Twitter was not at all what I thought it would be.

I envisioned a virtual water cooler where all sorts of people–many who didn’t work in an office– might get together during the day to exchange witty banter about what was going on in the world. I imagined a kind of democratic paradise, too, maybe like the ancient Greeks, a place where there was equal opportunity for everybody to be heard, and the quality of an idea was not contingent upon the status of the person bearing it.

Of course, it turns out that Twitter is a tire fire, and I simply could not have been more wrong.

Twitter and it’s 140 character cage, ( now upped to 280 characters ) did not spark conversations, it destroyed them. Instead of attempting to actually investigate ideas that you didn’t already own, people went on search and destroy missions, each Tweet a drive-by shooting aimed at a rival gang. Twitter was a weapon, a device used to amplify and distribute propaganda, and whenever a person was handed this weapon they immediately, without even knowing it, became a soldier in somebody else’s army.

Twitter was not a place you went to freely express yourself, it was a battlefield.

Just under a quarter of Americans are on this battlefield, and from what I can tell the preponderance of people using the platform would be loosely defined as a kind intelligentsia, those with sufficient space and security in their life to spend X-amount of time each day looking to make corrections in the lives of others. These people are driving the culture wars that are currently dominating our cyclonic news cycle, and that, in turn, is driving the political discourse. This means that the vast majority of Americans, more than 75%, are being led down a road paved by this influential, minority group.

Yet oddly, we seem more concerned about conspiratorial fictions then this beast in which we live.

No matter, the people behind Twitter know how dangerous and influential the platform has become, and in an effort to make it less pernicious, they’re now considering taking away the Like function.

Twitter is an obviously hierarchal structure, a place where status is measured by Likes, followers and retweets. The more of these you have, the more influence you wield. It’s practically a board game. The goal is not to learn about other people and their ideas, it’s about acquiring and exercising power. ( Exhibit A: Donald Trump) But it’s not the real world, not even close. The vast majority of humans live outside the gates of Twitter, yet they are directed and depicted, by those within. A technology that was meant to be radically democratic has somehow ended up being kind of totalitarian.

For instance, China is creating a Social Credit System which is intended to measure citizens social and business reputation. It’s a Black Mirror episode, a world in which everything you do is judged and catalogued by others, and it is upon that which your ability to function in society is dependent. In fact, Twitter had something very much like that which they called Klout, a complex numerical measurement of your influence. This is the unfortunate principal on which much of our social media exists, and if Twitter liberates us from it, they will be striking a great blow in a war most of us don’t even know we’re fighting.

I am an excellent father and husband.

A true family leader.

As such, I often find it necessary to call Family Councils so that my wife Rachelle, and our three year-old son, Jones,

can discuss important issues as they arise. These are the minutes from a recent Council:

*************************************************************************

Michael: Okay, Council #37 is now in order. I know that Jones has a matter that’s been troubling him. Jones, would you like to take Thor’s Hammer from daddy so that you might air your grievances?

Jones: NO!!! I WANT CAPTAIN AMERICA’S SHIELD!!

Michael: We’ve talked about this Jones, you wave Captain America’s shield when you want to be acknowledged by the Daddy Moderator, and you hold Thor’s Hammer when you have the floor. It’s sometimes hard to keep straight in your head, but it’s very important.

Rachelle: Why? Why is it important?

Michael: You see Jones, Mommy just forgot to wave Captain America’s shield to signal that she wished to speak, so the Daddy Moderator has no choice but to OWWW! Jesus Christ Rachelle! That thing hurts! You do know I’m on blood thinners, right? You know that’s going to bruise. It’s not just against protocol to throw the shield, it’s medically unsafe!

Jones: NO TALK DADDY!! JONES TALK!!

Michael: I cede Thor’s Hammer to Jones.

Rachelle: Jonesy, what’s the matter?

Jones: I want to break a chair.

Rachelle: Because of something daddy did?

Jones: Yes. Daddy did it.

Rachelle: What did daddy do?

Jones: I’M GREEN HULK!

Michael: (Waving Captain America’s shield ) Jones? Jones? Can daddy please have Thor’s Hammer so he can speak?

Jones: NO! YOU LIZARD MAN NOW, DADDY!

Michael: Ha, see?! He wants to break a chair because he’s green Hulk, not because I did anything wrong!

Rachelle: Oh, really? Jones, is green Hulk mad because daddy is always finishing Jones’ dinosaur puzzles?

Jones: Yes!

Michael: You know, I put our Family Council protocols in place for a reason. Without strict adherence to shield/hammer regulation the chain of evidence falls apart! And Rachelle, you should know better than to ask leading questions of a child!!

Jones: GREEN HULK SMASH DADDY WITH CHAIR!

Michael: No! Put that down! I’m not kidding, Jones. Put. It. Down.

Jones: You Lizard Man, daddy, green Hulk smash you face!!

Rachelle: Oh my, green Hulk is so strong, I think Lizard Man had best do exactly what you say and let Jones work on his puzzles on his own, and at his own pace!

Michael: Lizard Man is sorry to have finished your puzzle.

Rachelle: Lizard Man has OCD. He has it bad.

Michael: No. Lizard Man does not. He just thinks that if you start something, it is your obligation to finish it.

Rachelle: Lizard Man thinks no such thing. Lizard Man has seen about five minutes of every show on Netflix, before abandoning them. Lizard Man started driving lessons, but never took a driver’s test, and he’s been on page 36 of The Angel Effect for what? Four months now? Six months? Years, maybe? Lizard man is a liar! It’s his evil super power, green Hulk! You must smash the lies!!

Michael: This Family Council is now adjourned!!

**********************************************

Rachelle: Well, how do you know that?

Rachelle: No.

Rachelle: Really?

Rachelle: She pretended to retch?

Rachelle: Because you told her you liked her sneakers?

Rachelle: That is pretty extreme.

Rachelle: Was this one of the sorority girls who lives down the street?

Rachelle: The one who looks like Jennifer Lawrence?

Rachelle: I thought so.

Rachelle: And did you tell her this in a way that sounded like what you really meant was that you wanted to see her naked?

Rachelle: I see.

Rachelle: Yes, of course.

Rachelle: Look, I know you’re just trying to generate some light in this crazy, angry world, Pickle, I get that!

Rachelle: And sure, somebody has to help scantily clad sorority girls who are 30 years younger than you, feel like they’re making the right fashion choices.

Rachelle: Imagine if every time one of them passed by a much, much, much older man and he didn’t say something about what they were wearing? What would happen then? Their self-esteem might just crater and then who knows what might happen?! It could be catastrophic!

Rachelle: I’m not being sarcastic.

Rachelle: No, I’m not.

Rachelle: Nope.

Rachelle: Jesus Pickle, OF COURSE I’m being sarcastic.

Rachelle: It’s amazing to me how slow you are to pick-up on sarcasm!

Rachelle: Like at the park when that woman was complimenting how high you could go on the swings?

Rachelle: That was sarcasm.

Rachelle: And at the drum circle, when that man said that you “displayed a beautiful mastery over movement?”

Rachelle: That was sarcasm, too.

Rachelle: Oh honey, I’m sorry.

Rachelle: I am.

Rachelle: You’re right, sarcasm truly is the lowest form of humour.

Rachelle: Look,  it’s taking me longer than I thought here, do you mind picking Jones up from daycare?

Rachelle: Oh, I didn’t realize your group was meeting tonight.

Rachelle: I think it’s sweet that you guys get together and play Dungeons and Drama every month! Do you think you could let Jones join in? He’d love to dress up as Spiderman for it!

Rachelle: Dungeons and Dragons?

Rachelle: Oh, I always thought it was Dungeons and Drama.

Rachelle: I don’t know, I guess because of all the screaming and Lord of the Rings languages. Just seemed really dramatic.

Rachelle: Like an even nerdier version of Improv dramatic.

Rachelle: Whatever.

Rachelle: Okay, I get it.

Rachelle: It’s not a children’s game.

Rachelle: Very sophisticated. Very strategic. Good leadership training.

Rachelle: I’m surprised corporations like Google and Starbucks don’t use it as a training tool for their employees.

Rachelle: It really is a journey of discovery, isn’t it, Pickle?

Rachelle: Yes.

Rachelle: That was about 98% sarcastic.

Rachelle: Okay, don’t worry about it. I’ll pick Jones up, and you, my little Dragonborn Sorcerer, you have a great time playing Dungeons and Diggers! xox

And so I did.

The place, stripped to a skeleton staff and now loosely populated by the permanent residents– most of whom were confined to wheelchairs of varying complication– was pretty empty. The days, now shapeless and free of plot, offered little and so I wandered hallway after hallway. Seeming more memory than music, the theme song to MASH drifted from one room I passed,

while another was antiseptic and empty but for Trump/Pence banners taped defiantly to the wall, and then through a doorway, I caught a glimpse of a nurse changing a patient’s tracheotomy tube– so intimate and tender as to be virtually erotic. Downstairs, scattered like islands, I came upon people who sat anchored and voiceless in wheelchairs, each one stationed near a window, watching.

There was a church service later in the morning that took place in the same space that hosted Bingo, Pub Night and all our other events. It was Catholic, which occasioned a few religious props being removed from a box and placed on a cafeteria table, and somehow this act was achingly beautiful.

A strong, elderly woman dressed all in black walked in, made the sign of the cross, and then nodded warmly to all who made eye contact. She went directly to a middle-aged woman who was frozen and strapped into a wheelchair, and touched her with a tenderness that exceeded language. Gently, she pulled a favourite sweater over her head, and then smiling,  began to brush her hair—a mother’s imperishable, radiant love, holier than a saint.

An impossibly old woman was reclined, almost prone, in a wheelchair. Blankets and knitted things covered virtually every inch of her body, and her skin was so very thin, her body so frail, that it seemed as if a soft gust might be enough to push her through the veil. A couple of hospital staff tended to her, telling her that her brother would be there any moment now. Her eyes flickered open at his mention, and as if surfacing through water she said, “Oh, I hope so,” and then she fell back down and in to sleep.

Ten minutes later a tall, elderly man, clearly ill himself, entered and sat stoically beside her. With a bible open on his lap he mumble-prayed along with the priest. He never touched her, nor did he say anything to her while she slept through the service, but it was clear that he was her brother. He was her tie to this world, the one now disintegrating around her into a living mist. Drifting in and out, all of time swirling around her, what version of her brother might she have hoped to summon, what memory returning in dream, what ghost to see her home?

These are the texts messages I sent my wife in a recent conversation:

*****************************

Me: Just watered my plant.

Me: No.

Me: No, you’re wrong. The plant is doing great.

Me: I’m really going to look after it.

Me: I am going to be a money tree ninja.

Me: One hundred dollar bills are going to be growing on that fucker!

Me: And each bill will blossom into the exact change for the laundry!

Me: Really?

Me: Well, why do they call it a money tree if it doesn’t grow money?

Me: Marketing?

Me: The fuckers.

Me: Fake news is everywhere! It’s getting hard to know how to navigate this world!

Me: Oh, you think a job would help?

Me: You’d be wrong! Just like you are about my plant’s chances for survival!

Me: It’s way better than 15%!

Me: That plant has at least a 50-50 shot. Easily.

Me: I bought a spray bottle for that plant! It’s getting the five star Murray treatment!

Me: That’s what you’re worried about. Ha-ha.

Me: So very clever.

Me: But listen, not everybody needs a job in order to be fulfilled.

Me: Criminals, for instance.

Me: Oh.

Me: Yeah, I guess they do make license plates and stuff.

Me: Okay.

Me: Deer.

Me: Deer don’t have jobs. They don’t even respect the law, man!

Me: Crush the system!

Me: Look, I will eventually get a job.

Me: I will.

Me: I just need to finish the designs for my cryptozoology tarot cards and then I can open up shop and start reading fortunes!!

Me: I was told I could set up a table at Snakes and Lattes.

Me: Well, yes.

Me: I would have to pay a small rental, but that would come out of my fantasy baseball investment portfolio.

Me: Are you serious???

Me: Really???

Me: Fuck!

Me: I can’t believe somebody else already came up with the idea for cryptozoology tarot cards!

Me: Damn it!

Me: I was really looking forward to going on Dragon’s Den, too.

Me: Oh well, back to the drawing board! Fall six times, get up seven, that’s my motto.

Me: “More like fall six million times?”

Me: Good one, Petal.

Me: It’s true, you are a very funny and talented woman who doesn’t drink too much!

Me: No, I don’t know what you’re doing with me either.

Me: Really does seem an uneven match.

Me: Jones?

Me: Yeah, I think he’s around somewhere.

Me: Oh there he is! Standing up on the wobbly chair right by the window and a bunch of dangerous ledges!

Me: He’s fine, having some quality dad time!

Me: Oh you and your elite mothering!

Me: Fine!

Me: He’s down now, playing with a little brown ball on the floor.

Me: Oh.

Me: It’s actually a peeled apple.

Me: Gross.

Me: Listen I’m going to tell you something.

Me: When he hides, I ALWAYS see him.

Me: He’s just not as smart as he thinks he is.

Me: Fine.

Me: Fine. I will perpetuate the peek-a-boo myth if you insist, and throw out the dirt apple, but I am sure as hell not going back to that job at the Box Factory!

Me: Okay, see you at 5:30! xox

******************************

Me: That’s not true.

Me: I hate Donald Trump.

Me: Yes, I do.

Me: I really do.

Me: What on earth makes you think I don’t?

Me: The way I’ve been shaking hands?

View post on imgur.com

Me: Look, I’ve always had a strong, Presidential handshake. It’s one of the things that attracted you to me, you know that!

Me: Oh C’mon, Justin Trudeau didn’t beat him! The media, so many lies! So unfair!!

Me: Trudeau was just trying so hard to be macho. Sad.

Me: Fake. Not true

Me: I am not talking like Trump now.

Me: Trudeau’s a bad hombre.

Me: Bigly.

Me: You see the way he was ogling Ivanka?

Me: Disgusting.

Me: An embarrassment to Canada.

Me: No, you’re an embarrassment to Canada.

Me: You are, too.

Me: Hell, I don’t even think you root for Canada during the Olympics.

Me: You’re not a patriot.

Me: You’re not helping to Make Mike Great Again.

Me: You’re a disruptive technology.

Me: Sorry????

Me: My Google Autofill?

Me: That’s a sacred precinct!

Me: You shouldn’t be poking around in there!!

Me: Well, I really don’t know why “Trump Anime Sex Fantasies” showed up there.

Me: Probably some keys Jones hit by accident.

Me: That little nugget gets into everything!

Me: What?

Me: He did what?

Me: Fuck!

Me: That was a gift from my sister.

Me. Sentimental value. Huge sentimental value.

Me: Don’t have a clue where I’m going to find another The Apprentice: The Board Game.

Me: Jesus. I feel sad.

Me: That was a fun game.

Me: Better than fucking Catan.

Me: Who wants to buy goddamn wheat?

Me: Really, you think you can make an night of it with friends “buying wheat?”

Me: Please.

Me: My attitude is fine.

Me: Anyway, we’ll see how he feels when I destroy his dog toy.

Me: I swear to God, that dog is evil.

Me: It is, too. The tail wags for no reason.

Me: No!! There was no battery in it!

Me: Really!

Me: It was creeping me out so much I removed all the batteries, but it still barked and tilted its head!

Me: Oh.

Me: I just thought there was the one spot for batteries.

Me: Who ever heard of two spots for batteries?!

Me: That’s insane!

Me: Whatever.

Me: Still think it’s possessed.

Me: Gonna murder us all in our sleep.

Me: I am going to build a wall around that dog and make Jones pay for it.

Me: No, watching Poltergeist hasn’t poisoned me against a toy dog!

Me: Well, maybe.

Me: Yeah, I guess you’re right.

Me: I had forgotten how scary that movie is.

Me: Netflix should be more careful with the types of movies they broadcast.

Me: Yes, I was.

Me: Have you ever watched Poltergeist stoned?

Me: Fucking terrifying.

He has a few words, but they’re still unreliable and slippery. His verbalizing remains musical, each vocalization a note to a song that lives only in him. And so we were startled when he began to utter words, words we had never heard him say before, with absolute clarity.

The first time, while upsetting his food, he suddenly stopped and clearly said, “Osprey.” He then receded back into his activities, but within five minutes our friend Ottilie showed up at the door. ( She was having a panic attack because she’d lost a contact lens.) It was a bit of a freak-out, that.

Did Jones have ESP?

Later, while he was throwing building blocks at our chandelier, he stopped and said, “Pree-Pree.” Two minutes later, the delivery of my cheeseburger from Burger’s Priest arrived.

It was at this point that I realized our boy had a gift.

And as I am a Tiger Mother Dad, I decided to immediately implement an ESP training plan:

***************************************

Ouija Board Exercise

My son and I seek to contact a spirit.

1. Jones flips ouija board over.

2. Jones flips ouija board over.

3. Jones flips ouija board over.

Pokemon Go Exercise

Pokemon Go uses the GPS in your phone to help you locate the “spirits” you must capture in order to win the game. After showing Jones a character from the game, I take him out into the city to see if he can lead me to the Pokemon in question without my help.

1. Wigglytuff

Jones obsessed with stairs at front of apartment. Must climb up and down. Like baby robot obeying dark master. Feel like he’s been doing this for hours. Possessed? J certainly has his mother’s endurance, that’s for sure! Forgot to get her special grapes at the store! Fuck!!

2. Dewgong

Again Jones was dazzled by front stairs. Tried to lead him away but very, very stubborn!! Just dug in and yelled until I quit. Could a passage to a spirit realm exist there? Might have to start digging.

3. Ponyta

Jones drawn (summoned?) to empty bottle on street. Bangs it against twig as if conjuring super cute fire pony Ponyta. No Ponyta, though a Charmander was near. (N.B: Old Asian women dominant in bottle reclamation! WHY???)

Card Test

I select a playing card at random from a deck and attempt to telepathically transmit it to Jones.

1. J sticks something dangerous and sharp from ouija board in his mouth. Next several minutes spent trying to take thing out of his mouth. Forgot card I was sending him.
2. Jones finds raspberry bowl. Dumps on floor. Stamps. Purple red splatter everywhere.Like Pulp Fiction in here. Actually traumatic. J then throws dust pan into my face knocking off glasses. Funniest thing he’s ever seen. Unresponsive to psychic message of 3 of Clubs.

3. Concentrating on sending card while Jones screams. Shouting very piercing, very upsetting. Bad for health. Such a fucking headache. Sometimes just want to give up, turn into water. Take emergency pot brownie I keep wrapped in Kleenex in my pocket. Conclude experiment.

********************************

I know that this isn’t proper form, but can I just say, what a goddamn monkey!!

Can we give it up for, George?

Yeah, that’s the sort of monkey he was, the sort of monkey that could get an entire church full of people to yell and applaud wildly. Just think about that for a second. He was an entirely different species, and here we all are, brought together by this wondrous monkey, cheering at the mere thought of him.

Remember that cheer, people. That’s a gift that George left to us, his encouragement to go out there into the world– fearless and happy– and to make as much mischief as possible!

George, as you all know, was no ordinary monkey. Other monkey’s may have arrived on the scene…Bubbles? The Ikea Monkey?

Couldn’t even hold George’s banana peel.

George endured while all the others fell away.

And Lord, such a funny monkey.

The funniest monkey ever, I think.

He was the Robin Williams of monkeys.

It wasn’t just his curiosity that made him so uniquely beloved, there was something else, too, something that spoke to humans and primates alike. George was joy, a playful little monkey who led us back to our better angels, to a place where the light of childhood shone all year round. And regardless of how famous George became, regardless of how busy or troubled his life became, even when he El Chapo made a trophy pet of him,

George ALWAYS made time to play.

Now, a lot of you might be wondering why The Man in the Yellow Hat, his partner in crime, isn’t here delivering this eulogy. Well, he and George had a complicated relationship, and it has to be said that over the years an awful lot of poo was flung. Back when it all started, The Man in the Yellow Hat tricked George by taking advantage of his curiosity, luring him into his big yellow hat and then taking him from his home and family in Africa to the shores of America.

George always resented it.

By today’s standards what The Man in the Yellow Hat did was unacceptable. A crime, even. But in the 1930’s people didn’t see it that way. Anyway, as George learned more about what happened to him, he distanced himself from The Man in the Yellow Hat. Well, it turns out this separation did neither man nor monkey any good. The Man in the Yellow Hat took to pills, the bottle and street fighting,

his whereabouts now unknown, and George careened from one professional disaster to the next– the masturbation incident in the boardroom of Celebrity Apprentice now carved into the history of American popular culture.

Our sweet George sort of wandered through the wilderness after that, a lost monkey in the cities of man. It was at this time that Islam reached out to him, and ???? ???????, as George chose to be called after his conversion, seemed to be getting his life back on track. Unfortunately, like too many of the disenfranchised and alienated amongst us, George became radicalized. Monkey see, monkey do.

George’s curiosity just proved too much in this case, and his life ended in Syria as part of an ISIS suicide squad.

I don’t know much about the afterlife or where George is, but I choose to imagine that beautiful monkey still clinging to that kite from one of his very first adventures, the winds gently pulling him upwards and home to glory.

1. It’s late at night and I’m at my laptop playing WordCrack on Facebook.

I’m killing it. Words are just coming to me as if by magic. I’m easily the best WordCrack player who has ever existed. I am happy and at peace, surging through my life with the confidence and brilliance of an elite athlete. And then, amidst all the letters in the scramble, I see the name Jones popping up. I know it means something important and that it’s my duty to highlight and score the letters in order to keep my son safe, but when I try to do this, his name vanishes and appears somewhere else. I’m desperate, frantic in my attempts, but his name keeps eluding me, and then suddenly my time is up and I’ve failed. My score is zero. With a sense of dread I walk toward the nursery to check on Jones, but I know he won’t be there, that he’s gone, and that it’s my fault because I wasn’t a good enough WordCrack player.

2. Laetitia Casta and I are on a beach.

“Do you want me to climb up that tree and get you a coconut, mon cherie?” I ask her.

She says that she does and I shimmy up the tree with the greatest of ease. As I start to shake the tree, Laetitia does a cute, little dance for me down on the beach, “You are such a nimble, little monkey!” she says.

I can feel the sun on my face and the salt water breeze wafting through my hair. I am young and invincible. I shake the tree trunk a little bit harder, hollering like Tarzan, and this makes Laetitia laugh, and a coconut breaks free and begins to fall toward the beach, but instantly, it turns into Jones. I scream and throw myself after him, and I am falling for an eternity through a kind of darkness, never catching up to him, and then I wake up in a cold, poisonous sweat.

3. Rachelle, Jones and I are playing Risk.

I have amassed all my troops in Quebec and have assured myself victory, but Rachelle and Jones make a pact and gang-up on me. I try to be good natured about this, but inside I am burning with anger and jealousy. In short order they eliminate all my troops and knock me out of the game, laughing together as they do so. I start to scream at Jones, “You’ve always loved your mother more than me, always!!” And then I wake up feeling like an asshole, trailing this weight of shame behind me all day long.

Your Highness:

You ever have one of those days?

I was very nervous about meeting you, because I’ve never met anybody who was a direct descendent of God. That must be so cool. I come from a long line of sheep thieves who have always fled debt, not Gods. At any rate, I really wanted you (A GOD!!!) to like me, and in spite of taking an Ativan and drinking two glasses of wine before going to bed, I had trouble sleeping. When this happens I often listen to a calming CD of rainstorms,

which is what I did, and to make a long story short I ended up sleeping through my alarm and missing my opportunity to meet you. I had my blue suit laid-out on my bed and everything.

I had studied you in a completely non-invasive and totally not creepy way, and was going to make some pretty dazzling conversation, I think. I honestly do believe that we would have become best friends, likely participating in the same fantasy sport’s pools, attending Illuminati meetings together, texting one another about Game of Thrones and partying on boats with supermodels.

The One percent rules!

Do people make a lot of Hamlet jokes to you?

I bet that they do.

People are stupid.

Ninety-nine percent of people, in fact.

The rich are not stupid–especially not the rich who are descended from Gods.

I see from Wikipedia that you married a commoner, run marathons, are an expert sailor, have been on expeditions to Mongolia and Greenland, have extensive military training and care about the environment. It’s pretty amazing how much we have in common, as I also care about the environment. I really can’t stand that every summer is getting more and more humid, and I have to say, if it weren’t for my AC, well, it would be pretty tough slogging.

Look, Your Highness, I really hope you can find it in your gracious heart to forgive me for sleeping in this morning and that we can still become the friends that God wants us to become. By means of apology, I would like to invite you and your commoner wife over for Game’s Night on Thursday. We play a Star Trek version of the Settler’s of Catan and it’s an awful lot of fun– some people even dress in character for it!

Looking forward to seeing you soon,

Michael Murray