[brilliant falling down the stairs]
[lyrics: wagner]


the aptitude test cast a festive lustre over children it said were truly blessed.
a divination of the gifted class that sifted out the asterisks from the rest.
but nonetheless, politically correct interests follow an obsolescent crest:
the prescient educators never confess.
and so you're left to guess with a pleasant shibboleth:
"you can be anything you want to: an actor, a musician, or president,
provided it's not contraindicated by the way we've prescribed your strengths."

numbers said so from the get-go who would drop down through the pegholes
thanks to how you're predisposed.
a rubric that decided who'll be belaboring tom and dick and sally
while others move on to toves and borogoves in jabberwocky.
but even while your destinies are given different densities,
you'll still be dared to dream about the fantastic lives on tv --
they can be yours if you just try to achieve.
then just as your ambition is given the first chance to breathe,
the counselor's saying "an actor? a musician?
no, i'm afraid you've been deceived.
you see, you have to be practical, and take responsibility.
besides, your testing says there's little hope, and who am i to disagree?"

how often do you hear a six-year-old say
"i want to grow up to be a gas station attendant?"
well, not often, because firemen and ballerinas
and racecar drivers and horse-riders are still the precedent.
and then clueless society scratches its head and says
"why are so many teenagers so apathetic?"
maybe they're just coming to grips with the knowledge
that the adult life they envisioned possible and the one that appears
are completely and utterly antithetic.

maybe it's time to explain -- and i mean before eleventh grade --
that satisfaction's rarely born; it's usually made.
and a catch-all pleasantry about self-belief
is not on which this actual path is paved.

and if an elementary is supposed to be preparatory,
we shouldn't allow teachings so illusory.
a kid ought to know that most people don't like their work,
and if this leads to apathy, at least we got there honestly.
and yes, the irresponsibility of childhood is a thing of infinite beauty,
but hey, if it were up to me,
i'd rather have that tarnished as the price for knowing what's ahead of me,
than to follow a naive vision and have it spirited away at twenty-three.

and yes, i do in fact have faith:
faith in human beings to meet a bar and raise a stake.
but how can you expect to take a million people,
tell them "the dollar path is the only one's that safe.
forget what you wanted, it's too risky.
better to do something easy that you hate."

trust me, the people shaping history
aren't the ones endorsing this mistake.

so friend, if you want to see the best things possible
from your children,
let them know early on why most people prefer their vacation to their vocation.
and if their ultimate wish is to find a cure for cancer
or just to be happy, drunk and laid,
at least they'll have known what they were in for
and can put a few more checkmarks in the column "choices that i made."


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