‘Surviving Fame’

Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise To scorn delights, and live laborious days; “Lycidas” by John Milton

At the end only one of us will survive

From every fame-hungry sidewalk of life, eighteen of us surrender cell phones, careers and sex drives, give up shaving, deodorant and eyeliner, expose bodies and minds to programmed humiliations for however long the series runs

We play at castaways on a deserted isle, stone savages in tribal councils, derring-do adventurers in mock perilous landscapes while TV cameras telecast our survival games to sixty million living rooms watching in envy and safety

Making sure we’re caught at proper angle, we learn easily to dissemble, double-deal-and-cross, make alliances so dumb and crude the bewildered wildlife can see through them.

And all, all of it for the “fair guerdon” of one-in-a-million dollars or at the very least the chance for fifteen minutes of shame as last night’s loser on Today’s Early Show