Discovering Your Dream Job

Every now and then you come across someone who is disturbingly balanced. You run into each other and you say the arbitrary “How are you,” and they reply “I’m really good,” and they mean it, I mean really truly mean it. 

What is the secret? 

After a series of questions and intense prying I usually find the most common factor being a true satisfaction with one’s career, or at least a credible pursuit towards the stated goal of a career.

For me, and many people like me, work is simply a means to earn money to then pay for distractions like drugs and alcohol to, help us forget about work. The idea of a meaningful career is foreign, nothing but the pursuit of yuppies and wannabe yuppie scum. The “balanced” types, the folks who say they are doing “really good” and mean it, have found careers where they not only work for money but also find the experience of work rewarding. Many times these careers involve helping other people by working in medicine, or community activism. Others get involved in education, working with youth, or the disabled and seniors. They put other people first while earning a paycheck, it’s odd.

While I’m not one to jump up and suddenly start helping perfect strangers who probably don’t deserve help, it does get me thinking: what kind of career would I want to pursue if I really gave a shit? The answer hit me a few weeks back when I was reading the paper.

Baseball star Ryan Braun was popped last month (along with a good number of other major league baseball players) for using performance enhancing drugs. He had his season with the Milwaukee Brewers cut short. I was reading the paper when I came across a “statement” he released regarding his suspension which reads as follows:

“As I have acknowledged in the past, I am not perfect. I realize now that I have made some mistakes. I am willing to accept the consequences of those actions. This situation has taken a toll on me and my entire family, and it is has been a distraction to my teammates and the Brewers organization. I am very grateful for the support I have received from players, ownership and the fans in Milwaukee and around the country. Finally, I wish to apologize to anyone I may have disappointed—all of the baseball fans especially those in Milwaukee, the great Brewers organization, and my teammates. I am glad to have this matter behind me once and for all, and I cannot wait to get back to the game I love.”

I enjoyed every sentence of this “statement”, a lesson in bold horse shit if ever there was one. We are to believe that Mr. Braun himself sat down and composed this “apology”? The same guy who rode the high horse and smirked after some jerk mishandled his urine last time Major League Baseball was looking to take him down? C’mon. Someone in an office somewhere was paid to sit at a desk and put this together, then distribute it to the masses while keeping a straight face. I realized while reading it that I would very much enjoy being that guy, the guy up in the office writing these statements. I wouldn't mind pursuing a career as a Celebrity Apologist (I guess that's what you call it).

This sort of work is fiction writing really, which I’m interested in, but it’s also skirting and ducking the real issues and covering those issues with dirt by “moving on”, which I find liberating. Even better, I think it's good to point the finger in another direction, throw up a "smoke screen" over the celebrity's wrong doing. I feel like these sort of things can be written for any infamous person, and with the right touch, can be effective. Here are a few samples of the public statements I would like to pen:

Anthony Weiner AKA Carlos Danger - Disgraced Politician

As I’m sure you can imagine, the day to day stresses of American politics can be taxing to the human psyche. It is only natural that a person be allowed to blow off steam. Without the cathartic release of negative energy and built up frustrations, a  man can go mad. When you have a powerful person, a person with real responsibilities, like myself, madness can cause damage to the people I represent and the very fabric of society itself. It is not safe.

I release my stresses by texting women pictures of my genitals. Others blow off steam by taking part in dog fighting or in doing drugs. Dog fighting is a terrible past time and meth is destroying entire rungs of our populations, I am against those. Sexting does not harm innocent animals. Stand with me now and stand up against dogfighting and meth. Thank you.

Alex Rodriguez - Another Disgraced Baseball Player

Before I am a baseball player or a multimillionaire, I am simply a man. A man like any other man, who ages over time and becomes only a husk of what he once was. With this ageing body I am asked to do the impossible: hit major league pitching. Could you hit a pitch thrown by a major leaguer? I doubt it. I can barely do it and I’m pumped up on Performance Enhancing Drugs.

Speaking of drugs that enhance your performance: what about Viagra? If I can’t take a drug to help me hit a ball then all you men out there who boo me from the stands can’t take a drug to hit your wife. You want to take my name off the record books, erase my accomplishments from history? Fine, go ahead. But check this out: if my home run doesn’t count -your wife’s orgasam doesn’t count.

Either way, I would like to apologize to all the baseball fans and everyone I have let down. Thank you.

Ariel Castro - Cleveland Kidnapper:

We all make mistakes. I made one when I kidnapped those young women and held them against their will. But let me ask you: what kind of a world do we live in? I see a world where every waking moment is filled with pornography, even in advertising, and I see myself simply as a product of that world, not the monster that the media makes me out to be. If I am only a reflection of our world than could my actions not be the world’s fault instead of my own personal mistakes? Something to think about.

Either way, I would like to apologize to everyone everywhere. Thank you.

08-12-13

Empty City

When he woke up, the man got out of bed and walked over to the window to listen. Something was amiss, definitely, he just couldn't quite put his finger on it. He skipped showering, put on his pants from the day before, and walked out into the hall. The neighbors weren't yelling or arguing or talking on their phones, there were no T.V.'s blaring, no stereo's rattling on, it didn't feel like his building.

He went out on the street and found it empty, then walked the three blocks to the foot bridge that went over the freeway. All eight lanes lay still, not a car in sight, which was so odd it took his senses a full minute  to process what he was seeing: clear tar, as far as the eye could see.

He didn't panic but walked from the freeway to Center Street where there were still no cars or people in sight.

"Hey!" he yelled. "Hello! Is anybody here?! Huh? What the hell!"

He screamed out the worst curse words he knew then stopped forming words and began just screaming nonsensical sounds at the top of his lungs. He did this until his throat burned and his voice grew hoarse and rough.

A skunk ran out of the Wienerschnitzel parking lot across the street to the bank parking lot opposite and the man was embarrassed that the skunk had witnessed his yelling.

"Hey! Skunky! Where is everybody huh?! You scare ‘em off buddy?"

The man laughed weakly. He wasn't ready to admit that the morning was making him anxious, that the emptiness was getting to him. He walked the streets until he came across the car lot with a Cadillac lined up with a few other beaters left for dead. He picked up piece of broken cement from the curb and threw it through the window of the lot’s trailer office. He found the Cadillac keys hanging on a hook with the others, went back out to the lot, and let himself into the car.

He tore up one street then down the other, hitting every curb on every turn. He pulled onto the sidewalk at one point and took out a table and chair posted in front of a deserted cafe. He finally got tired and ran into a flag pole where he left the car. He had nothing to do so he began the long walk home.

He was walking by a park when he noticed and old man sitting in the grass. The old man had a long beard dotted with dirt and he stank. There was a grocery cart parked in the grass next to him filled with junk. The younger man was going to ignore him until he realized the old man was a person and the only one he had seen that day.

“Hi, how are you?” the younger man called out and the old man looked up from the grass, seemingly surprised.

“What?” the old man said.

“Well, where is everybody? There’s nobody out anywhere. Did something happen?”

The old man shook his head grudgingly and said: “Burning Man, man.”

The younger man nodded. He had forgotten about Burning Man. He walked back to where he had crashed the Cadillac and tried to drive it back to the lot. It started okay but wouldn't reverse, so he left it, not knowing much about cars anyway. He went home instead and decided not to worry about it.