So I am a young man, not particularly interesting to anyone other than myself, not successful or outstanding, but I think am a late bloomer. Anyway, thanks to my luck I have a pretty cushy life despite the incredibly stupid shit I done to screw it up.
When it comes to how your life works out I can't tell if it makes a difference if you're smart. It seems a lot of smart people piss away their lives because being smart and making good choices have almost nothing to do with each other. Choices are often made by moods, which have no intelligence. My impulses frequently get me neck deep in shit that I then have to use my brain to dig myself out of. I have a hunch I make more mistakes than some people, but I can't tell. Most people have the good sense to act like they meant to do whatever they are doing so as to maintain the mystique that it is all part of their plan. I never was too good at that. I prefer to blast along like a rocket fueled mercury comet on 3 wheels and a flat steered by a deranged team of maniacal cartoon toucans.
Anyway, I am also very self involved and that is boring.
I used to sleep a lot, but now I don't as much. I used to write a lot, but now I use that time to sleep. Then one day I had the idea to do something different than something I would ever do, and I started thinking about volunteering. I kicked this idea around in my head for a few months, and one day I decided to look into it.
So I picked up the phone book and called a place that gives free meals for bums and I spoke to the volunteer co-coordinator. I went down there, she told me what it was all about, showed me around, explained what they do and asked if I was interested.
I wasn't particularly. Helping people is not really my strength, I'm more of a try my best to not kill people person. The urge to save the world used to compel me in all kinds of poorly thought out ways, but that urge is dwindling. Also, spending your life trying to save the world seems to already be a hobby for a lot of nut jobs and I wouldn't want to crowd them.
But I figured I might as well give this half baked scheme a try. So I started volunteering at this soup kitchen/mission and so far its not so bad. This place is in downtown Edmonton in what is known as the inner city. It is probably the worst neighborhood in Edmonton in terms of poverty and drugs. The people who use the mission, who I will call guests, are a fun collection of the sketchiest motherfuckers in town. Some of them look scared, I assume when they aren't high they lose their irrepressible laissez faire and that feeling of total invincibility.
|
| This is my artists rendition of every single guy that lives in this neighborhood. |
I have seen some pretty awful stuff in the inner city area that is actually sort of funny. I remember one day I was driving through the inner city just after lunch, maybe about 1:00 PM on a friday. It was a warm sunny summer afternoon and people were out enjoying themselves. As I drove along I spotted an obviously wasted woman in the shade behind a building barfing on the ground. The first joke that popped into my head was "thank god its friday!"
I know that's callous. I was amused by the notion that she was cutting loose for the weekend and not that it could have been new years eve for all she cared. Because every night is saturday night in the inner city, and every morning is sunday bloody sunday.
 |
| This is a bar downtown called Stars. That's the great thing about the inner city, around here the stars come out around 10:30 AM. |
I suspect that apart from all their obvious differences the guests have all made at least a few common choices. With the cooperation of circumstances those choices have brought their lives to run in a disastrous parallel to leaves in a gutter. And I am beginning to suspect that the number of choices they made differently than me could be outnumbered by ones that are the same.
There is a funny thing about choices. You can't control the universe, it does all kinds of crazy shit and may just kill you at any second. But choices are your only rudder through the white rapids on the rivers of wishes and disappointments to the valley of well managed finances and stable relationships. A choice won't change the world, but it may steer you clear of a dark mass just under the surface with a bad attitude baracus.
Just a few choices make everything different. One choice means an unusually early retirement and HIV medication, one choice means one or more wife and kids. As one of the blessed middle class white boys who got the world handed to me on a plate I realize I didn't have to make a lot of the choices that our guests were faced with. I can't even guess what I would have done.
What does this all mean? Choices. Look at the person lying next to you in the morning, or the cat, or the empty space and realize that it is because of your choices. Are you happy? Does it make sense?
And you may ask yourself
How do I work this?
And you may ask yourself
Where is that large automobile?
And you may tell yourself
This is not my beautiful house!
And you may tell yourself
This is not my beautiful wife!
Or perhaps you won't. But if there's anything else The Talking Heads have said that feels like a fitting conclusion, use that.