If you love something it's supposed to be forever right?
Well, if you're one of my regular readers, then you know better by now.
One Reddit user asked:
and the comments were honestly a little heartbreaking.
It's Reddit, so you're typically not looking for any real profound statement on the nature of mankind, depression, and capitalism.
Buuuuuuuuut that's exactly the hellscape we got. Come stroll with us through a graveyard of dead dreams and long-gone joy.
Gamer Growth
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Video games.
For most of the first 25 years of my life I loved games. And then one day I sort of just said "why?"
And have really touched any in the last 7 years and haven't had much of a desire to.
As much as I enjoy video games...I find as I get older...I have less time for it. Other priorities take place and before I know it...not much free time.
It also doesn't help that gaming companies that I grew up with...are now corporate asshats and not the 'revolutionary' icons they once were (looking at you Blizzard)...the constant 'made for multiplayer online'...f*ck that shit. (looking at you Rockstar).
All my gaming friends slowly move on with their respective paths (having kids, marriage, new job --> new hours, homeowner --> homeowner problems, school-related stuff with kids, maintenance, scheduling appointments with doctors for care of self, or a mechanic to fix your vehicle)
...by the time I get home, I'd almost rather catch up on a TV episode of a popular TV show, because 30-45 minutes is more doable then trying to play Red Dead Redemption 2.
Also, relationships.
I will never forget being a 25 year old and witnessing a former co-worker...a 40-year old single, white, bald, male...who spent his free time playing 'Call of Duty', smoking cigarettes, and drinking cases of shit beer...it made me think "I don't want to be 'that guy' when I get older"
- Supaspex
7 or 8 Other Things
Playing guitar.
I've played for 20 years and for the first roughly 13 years I could sit and play pretty much all day every day. When I went back to college and started taking my education seriously I started losing interest.
I still pick it up and play but I haven't written any new music in well over a year and most of the time there are like 7 or 8 other things I prefer doing instead.
There were certain people that I collaborated with a lot and some of them still play music and some of them don't but I moved far away enough from them that collaboration wasn't as easy. They were all people I knew in Orange County, CA but then I moved to Los Angeles after college and now I live in Idaho.
There is this one guy in particular that I used to play music with the most. Him and I always kind of understood each others' visions for a piece of music pretty well and just generally really understood how the other approached writing music.
He still writes and records all of the time and he's considering moving out here. If he does I wouldn't be surprised if that ends up being the push to get me really into playing again.
Doodle Depression
Drawing. I loved to doodle and try and draw whatever popped into my head. Even tried learning new styles to try out but eventually that feeling just slowly died. Drew a few things from a tutorial video a few months back, but that's about it. Pretty depressing honestly.
I used to love drawing and painting too, and aced AP art...but now I look at a blank piece of paper and have zero inspiration. It's sad.
Happier As A Hobby
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Sewing.
Loved it as a teen. Made my own grad dress, won an award and a scholarship for my skills. Tried it as a job and it just killed any and all desire for it.
It stopped being fun. It stopped being a creative outlet for me.
It's really sad, cuz I had skills. I've tried to pick it back up in recent years, but I just can't seem to care like I did back then.
Same with knitting for me, which I picked it up as a hobby. Parents realized that I could make useful stuff and tried to push me into selling it. I never want to turn this hobby into a job; it would kill off all the benefits of being a relaxing way to pass the time.
Are you me? Working in the fashion industry is such a goddamn soul suck. I'll probably never go back. I hoped to get my creative inspo back after a sabbatical but it's been almost 4 years since I quit my job and I've barely touched my sewing machine (except to make a handful of masks for a few close friends and family last year).
I hate when people find out I sew and ask me if I can make them something...
Reading Used To Be FUNdamental
I was an avid reader since kindergarden up till uni. After that life just got in the way and I never picked up any books for the past 10 years....?
Still reads to my kids tho. Just, I don't have the energy to read mine.
- shfaeman
As child, schoolboy, and student I used to absolutely devour books. I always had one in my pocket or bag.
From Dumas to Dickens I lived in those pages and had travels, adventure, and experiences that still remain clear and potent for me all this time later. When the demands of later adult life made this impossible I felt the loss keenly.
I found that an Audible account was the solution, I can fit books into the interstices of my day, and a good unabridged reading doesn't leave you feeling dissatisfied.
It'll never be the same as the the intense personal connection I had with books from my days as a true reader. But it suffices for these years until I can again.
Obviously a huge chunk of people lamented things they lost in childhood - but childhood wasn't the only lost joy people wanted to talk about. We kind of expect to outgrow things we loved in our younger years anyway, right?
A lot of folks had something they were passionate for even as adults only to have that slip through the cracks as well.
Like Prostitution
Writing. I always thought it'd be a passion I'd have for life, but in the past year or two everything I've tried to write has been sh!t.
Slowly I've stopped even trying.
"Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, and then for a few close friends, and then for money. " -- Molière
I have been writing since I was seven, got a BA in English, and thought for sure I'd be a famous writer someday.
I very gradually wrote less and less over the years and now I am almost fifty and can barely muster inspiration to to churn out so much as a short poem. Looking back I tend to wonder if it was passion or if it just happened to be something I was good at that earned me praise and that validation is what fueled my motivation.
Now I don't care what people think of me so much so I just watch Netflix instead.😃
All Of The Above
Everything here.
Playing guitar, writing, video games, I guess I just lost it all.
I'm not in my teens anymore when everything was so deep. I'm just going through the motions of life as a mid 30 year old. Working, and going home and repeat.
The friends have narrowed down to about 1, the job is tolerable at best. I'm drunk now so that's why I'm spilling. I can't find something that gives me that spark but I'm hopeful for the future.
Dude aside from the drunk part and hopeful about the future. Are you me?!??!?!😲
Like for real, I lost interest in writing first, then gaming, have one good friend, work then home, mid 30's... duuuude. And to be honest, losing interest in so much stuff, has had me question if I'm secretly depressed, and just don't know it or what?
It's been years since I legitimately looked forward to anything or enjoyed something for any decent period of time.
- Linchey1
Hostile Hostels
Staying in hostels.
I still love travelling and meeting people, but I just can't do the hostel life anymore. I'd much rather have a nice, private bedroom and my own bathroom.
Part of me still dreams about just saving up some money and doing it all over again, but I know I'd be switching to hotels in about 2 days lol
This. I loved it when I was 22 and could meet people and hang out with them, It was a great way to meet interesting people, make fun memories, and see a new city.
But now? F*ck no.
If I stay in a hostel now, I have to have a private room and bathroom because I am not f*cking around with other people.
SCUBA Men
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I fell out of love with SCUBA.
Firstly I live in England so the waters are somewhat different to the Red Sea.
But when I did do SCUBA, either in England or abroad, I realized a large part of SCUBA is spending time on boats with middle aged men with marital problems who still, nonetheless, need to keep reminding me that they are better than me.
Hence the marital problems, I'm sure.
I always thought it should be an easier and more pleasant experience.
I'm a casual, by the way. I really don't have the inclination to get up early on a Sunday and look at 4 non-descript fish in the English Channel (which I've done, by the way.)
Plus I'm not very good at bragging so this excludes me from 95% of on boat conversations.
I would, however, like to rock up to Jordan or the Caribbean and just say "Look I'm here for a week or so. Lets do 5 dives but I haven't done it for a while, so can we spend some time on the first dive working on my bouyancy?"
I've tried this a couple of times only to get to the dive shop to find out its being run by an English couple. And if there's one thing worse than a middle aged man with marital problems, its an expat middle aged man with marital problems.
The worst thing about diving, especially in places where you need tonnes of gear, is the people. It just attracts a certain type of men - especially men who are "big strong men" in their own view but whiney b!tches with OCD to me.
These a**holes are sloshing around with fancy gear spending most time on the shore telling other people why they are doing it wrong.
I switched to free diving which I can do alone, and never looked back.
- ragefaze
Well that was kind of a bummer. Sorry about that. But hey lets leave you on a happy note - lots of people don't find the thing they really love until much later in life.
We guess it sort of depends. As who you are shifts, what you love should shift too, right? That's what growth and evolution are about.
Typically, I would write an intro about my own experiences with the weird kids at school, but I WAS the weird kid in school. Not in a bad way, more like a “I had a John Waters phase” when I was 16 and everyone knew it. So like, cool-weird. At least I hope so.
Schools aren’t always so lucky to have the cool kinds of weird kids though. The spectrum of weird extends even further than that, and can sometimes end up very disasterous.
U/Imaginary_East5786 asked: What was the weirdest thing the weird kid did at school?
Let’s start with the grossest of the gross. Because why not.
Was it worth it?
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He heard that you'd automatically get suspended if you peed your pants at school. He wanted to find out if it was true, peed his pants, got suspended.
> Observation: 'I've heard that by peeing your pants you will be suspended'
> Hypothesis: If I pee my pants I will be suspended
> Experiment: I peed my pants and I got suspended
> Conclusion: If I pee my pants I get suspended
Uhhh what was the intention here?
He got mad that he didn't understand how to play a game at lunchtime so he started hitting and punching the nearest person to him, who happened to be me. When I shoved him away and asked him what the hell was he doing, he whipped his unit.out, charged at me and when I shoved him away from me again he started crying and ran away with his member still sticking out.
Next ones up are the lowkey (or even highkey) disturbing stories. These weird kids can get a little scary.
Boom theret.
At my middle school, someone decided to get a little attention with a good old fashioned bomb threat. Except they thought that a bomb threat meant literally writing "bomb threat" somewhere. Worse yet, they misspelled the f*ck out of it, and wrote "boom theret."
So we had to go on a brief, very awkward lockdown while the police checked the perimeter for booms.
I hope there was no overlap in the columns.
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She wrote a list of all the girls and boys she wanted to kiss and murder and then casually passed it out on the playground.
2 separate lists or just the 1?
Same list 2 columns lol.
Holy crap.
Had the weird kid in high school ask the teacher to use the bathroom. She said no and this dude legit stabbed his hand with a pencil. Went all the way through then asked if he could now...sh*t was wild.
This was Pearl High School in Mississippi. This was the school Luke Woodham shot and killed his girlfriend and her friend at the school. This kid stabbed himself with the pencil about 2 months after that happened. This was late 1997.
Most of the time, however, the weird kids are pretty d*mn funny.
Ok, but this takes a lot of skill.
Had a kid nicknamed "cheeseburger" in the grade ahead of me in high school. He got his nickname because when it was time for his class to go to lunch, he snuck into the roof and crawled his way into the cafeteria, dropped down and proceeded to steal all the cheeseburger put out for lunch. Unfortunately they caught him in the act and sent him to the principal's office.
A year later he was caught stealing a teacher's computer, and in the process of being arrested he bit the officers hand, getting him sent to juvi never to be heard of again.
Every school had the cat girl.
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The weird kid at my highschool tied a string around his pencil case and pulled out around the halls pretending it was a dog. He still lives in my hometown. I think unemployed.
Oh also weird girl in middle school acted like a cat. She would meow and hiss at people, lick the water fountain and rub her body on the teacher's legs. In 8th grade. I have no idea where she ended up.
Mood.
Weird kid in elementary was a self proclaimed alien. Once, while waiting for the bus, she told me "On my planet we eat people like you" and proceeded to bite me. We later became friends in high school and she used to give me massages during lunch break in the quad. Just realized now she was likely tenderizing me.
I was exactly this kind of weird.
He didn't say much, but if asked, he would go to the front of the class and perform Tip-Toe Through the Tulips with all of the emotion and volume of Tiny Tim, holding nothing back.
The last I heard, he became an energy trader, made a ton of money and married well.
I can definitely relate to that last one. In middle school, my English teacher would let me go to the front of the class and perform monologues or songs from Broadway musicals. Weird, but that’s what happens when schools cut funding for the arts and the theatre kids have no outlet.
As long as you’re not hurting anyone, I say let your freak flag fly, man
Those who work behind bars meet people from all walks of life and hear a variety of unusual anecdotes.
I never worked as a bartender, but I know they get an earful from babbling patrons who have had one too many to drink.
Curious to hear about the wild life stories shared at bars, Reddit xXSlimi_Gacha009 asked:
"Bartenders of reddit, what was the weirdest/craziest thing you have overheard while making someone's drink?"
Attention Seekers
Patrons say the darnedest things.
Bobby
"The first restaurant/bar i worked in I was only serving but I frequently was in the section right next to the bar. One day I was busy serving a large group, but the restaurant was mostly empty and a guy behind me at the bar said 'you wanna pet my parrot?' my initial reaction was the same as if a stranger had just come up behind me and touched my shoulders but when I turned around... It really was a guy with a parrot on his shoulder. The parrots name was Bobby and yes both me and the bartender pet him 😂"
– Midiblye
Sales Pitch
"I was tending bar during an extremely busy happy hour. The place was mobbed and super noisy. Suddenly, a guy sitting at the bar stands up and announces 'Ladies and gentlemen of the bar, I represent the Acme meat company and we carry a full line of high quality...'. The entire bar goes silent while he continues to do his sales pitch at full volume. For some reason he decided that this was a great time and place to hustle up some business. My manager sprinted over to him and told him knock it off and that kind of thing wasn't allowed in here. So he sat down and resumed drinking."
Favorite A**hole Bartender
"Regular of mine who I hadn't seen in awhile was sitting at the bar when I came in for a shift change."
"I came in the back way and noticed he had crutches leaning against the bar."
"Recently in the news someone hadn't had their shotgun properly secured in their truck and it went off..."
"So I jokingly say, 'you're that f'king idiot who blew off his leg arent you?'"
"The whole bar gets quiet and everyone is mean mugging me."
"My regular starts laughing..."
"Yeah, it was him. I had no idea. I didn't apologize, because as his favorite a**hole bartender those comments were expected of me."
"Poor guy was only 20 couple and blew his leg off close to the hip. No idea how he survived."
Murder Plot
"I was a bartender for about two weeks (filling in for a relative who owned a bar and went on his honeymoon)."
"I heard a guy talking to a woman about murdering her husband. I called the cops, but these patrons were gone before they showed up. This was before cameras, so I just gave my story and that was it."
"Not long after, my uncle calls me saying the cops are looking for me. They interview me about the couple. Apparently, the guy was a hitman for hire and the woman was trying to get some insurance money. She got busted."
"It was actually an episode of 'Forensic Files' back when that was on TV. I remember watching the episode and they said something like 'the couple was overheard discussing the murder in a bar.' I was kind of upset that they didn't mention me. Lol. I was hoping for, 'The awesome bartender overheard them, but couldn't really tell us much. He also pointed at the male in the photo lineup and asked 'Is this him?' as if he was unsure. What a f"king dope.'"
"Edit 1: I spent half of the day reading the descriptions of every episode that's streaming on Netflix and watching the ones that seemed relevant. I didn't figure it out and I'm sorry, but I just don't know which episode it was. I recorded it on a VHS tape years ago, but don't know where that is either. I'm moving, so if I come across it, I'll edit this and let everyone know which one it was."
"Edit 2: As I recall, the hitman wasn't a professional by any means. I think the episode said he was just a local junkie who'd pretty much do anything for his next fix."
– Myzyri
Extremely Random
The following conversations were undoubtedly head-turners.
Poop-Blocked
"From a woman to her friend, 'I don't know about you but I just can't poop in a pink bathroom.'"
Proud Pecker
"Someone was boasting about his 'Very small penis! VERY TINY! LIKE MICRO!' he proceeds to lower his pants and show it to his friend 🤷♀️"
Couples
Passions are inflamed where alcohol is in the mix.
Ferris Wheel Payment
"A married couple in their fifties arguing how they were going to explain the fact they couldn't pay the remainder of the 3 million euro bill for a Ferris wheel they'd ordered 18 months ago, already put a million deposit on, and who's collection was due at 8am the following morning."
That's Amore
"Man and woman is sitting at the bar. She starts crying and says 'I just want us to have something special'. The guy looked her dead in the eyes and said 'we do have something special, we have sex. We are both married'. 10 minutes later they are making out and she's rubbing him over his pants. I loved slow Wednesdays."
I'm a cheap date.
So whenever I'm halfway through my first – and usually ONLY – glass of cab sav at a bar, I know I'm talking in a stream of consciousness and volunteering embarrassing personal information.
Once, I confided to all the patrons and staff at a bar in Barcelona, France, about my embarrassing college experience. And I apparently gave a wild performance when the DJ played Prince's "Kiss."
I'm still searching this subReddit to see if any of the comments might be referring to me.