Before our breaks at work, we're supposed to do a "360," which means we approach each customer in the store and ask if the need assistance. That's to ensure that 1) everyone is getting helped and 2) we're getting to every corner of the store, so there's nowhere in the store that shoplifters can expect us not to be. Lately, since it's the holiday season and we're scheduled heavily at the information desk, I just walk to each corner of the store and then go to my break. I only talk to the customers that look interesting.
A week ago (or two or three), I walked past a kid (LOL, I feel old; he was college-aged) and noticed he was reading the back of The Dharma Bums. "That's an awesome book," I told him. I told him about how I bought it for Jeremy before he moved to Hawaii, and he said he'd just started to realize that there may be more to life than going to school and then getting a career. So I also handed him Illusions, and also told him about when I quit my job and hit the road (it pains me to realize this is past-tense; that I no longer live "on the road"). He told me that sounded about right, like it was a secret he'd suspected. He bought both books and as he was walking out the door I thought I should have recommended a hundred more books. I should have grabbed him by the collar and yelled, "RUN! RUN AND DON'T LOOK BACK!"
I feel like I'm setting a bad, bad example. I don't want to be one of those people who "did something crazy," who "had adventures when I was young." Shortly after I moved out here, I talked with a man (I just looked back to link the post, only to find that it's one of the many blogs I never wrote; how disappointing) about how I think life is. We discussed how my father feels about his generation, that they all sold out & became the people they'd been fighting against, and that I didn't want myself or my peers to be like that. The man said he wouldn't argue with me because he knew better, that I'd see, that sooner or later we all admit that we need insurance and financial security. At that moment I felt like I never would do that, even if I learned that my way of doing things was NOT the best, just to prove that "defeatist attitude" wrong. But here I am, off the road.
A recent argument with Jenny (there wasn't much arguing, really; I admitted quicky and easily that she was in the right) brought light to something discussed in several arguments with Katie, about how I essentially preach but don't practice. I "talk the talk," but do not "walk the walk." Neither girl said that precisely, but that fact is what was underneath the symptoms they found as faults. I can talk up a crazy revolution, but then come home and play my Nintendo Wii and buy the 5-Disc version of Watchmen and drink and hope for somebody to come in so I can show off by bookcase of philosophy books and act like I'm still myself. At this point, I am all talk. At this point, I am telling young men to read Kerouac and hit the road, which supports my philosophy, but by living comfortably and working where and as I do, the unintended message is the same thing that man told me a year and a half ago.
At the moment, I feel pitiful, feel like I've never practiced, never walked the walk, but I have. I'm just not, now. I do this, repeatedly. Katie says I always seem to want to become a monk when things are looking bad, but really I always want to be a monk but, get lazy about it when things are looking good. Looking at my life, one can always tell when I'm feeling shitty about how I've come the live. The signs are simple: I return to square-1, reading Illusions, Siddhartha, and Round the Bend. I'm currently devouring RtB, and annotating a copy of Siddartha as a Christmas gift. I think I'm going to add The Alchemist, Beyond Civilization and The Element to this list.
My usual order of operatons is, I realize I'm no longer practicing, I read those books to get pumped up, and then I dash the whole house of cards I've built. But now I've added as a feather to my cap the Jenny Owen Youngs line, "Building is better but breaking is easy." I've compromised myself, and buried myself under a house of cards, but I like where I am, and who I'm with, and really all I don't like is myself. So that's my next big adventure: Do I Have What It Takes To Live Here Without Fear?
I hope so...
