The Worldwide Canvass

We went to another Los Angeles Angels game last night but I couldn’t concentrate. I kept seeing the Texas Holdem Bandit at every turn. I just pictured him coming after me. The Sox lost again. I felt Joe was disappointed but didn’t say anything. I wish I could be more like Joe and not worry so much about people trying to kill me because I am a witness. I told Joe to be careful. He promised that he would be. This morning, I went over to Donna’s house and picked up her Tazer. I told her about the Texas Holdem bandit being out of jail and she was glad to give it to me. I then went to the liquor store and talked to Don. I told him about the bandit escaping and he said he was ready. He pulled out a 22 from under the counter. “They’ll have to pry my gun out of my cold dead hand,” said Joe, a lifetime member of the NRA. I decided to get a bottle of Jack Daniels for my neighbor, Mike. Don looked at me with suspicion but I ignored him. Even if this was for me, I would deserve it. Armed with my tazer, I found myself looking over both shoulders as I walked out of the liquor store and heading back home. As I got out of the car, I walked towards the house and felt someone grab me from behind. It was the Texas Holdem Bandit. Before I could get out my tazer, I whirled around and hit him in the head with the $22 bottle of Jack Daniels. He was out cold. Once again, I was being hailed a hero for capturing a criminal.

The Goldcoast Chicago neighborhood is like the neighborhoods you’d see on TV. There’s huge high-rise buildings with doormen and great views of Lake Michigan. Everyone drives an expensive car and wears a nice suit while they work at a big, ultramodern office somewhere downtown. Except on TV, they try to pass this off as a typical neighborhood. Everyone who’s anyone lives in Goldcoast, but all the other neighborhoods look the same. The people living there just aren’t as cool. They don’t have overly complicated social lives where they’re in love with the boss’s wife whom they dated back in college but lost touch with for years and have been with their current girlfriend since that time who’s cheating on them with someone who might or might not be her half-brother. Neither of them knows for certain yet. The blood tests still need to come back, but it’s not looking good. They kind of look and sound alike and people on the street mistake them for brother and sister. It’s all so dramatic and really utterly pointless everyone’s life would be improved two hundred percent if they were all just honest with each other. But then there wouldn’t be any conflict and then there wouldn’t be a TV show.

My father likes to brag about the number of really awful jobs he’s had to work in his life. He also doesn’t hesitate to exaggerate about how awful the work conditions actually were. He loves telling people about wiping up blood and brains working as a janitor at a retirement community Decatur down in Georgia. Another job he had was as taxi cab driver up in Milwaukee, WI and how he always drove around the midgets when they had their annual convention up there. He claims to have been the doorman to a mafia boss’s business offices and used to see all these bad men, criminals, and killers and even cops and feds always walking in and out and he had to be polite to each and every single one of them. When my father starts talking about how the CIA recruited him to become an assassin, it’s time to excuse yourself to go to the kitchen and fix a sandwich because he’s just getting preposterous. I don’t know how much of what he says is true and what isn’t, but he acts like it’s all true and maybe it is to him. But it is to only him. That can get to be too much.

I dream of a life that I can love. I dream of living with the means that life gives me. I don’t want any more than what I need. I don’t need a big house or even a big family. I need my friends and what family I have and enough money to get me by. I don’t need a job that pays me a million dollars. I need enough money to pay my bills and have a little extra to enjoy with my family and friends. I guess I have all of this now. It takes time and patience to realize that you can still live life frugally and have fun on the side. Money is basically the root of evil. I watched a show on THS the other day about people who won the lottery and each and every one of them said that they would take back their old life any day over what they have now. One of the winners started up a Network Marketing firm, which is now one of the most successful firms in the US. The poor guy ended up dying alone, because his money meant more to him than the closeness and security that friends and family bring. He realized this in his final months, unable to turn back. This is why I say that I don’t need any more than what will get me though daily life. I may be looking at a few bumpy roads ahead, but at least I will have my family and friends to get me through them.

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