"The Mav's Wisdom"

by John H.
2001.09.04

Once again its time for another installment of "John’s brain craps out insane ramblings". This week, we’ll diverge into the subject of change. An age-old topic, but it never seems to lose its relevance in our lives.

"Change is the only constant in our lives..." - The Maverick

As we all know, life is full of change, from the smallest thing, like McDonalds getting rid of the Styrofoam containers and putting everything in biodegradable, "environmentally safe" wax paper.  To the large things like Metallica breaking up, err.. I mean death.  Its true that death and what your Big Mac is wrapped in are on total opposite ends of the spectrum, but they do share one common trait, examples of change.

But for this week, we’ll concentrate on the changes that are hitting my reading demographic.  For most us recent college graduates, graduating seemed like the end of the world.  I felt the same way when they cancelled "Pee Wee’s Playhouse", betrayed.  I know from personal experience that graduating was one of the most mentally challenging times of my life.  It made me question my existence on this wretched planet.

Confronted with the whole challenge of getting a job and accepting my role in society. But not a day goes by that I don’t yearn for my couch from Good Will, a smoke and some sort of video game.  But alas I’ve accepted my role, and here I am.

Certain things I can accept, work and the whole responsibility deal.  Other things I can’t accept. Things that we may not notice, unless we really look inside ourselves.   Take a minute and think about who you were when you were in college.

Go ahead I’ll wait... (Cue Jeopardy music)

Ok, so we all have a mental picture of ourselves during those college years.  Now compare that some person’s ideals with those of the person reading this.  Ah ha... I see the light bulb going off.

For me, I was full of rebellion, angst, and the non-conformity.  I was never going to be a tool of "the Man". I was never going to buy into Corporate America’s dream to Marx-ize the world. And at times it has been a struggle not to lose myself in the day-to-day horse droppings of everyday life.  But I quickly realized that real life demands we sacrifice some of those ideals in order to "fit in" with the rest of the working stiffs.

That’s enough for this week.  Our time is up, so pick yourself off the leather couch and give the world a good swift kick in the nuts. It will make you feel a lot better, trust me.