society and its need for constant stimulation.  Why did everyone seem to be unable to cope with being alone with their thoughts?  Was there something intrinsically wrong with the American psyche? Jerry’s train of thought tended to deviate from there at this point, as it certainly did today as the music faded into the background of his mind.

            Was he, Jerry, preoccupied with being entertained?  Was it right for him to put much thought into his perception of society as being different from him, if he was truly not different at all, but one of the many he looked at?  How can a drop of water perceive whether it is part of the rain or the lake? Does that matter, in the end, anyway?  Jerry heard a honk and some irritated yelling from behind his car, and he realized that he hadn’t scooted forward after the car in front of him had.  His thoughts returned to Earth long enough for him to lurch into an acceptable place in line, make sure to stop, and let the music take him back into that fun little cerebral playground he had been thrown out of.  Was Alanis using bagpipes in this part of the song, or was that just some other instrument that had gone through massive electronic distortion?  Jerry couldn’t tell, but he still loved that song. 

            This got him thinking, though: Could he take silence?  What would happen if he were to just shut the music off and soak up everything this world had to offer him at this point?  Thinking about it, he realized that the only thing that would happen would be that he would get bored very quickly, and nothing beneficial would really come of his boring himself in a car on the way to work, which was bound to be boring today, as it had been every other day.  There really was no point to prove in that. No ground to gain.

            But then, an epiphany struck Jerry like an angry ninja with no hands.  There was nothing making him go through the boredom of work.  Boredom was simply a product of routine experiences over a significant period of time.  People were only subjected to the routines they chose to experience.  Therefor, the only reason people ever became bored was because they chose to be.  They could break their routine at any time.  What a thought!

            Hypothetical situations and extrapolations only went so far, though.  To really see if he was on to something, Jerry had to put his idea to the test.  Now was the time to live!  Jerry hit the “skip” button on his radio until he reached the song on this album called “You Learn”, thinking it was an appropriate theme for such an occasion, and cranked the stereo’s volume up to its maximum.  Jerry then opened the driver’s door to his car, followed by the other three doors, ran to and through the median of the freeway, and managed to jump into the bed of a pickup truck as it cruised by.  He had always wanted to do that, and he had finally found the time.  It was any time.