NO ONE CARES

Based on a True Story

So, why would I use a public space such as this to criminalize myself? You’d think that theoretically, with the entire world having access to my writings, I would find it in my best interest to talk about what an impact I’m having here and how much good I’m doing. Hell, this can be read by future employers, girlfriends, girlfriends’ parents, senators, parole officers, etc. Why would I make myself look like such a dick all the time? Well, there’s a long answer, and a short answer – I’ll give you both since you obviously have the time, but, in the name of brevity, just in the off-case you do actually have something more pressing to attend to, the short is this –

Eat me, I can write whatever the hell I want.

Now that that’s settled, run along and get that kettle you left boiling on the stove. For those of you with a more flexible schedule, we’re gonna dig deep and root around in the psyche of everyone’s favorite adorable emigrant southerner.

First of all, maybe I was never too clear about this, but this is ENTERTAINMENT, people. I’m not fact checking and quoting reliable sources – in fact, there is so little ‘fact’ floating around on this blog that the only thing of value you could realistically think of doing with it is maybe, I don’t know, start a hunt for WMDs (zing!). No, seriously, though, real life is pretty damn boring – you wake up, you go to work, you go to sleep, maybe you cuss a few times along the way cause someone cut you off on the interstate – snooze fest – who the hell wants to read about that?

Your Life

These are real situations, real scenarios, just incredibly embellished – just like what we learn in school about Pocahontas, Christopher Columbus, The Alamo, The first moon walk, The Civil War (Thats The War of Northern Aggrestion where I come from), The Revolutionary War, Lincoln and Emancipation, etc. - its based on true events, but its been spiced up and moved around and warped a great deal to make it work for us.

Yeah, not true

The rule of numbers comes into play here as well – only interesting things seem to happen when I’m off being free and wild, the one time every few weeks that happens, so of course I’ll write about that and not the weeks of boredom. So, when I talk about drinking from sunup to sundown and doing nothing of value for weeks on end, is there a grain of truth in that? Yeah, sure, I probably had a few beers down by the beach on a Sunday afternoon and woke up late on Monday. So why so obviously overdo it? Follow me to point #2 –

NO ONE CARES. Now please, say that out loud for me. Say it one more time for good measure. Internalize that one, it will serve you for the rest of your days. No matter how interesting my life is, no matter what kind of incredible things I am doing, no matter what kind of massive mental and spiritual changes I undergo from my various travels, it doesn’t matter to anyone. Think about any movie you’ve seen where the square family shows slides from their family rafting trip to dinner guests and everyone is squirming to get out of there – ITS ONLY INTERESTING IF IT HAPPENS TO YOU. If something doesn’t directly involve the ego of the person you are talking to, 99% of the time, their eyes will glaze over after about 5 seconds of you talking about your life. How do you avoid this confectionerisation (Im making it official, Steven!) of the masses’ ocular capacities? Simple – leave ‘em laughing. Also, pictures help – everyone likes a book with pictures. No one wants to hear about the boring computer class I had or the incredible cultural exchange I had buying tomatoes in the market. However, throw in a bit of general rapscallionism, a couple shakes of banditry, and a healthy dollop of villainy and what do you have? You have the much more entertaining story of a 6’4” sunburnt white-man chain smoking his way through aisle after aisle of piss-smelling stalls, carrying a glass of scotch and cussing because he can’t find a proper tomato in this god-forsaken country full of god-forsaken shitty vegetables.

YES!

See? Pulitzer here I come. And still the post goes deeper - Onward to point #3!!!

THE MARTYR COMPLEX. I have read that there are 4 types of people who leave everything they know and move to beat-up parts of the world to do whatever the hell they do there – Mercenaries, Misfits, Missionaries, and The Broken Hearted. I have only been here for round-abouts a year, but I will stand by that one 100%. Each of us are running from something, in our own ways, but most of us no more so than anyone else back home – its just blatantly obvious with us. Everyone has their drug, it just depends on how wisely you pick your poison - cocaine habits, shopping addictions, reality TV, constantly building additions onto your house, these things can be covered up or are seen as relatively normal back chez moi. For us, however, its kinda hard to cover up vanishing for years on end to live in mud huts. I don’t know, I’ve never done cocaine, but I would guess it probably beats the mud huts some of the time, so I can’t judge too harshly. We all fall on the MMMBh scale in some way – some come here to help, some come here thinking they want to help, and some come for lack of a better idea. To this day, I get emails talking about ‘how much good’ Im doing and that I don’t have any idea how many lives I’m touching. I won’t say that’s a complete fallacy, but I want to set the record straight here and for the rest of my life – I AM NOT A DAMN MARTYR!

No.

I am here because I want to be here, because I enjoy what I do, because I’m having a blast, because I find it way more preferable to, I don’t know, being a bank teller (no offense, bank tellers, thank you for all the free suckers). My job here is business advising, which can logically lead to ‘helping’ others, but that’s a happy side-effect - anyone who says helping people is their only goal is most likely lying to you. People do what they WANT to do in EVERY situation, based on what is better for THEM. And, as a side note, I never, ever, EVER want to get lumped in the same category as missionaries here. If that means I go to the other extreme when I talk about my work here, then so be it. I won't delve into my missionary rant here, though - I’ll save that for only the truly initiated.

So there you have it – no longer any need to worry about my mental or liver-al health. And not a moment too soon, either – I’ve got a full day of hugging African children, helping elderly women cross busy streets, facilitating those Israeli-Palestinian Peace Talks (again), and at 3 I’ve got my local alchemy group – I’m teaching local artisans how to turn trash they find on the street into gold bullion. And then I’ll probably get drunk.