Sometimes I wish I was the type of person who looked at each and everyday in life as a treasure hunt in the depths of the ocean of life. You read all the time about these people who say things like, “Treat everyday like its your last” or “Look at everyday as a clean slate where the sky is the limit.” I hear these things and I think to myself, man wouldn’t this be great?
Then my alarm goes off at 6:20 in the morning which prompts my right arm to seek out the damn wailing blackberry and snooze it 3 or 4 times before actually pulling my ass out of bed. The idea of waking up and treating a normal Wednesday like its an oyster with an undiscovered pearl flies out the door as I scratch my ass on my way to the bathroom, burn a few layers of skin off in the shower and search for clean underwear while watching Mornings on 2. Anyone who can find the pearl in riding on an overcrowded bus with at least 10 people in front of the yellow line has got to be considered for some type of new prize. Fuck Nobel, you try standing up close and personal with everyday work folk; legs, crotches and asses rubbing together while fresh armpits are exposed for all to pick out whether its Axe, Right Guard, or Secret pushing itself up their nostrils. God forbid someone let one rip while barreling down Union St, or even worse, while traveling up Union at the end of the day, when those same deodorants are fighting for first place in the long lasting category. Twelve hours of protection my ass, they’re all liars if you ask me. Take the 45 in San Francisco, and you become a connoisseur of scents while the normal 20 minute bus ride expands to about 40 minutes of “sorry if my bits are so close to your face every page you turn in that book you’re reading brings me closer to climax.”
I’ve searched every cube and office on our 2 and a quarter floors for that damn pearl as well. As the IT guy it gives me the perfect cover to say that I need to install some new software on a user’s computer or crawl under their desk to check wiring. I can be certain without a doubt that there are no pearls there either. There are other things though, like crumbs from lunches in keyboard cracks, finger lickin’ good grease on every key except maybe the Z, make-up buildup and earwax on phone earpieces, dried and flaked off skin scattered across the desk, popped zit stains and various smears all over monitors. Under desks I’ve seen car grease, mud, kitty liter, dog shit, spilled wine, clipped nails and beer stains. This elusive gem is not in the bathroom either, although the guy I seem to shit next to everyday probably isn’t convinced. The best thing about our shitting buddy relationship is that we both know the other washes their hands after doing our deeds, which is more than can be said for this nasty bunch of “professionals” I work with. Everyday can’t be a clean slate if you know that the guy whose computer you are working on doesn’t wash his hands after going poo.
Its hard to find that pearl in the mundane reality of the Monday thru Friday grind we all go through just to survive in this world. Is it really going to be in that copy job you did that took over an hour because for some reason the machine didn’t collate? Can you find it amongst the chicken scratch writing of the attorney you work for who needs to you type it out and file it in the next ten minutes? How many value meals does someone have sell in order to realize that streamers are not going to fall from the ceiling and Ronald McDeez is not going to come out and give you a 10 thousand dollar bonus just because you’re so keen at super sizing the meals for your clientele?
Maybe I’m looking in the wrong place. Maybe its not in the things you do on the daily, but rather in the things that get you through the day. Maybe it’s The Avalanches Since I Left You album playing on my way to work. Maybe its my morning latte, or the bowl of Life cereal I take for granted until I run out and have to buy more. Maybe its an email from my girlfriend telling me she misses me. Maybe its getting the chance to quote Ron Burgundy, Monty Python or the movie Clue during a work time conversation.
Its never just lemons you are handed, its stuffy disgusting bus rides, crusty keyboards, botched copy jobs, and unsanitary co-workers. Trying to make lemonade out of that is like shoving a bottle of rum and mint plant up my ass and hoping my breath smells like a mojito. Why search for just a pearl when there are so many other shiny gems to be had out there daily. That first sip from a can of Coke. Eating a warm krispy crème donut. Seeing someone get hit in the nuts on YouTube. Listening to a song over and over again because its that good. Right now mine is Reptilia. People limit themselves by searching for that one thing that makes them happy, when they should be enjoying all the other things that simply make them smile. I don’t think a clean slate or living each day like its your last has anything to do with it at all.
Mundane reality will always creep in to try and suck you down into a pit of misery, even if in the grand scheme of things your reality is not that bad. At least you’ve got a job to go to; and that bus ride, no matter how shitty, gets you there so you can survive another day. A friend told me a long time ago, “Don’t sweat the petty stuff, instead pet the sweaty stuff.” Now doesn’t that sound better than cleaning your slate or re-living your last day on earth or even searching for some tiny pearl in a bucket full of slimy oysters? Sure many times the petty crap in life gets on my nerves, but I’ll take the sweaty any day of the week.
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