Loner Utopia (The Voices in My Head)

Since I was a little kid, I've always enjoyed spending time alone. This is a very fortunate personality trait for farming up here on Cardinal Ridge and most other places I suppose. One thing about spending nearly all your waking hours by yourself is that you start to get pretty well acquainted with the cast of characters inside your head. Does anyone else remember the TV show, "Herman's Head"? I had absolutely no idea how many people lived up in my cranium while I was caught up in the hustle and bustle of San Francisco, any downtime was usually still spent on a crowded bus trying to avoid making conversation with crazy people or surrounded by tourists while I walked Otto through Golden Gate Park. So I just didn't have the peace and quiet one needs to actually hear these voices. Now, I am the crazy guy talking to the voices in his head that you wouldn't want to sit next to on the bus. I also tend to sweat a lot more than I did in my cubicle, so I usually have a nice stench going to complement the voices. Anyone who buys those pheromone attraction colognes and perfumes is a moron in my book, who wants to smell like hard labor? I think I prefer smelling shower fresh with maybe a hint of the Old Spice. But back to the voices. The voices aren't always the best company, actually. The voices are very good at adding up all the time it takes to prune an apple tree, spray it with neem oil, hand thin the apples, pick the apples, core, peel and chop the apples and can the apple jam and dividing that hourly total by the $4 you are going to sell the jar for and let you know that your new hourly wage is .25 cents with no benefits. The voices remember things like how you used to make more money taking hour and a half lunches watching Champions League soccer at the Royale Exchange and having a pint of beer than you do in 6 hours at the Farmer's Market. The voices get particularly chatty whenever I am engaged in housekeeping tasks like washing dishes, folding laundry or vacuuming; they like to point out clumps of dog hair I missed or critique the way I fold t-shirts. The voices don't believe in lunch breaks or tall glasses of ice water when the thermometer is tickling 100, not when your wife is off solving the neurological problems of Caldwell County and bringing home the bacon. The voices aren't always happy doing heavy lifting on hot days and make little mental notes to check monster.com for another gig later that evening. The voices remind you of how easy and carefree it was growing up in El Segundo, going to the beach and trying to plant a peach tree in the sand with your grandma.

my wallet is somewhere in that town

The voices remind you of late nights in 9th grade eating Oreos and playing Joe Montana Football on the Genesis with Chris Taylor. The voices remember how the plumeria smelled in Hawaii and exploring the steam tunnels beneath the University with Mike French.

secret waterfall near ka'a'ava

The voices remind you of the time you killed your ferret Cinnamon in a tragic couch accident at the Royal Park apartments in Chapel Hill. They remind how you got lawsuited out of a job producing the evening news in San Antonio because you were still under contract in Laredo to make $15k a year. The voices remind you that is more than you are making now. The voices remember swimming in a pool velveteen with algae on a sadistically hot day in Laredo with April and some neighbors who worked for the cartel and the silver belt buckle of the flamboyant drug lord who strolled up and dumped a paper bag filled with cartons of cigarettes and the makings of michelada for everyone to share. The voices remember selling cars in similarly hot and humid weather at Saturn of Orlando wearing Hawaiian shirts and keeping a fuzzy German Shepherd puppy on your desk to attract customers. The voices recall a Christmas photo where you and your wife dressed up like elves and posed in front of Lake Eola. They remind you of the weird cashier guy April met buying me a Slurpee at 7-11 who borrowed your copy of "The Illuminatus Trilogy" & April's VHS of "Fear and Loathing" and never returned either. The voices remind you that you used to wake up every morning and drink 2 Red Bulls cut with Perrier and smoke 3 cigarettes before you left for work. The voices have a strange and patchy memory and make you wonder just how it was that you ended up here doing whatever it is you are doing now. Is it farming if you only sell $40 worth of peaches and jams? Is it gardening since you barely grew enough corn and potatoes to eat this summer, let alone put up for the winter? Is it just being unemployed even when you always seem to be busy all week and weekend taking care the house, the land, the plants and the chickens? The voices ask a lot of questions but I think I will be alright as long as I don't start talking back to them. The voices have humbled me a bit, they have made me thankful for what I do have and somehow I feel they have brought me a little bit closer to God. That is not to say the voices have anything to do with God. I think they may be better described as a product of the adversary. Voices that question me, who I am, what I am worth, voices that criticize my decisions and choices, voices that tempt me with memories of times gone by. But it is through faith that I believe I will come to an understanding of why I am on this path and how I will be able to serve others where I am now. I guess I have come to understand that I am never really alone, not even in my Loner's Utopia...