I grew up to be eight years old, and truth is, I never went past that.
Things that happened to me, things that made me what I am up till I was eight, stayed with me forever.
As a 28-year-old 8-year-old, and a pompous, megalomaniac one at that, I have always believed that the world rests on my shoulders. That everything is up to me. Everything.
To forward the race of the Malays? Me. Racial segregation and intolerance and finally people killing each other because of what they eat? My fault.
I have always believed that by being alive, I am responsible for everything. That the burden falls on me to make things better. This is called a superhero complex. And I live with it every single day.
I wake up each morning, and I start to think about how things could be so much better if people stopped living in denial, if people stopped lying and tried to manipulate each other so much. If there was no spite and no backstabbing.
If we could go to work in flying cars powered by air. If people just dropped the religious fighting bullshit and just calm the fuck down.
My intentions have always been good, but intent and outcome are rarely coincident. Neil Gaiman wrote that.
I was 17 when I finally realized that I cannot save the world. Not because I really can't, cause I can, but because the world does not want to be saved. And for me to think that anyone wants saving is extremely arrogant, even for me.
Wandering through the pyramids of Nyalarhotep and the tomb of Shub Nigurrath, I realized that the world is on a suicidal course to destruction.
Realizing my powers of observation, I decided to be a dark mirror to society and the world. Because everything is a joke. And I need you to see that joke. Desperately. Before we come to the punchline. The final, ultimate irony.
So I became one. A mirror. A joke. That took on nightmare turns.
I became a demon, simply because I was hoping that angels would come out from the woodwork, swoop down from the skies and smite me with their flaming swords.
Then I realized that there are no angels. There is no heaven. And the only hell that exists is the one we create right here on earth.
All I found were other demons, wearing human and sometimes angelic masks. Sometimes without even them realizing that they have a mask on.
But even a demon wearing angel-skin will set fire to temples and mosques if they walk inside.
I come again to the realization that the burden of responsibility falls on my shoulders and to similar shoulders of people like me. And I don't have long before that becomes even heavier.
See, right now, Generation X is killing the Baby Boomers. After Generation X takes over completely, there will be a brief respite before the Children of the 80s, my generation, takes over before the era of Generation Y starts.
So my generation has the unique opportunity of swinging the world on an axis towards the direction we would like to take it before our younger, more tech-savvy brothers and sisters take it from us.
We're like a snowflake that can determine the shape and direction of an avalanche.
All that is and will be, are up to us, as it was to others before us. Up to me.
But...I do not want that responsibility. It's too much. For an 8-year-old like me. I mean, I am blessed with many things other people do not have. The kind of opportunity and doors which are open to me, the skill sets, are all things that my predecessors could only dream of.
I take advantage of their glory, and their mistakes. And one day they will give me the keys to the family car.
Fuck, man. I'd rather be in a cab. Or a hearse.
I do not want to be responsible for this world. And yet by being born, I am automatically responsible for it. I do not want to be responsible for other people's happiness, and I am not. No. I am not. But it doesn't feel that way.
That's why I wish I am a machine. Like my father, who does not have any emotions of guilt or any other shit to bog him down. I wish I could be a machine.
In fact, the only thing I want in life is to be able to afford a lifestyle that allows me to read and write. And fuck. Till I die. And that's it. Not to save the world. Not anymore.
Man.
I hate this shit.
Oh well. Whatever.
My name is Amir. I am a superhero.
