Don't try this at home.

So, I was flipping through the channels on the "boob tube", and I came across Anthony Bourdain. (don't care if that is spelled right) For those of you who don't know, he travels the world, eating great food, drinking awesome wine and liquor, smoking unapologetically, swearing poetically, and having lots of rough gay sex. O.k, that last part is never depicted on his show..it's just something I know about Tony, also, he is a bit of a nudist... But I digress.
He was hanging out with the "Black Keys". About two weeks before  they became famous. What was interesting was how they insisted that their method of rising to the top was not something they would suggest.
Spending several years living in poverty and selling CD's out of a mini-van is not the way to go as far as they are concerned. They suggested winning "American Idol" and getting a free ride to the top.

This reminded me of my brother in law. This man is the only one of my wife's family I can tolerate. He doesn't fit in at all. He is the quintessential "mountain man", he bought a large swath of land, had a pile of kids and a horse of a wife. (ok, look, his wife's name is Gerri, she is a very good, hearty woman who also, sings like a fucking opera star, but is also like 6'2"... so "horse" is a term of endearment). He is dyslexic. So he never went to college. But he got a job with an engineering firm, then proved himself smart enough to actually get an engineering position. He dug a hole in the middle of his property and lined it with cinder block, then made a place for his family to live. It was a basement for the house he would build them on top while they lived in this ... hole. He made everything by hand... The house was so precise, and perfect, that it was actually air tight.
So, maybe some of you are wondering. What the problem is with a perfectly precise house? Well, here is the problem. When you run the clothes dryer, you suck air out of the house. That creates a vacuum. Which, then sucks sewer gas out of the toilet.
And there you go. I bet you didn't know that. But now, they have to open a window, even in the dead of winter, so they can dry clothes. I was sitting on the porch with my favorite relative brother in law. It was his porch that he had built with his bare hands. Sitting in the rocking chair that he had built with his his bare hands. And drinking his home made wine...... ok, look. Home made wine from a Kentucky mountain man who has a horse barn is the absolutely WORST wine that you will ever drink.. I mean.....OMFG!!! Really, if you go to like, Wallgreens and pick out a $5 wine thinking..shit, it won't take me an hour to down this rot gut... it's 100 times better than mountain man wine.
But I digress. The fact is that he admitted that if he had it to all over again... he would have just bought a double wide and bricked it in. (those of you city dwellers might not know the phrase "double wide"..it's a trailer that is double)
And there you go.
I had my own business. I was a driver contractor for FedEx. It was hugely stressful. It just about drove me nuts. I would never suggest that to any one.
And that is the point.
No one who does anything hard suggests that you do that. it's way too hard.And there are so many easier ways to go through life. But actually, there is a reason people do things the hard way.
It's the Journey that makes your life so much more richer. It's the experience that gives you that look... that been there, done that... look. That feeling, that confidence that comes with trial by fire that really makes a life. Dive in. Learn to fly on your way down. Jump at the chance. You have 80 years to get it all in... that is not enough.
Tonight, slavegirl gets the leash... she is on top, she controls the night. She is the master of her own destination.
Don't try this at home....unless you really want to.