A "fiction" piece that started as a rather..developed...running2win entry.


The Littler Mermaid.

There once was a mermaid named Ariel. Beautiful, with a melodic voice, she was nevertheless high-strung, insipid, and shallow. Ariel was born into the Sea Kingdom and was the natural heir to her father's throne; silly girl that she was, she ran away in her teens to elope with a supposedly dashing prince named Eric, who had no friends excepting an oversized slobbery dog and a curmudgeonly court advisor. King Triton naturally attempted to bring his daughter back by force, but utterly failed. The case became politicized and the monarch's reputation jaded. Though she was technically a minor, her father King Triton was compelled through public pressure to allow her to remain on land, abdicating the throne. Unfortunately, the lot to reign over the Sea Kingdom fell to Ariel's obscure twin sister named Princess Mar. Mar clearly did not possess Ariel's capacities in terms of beauty and charm. Nevertheless, this princess wasn't TERRIBLE to look at. Maybe her hair wasn't ruby-red like her sister's. Maybe her seashells slipped off once in a while because she was less endowed physically in certain departments. And maybe she possessed only mediocre singing talent, juxtaposed with her sister's vocal brilliance. Nevertheless, this Princess wasn't as flighty as her publicly lionized sister, and properly conceived of her duties and propriety to both family and to country.

Like Ariel, the Princess' greatest dream, though, was to be on land, which she obviously could not accomplish with those loathed fins. The King made a deal with her when she was a small thing that he would remove her fins as a strictly ephemeral gift; she could spend eight years of her life on land, running to her slowly-beating heart's desire (she had outstanding aerobic fitness), if she promised to return to the kingdom forever after those wondrous eight years. In return, Princess Mar would assist Ariel in the day-to-day of the vicissitudes of regime life. Mar even voluntarily dedicated half of one of those eight years to learn about the politics of ruling, returning to the sea for six months but eagerly awaiting the fulfillment of her final year on land.

But all changed. Ariel had left an enormous void, and the King needed an interim ruler immediately. With the notice of only five days, The Princess struggled to remain stolid upon her return to water. She quickly realized that she would remain in the depths of the sea for eternity. The King perceived her melancholy and gloom, and desired to alleviate her plight. Instead of requiring her to swim about the Kingdom amid the (team) coral and murky waters, he allowed her to keep her legs, granting her the ability to jog on water, wherein she would still fulfill her duties to the Sea Kingdom but could nevertheless experience at least a phantom of the delight that she had once enjoyed on land. The Princess lived in a middling place, a sort of watery Sheol, no longer fish nor human. She spent the minutes of her days and the long hours of her nights jogging, jogging, jogging in the water, vicariously sharing in the delight of her beloved land friends, but always in the perennial grip of her obligation to the kinsfolk of the Sea, paying the enervating tithes demanded by her unhappy consanguinity.

The. End.

A mundane and yet potentially problematic fact: I don't pay attention to lyrics of songs. I'll just hum along innocently to whatever is blaring from the vans during our 600 meter repeats at the Golf Course. Granted, I'm not so blithe that I don't perceive the message of Latest Musical Genius that composed the more-than-tedious "Sexy Bitch...la la Sexy Bitch...". But encouragement (euphemism: mild derision) from the peers has of late instigated an interest in lyrics/content...dare i write "substance"?

Wheeling through the songs on my ipod and juxtaposing two particular specimens:

"I'd rather laugh with the sinners than cry with the saints, the sinners are much more fun", proclaims Billy Joel playfully.

Meanwhile, Ms. Spears in '3' surveys modernity and astutely pronounces (in a voice that is what plastic converted to sound waves would sound like) that "Living in sin is the new thing".

I wonder what it is about the musicality of the pieces that makes Britney so much more offensive than Billy (other than the obvious fact that Brit's lyrics are slightly less subtle about the nature of her sexual escapades). Also questioning how either of these songs ended up on my ipod.