Death of a Conspiracy Theorist in The Stuff That's Not Interesting But Is The Most Interesting Stuff I'll Write

I just got back from a mini vacation to the Bay Area. A couple of things happened that were… not seismic so much as helpful in breaking me out of my funk. I went with some friends of mine for a singing competition and I went for two reasons. First, I wanted to get away from my fucking mother for two days and not have her lording her presence over me. Second, this competition happened to be in the city of a fellow writer on here whom I greatly dislike and the idea of seeing his city through my eyes instead of through the grotesquely obtuse words he uses seemed like an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.

I don’t follow him anymore (in fact, I blocked him) but he often described his escapades at this particular bar which he named and described as disgusting, degrading but he kept going back because he liked it. I went there and found his description to be colored by his own negativity. Sure, it’s a dive bar but dive bars are a treasure and if you can’t appreciate them as such and not bitch about how the paint on the brick is chipping off, then go to BJ’s Brewery and shut the fuck up.

The negativity has to stop. Everything is a matter of perspective. This little trip, whenever I found myself starting down some kind of negative thought, I stopped. I’m not kidding. I have no idea how I did it. There was this sweet little guy named Anthony and he was quite the little star, he was super cute, great ass… and he was genuinely nice… which of course made me suspicious of his character because I sometimes find “genuine niceness” to be a façade. But I stopped myself when I heard my friends tell me that he had “no ego”.

It happened again when some guy who worked at the bar we were at came up and started talking to me in a very friendly manner. My mind started wondering why he was talking to me and coming up with little conspiracy theories, but I stopped and tried to look at it objectively… We’re oddities, he’s familiar with my friends but not familiar with me and, according to the theory of attribution, when you are with nice people others will assume you are nice as well.

It was something that I started practicing while I walked the beach in Santa Cruz earlier that day. If you know anything about me, you know that I hate sunshine. It gives me a headache from all the brightness. If I weren’t such a morning person, I’d prefer to sleep all day and awake only at night. One day, I hope to find a vocation that allows me to do that.

That morning I had finally gotten another e-mail from the French government regarding the job in Paris. This time it was to connect all of the teachers together by putting our contact information in there. No later than ten minutes went by and my phone started buzzing from group text messages from my co-workers around the country. My immediate reaction was to scream. My friends didn’t understand why I was so annoyed.

There seems to be absolutely no hesitation on the part of the French government about my continuing in the program and as I walked the beach and looked out at the ocean, I realized that my frustration about not being in control is a matter of perspective. I’m not in any more control of this situation than I have ever been in these situations but the difference is that I’m currently wallowing in my own perceived shortcomings.

I can still move forward because when the door closes to Paris, as it might, it will feel better for me to be prepared to spring into action on some other choice than to sit here and try to regroup yet again.

Perspective is where it’s at. I’m not kidding, just let go. Stop yourself from following those negative thoughts because they lead you deeper and deeper. It’s NOT good. Kill whatever part of yourself starts making hypothetical scenarios because you can’t know the future, but you can prepare yourself for the best or the worst… whichever you expect.