How To Escape A Drama-Filled Society

Living in a drama-filled society can be exhausting and draining for anyone. It’s no secret that drama often causes unnecessary stress, anxiety, confusion, distraction and it can be difficult to escape. But not impossible. There are a few steps you can take to remove yourself from the morass of drama and create a more peaceful, stress-free life.

Identify the sources of drama:
The first step in escaping the drama of your society is to identify its sources. It may be certain friends, family members, or co-workers who create drama. Alternatively, it could be social media or news outlets that stir up emotions and create angst. When you identify the causes of drama, it’s easier to avoid them.
Limit your exposure to drama:
Now that you’ve identified the sources of drama, take steps to limit your exposure to them. For example, if you have a mentally unstable sister who constantly involves herself in your drama thus creating even more drama for yourself, you may need to distance yourself from her or set solid boundaries. Similarly, if social media causes negative emotions or triggers drama, delete the app or take a few days off.
Surround yourself with positivity:
To counteract the negativity and drama of your society, focus on surrounding yourself with positive people who bring you joy and make you feel good about yourself. I realize that positive people can be superficial and dull. This may mean eliminating friends who don’t share your values and interests or making time for self-care activities that lift your mood and counteract all the soul-destroying drama.
Practice mindfulness and self-care:
Mindfulness practices such as meditation and deep breathing can be helpful in reducing stress and anxiety. Self-care activities like taking a hot bath, reading a book, journaling, stretching, cleaning, listening to music, being naked with another human, hanging-out/doing nothing or going for a ponderous walk can also help reduce the impact of deadening drama on your life.
Focus on what you can control:
Finally, remember that while you can’t control the drama in your society, you can control your reactions to it. You may feel like being distracted from everything but focus on the things you can control, such as how much time and energy you devote to drama, and let go of things you cannot control. By taking ownership of your own life, you’ll reduce the impact of drama and create a more peaceful and interesting existence.

Escaping the drama of society takes effort, diligence and discipline but it’s worth it to create a more fulfilling and stress-free existence. By identifying the sources of drama, limiting your exposure to them, surrounding yourself with positivity (that is not superficial or dull), practicing mindfulness and self-care, and focusing on what you can control, you can escape the drama and create a more relaxed living situation for yourself.

The Smilist

I have decided that my form of protest is smiling. I have always wanted to be more of a social activist but have just never been one to involve myself in large causes. I seem to stray away from any kind of cause that can not immediately have an effect on the thing I am trying to change. Maybe this is why I have always enjoyed protest as a solo act. Throughout my life I have done this in many ways- being a vegan, holding a protest sign on the side of a busy road day after day, spending my days reading novels, making art, spending the afternoon walking around when I should be working, turning American flags upside down and now I am smiling.

For the past few years I have been observing other people’s faces. I look at their faces while they walk down the street, sit at bus stops or drive their cars. One phenomenon that I have noticed is that the great majority of people have what look like grimace on their faces. The opposite of smiles. In the past year I have noticed that the sides of people’s lips have begun to droop even further downwards indicating a feeling of defeat and distress. Brows have become chronically furrowed and more and more people have wave-like distress lines on their foreheads. I began to feel that the smile was becoming in danger of extinction. As a result, one morning many weeks ago, I spent hours practicing my smile in my bathroom mirror. I also had unconsciously developed a chronic grimace and it was tiring to keep the sides of my lips and cheeks in an upright position. I had to retrain myself to smile by holding a smile for as long as I could and repeating the mantra “life is good” over and over. After a few days of practice I was able to keep a smile on my face all day long.

Every time that I leave my house I am actively smiling. I smile at whomever I pass by. I smile when I walk, talk and browse in the supermarket. I am making a conscious effort to look strangers in the eye and smile. Some people seem to appreciate this and reflect a shy smile back at me. Most other people seem to be put off by my smile and tell me this by looking the other way. I suppose unhappiness gets really comfortable after awhile and the sight of a person smiling at you may be too much to handle. I am compassionate about this so I do not take other people’s dismissiveness personally. What I do take personally is the people who seem to enjoy trying to wipe the smile right off my face.

There are always those few people who are so unhappy and miserable inside that they want the rest of the world to feel this way also. As a person who is making the conscious effort to save the smile from extinction I try to continue to smile at a person even when they are calling me “gay,” “idiot,” or any other derogatory term I have heard shouted my way. There have been a few men who have tried to physically attack me when I smiled at them- I assume this was because they are insecure in their own sexuality and assumed I was coming on to them. The other day I was run out of a record store because a large man with tattoos was threatening to cut my balls off because I was smiling at him. I admit, maybe I was partially to blame for this. The tattooed man looked so deeply angry that I had to smile at him a little bit longer than I should have.

I have heard it said that smiling is contagious but what I have found to be true is the opposite. Smiling can also be offensive. Maybe it is because we are living in a time where people are so stressed, over worked and worried about money that smiling represents a kind of mockery of the average Americans situation. People in America are really suffering at the moment and smiling as a result is not in fashion. I have found that to fit in you have to frown, or smile just a little bit. The person who decides to walk down a city street with a big smile on their face is considered to either be mentally ill or unstable in some sort of way. When I walk through the town where I live I am continually hearing names hurled at me from passing car windows. What I have heard most often as of late is “there is that smilist again.”

So be it.

Maybe I am the idiot but it is my belief that we create our reality from the inside out. There are things that happen to us that are beyond our control, but we do have control over how we choose to think about these experiences. If a person decides to shout a negative name at me, or be disrespectful towards me because I am smiling it is my choice whether or not I allow myself to get mad or just let it go and keep smiling. As far as I am concerned- if each individual does not take responsibility for his or her own inner well being, then the smile is doomed to become extinct. For now I will keep working to keep the smile alive. I will walk, drive, sleep with a smile on my face despite the danger that this seems to be putting me in. When others try to bring me down I will continue to smile. If they want to shout “smilist” from their car windows at me, then I will smile more. Please, if you can- join me and start smiling. Life is better this way.

The Prostitute and I

Two blocks from where I live there is a prostitute who spends her afternoons standing on a busy street corner. I noticed her when I first moved into my suburban neighborhood. I thought it was strange that a woman dressed in a tight mini skirt would stand in the same place, every day for an entire afternoon. Every time I drove past that street corner I would check and see if she was there. I was not doing this because I desired this woman and wanted to have a sexual experience with her. No, I was not attracted to her at all. From an objective perspective there was little to be attracted to. I was interested in this prostitute because I thought it was very odd that there would be a prostitute standing on a street corner in the middle of a middle class suburban neighborhood. I had lived in the ghetto of Oakland, California for a long time. Seeing prostitutes there was as familiar to me as seeing bullets flying in the sky. It was a daily occurrence. But in this Los Angeles suburb, she was the first and only prostitute I ever saw. She had my full attention.

A month after my wife and I moved into our new home we bought a German shepherd. I started walking my dog everyday past the street corner where the prostitute stood. Sometimes she would not be there but most of the time she was standing there, waiting. Toyota Priuses, Jettas, Ford mini vans and various other symbols of the middle class on wheels would drive past pretending not to notice that there was a prostitute standing on a middle class street corner. A block away was a school. Across the street was a Starbucks. Was I the only one that found it so strange that there was a prostitute hanging out there? I became obsessed. I started walking my dog twice a day. I would sit on a bench across the street from her and observe. Even my dog knew that something strange was going on across the street.

She would wave at cars with single men in them. Often times these men would look shocked. They were either young men driving there parents car who had yet to experience the sexual transgression of being with a prostitute or they were middle aged men who had been locked up in an office someplace and were utterly startled to notice that a middle aged woman on a street corner was waving at them. Rarely did any of these men stop and pick her up. She looked treacherous and scarred by an unfair life. There was something frightening about her. But occasionally a man would slam on his breaks and make a hand motion for her to get in the car. She would run up to the passenger side car window, bend down to check the man out and then jump into the car with the fluidity of a gust of wind.

If it was raining out she would be standing on the street corner dressed in a shabby raincoat and holding a cheap umbrella. Her long grayish red strands of hair would stick out of what looked like a hand knitted ski hat with flower patterns. On the days that the sun would be out, her long hair would blow freely in the afternoon breeze created by all the passing middle class cars. She would wear a black min-skirt with some kind of shirt that would almost always reveal her aging stomach. I could see some sort of piercing on her belly button and I also noticed a tattoo that ran down the side of her legs and into the blue high heel shoes that she was always wearing.

After a month of observing the prostitute I decided to confront her. I was so fascinated by the life that she seemed to be living. I made up all kinds of stories about her. Was she a middle class homeowner who had lost her home in the great recession? Did she have a family? What she was doing for work was so outside of the middle class norm that gradually ate away at the souls of almost everyone that I lived around. I have always had a certain fascination with deviants and those who decide to live way outside of the norm, I just never thought I would become fascinated with a prostitute that was working on a street corner two blocks down from where I lived.

The first time that I approached the prostitute I remember having the thought that it was life, not drugs that had worn her out. She did not have that familiar drug abused gauntness in her face that most aging drug addicts display. Her skin and eyes looked hydrated and unravished by any kind of drug addiction. There were no dilated pupils or bags under her eyes, just a sadness that tried to hide the fact that she had fallen upon difficult times. Before I could say anything to her she shouted, “please keep your dog away from me! I am terrified of dogs!” I apologized and told her that my dog did not have a mean bone in her body. “But she is a German shepherd. Those dogs are viscous,” she pleaded. “That is a huge misconception. They are trained to be viscous but naturally they are one of the sweetest breeds of dogs,” I said. She looked at my dog as if she was thinking about what she should do next. She was in a contemplative kind of deliberation. I heard a car horn. She looked up to wave and then looked back down at the dog. “Ok,” she said. “What the hell, but hold on to her tight.”

After the initial cautious greeting, the prostitute and my dog were like close friends. Before I even had a chance to introduce myself, the prostitute was crouching down hugging my dog and enjoying the disgusting privilege of being licked by a dog that is obsessive compulsive about cleaning her own private parts. She hugged my dog and rubbed her face in my dog’s furry neck. It was as if this was the first time in a long time that the prostitute had given or received love. I watched the prostitute and my dog exchange loving gestures in the same way that you may watch a person getting the help that they are in desperate need of. After a few minutes of this the prostitute stood up, looked at me and said, “so what is with the fascination, huh?”

I was surprised and caught off guard. What did she mean by fascination? I was silent and noticed myself stepping away from her. The prostitute then smiled and said, “what took you so long?” “What took me so long?” I replied. “Yeah, I have noticed you sitting over there across the street for more than a month now. Seems like you just sit there and watch me.” How could I be so inept to not think she would notice me sitting on the bench across the street? At first I thought about denying it but then I realized this would be like denying the obvious. Only unstable people do this sort of thing. And even though I had spent the past month obsessing about a prostitute on a street corner- I was not unstable. So I looked her in the eyes and said……….nothing.

“Look honey, you do not have to be shy. Wanting to get off is a natural human impulse. So what, you want to get off with no strings attached. Big deal. I know what it is like to be shy and all, but let me promise you that once you break through your shyness you will feel like you parted the waters of the Dead Sea.” The prostitute said this to me with a promiscuous smile that revealed a need for some dental work. I giggled a bit and to be honest, it took me a second to realize what was going on. The prostitute was thinking that I wanted to hire her for a sexual experience but could not get up the nerve, so I sat on the bench across the street too afraid to approach her! “And honey your dog, well you do not need to bring her for protection. I got all the protection you’ll need in my purse.” Then she laughed.

You know what they say about finding yourself stiff and unable to articulate words when you are in a moment of shock? Well that is what happened to me. Every nerve in my vocal cords wanted to tell her that I was not interested in her in that way but it was as if someone had put a tight sheet of plastic, saran wrap or wax paper over my face and I was desperately trying to break through. You got it all wrong lady, I kept thinking to myself but for some ridiculous reason (the answer of which can probably be found in my childhood), I was unable to talk. It was at that moment that a black Toyota Prius pulled up to the curb. A white balding man in a white collard shirt rolled down the window and said, “it is four o’clock baby.” The prostitute turned towards the man in the car and said, “I’ll be right there.” She then turned to me and said, “look I got to go honey, but come find me tomorrow and I’ll show you what all that shyness has been cheating you out of.” She then bent down and gave my dog another love starved hug and then disappeared into the black Prius.

I stood there on that corner with my dog sitting by my side. I watched the black Prius get smaller and smaller in the distance. I felt like a failure for not having had the courage to tell her that she was all wrong about what she was thinking about me. I did not want the prostitute to think that I wanted her services, because then I would never be able to come observe her again. I really wanted to ask her why she was standing on this particular street corner, day after day, but I was unable to get a single word out. My month long stretch of curiosity had resulted in nothing but shame and embarrassment. I stood on that corner until the sun fell behind the busy Starbucks across the street. My dog did not put up too much of a fuss about standing there with me. It was as if she knew that I needed some time to myself. I stood there on that corner and watched the cars pass by. I imagined what it would be like to be her standing in that very spot. I noticed all the men who were driving in their cars alone as they passed by. I felt the breeze created by the numerous passing cars blowing my hair.

When I finally returned home that evening my wife confronted me and said, “where have you been?” I took the dog off the leash and opened the back door for her to go run around in the yard. I looked at my wife and did not know what to say.

Interview #5: Difficult Parents, Anger Towards a Father, Economic Woe and the American Dream.

I am seated at my kitchen table. It is a round vintage table from the 1950’s. I spent a lot of money on this table and every time I see it I think about that. It is 9:49am and I am dressed in a t-shirt, sweat pants, slippers and I have a blanket draped over my shoulders. My hair is a mess, my eyes are swollen, I feel lethargic and bleak and I did not even drink alcohol last night (I did have a pint in the afternoon). My wife just walked into the kitchen and asked me if I was “filled with the love of the universe.” I replied, “No I am filled with the dread and worry of the American dream.” Not so sure where that answer came from. I am about to eat a muffin and drink some green tea as this interview begins.

Interviewer: Good morning Randall.

Randall: Good morning.

Interviewer: Good morning.

Randall: Good morning.

Interviewer: Look I just want to apologize if you feel that the last few interviews have not gone so smoothly.

Randall: I appreciate your apology. I’m not feeling hung up about it at the moment. It is in the past.

Interviewer: Good I am glad to hear that. I will do what I can to make sure that this and following interviews are much more pleasant for the both of us.

Randall: Sounds good to me.

Interviewer: How are you feeling this morning?

Randall: I am ok but I suppose a bit grumpy. I did my thirty minute morning meditation and my mind was racing with all kinds of thoughts.

Interviewer: What kind of thoughts?

Randall: Well thoughts about my anger towards my parents, thoughts about my childhood and how much I have aged, thoughts about all the bills and economic worries I have, thoughts about my difficulty breathing in the mornings- all kinds of thoughts.

Interviewer: Do you mind if I delve a little deeper about some of these thoughts that you speak of.

Randall: Sure.

[Randall eats his muffin and sips his green tea]

Interviewer: Do you still feel like you have a lot of anger towards your parents?

Randall: I do not know if it is a lot but it is in there and it comes up at various times. The anger that comes up seems to be more directed at my father.

Interviewer: And what are you angry with your father about?

Randall: It is hard for me to fully understand but I think I am angry at the way he has treated me all of my life. For me he was a monster while I was growing up and still to this day he gives me the creeps. I do not trust him and I never know if he is really trying hard to be nice to me or if it is an act. I am often very uncomfortable with my relationship with my father. I have all these past resentments that I feel never get resolved and I have current resentments towards how he shows up in my life even though I really don’t want him to show up anymore.

Interviewer: How does he show up in your life?

Randall: To be honest he plays a small roll. If I really need it he will throw money my way, I get a phone call once or twice every two weeks from him, which I admit I try and avoid. When we talk it is very superficial, uncomfortable and we both try and pretend like everything is ok. I know he is making an effort to be nicer, to be a better father but the problem is that I don’t feel like he takes much responsibility for what he has done to me nor does he acknowledge the pain that I live with that is a direct result of our relationship.

Interviewer: I also know that you are angry at him about money issues. Is this still true?

Randall: It is, as much as I would like to admit that it is not. I do feel that he is very greedy and selfish with his money and am resentful that he does not help me out more economically. You and I both know that I have a lot of worry about money. A lot of my self-worth issues revolve around money (I can thank my parents for this). I currently have a lot of economic worries and wish that he would help me out more instead of build his mansions in Idaho and take long vacations in China. I feel that some of that money can be put to better use (his children’s well-being) but this is not my parents priority. They feel that we should make it on our own, work hard and that economic struggle is a good thing. I think deep down they believe that if you do not work hard enough you are going to struggle economically. In their mind it all boils down to- I have earned my economic struggle because I don’t work hard enough. I don’t slave away at a job, so I have earned my economic struggle. My dad is a republican- what did expect?

Interviewer: But you also know that it is not a good idea for you to take money from your father. That taking his money in the long run can make your life much more stressful, unhealthy and it is not good for both of your relationship.

Randall: Yes, I am aware of this. I suppose I am resentful that my parents have allowed for money to become such a big issue between us. It just should not be that way. Money is there to make life easier not more difficult.

Interviewer: It seems to me that you are a bit confused by exactly why you are resentful or angry towards your father.

Randall: Hmmm. I suppose so. I suppose there is so much water under the bridge that it is challenging to sort it all out. Fundamentally I am resentful about the fact that he does not love me the way that I need to be loved, he does not meet my needs for trust, authenticity, safety, care. Ultimately he has made my life much more difficult than it has needed to be and I am resentful towards him for this. But I am an adult now and I am trying hard to let all of this go. To become independent of him and all the emotional garbage I carry around. I feel this will be a lifelong process.

Interviewer: Yes it will.

Randall: Yes.

Interviewer: Well this brings me to wanting to know more about your economic worries. Can you tell me a bit about this?

Randall: Well this is complicated also. One thing that I have learned about myself is that when I have more money I feel much more confident and good about myself. When I sink below the economic worry line and start to feel like I do not have enough money and then feel like I need to rely on others for financial help I no longer feel so good about myself.

Interviewer: What do you feel like when you are in this economic red zone?

Randall: I feel like a failure. I feel embarrassed. I feel stuck. I feel like a loss of independence.

Interviewer: I see. This loss of independence must feel terrible.

Randall: It does. I also feel like others judge me because I am 41 and not in a position in life where I am making a lot of money.

Interviewer: Hmmm. I understand this.

Randall: Yeah.

Interviewer: But you have a nice life. You have your own house filled with beautiful furniture and a remarkable backyard. You have a wife who has a good amount of money and is willing to help you out. You have a beautiful dog, a nice car, a painting studio, computers, a refrigerator filled with delicious food- you really have it all.

Randall: Yeah in a sense I do and I appreciate you focusing my attention on these things but I suppose I am someone who looks at the glass as half empty. All these things that I own I can barely afford. I have never had more bills than I have at the moment. I also have financial aid loans that are over $80,000. My employment is not bringing in any money at the moment and I really have no idea how the hell I am going to afford my current lifestyle. All the good things that I have in my life just do not feel like enough to assuage my economic worry. What if I have car trouble or my dog gets ill? I have no idea how I am going to afford these things and that worries me. How am I going to pay my bills and have enough money to live? It is thoughts like these that run through my mind and yeah I am resentful that my parents are traveling around China in luxury when they could be doing more to help me out of this financial worry.

Interviewer: Yeah but you understand that you are trying to become independent from your parents, to separate yourself emotionally from them and if you take money from them it is damaging to you on so many levels.

Randall: I know. I know but why do they have to be so fucked up around money?

Interviewer: The American dream does this to the best of us.

Randall: (silence)

Interviewer: Look, it is just the way it is. It is not that they are bad people- it is just what they have learned from their parents and it is who they are. You need to accept that they are not going to change. They have their karma to live out and you have yours. Don’t allow their karma to mess up your karma more than it already has.

Randall: I am working on this. Do you know that when I got married my wife’s parents spent way over 40 grand on the wedding and my parents gave no more than a thousand dollars towards our wedding?

Interviewer: Be happy they gave anything at all.

Randall: I know but it just does not sit well with me. If they had no money it would not bother me but because they have so much and give so little it just feels selfish.

Interviewer: I understand but don’t let their negative karma become yours. You need to find ways to let go of your anger and resentment towards your parents before it corrupts any more of your life.

Randall: Yeah I know. I am working on it. I have been working on it for years. I try to be kind to my parents, be there for them and be a good son- but it is tough when I have all this rage towards them. I know I need to let it all go and trust that if I do let go- things will work out. It helps talking with you about all of this.

Interviewer: Good I am glad it helps. I am glad that you trust me enough to be so honest and open with me. It always amazes me just how much power a parent has over the life of their children. Unfortunately most parents are not aware of how their behavior affects their children and as a result generation after generation passes down these emotional wounds. You can look at it as a kind of inheritance.

Randall: That is a bleak thought.

Interviewer: I know but the only way to disown your negative emotional and psychological inheritance is to distance yourself emotionally and financially as much as you can from your parents and also to continue to work on yourself and cultivate the qualities you needed from your father and mother but never got. Be generous, be honest, be loving, be kind, be grateful.

Randall: Yes. Thank you for the reminder.

Interviewer: Not a problem. I think that pretty much wraps up our interview for now. I know it was a rather serious interview but I hope it was helpful.

Randall: It was. I enjoyed this interview much more than the last two.

Interviewer: Good I am glad. Well have a pleasant, worry free day and go get dressed. You look terrible.

Randall: (giggling) I will.

At the End of a Rainbow (re-post, gosh I love this one)

Ever wonder if there is really a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow?

It had been raining for a week straight. Streets had become shallow rivers and plants were drowning in excess water. A dusty shade of gray had colored the sky until yesterday and then the clouds decided to break. I was sitting at my desk trying to keep my mind off the dismal weather outside. A pen drawing of a nude woman sat unfinished on my desk for hours because I was having difficulty staying interested in it. I had the radio on and repeatedly looked up from the drawing and stared out the window. I watched the slight drizzle and my aching eyes took delight in the birds sliding across the wet sky. Then it happened. The sun began cracking through the gray colored sky and off to my right I noticed something that I was not used to seeing through my window. What was taking shape right before my tired eyes was the birth of the most incandescent rainbow I had ever seen.

The colors of the rainbow began to form gradually and then grew into bright vibrating hues of red, yellow, blue, green and violet. I sat mesmerized at my desk watching this creation of nature unfold in front of me. For a moment I was reminded of the rainbow flag that was used in the German peasants war in the 16th century as a sign of a new era, of hope and change. So much awe overcame me that I had to go outside and watch the birth of this rainbow without the obstruction of a window. I noticed other residents of my neighborhood coming outside their homes and observing the same thing that was mesmerizing me. Bicyclists, dog walkers and joggers all stopped to watch the uncanny sight. The luminous rainbow covered the entire length of the city in which I live and owned the sky like a majestic doorway into some unknown place.

After ten minutes or so of staring at the rainbow, I slowly lost interest and decided to come back inside and finish my nude drawing. Even though what I should have been doing was spending my day looking for a job, I am a master procrastinator who will find the most obscure ways to distract myself from what really needs to get done. As I worked on the women’s hips the idea that there is a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow, popped into my mind. As a child my mother, my grandmother, a baby sitter and several of my teachers had often told me this but as I grew older other adults told me this idea was just a myth or a superstition. I believed these adults without ever really checking for myself to see if they were right or wrong. Now I was in a different predicament. I was a thirty-eight-year-old man, a victim of the great recession who was out of work and unable to pay next months rent if I did not find some money fast. When the thought occurred to me that I should go check and see if there really was a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow– I said to myself “what the hell- I got nothing to lose.”

I am an average, lower middle-class man. I am a dull man with very few friends. A man who would rather not work and be left alone so I can read books, draw and roam around town. When I found myself putting on warm clothes to go on a long journey in the cold and emptying out my backpack to take with me (just in case I did find gold) the thought did occur to me that maybe I had lost my mind. “Maybe I already lost my sanity months ago and this is the real reason why I am broke and having a hard time finding a job?” I thought to myself. I tried not to listen to this judgmental voice of mine and just focused my attention on what I remember my grandmother saying to me many years ago when she showed me my first rainbow. “The end of the rainbow is further way than you think, but if you keep on walking really far you will be rewarded by finding the most beautiful pot of gold right where all those brilliant colors touch the ground,” she said to me.

It must have been below fifty degrees outside when I began my “end of the rainbow” search. I threw away the naked drawing I had been working on and fed the cat before I left. I had an empty backpack on my back, thick gloves on my hands, a wool hat covering my ears and the anticipation of an excited child inside my rapidly beating heart. As I walked I imagined to myself what my life could really be like if I found a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. I would be able to not only pay my rent next month but also never again have to spend sleepless nights terrified by what I was going to do if I ran out of money. I would not have to eat beans out of a can anymore or tell my wife that I cannot afford to meet her for lunch or dinner. No more frozen food. No more ripped socks and old underwear. No more jobs and bosses I cannot stand. No more suffocating anxiety every time I spend more than a dollar. If there is a pot of gold at the end of this rainbow, I told myself, I will be free.

These thoughts caused me to walk faster. I could feel anticipation in my feet. As I walked I noticed more people stopped in the streets, watching the rainbow in a state of awe. I however did not bother to look up. I had both my eyes set on one place, and one place only- where the colors of the rainbow touched the ground. My grandmother was not wrong when she told me that I would have to walk really far. The closer I thought I was getting to the end of the rainbow the further away that it seemed to be. When I finally felt as if I had reached the end- the rainbow moved a little further from me. After an hour or so of walking frantically I was exhausted but determined not to give up. The thought did not occur to me that the end of the rainbow could be an optical illusion, like a pool of water in the middle of a hot desert. Had that thought come into my mind- I may have given up.

One belief that I have never let go of is that all perseverance is rewarded in the end. It must be! With this belief buried deep in my heart I kept on walking towards the end of the rainbow no matter how many times it seemed to change directions. I walked off road and went through horse stables, ravines, cornfields and forest areas with thick overgrown shrubbery. I felt like a warrior on the war path when in reality I was just a man who really needed money.

As I walked out from a claustrophobic cornfield that threatened to burry me alive, I finally came upon the end of the rainbow. There it was before me touching down in the middle of a dirt field in the middle of nowhere. All around was nothing but miles and miles of wide-open farmland. The end of the rainbow was not more than half a mile away from me and without a moments hesitation I began to run across the field with the slow speed and tight muscles of someone who has not exercised in months. I was willing to die for what could be at the end of that rainbow. I felt terribly out of breath as I ran but I forced myself to run faster because I was afraid that the end of the rainbow would get away. But all my determination paid off, because right when I could run no more I stood directly in front of the radiant colors of refracted light. I had made it to the place where “the brilliant colors touch the ground.” But my grandmother failed to tell me about what would happen next.

It was not until I was finally able to catch my breath that I was able to see what was in front of me. A young woman, no older then twenty-six or twenty seven, was rainbow bathing in the nude in the center of the rainbow. It took me a moment to see whether or not what I was seeing was real or just the result of my exhausted mind. Sure enough, when she sat up and looked at me with a bright smile I could see that what I was seeing was not an illusion. She was lying on a red towel that had the word Hawaii all over it. She watched me as I watched her until I finally got the courage to say, “excuse me. Ah….I do not mean to bother you…. but did you by chance…. find a pot of gold in there?” I knew that what I was saying must have sounded ridiculous, a little insane but she did not laugh or seem in the slightest bit surprised by my question. She just stood up and said to me “why don’t you get undressed and come in here and see for yourself.”

I felt my throat tighten up. I was shocked. The young woman was too beautiful, so perfect in every way that I felt like something had to be wrong. Things like this just do not happen to me. I was much older than her and could not understand why she would want to see me naked. I was slightly embarrassed but again I reminded myself that I had nothing to lose. The young lady stood there in all her nudity, patiently waiting for me to make up my confused mind. I was still thinking about the pot of gold. I so badly wanted the money. Maybe it is hidden someplace in there, maybe she is hiding it, I thought to myself. So like any desperate person would do- I said what the hell, got undressed and walked into a rainbow. She reached out her hand for me and I walked in just as naked as the day I was born- except for my wedding ring and the backpack in my hand (just in case I was going to find the pot of gold).

I remember reading someplace that the ultraviolet light put off by rainbows was beneficial for skin cells and blood. The light was filled with vitamins D, K, E, C and numerous antioxidants. I was comforted by the thoughts of these health benefits (since I have been struggling with some health challenges) as the young woman held my hand and escorted me towards her Hawaii towel. One of the only things she said to me during our time together was “there is no need to talk. Just feel and allow yourself to let go.” When we sat down side by side on the towel I tried not to stare at her naked body. I could not tell what mesmerized me more- being besides an exquisite naked young lady or being inside a rainbow. I also could not tell if it was the warm rays of a rainbow heating up my body or if it was my nervousness that was making me warm. The young woman started to rub my back with the palm of her warm hand and then whispered into my ear “lay back, let go and feel.” It was at this moment that the thought- maybe she is an angel, ran through my mind.

I followed her directions since I was in no condition to argue. I was a little concerned about getting an erection but I took my mind of off any sexual thoughts by visualizing a pound of ground beef. She lay down besides me- so close that I could feel her skin breathing. Together we lied there, not saying anything to one another, just feeling the warmth of the rainbow. Slowly I felt my eyes close and my heart slow. For the first time in months I felt my mind become still and my body felt at ease. I was hovering someplace between bliss and relaxation, feeling the individual colors and mist of the rainbow nurturing my skin. I was not cold and there were no thoughts about needing money frantically swimming around in my mind. I could swear the sun was shinning and the sky was a brilliant shade of blue. I did not worry about anything. For the first time in months- I did not think about how I was going to find a job or what I was going to do. Everything seemed to become silent except the exquisite sounds of the vibrating rainbow. The last thing I remember saying was this is fantastic before I finally let go.

When I opened my eyes I was lying naked in the middle of dirt field. I did not know if an hour or days had passed. Cold rain was falling on my body and there was no longer even an inch of sun in the sky. I looked around and all I could see was miles and miles of farmland. Besides me was my empty backpack and a few feet from me were all of my clothes neatly folded and placed in a pile. The young girl was gone and so was the rainbow. I was shivering from the cold when I got up to put on my wet pants, shirt, sweater, and shoes. I looked around to see if anyone else had witnessed what had just happened. No one. I put on my wool hat, gloves and backpack and started walking out of the dirt field. I did not feel sad, frustrated or confused. In fact I did not feel any negative emotion at all. I simply felt each step I took and listened to the raindrops as they fell all around me with a deep sense of satisfaction. When I finally made it back to the road I turned around and looked at the field that I had been lying naked in. It was at that point that I thought to myself, so that is what they mean by a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. I smiled, took a deep breath and began my long journey home.

Ants In My Pants (A respost in memory of Renee Khan)

Outside my home, life is passing by. There are students on bikes with heavy backpacks filled with books. There are buses filled with pedestrians and cars filed with five-day-work-week commuters. Trucks, vans, government vehicles are all making their way through the intersection of life, that sits just outside my door. Inside my home, there are ants. Billions of ants that cannot be defeated no matter how hard I try. There are ants in the cupboard board, ants in the stove, ants in the bathtub, ants in the couch, ants in the bed and ants in my pants.

I have always been adamantly averse to killing any living thing. I preached to others the virtues of sparing a life- even if it was only a moth, mosquito, fly or spider. I have often heard myself compared to the Jains, who are members of an ancient Indian religion that prescribes a path of non-violence for all forms of living beings in this world. Whether you want to call it your karma or your luck I believed that if you took another living creatures life it would eventually reflect back upon your life in a negative way. Besides, I felt better when I let a fly, spider, mosquito or moth go free. I had the power to take its life but instead I made a more noble choice to let it be. Somehow this made me feel like I would be rewarded by the Gods who would appreciate me for all the lives that I had saved. Instead, what I have received for my virtuous acts is a home infested with little black ants.

I have been killing ants with the fervor of a Nazi. I have become convinced that all ants must die because they are polluting the sanctity of my home. Not only is it unhygienic to live in a home with billions of black ants but it is also one of the most frustrating annoyances to constantly find then running across your arms and legs, through your hair and sometimes into your eyes and mouth. I find ants in my food and between my toes. They have made their way into my books, into my pillows and onto my toothbrushes- they are polluting my entire life, so I had no choice but to induce a full-blown fight.

I spend hours a day waging war against these annoying creatures. The ones that I can see with my naked eye are only a half of the entire gang that is infesting my home. They lodge in the ceiling and underneath the house- but it is my hope that by killing all the ants that I can see I will send a loud message to the other ants that are below ground and in the roof of my house that I am not fucking around. I have spent over a hundred dollars on non-toxic ant spray, which I use excessively. I spray it like a hose, all through out the day, wherever I see ants congregating together. I whack them with brooms, flood them out with water, wipe them up with wet rags and have even thrown burning paper on a few. I like to watch them suffer, and when I am done with what can only be compared to waging genocide- I like to walk around and look at the piles and piles of dead ants. I know that this is a war that cannot be won- but at least I can do my part to get some sweet revenge.

This morning I had a job interview. I put on one of my favorite suits and made sure that I looked just right. I shaved, put gel in my hair (something I never do) and I must say that when I looked in the mirror I did not look like a man that was living with billions of ants. I looked affluent, in an educated kind of way. I looked like I had a bank account filled with money and expensive food in my tummy. Instead I was going to a low level interview as a copy editor for a company that I had never heard of. I probably did not need to get as dressed up as I was, but since my bank account is empty- I was desperate to make a good impression. I met with a group of corporate looking people who call themselves “the board.” They put me in a single chair in front of their elongated table, behind which they all sat staring at me. They asked me a series of ridiculous questions like “why do I feel like I am the best candidate for the job?” and “what about my editing abilities makes me an effective copy editor?” I certainly did not reveal to them that I am dyslexic and have a terrible time spelling correctly but I did talk at length about my love for reading and my years of experience working as a writer and a high school English teacher.

Everything was going well until what felt like small, brief pinching sensations in my crouch began making me feel very uncomfortable. I had been noticing all morning that I was itching myself more than normal but I just assumed that was because of the starched suit I was wearing. I crossed and uncrossed my legs trying to nullify the slight pain that was starting to make its way down my legs. While I tried to maintain my composure and talk about why I thought I was the best candidate for the job- the pinching sensation intensified. It felt like I was being bitten in the strangest way. The sensation proceeded to very slowly move all the way down to the bottom of my legs and when I looked down at my shoes I could not believe what I saw, ants! My heart raced, I twitched, scratched and began to sweat. I cannot imagine what “the board” must of thought of me- but I tried to appear as confident as I could. I am hoping that they assumed that it was nervousness that caused me to twist and turn in such strange ways.

When the interview had ended, I shook all their hands and walked as quickly as I could to the bathroom, where I proceeded to take off my pants, shirt, socks, tie and shoes. I stripped down into my underwear in a bathroom stall and with tissues I wiped off the dozens of ants that were on my pants, legs, and socks and inside my shoes. I cursed the little creatures to hell before I squashed them and I even shed a few tears out of frustration rather than sorrow. “Why me?” I muttered to myself, but abstained from saying it out loud. When the bathroom was vacant I went out to use the sink and ran soapy water all over my legs, feet and chest. After what felt like hours of sanitation– I got dressed and returned home. In my car I still felt itchy all over my legs, which I prayed not to be more ants. I looked down on the floor of my car and found dozens of ants there to.

It was at this point that I decided I had lost. I threw my hands up in the air and declared “surrender” out loud. The war could not be won. The more ants that I killed the more that they multiplied. Karma had fucked me and there was nothing that could be done. I had to drive home resigned to the fact that there were ants crawling all over my legs and there was nothing I could do about it. The sensation drove me mad but all I could do was drive and breathe. For months I have been trying to avoid calling an extermination company into my home but I have decided that it is the only thing that can be done to bring my wife and I some relief. When I arrived home I took off my suit and stripped down into the nude. I noticed dozens of ants crawling around on my legs and between my toes, on the bedroom floor and when I got into the shower there were more. Under the hot water I washed away whatever sins and ants were left upon my burning body. I rinsed myself down with patchouli soap and watched the ants helplessly get funneled down the drain. The phone rang and I did not care. I heard the message on my answering machine, which was turned up much to loud. “Hello, this is Wendy from the board whom you just interviewed with. Someone found socks and a tie in our bathroom and I am almost certain that they belong to you. If these are indeed yours could you please contact me as soon as possible, I will hold them for you just in case. Thank you.”

The Lentil Challenge

A few evenings ago my wife made a gigantic pot of lentil stew. We have both been very low on money and we were trying to find ways to save money. My wife had the idea of making a large pot of lentil stew that we could feed off of for days. Lunch and dinner for at least three days was the initial plan. My wife added potatoes, carrots, onions, cilantro, peppers and kale to the stew, which seemed to grow as it sat simmering on our electric stovetop. When my grandmother lived in Communist Russia and suffered through the food shortages and poverty that was an epidemic in the 1940’s and 50’s, her mother would make a massive pot of lentil stew to feed the whole family with for a week. Now that my wife and I are living through an economic crisis of equal proportion, we decided that it was a perfect time to use the recipe for this lentil stew that my grandmother gave to us on her deathbed.

As the lentil stew simmered on the stove I stood over it in the same way that a man would pray at a shrine. I had my eyes closed, hands clasped and I breathed deeply. I was reminded of a time when food was more plentiful and economic woes were no place to be found. Another way that my wife and I are trying to save money is by not using any heat in our house, so I also used the simmering stew as my heater. I would grab a book or a magazine and read by the stew. My grandmother’s recipe said that the stew had to simmer for eight hours and I spent every moment by its side. I read an article about the thousands of people who have lost their homes and gone bankrupt because of medical bills that they could not afford to pay. I read another article about how the richest Americans are living the high life, “rolling in economic prosperity” while 97 percent of Americans are in some way struggling economically. The article talked about how the main consensus amongst the wealthy is that they would like to see Julian Assange jailed or assassinated because he is exposing the lies and corruption of the American government, whose job it is to work for the rich. I read all of this as I hovered over the simmering lentil stew, longing for the time when it would be time to eat.

That night at dinner I consumed three bowls of lentil stew quicker than my dog plows through a bowl filled with kibble. My wife and I did not talk much since she has been struggling through a wintertime spell of depression. Since we are trying to save money we no longer buy much wine and beer. We go a few days a week without a drink but that night at dinner she nursed a glass filled with some whiskey that was donated to us by a friend who owns a successful restaurant in San Francisco. My wife is in her final year of graduate school and the stress of her program, and the worries that coagulate in her mind (worries about what she is going to do when she is done) sometimes cause her to become quieter than a silent film. When I got up from our small dinner table to get a fourth bowl of lentil stew my wife suddenly blurted out, “how many lentils can you eat?” I turned to her and said, “I am so hungry that I bet you I can eat more lentils than any other man in the world.” She chuckled and said “no way.” I reminded her that our economic woes have caused me to have to go days on end with very little food. “The recession may cause a lot of economic despair but it also creates a lot of hungry men,” I said with an upturned grin on my face. It was at this point that my wife lifted her wallowing head, pointed both her wide eyes in my direction and said, “I have a challenge for you.”

I have always loved a good challenge, especially in times of despair. Challenges distract my mind; take my consciousness to another level. The last good challenge that I had was a few years ago. A friend of mine bet me one hundred dollars that I could not walk in a straight line for one mile through downtown San Francisco. I took the challenge and with my friend following me I managed to walk in a straight line for more than three miles. I walked through stranger’s homes, through gas stations and office buildings. I had to walk through a police station and several restaurants, but somehow I managed to walk in a straight line through the heart of the city. Sitting at the dinner table with my fourth bowl of lentil stew in my hand, my wife challenged me to eat 5,000 lentils in one day. She told me that there where at least that many lentils in the stew that she made and she would give me until 7pm the following day to eat the lentils. “Do I need to count every lentil I eat?” I asked. “Duh,” she replied. “How else would I know if you ate 5,000 lentils?”

Since I myself am unemployed and on winter break from graduate school- I had nothing to do the following day. I woke early to prepare myself for the challenge. I boiled a pot of hot water on the stove to get warm and I then did thirty minutes of meditation, where I visualized myself winning the challenge. I saw myself jumping up and down after I ate the final lentil, a victorious smile upon my face. My wife would not be home that day but she told me that she trusted me enough to not lie about the amount of lentils that I ate. I may be a poor man but I am no liar, so I appreciated her faith in me not being a cheater. When I was done with my meditation I took the ten-pound pot of left over lentil stew, warmed it up on the stove and began to eat one lentil at a time. Each lentil I ate I counted out loud and every fiftieth lentil I would make a note of on a pad of paper.

I spent the afternoon in my kitchen. I was hovered over the simmering stew pulling lentil after lentil out of the pot. On the busy street outside of my house I could hear the sounds of cars, busses and people. I heard the mailman drop of the daily mail. The symphony of commerce and daily toil was in full swing as I sat in the solitude of my impoverished kitchen eating lentils. Every hour or so I had to take a break. I would go into my living room and stretch out on the fading green carpet that I inherited from my grandmother. I would lie on my back and remember a time in my youth when my days were filled with tennis lessons, private tutoring and three large meals a day. I remembered my heated bedroom, the white carpet that I would often lay down upon, the large swimming pool in my backyard and the feel of economic prosperity that ran through my childhood memories. “Now I am living in a cold house where I cannot afford to pay the heating bill. How things change overtime,” I thought to myself. Rain came down outside, I stared at the ceiling and tried to find a way to eat more than 5,000 lentils.

Psychologists often suggest that in times of distress the human mind distracts itself with the most superficial preoccupations. This is often referred to as the denial syndrome. The idea is that often the real reality of a person’s life is too large and troubling for the human mind to comprehend. So the mind has a built in mechanism, which allows it to focus on things that are not as threatening to its survival. I realize that spending my day focusing on eating 5,000 lentils was a way for me to avoid thinking about more pressing concerns. I had bill collectors I needed to call. I needed to contest inaccurate charges on a medical bill. I needed to look for a job and register for my next semester of classes. I also needed to clean out the birdcage, exercise, clean the bathroom and check in on my 90-year-old neighbor who spends her days staring at a blank wall. But I managed to avoid all of this and more by focusing all of my attention on getting that number 5,001 lentil into my mouth. I got my lanky body off the floor and continued to eat lentils.

Time has a way of passing without my awareness when I am deeply immersed in a task. When my wife came home at around 6pm it was already dark out. I had not noticed the transition from light to dark because my head was buried in a pot filled with lentil stew. I heard my wife complain about how cold and dark the house was and I answered by saying, “welcome to our America.” In my attempts to save money I insist upon keeping as many light off as possible and my wife does not like living in the dark. When she came into the kitchen she noticed that I was still dressed in the clothes that I slept in. She asked me how close I was to eating 5,000 lentils. As I put a lentil in my mouth and slowly chewed it- I pointed to the piece of paper that I was using to keep track of every lentil that I ate. She began to count up all of my markings and when she was done counting she let out a small, victorious laugh. “Ha!” she said. “You have only eaten 2, 203 lentils?” she asked. “If that is what it says than that is how many lentils I have eaten,” I replied. She came up close to me and said, “well your still my champion.” She grabbed my penis and then gave me a kiss on the cheek before walking away.

It was at that point I knew that I had lost the lentil challenge. I may be one of the hungriest men in the world- but there was no way that I was going to be able to eat 5,000 lentils. If it took me the whole day to eat 2,203 lentils then it would take me all night and some of the morning to reach 5,000 lentils. One of the virtues of growing older is that I have learned when to accept defeat. I believe that it was the essayist Montaigne who wrote, “a wise man is able to smile when they have lost and congratulate the victor.” I nodded my head and walked away from the pot of lentil stew. Slowly I walked to the bedroom where my wife was changing into several layers of thermal underwear, sweaters and socks. “It is going to be cold tonight,” she said as she slipped a sweater over her head. I swallowed and then suddenly felt sad that this had become my life. I never thought that things were going to turn out this way. “What’s wrong?” my wife asked as she put on gloves. “Nothing,” I replied with a superficial smile. She came up close to me and took my arms in her gloved hands. “You did the best you could sweetheart,” she said looking me in the eyes. I did not want to talk about it so I asked, “what’s for dinner?” My wife chuckled and as she walked past me towards the kitchen she said, “lentil stew.”

At The End Of A Rainbow

Ever wonder if there is really a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow?

It had been raining for a week straight. Streets had become shallow rivers and plants were drowning in excess water. A dusty shade of gray had colored in the sky until yesterday, when the clouds decided to break. I was sitting at my desk trying to keep my mind off the dismal weather outside. A pen drawing of a nude woman sat unfinished on my desk for hours because I was having difficulty staying interested in it. I had the radio on and repeatedly looked up from the drawing and stared out the window. I watched the rainfall and my spirit took delight in the birds that I saw sliding across the wet sky. Then it happened. The sun began cracking through the gray colored sky like an eye that was struggling to perceive the divine when off to my right I noticed something that I was not used to seeing through my window. What was taking shape right before my tired eyes- was the birth of the most resplendent rainbow I had ever seen.

The colors of the rainbow began to form gradually and then grew into bright vibrating hues of red, yellow, blue, green and violet. I sat mesmerized at my desk watching this creation of nature unfold in front of me. For a moment I was reminded of the rainbow flag that was used in the German Peasants war in the 16th century as a sign of a new era, of hope and change. So much awe overcame me that I had to go outside and watch the birth of this rainbow without the obstruction of a window. I noticed other residents of my neighborhood coming outside their homes and observing the same thing that was mesmerizing me. Bicyclists, dog walkers and joggers all stopped to watch the uncanny sight. The luminous rainbow covered the entire length of the city in which I live and owned the sky like a majestic doorway into some unknown place.

After ten minutes or so of staring at the rainbow, I slowly lost interest and decided to come back inside and finish the nude drawing. Even though what I should have been doing was spending my day looking for a job, I am a master procrastinator who will find the most obscure ways to distract myself from what really needs to get done. As I worked on the women’s hips the idea that there is a pot of gold at the end of every rainbow, popped into my mind. As a child my mother, my grandmother, a baby sitter and several of my teachers had often told me this but as I grew older other adults told me this idea was just a myth or a superstition. I believed these adults without ever really checking for myself to see if they were right or wrong. Now, however, I was in a different predicament. I was a thirty-eight-year-old man, a victim of the great recession who was out of work and unable to pay next months rent if I did not find some money fast. When the thought occurred to me that I should go check and see if there really was a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow– I said to myself “what the hell- I got nothing to lose.”

I am an average, lower middle-class man. I am a dull man with very few friends, who would rather not work be left alone so I can read books. When I found myself putting on warm clothes to go on a long journey in the cold and emptying out my backpack to take with me (just in case I did find gold) the thought did occur to me that maybe I had lost my mind. “Maybe I already lost my sanity months ago and this is the real reason why I am broke and having a hard time finding a job,” I thought to myself. I tried not to listen to this judgmental voice of mine and just focused my attention on what I remember my grandmother saying to me many years ago when she showed me my first rainbow. “The end of the rainbow is further way than you think, but if you keep on walking really far you will be rewarded by finding the most beautiful pot of gold right where all those brilliant colors touch the ground,” she said to me.

One belief that I have never let go of is that all perseverance is rewarded in the end. It must be! With this belief buried deep in my heart I kept on walking towards the end of the rainbow no matter how many times it seemed to shift. I walked off road and went through horse stables, ravines, cornfields and forest areas with thick overgrown shrubbery. I felt like a warrior on a mission that I would never surrender when in reality I was just a man who really needed money.

It was not until I was finally able to catch my breath that I was able to see what was in front of me. A young woman, no older the twenty-five, was rainbow bathing in the nude in the center of the rainbow. It took me a moment to see whether or not what I was seeing was real or just the result of an exhausted mind. Sure enough, when she sat up and looked at me with a bright smile I could see that what I was seeing was not an illusion. She was lying on a red towel that had the word “Hawaii” all over it. She watched me as I watched her until I finally got the courage to say to her, “excuse me. Ah….I do not mean to bother you…. but did you by chance…. find a pot of gold in there?” I knew that what I was saying must have sounded ridiculous, a little insane but she did not laugh or seem in the slightest bit surprised by my question. She just stood up and said to me “why don’t you get undressed and come in here and see.”

I felt my throat tighten up. I was shocked. The young woman was too beautiful, so perfect in every way that I felt like something had to be wrong. Things like this just do not happen to me. I was much older than her and could not understand why she would want to see me naked. I was slightly embarrassed but again I reminded myself that I had nothing to lose. The young lady stood there in all her nudity, patiently waiting for me to make up my confused mind. I was still thinking about the pot of gold. I so badly wanted the money. “Maybe it is hidden someplace in there, maybe she is hiding it,” I thought to myself. So like any desperate person would do- I said what the hell, got undressed and walked into a rainbow. She reached out her hand for me and I walked in just as naked as the day I was born- except for my wedding ring and the backpack in my hand (just in case I was going to find the pot of gold).

I remember reading someplace that the ultraviolet light put off by rainbows was beneficial for skin cells and blood. The light was filled with vitamins D, K, E, C and numerous antioxidants. I was comforted by the thoughts of these health benefits (since I have been struggling with some health challenges) as the young woman held my hand and escorted me towards her red towel. One of the only things she said to me during our time together was “there is no need to talk. Just feel and allow yourself to let go.” When we sat down side by side on the towel I tried not to stare at her naked body. I could not tell what mesmerized me more- being besides an exquisite naked young lady or being inside a rainbow. I also could not tell if it was the warm rays of a rainbow heating up my body or if it was my nervousness that was making me warm. The young woman started to rub my back with the palm of her warm hand and then whispered into my ear “lay back, let go and feel.” It was at this moment that the thought- “maybe she is an angel,” ran through my mind.

When I opened my eyes I was lying naked in the middle of dirt field. I did not know if an hour or days had passed. Cold rain was falling on my body and there was no longer any an inch of sun in the sky. I looked around and all I could see was miles and miles of farmland. Besides me was my empty backpack and a few feet from me were all of my clothes neatly folded and placed in a pile The young girl was gone and so was the rainbow. I was shivering from the cold when I got up to put on my wet pants, shirt, sweater, and shoes. I looked around me to see if anyone else had witnessed what had just happened. No one. I put on my wool hat, gloves and backpack and started walking out of the dirt field. I did not feel sad, frustrated or confused. In fact I did not feel any negative emotion at all. I simply felt each step I took and listened to the raindrops as they fell all around me with a deep sense of satisfaction. When I finally made it back to the road I turned around and looked at the field that I had been lying naked in. It was at that point that I thought to myself, “so that is what they mean by a pot of gold at the end of a rainbow.” I smiled, took a deep breath and began my long journey home.

Will Write For Food (Organic) Or Money.

What little money I once had seems to have dissolved with a speed that not even entropy could compete with. Now you may all be thinking that entropy is a slow and gradual process, but I would argue that this is true until you have reached the end. Then entropy feels is if it had taken no time at all to move towards an end (it is like how older people say “my life has passed so quick!”). I once had money, plenty of money- but now my bank account is a few dollars away from a negative balance and there is little relief in site. It all happened so quick.

I have never been a terribly ambitious man. I have lived my life with a certain contentment that has always worried my father and made me into a man with little accomplishments- if any. I have taken each day as a thing unto or into itself and worried little for another day which everyone has always told me will follow. I have kept to myself and cultivated my own rose garden but now in my 36th year of life it seems as if this rose garden is in jeopardy of complete destruction. I have not the money to afford the soil that I need to harvest my beautiful roses. Instead I have been using compost- and it is no longer seeming to do the trick.

Money has always been an issue in my life. My parents have always had lots of it and I have seemed to struggle with cents in comparison. I have been waiting for fame to strike like a desperate man who is watching a clock move at a speed, which seems to suggest that the clocks batteries are about to die. My financial woes have been comforted by a perpetual thought of impending fame, which so far has only been a gross delusion of my misguided mind. “Tomorrow,” my mind says- “you will write a novel or be discovered to play a role in a film that will abolish all of your financial burdens, so don’t worry about today- just drink a beer and relax.” It is as if my mind has made me believe that one morning I will wake up and wealth will be waiting for me upon my door step. All I have to do is sit back, relax and wait for it to appear.

Meanwhile my wife is in a state of perpetual frustration with me, my car is not working because of $1,500 dollars worth of work that needs to be done, the price of gas has gone up to $4.00 a gallon, the utilities bill is collecting spiderwebs, my rent check bounced, the minimum balance due on my credit card is $517.00 because of 17 late fees, the price of food is causing me to have to eat cheap processed food which is in turn affecting my health, my cat is eating a cheaper form of cat food which gives him bladder infections, I am depressed and underpaid at a job which I will not be able to keep because it is taking up to much of the time I need to be working at another job making a better income. I am finding it difficult to ask others for help (although I am going to write a letter to the President asking him if he can give me a job writing something for him) and I try to not think about my ailments by spending my time staring at a wall, drinking beer, watching pornography and reading books half way through and then putting them back upon the shelf.

I will write for food (preferably organic) or money. There is nothing that I will not write about nor do I care if my name is used. I will write and then you can use your name and I will not say a word to anyone about it. I have been practicing the craft of writing for years always knowing in the back of my mind that it is a trade that I could use if everything in my life went bad. Of course, at the time I thought that this would never happen because I was young, idealistic, stoned and certain of my greatness. Now I am older, pessimistic and swimming through my own personal recession, which seems to be slowly breaking down the structure of my life. These are desperate times, especially for a man such as myself who has little ambition to do anything and only wants to be able to say at the end of the day (with a copy of Mark Twain or Thoreau’s Walden in my hand) that I did the best I can to live my life as a free man. I am living in America in a time where truth seems to have been turned on its head and all citizens of this country are living inside an irony so great that it is swallowing everyone alive. So please remember- I will write for food or money. I can not spell very well but my hope is that you have enough money to not only afford me but also an editor.