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“So what inspires you?” Silent fidgeting as the audience struggles to fill the empty void at the reading. Typical answers: things no one talks about, my culture, the stories of my grandmother, comic books, etc, etc. Me? I’m inspired by pictures of my throat when it was invaded by mathematically perfect spherical colonies of bacteria.

I was born in a generation that watched the flesh of my country scar and people dive hundreds of stories, screaming, charred skin, seared mouth, and from somewhere hearing: do we have a list? Angered and pained, I supported Congress to war. Seven years, 4,000 soldier bodies, and a thousands of dollars lost on a depreciated economy, I’m regretting that decision. I sat on the pinhole of a gun in slum raids at three o’clock in the afternoon, and in the cockpit watching bombs fall to a mushroom in a part of the world that I thought were only markers of my parent’s generation. After we won the war, we’d leave, right? But war is never that simple and I wonder what was I cheering for on the tv? Say mister, is that an extended cab, 12 cylinder engine SUV?

Or how about the financial uncertainty since the fifth grade that there would no Medicare/Social Security funds for me? Nothing better than a 15 minute surgery that costs me two months paycheck even with insurance. Welcome to the land of the free and watch your step, don’t want to get injured and fall financial uncertainty or foreclosure with medical bills. But those with money aren’t really affected, right?

Do you want me to say the fairness of affirmative action? No, that ended the year I applied to law school. Watching the lawyer across the way living in a one bedroom to pay quarter million school loans to get a job that pays a teacher’s salary just didn’t equate. So this artist/teacher wonders why one job should be more prized than another while society complains on issues of crime, child endangerment, etc.? You get exactly what you pay for returned with the respect that you give it. Were we better off trying to balance a situation of inequality or asking a child to be responsible even if they couldn’t get all those extras tutorials and experiences on the other side of the tracks? Or was that just a band aid for a bigger issue of inequality that no one has dared to touch?

So, is it any wonder if I choose something that can be proven, logical, and needs no translation to inspire me? I am part of Generation Bacterium. I am Googlized, idealized, generalized and egocentrically privileged to hide in the world I want…just look at my avatar. I am part of a generation of extreme information and inverted emotional disposition; just check my blog or Facebook to keep up and don’t forget to show comment love. I am the generation that has watched documentaries of thousands starving in third world countries since 1986 fed by the UN except now, there are no more crops. I wish it would be about survival, but that would be standing on those that live on hands and knees. I watch for haphazard encounters, like worms on vermiculated wood, looking for the few to change the world for the world’s sake and not to benefit their pocket.

As for the I never get political argument, I would, but it would be a two headed dog in a New York avenue looking for some time to kill.