Rich People Suck

My Soap-Operatic Life

"If you want to know what God thinks of money, look at the people he gives it to." -American proverb

Well, if ANYONE is able to read this, today's entry is gonna be a bitch about the wealthy. I found, on the front page of the newspaper (in the corner though- guess we were lucky that stories on the homeless and bombing made it to the front instead of this newsworthy event) an article titled, "Mother discovers a new career as winery's unofficial ambassador." It was all about how the wife of the big shot Wente Vineyards CEO is now doing something other than raising the kiddies at home.

For crying out loud, this is not a newsbreaker that should be on the front page. Maybe the valley/lifestyle section, but come on: This is an important news story? Can we say sucking up to big bucks?

One of the Wente kids is a bit older than me. I vaguely remember that I went to school with him, remember nothing other than some karate demonstration he was in. It made the front page of the paper when he decided to go to another school (out of town) rather than LHS because LHS has practically no AP classes. Front page??? Come on. Gag me. (Later on I got a big laugh when the guy's new school played LHS in basketball, and an LHS player claimed that he personally shot the guy down.)

Reminds me of "The Monroes"- a quickie TV series about one of those big shot political families- in the opening shot, a son is pulled over by a cop and gets off because of his last name. I can't imagine being in a family like this, but it sounds quite frightening.

Recently I was going through my old books from childhood/teenagedom, and found this odd one, The Winchesters, by James Lincoln Collier. I'm not sure why I had this book or kept it, but I read it last night. God, talk about depressing.

The plot: Chris Winchester's father was born of the snooty Winchester (as in mills) family, who rule the town of Everige. Not caring for the domineering, power-mad way his family worked, he joined the Peace Corps, met and married a poor chick, and had three kids before dying in an epidemic. His family was taken in by the Winchesters and moved to Everige, and treated rather as second-class citizens by the big W's. They lived in the gatehouse and went to public school, while their cousins were hauled off to boarding schools- the boy to learn how to run the mills, the girl to be a decorative ornament to any wealthy man. (GAG ME.)

It's about eight years later, Chris (the oldest and apparently only son of his father) is closer to his friends whose parents work at the mills than he is the snooty relatives. But when a strike at the mill is impending, plus some town kids get into an altercation over the Winchester pond (don't ask, long unhappy story), Chris's friends and their families tell him to go away and never come back, because he's a Winchester, even if a. he doesn't like them too much, and b. has more in common with them than his family. The Winchesters in charge force him to take sides- their side- when he doesn't want to, he loses his friends, is forced to go to boarding school himself, and discovers his own mother wants him to do whatever the Winchesters (his uncle and grandfather) want so he can get a big piece of the pie. Chris dreams of chucking it all and going into the Peace Corps like his dad- but is swallowed by the Winchesters for the time being. There isn't one good moment in this story, it just gets worse and worse. The uncle and grandfather throw hissy fits if anyone crosses them in the slightest way and aren't happy until they've ruined people's lives- "otherwise it erodes our power." Nauseating.

And then I open the local paper in my podunk town- which at least has one more industry than Everige- and what do I find?

Now, I know that I've been going off lately (backlash from dating a broke workaholic, I guess) about how I want a guy with money so I don't run into this problem, and can afford whatever I want. But after reading this kinda stuff I'm feeling regret about that. If that's what it's like with everybody rich . . . yikes. The few rich kids I've met have been nice, and doctors' or lawyers' kids, not power-mad domineering people with an empire- so maybe it's all fiction. Or maybe not. I don't know, but the idea is rather chilling.

And my unease from reading didn't exactly diminish when we went to Blockbuster last night. Rented The Rainmaker (last night's viewing) and That Thing You Do! Now, I'm getting as sick of going off on my newest guy (nothing's even happened yet and my imagination's going off on me! I am nuts.) as everyone is of hearing it out of me. I swore last night as I uploaded the last entry (if anyone's even SEEN it!) that I wouldn't do that again until there was any actual dish to dollop out. But while watching The Rainmaker, I started feeling somewhat disturbed.

I've always had a fondness for lawyer shows and books (read all Grishams), and think that I would make an excellent lawyer if 95% of it wasn't boring crap- if it were all courtroom drama I'd have a lot of fun. I mentioned something like this to FDG, but I suspect he thought that was kinda weird/nuts. And he's probably right.

But as I'm watching this movie about a young lawyer, I couldn't help thinking of him. And there's a whole lotta lines in the movie (pretty good, by the way- a bit different from the book in a few plot points, but great choice of actors) about lawyer sleaziness. Besides the lawyer jokes (which I think are funny. Okay, I find most things funny), there's some lines about selling out and sleaziness, etc. And then there's the closing part:

"Every lawyer, at least once in every case, finds himself crossing a line he doesn't mean to cross. And if you cross it enough times it disappears forever. And then you're nothing but another lawyer joke. Just another shark in the dirty water."

This is an incredibly weird entry, isn't it? Why the hell is someone my age thinking about this stuff?

Write to gr3ruth@pacbell.net. I'm tired of putting up two e-mails, it all goes to the same place anyway, right?

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