Mandible Twitch
What I think I know of industrialism
It was all a steady decline.
The rate of the decline is up for debate, but what is not debatable is that the decline had begun.
Can a slide into systemic madness be the catalyst for the action?
It is best if I describe my own experiences during this period of regression.
I never really had to work for anything; I mean… I have had jobs. I have worked for a paycheck. I have put some effort into existing, but I do not believe that I was ever really challenged. This is not a brag but an indictment of my position.
A personal struggle with the day-to-day monotony of existence does not constitute a true struggle in a life-and-death sense.
I was slow to notice just how unjust and deplorable the conditions had become.
True industry has not existed in my lifetime. It was probably on its deathbed decades before I was born. The skeletal remains of this industry are scattered about. There are abandoned sawmills, fisheries, and dilapidated smokestacks marring most of the surrounding landscape.
What I think I know of industrialism is, in reality, its final breaths.
We, who remain, cling to this corpse of the industry for our meager incomes.
Nothing, in a material sense, is truly being produced any longer.
The only thing being produced at all is confusion, vitriol, and hatred.
History has shown how such times of change fan the flames of tribalism and bigotry.
Change makes people more insular and more extreme. Upheaval prompts some to seek refuge in the sanctuary of modern escapism, while others attempt to regress and find solace in the remnants of archaic institutions. Regardless, most people just dig in.
I wonder what this place sounded like when the whole apparatus was functioning?
Did the screech of the clawing metal carapace wrest one from sleep?
Right smack dab in the center of everything is that huge construct. It insists on itself—on failed industrial hubris.
The denizens perform their materialist dance in its shadow.
The spire juts into the sky, and the expanse surrounding it seems endless.
It has always existed, but oddly, the sign out front says established in 1997.
There is another sign out front; this second sign reads “all are welcome.”
I do not think either sign is true. I remember 1997, but I don’t remember this construct being built.
It is possible I wasn’t paying that much attention at the time.
I was still a teenager then.
I suppose I had other things on my mind.
I honestly think the carapace, as I call it, is much older. I cannot remember a time when the thing wasn’t there.
As far as the “all are welcome” sign is concerned, nothing can be further from the truth.
It gnaws at a person.
Those thick beams and heavy geometric bolts. Those insectoid angles, invasions of the sky.
I know it is no excuse for my behavior.
It does grind at your soul.
Saws into you.
Cuts away chunks of your humanity.
Breaks the gears that drive your machine.
It is impossible to withhold judgment from that structure. Its presence is a judgment in itself.
I grasped the basics early on. I believed the myth that education was needed to be a successful citizen. I struggled with the more complex areas of math and science.
I wish I had just learned a trade.
The world of liberal arts and relativism was a mistakenly chosen path.
Too much relativism clouds the decision-making process.
Too much perspective can paralyze those living in times of insistent architecture.
I am not sure if I am thankful for the cynicism that comes along with that type of education, but the alternative — ignorance — always seemed like a worse fate.
At the very least, my cynicism protected me from the trappings of hate-fueled tribalism.
I still wish I could have learned to fix a small engine or even a chainsaw.
Not so much for a career anymore…
Those avenues have all gone away…
Fixing a broken machine at least gives one a sense of accomplishment.
Accomplishment and productivity are difficult to find in the relativism that passes as intelligence.
I often fantasize that the din of a small engine could drown out the gnawing and grinding.
Drown out this social collapse.
The din of a small engine might halt the staunch trench digging or construction of monstrosities.
In 1997, I worked at the last remaining sawmill in town. It was called Henderson’s Sawmill.
Henderson’s only served the local area.
I worked there for 4 hours.
They promised me ten dollars an hour, but by lunchtime, they had dropped the pay back to minimum wage.
In hindsight, this was a bait-and-switch, but at the time, I viewed it as a failure on my part.
Henderson’s closed for good a few months later.
My generation didn’t seem equipped to keep these businesses running.
Not much was left anymore.
There were discount stores, liquor stores, grocery stores, and superstores, but that was it.
Just stores.
If you wanted to stay in town, you could work as a shelf stocker or a cashier.
People still have pride in their materialism; they still need things.
The stores had those things.
We stopped making things.
Maybe that carapace did go up in ’97.
It would make sense.
People needed something to cling to or hang from.
People needed to make a connection to something.
People needed to create and belong.
It is a shame that in the end, all those people would be creating something so destructive and intrusive.
I jumped the fence to Henderson’s Sawmill a few weeks back.
It wasn’t much of a feat. I didn’t even really need to try that hard.
It is not like there was much left to steal.
Most of the time, when places like Henderson’s close, they just sit and rot.
The global bank didn’t even deem it worthy to repossess.
The bank sends a man to buy a “no trespassing” sign. That’s that.
Nature will take care of the rest. The building will just crumble where it stands.
To some, it sits as a reminder of decay and waste.
However, I had a use for it.
I needed a ten-inch circular saw blade. I could get that blade from one of the smaller machines.
I had an old wooden baseball bat, and I figured with a little ingenuity and a large nail, I could affix that saw blade right to the top of that bat.
You know, kind of on the side.
I would have myself a little makeshift axe of sorts.
Something that probably looked more fearsome than it was, but we weren’t allowed sharp things anymore, or you couldn’t buy them at the store.
I could have taken a blade much larger, but I still wanted to be able to swing it.
I didn’t want it to be too cumbersome, too heavy, you know.
I wanted something light.
It didn’t take much rummaging to find it.
Nobody could see me anyhow.
Not too many people looked around anymore. Nothing to protect.
If I stayed away from the stores and the eyes on that carapace, I could remain invisible.
It’s strange how invisible one can become when nobody has a use for you anymore.
I know it was all in my mind, but I could hear that blade spin—like an angle grinder.
It was working. It covered up the din—the hum of those lights, the wire nooses that dangled from steel beams.
When I concentrated really hard, it would even cover up some of those chitterings of hatred that seemed to blast forth from that construct.
“All are welcome.” How funny. Another lie of that never-living bug. That monolith to dead industry.
The hypocrisy of my desire mixed with my relativism.
My cynicism crashed against my humanity.
The blood in my brain was pumping so hard I could feel it.
I was thinking too much.
It is never good to think too much.
It is like redlining an engine.
Running at this speed for too long is bound to snap something, or at least that’s what I’ve been told. My saw blade was spinning on that nail too fast.
Again, I have no firsthand experience in anything.
Let alone psychology or mechanics.
I needed to trust something, and I chose my construction, not theirs.
There were no delusions of grandeur, no aspirations to escape.
What was left to escape to anyway?
Another few decades of this?
Another few decades of that buzz that gnaws at a man’s soul, another few decades of hearing the din of synthetic metal carapaces.
I knew I didn’t want that.
Floundering hopelessly in this disordered space needed to end.
It was time to confront that “All are welcome” sign.
If I could just accomplish the simple task of repairing.
Repairing a broken cog in this ancient machine.
I decided to swing overhand and down first.
I would aim for the wooden pole on the left.
No sirens, no hum, no din, no buzz.
I don’t think anyone noticed I cut the sign down.
I saw the carapace move, though.
It almost turned its giant metal head a bit. I saw its mandible twitch.
That was it, though. I threw the sign over the fence at the old sawmill.