ONE

There’s just something about watching the rain hit the stray blades of grass out on a ranch that puts one in a sort of a contemplation mood. I sat for an hour the other day watching the rain hit the skeleton of an old lantern that sill hangs from Jed’s old veranda. In the distance the creek was filling with rain as it had every winter for the past few years. It’s nice to see that some things are so consistent.

I couldn’t think of a more appropriate place to end my stint in San Luis Obispo. Over the past few years the ranch has sort of been a fixture among all the other times that have changed. It’s always been rather relaxing. I tell you what; you’d be surprised how rejuvenating a sunset session of shoveling manure is to a mind inundated with ink and equations. Furthermore, there’s something great about putting on a pair of boots and getting dirty. For someone who grew up working with their hands it’s really quite grounding.

I suppose it has also provided a decent environment to work through some inherent uncertainty that comes from changes such as those occurring right now. College graduation is similar to that scene in Forest Gump when he runs from coast to coast for a few years and then just decides to go home. Up until now I was always running somewhere. Now? Now I have no idea. I hate not having direction. I don’t like it one bit. My friend Jenny keeps trying to tell me that indecision is ok. Obviously Jenny is, therefore, stupid.

Totally kidding Jenny… ps did you notice that a reference to Forest Gump was in the same paragraph as you?).

To tell you the truth as I sit here berating my friends while I claim the necessity of a general framework, I think that I’ve had one all along. Now stay with me here, it might take a little while to work through.

I got to talking to someone about the difficulties they were having opening up to people. As I sat there over a wonderful batch of Tahoe Joe’s nachos and a margarita, it hit me how different I’d look at the world if I were able to see everyone around me as if we were all 10 years old. Imagine seeing everyone without eyes withered from bitter experiences and caution. It’s true, really, what they say about a child’s eyes being quite different then the set that one has on their deathbed. So take it a step further: imagine if everyone were able to see each other as the same. There’s a line in a song that I’ve been listening to recently that goes something like “why can’t we see that when we bleed we all bleed the same” (muse). It doesn’t seem like such a foreign concept to me, but apparently we need borders, locks on our doors, wars, and sanctioned discrimination because the mindset is rather uncommon. Naturally.

Lately, perhaps as some attempt at self-support for these bouts with societal discrepancies, I’ve been thinking that the greatest lesson that I learned over the past 5(ish) years have nothing to do with the curriculum that I studied. Personally, I think it a personal triumph to know that every Muslim has a family just like me, despite being raised in the last great vestige of conservatism in California known colloquially as Orange County. No history book or calculus equation ever said that the divides of family, blood, skin color, religion, sexual orientation, etc etc.. were only surface deep. Now I don’t mean to play up this realization as any sort of magical thing and I will refrain from usual preaching (at least for this paragraph), but it serves as an example of assimilating a far greater concept then any econ book could ever give.

As a natural extension of this, I’ve come to think that college is not as important as people claim per se. Being here at the pinnacle of my educational success I thought I might feel differently. Nope. Sure, it’s for some people, and western society certainly tends to value a degree of some sort. That’s societies values though. This society. Bleh… In the end, however, what does a degree really mean? I feel that it should say that you learned a great deal in your classes and came out with an understanding and interest in the topics that you were introduced to. To often it seems that people I speak to tend to think of it as more of a “get through it and get a piece of paper at the end” sort of experience. Why be here then? In my opinion it comes down to a “Hidegarian they” / “the box” type of conversation that I will not go into here.

My general framework is, therefore, to do something with my life that has a direct effect on people, something that effects society for the better. I would like to live my life without the “thou should’s” that I’ve been under for the past few years. Of course I’d like to be in a position to not have to ask good ol’ mom and dad for money when I’m well into my 30’s, requiring everything I do to have a significant measure of sustainability.

I started talking to some people like Rach about what it is that makes them passionate. For some it is green things, for some it’s indigenous rights, some it has to do with discrimination, yet for others it has something to do with income disparities. For me, I think that discrimination encompassing indigenous rights is what really get’s me thinking. The beautiful thing about it is that it’s all tied together. For instance, indigenous rights in the Andean highlands have forced deforestation and erosion as the indigenous are forced to go further and further up the hillsides for farming practices.

I’m also really amazed by the fact that whatever topics are on my mind seem to be on the ones of my best friends as well. It’s really encouraging, and serves as a wonderful reminder to do what I’m passionate about.

Having said that, I’ve started looking into some different NGO’s lately. I may also end up getting a specialized graduate degree in microfinance. I could really see myself doing that in the future. It even satisfies all the requirements too. Beyond that I may try to take a job in South America teaching English so I can complement this whole International Business thing will a foreign language.

Wrapping it up, maybe Jenny isn’t so stupid. Indecision is ok. Well now that I realized that I have a general framework it is. But if I’m upset about how things are going, she is. After all, the world revolves around my whims. Obvio.

But in anything, faithful blog reader, hold me to the un-negotiable that I put forward. Don’t let me work at a desk for a paycheck for the sake of the paycheck. I’m counting on you. That’s right you.

"To be nobody-but -yourself-in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else-means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting." -E.E. Cummings