Storytime
I was sitting in my digital art class, fucking around on photoshop like any other normal day. My digital art teacher, who is in about her mid twenties, still uses pandora radio for some reason. Yeah, that's right, pandora radio. While the whole class was dicking around on photoshop and I was beautifully crafting a meme about Birdo from super Mario brothers, it happened.
Most of you probably do not know that I’m jewish. Been jewish all my life so when Pandora radio decided to play Spirit in the sky by Norman Greenbaum of course I wanted to die on the spot.... The lyrics include “gotta have a friend in Jesus” and many references to heaven... if you couldn’t tell it’s Christian as fuck. Naturally, I was extremely uncomfortable because I was not in fact Christian. My twin brother who was also in the class was uncomfortable too because he was not in fact Christian either.
So we’re both sitting there awkward as hell and when the song stops we both breathe out a sigh of relief. There was a moment of silence as Pandora radio went to the next track. What could possibly be worse than a horribly sung Christian song, I thought, what could possibly be worse? In retrospect, I think I probably jinxed it.
The classroom was utterly silent. Even the Christian kids who probably didn't care about the Christian song that just played wanted to know what the next song was. Suddenly from the promethean board speakers, four words blasted out. And I knew that I was wrong. Something could definitely be worse than Spirit in the Sky by Norman Fucking Greenbaum.
someBODY ONCE TOLD ME
That’s right. Shrek. What the fuck kind of pandora station is this, lady.
Shrek must have heard my prayers during the jesus song that day.
And oh god, did he answer them. I may have not wanted him to answer, but he answered.
I was in my own personal hell. Shrek hell. All Star blares out from the speakers and you can hear everyone in the classroom being violently triggered. Everyone takes a deep breath, in and out. They know. Shrek is here. We are all in hell now.
Our teacher is oblivious. She does not change the station. All three minutes and twenty one seconds of all star by smash mouth plays while I try not to cry. The classroom does not say a word, but we have been bonded by this experience. Somehow, Shrek brought the students of my classroom together. We all endured pain, we all endured hell, but at least we endured it together.
What’s the moral of this story? Find the beauty in mistakes. The song all star by smash mouth was a mistake, but it brought my classroom together. Pandora radio is a mistake, but it brought forth Spotify and various internet radio platforms which we can all agree is far superior. Fuck pandora radio. Sometimes one positive amidst the sea of negatives keeps you going, so try to find a positive for terrible things. It might not reveal itself immediately, but once you find it you’ll feel much better.
Example: Oh god, I just spilled hot tea all over myself while trying to type out a tumblr post. This is shitty, but at least I will be more careful when I drink and blog. That’s right Zoey, kick the tea’s ass. Who does the tea think it is? It’s a peasant compared to me, so I’m going to be so goddamn careful from now on to show it a lesson that piece of s-
Sorry I tend to get carried away. Thank you for reading this garbage.
-Zoey