We Are All Melania

 

 A rich old man and she won't have to worry
She'll dress up all in lace and go in style

Did you ever wonder what it’s like to be Melania? I mean, on one hand she has just about everything a woman can ask for, doesn’t she? She can go anywhere in the world whenever she desires. She can go to a Broadway play or attend the Cannes Film Festival. If it were her thing, she could get courtside tickets to an NBA Finals game or ringside seats to a championship fight. She has everything she could possibly want at her fingertips.

 Undoubtedly such wealth and luxury and privilege has a price, though. I won’t go into it, but since I asked you to imagine what it would be like to be Melania, I’ll let you ponder the price she pays. It’s not merely the love she has to give to her golden-haired benefactor, it’s the life she might have lived and the love she might have had but was forced to abandon in order to be Mrs. Donald Trump. We all have our choices to make in life, best to think about them carefully before diving right in.

 Did she get tired or did she just get lazy?
She's so far gone she feels just like a fool

 And it’s not like it’s an entirely loveless marriage. While she may have married her sugar daddy only for the wealth and security he provided, at least he loves her, right? Until the day she realizes that the person she married doesn’t love her, either. Because billionaires who marry young women for their appearances aren’t capable of love. They’re just an object to them, an acquisition. I’d guess that realization has occurred to Melania already.

 Melania is not the first woman to sell her love for wealth. I remember the Anna Nichole Smith marriage to an octogenarian billionaire some years back. I’m sure I could name a lot more if I had spent more time watching ET, but countless men and women alike have cashed in their integrity in order that they might have an easier life.

 I confess to having been one of them.

 At first it all seemed so simple. At first I didn’t even realize I was giving up anything at all. I was able to see the world, was able to see many truly great concerts. I got to see Spock’s Beard perform their concept album Snow live in Nashville, Tribute perform New Views in Sweden, Magma perform in Paris, Black Widow in London, and Paul Robeson sing before coal miners in Scotland. I saw all of the most memorable boxing matches and I got to listen to Russell Brand, Aldous Huxley and so many others engage in intimate conversation. I was spoiled and I knew it, but I was only dimly aware of the price to be paid.

 My sugar daddy was YouTube. My relationship permitted me to see many amazing things I never would have seen otherwise. But like any relationship of this sort, all of the power resided with the sugar daddy. And the longer we hung around, the more I realized the price I was being asked to pay.

 There had always been the commercials, but in the beginning there weren’t that many. And It would be foolish of me to believe there wouldn’t be some cost for the wonderful gifts I was being provided. But then the commercials started coming more and more often until they started following one after another. And suggestions started being less helpful and searches more difficult. And videos just led into other videos instead of waiting for me to choose one.

 But even this was merely a dream relationship experiencing a bit of a coming down to earth. My sugar daddy still let me see whatever I wanted to see.

 Until one day he didn’t. One day I awoke to hear that Graham Elwood, Jamarl Thomas, and others had been demonetized by YouTube. Soon, people I greatly admired, amazing people I was introduced to by YouTube, were now being poorly treated by YouTube. All of the classic symptoms of an abusive relationship started revealing themselves. And I felt ashamed because I had been foolish enough to allow myself to enter into a relationship where I had none of the power.

 It wasn’t just Google. I had come to realize how so many of my relationships were unhealthy ones with rich and powerful entities who gave me things. And in turn I surrendered the healthy relationships I could have pursued even as I distanced myself from the idealism of my youth.

 She wonders how it ever got this crazy

 We’re all Melania nowadays. In an age and a country where Donald Trump can become president, it’s very hard not to be. We have all surrendered our youthful aspirations for comfort and luxury. And while we ooh and aah over each trinket we are given, I think we’re all getting to that point where we’re realizing they’re coming at a cost. At a cost to our integrity, to our innermost desires, our happiness, our sense of self. More than anything, we are starting to realize that our sugar daddies don’t really adore us the way we foolishly believed they did. We are coming to realize they are incapable of normal human emotions.

 For the record, it has been 54 days since I watched anything on YouTube. Furthermore, since Google owns YouTube, I got rid of Google Chrome and Google search engine, as well. Is this merely a symbolic gesture? Perhaps. But when you realize you’re in a loveless relationship, it’s time you start asking yourself if you need the luxuries that drew you to it in the first place. And while you might not be ready to leave your comfortable but soul-crushing situation, you better start planning an eventual escape. Because before too long, the golden-haired sugar daddy is going to creep into your bed at night and demand some payback for all he has given you.

 I love you, little yellow bird,

But I love my freedom, too.

So good-bye, little yellow bird.

I'd rather brave the cold

On a leafless tree

Than a prisoner be

In a cage of gold

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*Lyrics are from Lyin’ Eyes by The Eagles and Goodbye Little Yellow Bird W. Hardgreave