As a small child, you had a surprisingly clear notion of the Cold War, thanks in no small part to The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. The Russian spies—Boris Badenov and Natasha Fatale—were your first exposure to international espionage. They weren’t subtle. They schemed and snuck around trying to steal jet fuel and military secrets, their motives cartoonish but unmistakable: Mother Russia wanted what America had. It was geopolitical skulduggery with punchlines. But beneath the gags was a message that stuck: America and Russia were locked in a death match for global supremacy.
Television kept hammering the point. Every other cartoon, sitcom, or Saturday matinee made it clear who the winners were in this world: the ones in uniform. They flew jets, walked on the moon, and—most importantly—got the girl.
Exhibit A: I Dream of Jeannie.
Major Anthony Nelson was your blueprint for alpha success. He wore a crisp military uniform, cracked classified codes, and—oh yeah—discovered a genie. A blonde bombshell genie in a pink silk outfit, no less. Barbara Eden was your first crush, and rightly so. She was radiant, pliant, and always barefoot. She called him “Master” and granted his every wish. You never questioned the logic. Of course Major Nelson found Jeannie. He was an astronaut. A military genius. A winner. That’s what TV taught you: if you reached the top of the competence pyramid, beautiful women would appear from household objects to serve you breakfast and unconditional love.
You internalized that myth early—long before puberty had its say.
Your first real-world test of dominance happened when you were five, in Gainesville, Florida. You had a treehouse wedged into one of the mangled trees at the Flavet Villages Apartments, and you thought you were the man. You invited Tammy Whitmire—flaxen-haired, gap-toothed, and already a queen bee—to climb up the slats of your kingdom. Your bait? A box of Sun-Maid Raisins.
You flashed the red box like it was contraband gold. The Sun-Maid girl beamed up from the label, holding her tray of grapes like a Eucharistic offering. Her red bonnet and angelic glow gave her the holy aura of snack-time supremacy.
Tammy bit. She started climbing. You were about to win.
And then, betrayal—sudden, brutal, Cold War-style betrayal.
From a nearby tree emerged Zane Johnson, a rival operative whose swagger you hadn’t accounted for. He popped his head out from the foliage like a jungle sniper and shouted, “I’ve got Captain Kangaroo Cookies!”
Tammy froze on your slats like a deer caught between two headlights of desire. Her eyes locked on Zane’s offering. Chocolate-drenched. Cream-centered. An unholy union of fudge and status. Compared to your meager raisins, they were basically nuclear warheads.
Tammy snarled at your pathetic bait, climbed down without a word, and defected to Zane’s cookie republic. They ascended together and cozied up in his treehouse like Khrushchev and a new mistress. You watched them eat and gloat, their lips chocolate-slick and cruel with triumph.
You reclined in your empty fortress and cried yourself into unconsciousness.
Hours later, your agony turned literal. Red ants—attracted to the raisins, no doubt—had overrun your body, biting every inch of skin. You woke up in hell, bolted for home, and howled under a scalding bath as your mother drowned the ants clinging to your body.
It hurt. It really, really hurt.
But the worst part wasn’t the bites. It was the sting of humiliation. The alpha lost. You lost.
In that moment, you understood something primal: in the great arms race of life, you’d better bring cookies.
Cinemorphosis 
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