You can blame Lidian for this post. She's the one who made the comment in the previous post which made me want to talk about personality and life-purpose some more. (As if Google would see any authority in a link from THIS sorry blog, right? Go visit her anyway. And comment on her posts. Harass her. That's a jest - do NOT harass Lidian. She is an introverted writer who lives in a Cabin in the woods. Wood. In the Yukon. Whatever.)In my last post, I ridiculously put forth the notion that all of us fit into one of only three personality types. That was hogwash, of course; there are only two. All people are either Homer Simpson or Mr. Burns. Those who are gullible - clueless - and those who prey upon the gullible - assholes and politicians. Wait, those last two words mean the same thing. Sorry.
Seriously, though. If I may be serious. Ok, I will ease into the serious part slowly.
In my closely-guarded MUPPET system of human personality classification, there emerge, remnants of Mt. Olympus, superior beings who see it as their mission on earth to interpret the world around them - who even try to make sense out of life. These people are insane (of course) and they make me sick. As proof of its sense of humor, the Creator made me one. Thanks a lot.
Though my intentions were benevolent, I lied in my previous post when I said sculptors and painters and dancers and musicians were "Craftsmen-Artists". All artists are actually "Interpreters." So are photographers, those lazy painters among us. And ...YES!... so are introverted writers.
There are no extraverted writers. Not good ones, anyway. There are only introverted, tortured souls who write in solitude from inside a whiskey bottle. Or whisky bottle, if your name is Dylan Thomas. Ok, William Shakespeare was an extravert, but his writing was crap, right?
From their Poe-esque demented dispair in their lonely behind-in-the-rent garrets, they stare vacantly through the thick cigarette smoke and type at 2 a.m. with two fingers on old black Remingtons. No self-respecting introverted writers ever seem to learn to touch-type. And in their tragic liquor- and tobacco-shortened lives, they interpret the human condition.
As for me, I don't drink whiskey OR whisky, and I stopped smoking eons ago. My black 1938 Remington is retired to a dusty closet in the basement, replaced by a computer keyboard. Worse, I touch-type. But then, we all know I am not Dylan Thomas, either. "Interpreter-Lite," that's me.
If you've read this far down, hoping I'm about to devulge the meaning of life in the last part of the post, you should probably stop reading right now and go ask for your money back. I think I DO know why we are here on this earth. It isn't to be lawyers or politicians or telemarketers, just in case you thought that. The best advice this little doggie can give you is to find some sort of work that is congruent with your own personality and then grapple courageously from day to day. Find your passion. Something you care about. Let that passion provide your motivation.
Big letdown, eh?
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Jo Coudert (in "Advice from a Failure") wrote that our lives sometimes seem to follow the format for a theatrical play: in the first act, the protagonist is chased up a tree; in the second act, people throw stones up at him as he cowers on a limb; and in the final act he finds a way down out of the tree.
The only thing is (she writes) is that we have come to the theater late, or dozed off, and we've missed the first act. We know we're up a tree, all of us - hell, people are throwing rocks at us! - but we don't know why we're up there or why we are being stoned. So we go through our lives trying hard to learn why we are here and what we did wrong to deserve what we are getting, and, in any respite of the slings and arrows being thrown at us, we earnestly try to find our way down out of the tree.
May you find your own purpose in life, and may that knowledge lead you, finally, to peace.
