Every time I turn on the news, there’s something dreadful happening. Drugs pouring into our communities, innocent people dying in the streets, chaos unfolding in practically every corner of the country. Things outside the U.S. aren’t much prettier. Famine, war, poverty, terrorism. When did things get so hard? When did we become so divided? Basically it seems like the whole world’s a mess, teetering on the brink of collapse. And just when I think it all couldn’t get any worse, my wife makes me go to a play.
That’s right. It’s end times, folks. She’s putting on earrings and telling me to go shave.
Friday night only comes once a week, and yet here I am about to spend another one at a freakin’ play. Another play, another three hours of a bunch of people on stage doing nothing but talking to each other. There’s not even any songs in this one. Not that the ones that do have songs are any good either. And if you get out your phone, everybody gets mad at you. It’s enough to make you want to give up on society once and for all.
When my wife told me to go find a tie because we’re leaving in 30 minutes, I was confused because we just saw a play six months ago. It was called Wit, and it was terrible. My wife loved it. She cried the whole way home, so loud I could barely enjoy my Culver’s. You would think like sports, there would be an offseason with these things, but apparently not. Plays just keep happening all the time.
This one’s called August: Osage County, and there’s no way it doesn’t suck. Apparently, there’s a movie version, which also probably sucks. I asked my wife if we could just watch that instead, so I could get up to pee without climbing over people to reach the aisle, but she said no. She says we need to take advantage of “culture,” which, as far as I can tell, is just a synonym for plays.
The world is a cruel and irrational place.
I should have seen this coming. Bad things always happen in threes. ISIS is back in Nigeria, NATO is falling apart, and now my wife is ironing a shirt for me. You want to know how much this stupid play cost? Thirty-nine dollars. And that’s per ticket. That’s even more than it costs to do a real activity, like going to Texas Roadhouse or the casino. When it rains, it pours. And oh Lord, is it pouring.
The theater is a 30-minute drive, and there’s nothing to do there but drink wine. It costs $11 and comes in a tiny plastic cup. There are snacks, but no good ones. They don’t have beef jerky and the only candy they have is Toberlone. She says she told me this play was happening weeks ago, but I doubt that. I might grow numb to whatever tsunami or mudslide is killing thousands of strangers on the other side of the world every week, but I’d never forget something as horrifying as spending an entire evening watching a bunch of people shout at each other in a fake living room.
Hell is a place on earth, and it’s inside the Port City Playhouse.
Sometimes I get so bored, I start watching the play. It’s enough to make me wish the next world war would just happen already. If this theater was bombed by China tonight, well, let’s just say I’d welcome them as liberators.
Oh, well. Time to go warm up the car. I can always go watch Landman in the bathroom.
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