UPON PILLARS OF SALT AND PILLARS OF SAND: BUILDING A WONDERFUL LIFE

SARIM AT THE MALL

DAVID AT THE MALL

To build a life that matters, Emily Esfahani Smith writes that we need to be cognizant of the four pillars sustaining our day-to-day existence (The Power of Meaning, 2017).

The first pillar, Smith states, is that we need to feel a sense of BELONGING.

I’ve always felt a sense of belonging.  As a child I was always perched on the bluebird abilities branch in my elementary school classes.  Few of us flew high enough above our desks to be bluebirds.  Most others stayed in their nests as robins or sparrows.  Academically and chromatically divided, we brick-red breasted and blue-winged bluebirds were the brightest; the grey-brown and orange-breasted robins were the average; while the grey-brown sparrows were the dullest.  (I should mention that terms as brightest and dullest are not appropriate in Edu-Speak.) 

As an adolescent, being cool meant everything (school grades excluded).  Having all the eyes and ears of my imaginary audience as I swaggered up the sidewalk to our Chinese café was very cool. Cap-a-pie I had the Brylcreem (a little dab’ll do ya) hairdo, had my cool white shades, had my madras shirt, and my tight blue jeans, the pie complete with white socks and pointed shoes.  Having a lit Black Cat smoke lightly clenched between my teeth, the grey smoke encircling no doubt enhanced my coolness.  Coolness is what my buddies and I were all about as we pranced around our town in groovy adolescent costume.

These days my delusional self spends significant free time fraternizing with some local guitar-slingers.  These guitar guys and gals almost always join me on the Bushwakker Brew Pub stage winter, spring, summer, and autumn, for my regular and seasonal singer-songwriter gigs.

Smith suggests the second pillar to be to make time to find a PURPOSE. 

The purpose of all my life to date seems to be to gallivant.  I try not to waste a lot of time, but I do.  As my gig dates approach I practice, practice, practice, and right after each gig I wind down.  Factoid:  In wintertime, because I’m not a brutto-tempo busker, I portrait busk rather than guitar busk. 

Another factoid:  I seem to only thrum when I’m prepping for gigs.  One would think I would do my song writing in winter, but I don’t.  Most of my song writing is done whilst summertime busking.  (My consumers unwittingly pay me to write and practice my songs.)

My ideal purpose, in a most existential fashion, would be to exercise at my morning executive gym (Evolution Fitness) from 5:30 A.M. until 6:30 A.M. After this I would practice my didge; I mean, really, to be a planetary didge busker I need to practice, practice, and practice.   Early evenings I would continue to take Muay Thai classes.  (Being a planetary busker I can never have enough skill in self-defense tactics.)  Of course I would keep writing my soon-to-be bestseller novels.  And maintaining my hypnotherapy private practice would continue to be a treat, alongside wintertime gigs and summertime busks, betwixt my global adventures.

GETTING GIG READY AT THE VENUE

Pillar number three, according to Smith, is that we need to create for ourselves particular moments of  TRANSCENDENCE.  I’m thinking she means those Zen moments when I feel I’ve risen above the pedestrian hustle and bustle.  I’m getting there.  My dream of traveling to all of the 149 countries from which people have read my blog does offer transcendence to a degree.  So far I’ve been to United States, France, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, The Netherlands, Ireland, Germany, Morocco, and England.  (I’ve only 139 countries to go.)

Guitar busking I travel incognito.  My consumers, I think, imagine me to be the free spirited minstrel, that stranger who comes to town.  My consumers, I know, do not know that I represent middle-class America, that I sip Americanos every morning and bourbon every evening.  My consumers, I know, do not know that I am an easy-peasy debit card transaction from leaving the street to my luxury hotel room.  

Portrait busking I am still a box-office draw (pun intended) every time I complete one of my ten-minute on-the-street sketches.  In those moments I feel above the pelotons.  This sense of superiority is enforced especially when the crowd gathers to watch me sketch.  Not-so-strangely, by first sketching my customer’s eyes I can determine right away whether this particular portrait is going to be a likeness.  If not, I edit and edit the eyes until I get that notion that this is a likeness.  Whether or not my consumer thinks there is a likeness is of little concern.  I know whether the portrait I draw resembles the person and sometimes I just have to agree with my friend and artist, Jack, who always states with conviction that, “People do not know what they look like.”

And the fourth and last of Smith’s pillars, is STORYTELLING.  Storytelling, I interpret as expressing one’s personal myth (projective psychology).  No problem here -- I’m a storyteller.  I’m the hero of every story I tell and I suffer from lookism.  I judge people by their looks.  Cap-a-pie I look at their hair, their face, their build.  I look at their headwear, their costume, and whether or not their shoes are shined.  (If their hooves are booted, they are definitely kindred spirits to me.)

William Glasser, the founder of Reality Therapy and Choice Theory, stated that everyone has a story to tell.  He was right, of course, but somewhat short.  Factoid:  Everyone has a sad story to tell.  As I fancy myself a genius among the pedestrians in my downtown neighborhood, I tend to compare myself to the downtown street people.  By street people I’m referring to those sidewalk wanderers, the pan-handlers, the cigarette butt pickers, and yes, the buskers. 

Reading the latest Your Brain magazine, on display until 1/12/18, Beethoven poured water all over himself while composing; Charles Dickens combed his hair hundreds of times in a day; Lucille Ball hoarded pencils; Albert Einstein picked cigarette butts off the street to stuff in his pipe.  These famous people behaved not unlike the street people to whom I’m referring in the previous paragraph.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

“And I discovered that my castles stand

Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand.” (COLDPLAY)

Marching in my CHAUCERIAN PARADE this week is my very best friend, COLBY WILLIAMS, professional hockey player for the HERSHEY BEARS.  Congratulations, Colby, for being voted the PLAYER OF THE MONTH, this October in the AMERICAN HOCKEY LEAGUE!