The Trouble With Swag

Part 7 of 30

The Mam & Pap

Royal Splendid Traveling Rodeo

Forgive me if I’m a little clinical on this post. I’ve done some work over the years in the field of challenges and accomplishments, not so much with setting goals and fulfilling them but the personal ramifications of having accomplished the task. Primarily what it means in terms of pride, self-image, comparing yourself to others, and boasting.

So when I find evidence of Mam and Pap, and especially their underlings, puffed up with pride not only for what they’ve done in terms of the rodeo but the social markers of recognition for their several accomplishments — in this case, blue ribbons — I’m interested. I suppose most people who are recognized for an accomplishment can barely forego a moment of pride. What is more interesting are the ones who accumulate those tokens of recognition and see that as a greater accomplishment than the actual accomplishments themselves.

It’s one of those unconscious, subversive traps — depending on your psychology, no doubt, with parenting issues, whether you still peed your pants in your 40s, etc. — that so many of us, well-balanced and happy but not necessarily insightful as to what drives us individually, fall into. Of course it’s part of the Human Comedy, and I can be as ridiculous as the next guy, and for that reason alone it’s part of the fun. You go to someone’s house and they have bowling trophies over the course of a successful pursuit of the hobby over the decades. It’s hard not to think, “You poor deluded fool,” even while smiling two-faced, praising him for such a great game in 1965 with the evidence of the memorable victory still front row center.

Traveling rodeos of course are not a competitive thing in tournaments and contests that pass out trophies or ribbons. They’re a capitalistic enterprise that, beyond the normal interpersonal fun they have, are in it for the money. They get their money, and if they’re in management, they reinvest in the rodeo. If they’re employees they save a little, send a little to parents and kids. If they’ve crossed the line somewhere they pay off whomever’s on their case. And life goes on. But getting to the rodeo in a permanent capacity, most of the talent has gotten blue ribbons and other recognition. And to a lot of people that swag means something.

The fact that it has this whole fictitious side is what interests me. Because it’s hard to go back and contextualize the scene when you won the swag. Were you up against real talent or was it you and four halfwits? The records aren’t great on these things. You performed feats of strength. Was one of your competitors Superman? Or just a couple of PE dropout squirrels? You won honors in a cake-baking contest. How do we know you didn’t pay of the judges? So many questions, potentially meaningless.

In conclusion, your swag — be it blue ribbon, red ribbon, trophies, or a Billy Bass fish flopping back and forth on wooden plaque — ain’t worth squat. Like they say in the old religious classic, The Old Rugged Cross, “Till my trophies at last I lay down.” Or equally profound, Billy Bass himself, don’t hang him on the wall when he’s clearing saying, “Take me to the river, put me in the water.”

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I’m submitting this post to an academic/humor blog site to see how it fares in the competition. (The biggest competition I get are guys still stuck on Polish jokes.) I promise that any swag I get I'll put on a fence post and let a friend with a high-powered rifle blow it to bits.

Keep Your Hands Off Ruthie

My failure to figure out the motives of Money Mules made me a wreck. I asked myself over and over, Why do they always run instead of returning with the money? But there was no satisfactory answer, leaving me, frankly, crumpled and crying. When that happens, I'm a mess. I'm sparking and sizzling, twitching and babbling on my bed, close to destruction; I'm afraid to brush against anything lest I spontaneously combust.

I knew I needed help, but who was qualified for the job? I'm Super Brain, and if I couldn't figure it out, who could? Wracking my mind, I came up with this thought: Those who first taught me the deeper principles of people skills, psychology profs at the university! Maybe, if they put their heads together, their collective intelligence plus my own greater intelligence would give us the answer.

I should probably mention, those guys are shells of their former selves. They're bogged down from reading the same lectures since the early '60s, while I've cruised past them, making me, the student, their master in every way. It has to be a nasty feeling to watch me run laps around them as though they're standing still, but that's what you get if you lose the hold on life and scholarship you once held dear.

Then we must add sex. We all know the go-to rejuvenator for old guys, at least in their fantasies, is sex. You're old and decrepit, like my professors, and you try to prove your abiding mastery of life by sex. The main reason being, the equipment's right there in easy reach. Surely, that guy or that lady feels as I do ... We shall rise together from the ashes! they're thinking. Which, to the rest of us still holding our mental clarity, is obviously vanity.

So, anyway, I got my esteemed profs together, and threw in one fatal juicy apple of temptation by which to test them -- the cashier from the union cafeteria, Ruthie. Were I to see them entirely resolved to scholarship and not thinking of a roll in the hay to prove their scholarly manhood, then and only then could I trust them with the Money Mule question. (This is preliminary stuff. The sex stuff plows the field before we see the harvest, the "meat of the goodie," the answers I really care about.)

There they were, then, gathered in the seminar room. And each of them had his damned eyes on Ruthie, seated next to me, exquisitely dolled up! Perverts! (I would've done her myself, had my brain been just a little looser and slightly more unreliable.)

Of course I first had to set the parameters of our study and call them unto the quest: Why, when you present a Money Mule a sum of money, say $100,000, and send him forth, does he always run and never return?

They looked like they were ready to venture a few good guesses to the question. Before we could dive in, however, I wanted to inform them that I had strict ground rules:

1) Do not approach or in any way come on to Ruthie. Keep your grubby hands off Ruthie.
2) Abide by all the best legal and academic scruples. Give me your best work.
3) A Number 2 pencil is preferable to any and all other numbers. If it ain't Number 2, it's crap.

And that's it. The professors raced forth to find their pencils and bone up on the best legal and academic scruples.

As for me, I fell to my knees where I stood, a shaft of light streaming through the skylight putting me in a very dramatic limelight, and asked the Lord: "Bless them, dear God, if they deserve blessing. But if they're not ready for this important task, please reveal that as well. Thou knowest what I mean."

Of course I referred to Ruthie. She really does have a fantastic allure when she's out of cafeteria scrubs and exquisitely dolled up. I glanced around and reached down, then told myself no.

Have You Seen The Pink Professor?

Right on time this morning, my team of university professors arrived and began their work of evaluating the 300,000 books, their task to choose out books I would want. They couldn't wait to dig in, which got my day off to a great start. A literature guy, a religion guy, a philosophy guy, as well as specialists in sociology, general scholarship, and even trivia, got down to brass tacks, a sight to behold.

I milled around the large sorting facility, and in watching them noticed many attractive qualities. Efficiency, confidence, intelligence, and delight for books, to mention a few. So I may as well say, I've always had a thing for professors, whether they wear the traditional mortar board and gown or prefer the more modern, non-scholarly garb. This group was a mix, which to me only attested to their confidence and how comfortable they are in their own skin. That is to say, there wasn't a dogmatic bone in their bodies, no judgment, just the love of teaching, learning, and being helpful.

You might know where this is going... Watching them, and these forces at play, had me, as it were, salivating, being so often provoked as I am in my spirit at the bitterness in our social affairs today. When professors could lead the way to something better. Then there was an additional reason for my salivating, the longing that arose in me for my own prof, The Pink Professor. O God, where can he be! If only money could bring him back, I've got all the money in the world! If I could, I'd apologize a million times, but of course he would silence me well before I could. It's all too much.

We had the most foolish falling out a few years ago and he left town. I say it was foolish, because we should've known better than to argue about "proper ways" of kundalini meditation/lifestyle. Even now I'm kicking myself in the muladhara. I was at a certain level and he was at a certain level -- without explaining the terms, the argument was over philosophies, the "Trash stratum" (Philip K. Dick) vs. "Sahasrara purity." It was quite the dispute, recalling Jesus vs. the Pharisees. Of course I was the complete libertine. I threw a cup of coffee all over his wall and he rolled his eyes at me, illustrating which of us expounded which doctrine. But doctrine be damned!

Later, in subsequent revelations, I realized we were both right (and wrong for insisting on rightness), and that I missed my man. By then it was too late. I sat at the bikers bar, where we met, for three weeks, and slept behind the bar on the floor like a dog, but he never returned. I thought our life had been complete. But it was all broken. If only I could find him. He's gotta be out there somewhere.

Flash! All my life I've had brilliant ideas when pressed. Now I'm a billionaire, they're even more brilliant. I looked up at that team of professors, nearing the end of their book sorting, and decided, These professors are the ones to bring him home! Like attracts like! Who better to track down a prodigal professor than other professors? One professor in hand might be worth two in the bush, but I don't know where--- [lost my train of thought] all that to say, The Pink Professor gets me ... here (chest bump).

I explained the whole situation and offered to finance a sabbatical like they've never known, if they'd only help bring him home. I set out the facts and shared his emblem (his unremitting pink shield) and they immediately knew who I was talking about, The Pink Professor. There were smiles of recognition all around. One of them, in addition to being a scholar in liberal arts, was also a math whiz, as he put 2 + 2 together really fast: "So you and him? Him and you?" I nodded, as if to say, "You got it, Ace."

Binoculars were handed out -- each responsible for his own pair -- and they became my Binocular Brigade. "Your only boundaries, there's no boundaries. Your only mission, to bring him back to me, or good information. Your only rule, Don't fall for him yourself, he's mine." With that, they were off! Leaving me very much alone, to look over the books they had so skillfully separated from the 300,000, and wait.

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My Past with The Pink Professor

The Pink Professor Explains a Game of Pool
The Pink Professor -- The Biological Impetus
Bikers Bars Need a Pink Professor
The Pink Professor A Baton Twirler
Pink Professors Needed -- Immediate Openings
Body Language with The Pink Professor
The Pink Professor -- Someone's In Love
The Pink Professor -- The Rules of Love
Breakfast with The Pink Professor
The Pink Professor -- My Dreamboat
Sex Talk with The Pink Professor
My Real Life Pink Professor
The Pink Professor at the End of My Path
Proceeding from The Pink Professor's Open Zipper
Lovingly Bathing The Pink Professor
The Pink Professor -- Don't Judge Us
The Pink Professor -- The Heavenly Marriage
The Pink Professor -- Concerned About Our Health
The Pink Professor -- Beautiful Things, Beautiful People
The Pink Professor -- Gang War!
The Pink Professor -- Baby, Please Come Home
The Pink Professor -- All Night Long!

I'm A Gentleman And A Scholar

I was the recipient of a rather great honor the other day. In one of the picture-sharing social-media sites where I have an account, I complimented a guy for one of his pictures, and he messaged me back, "You, sir, are a gentleman and a scholar!" Read that again ... It's awesome!

Of course I was floored. I honestly never heard anything so nice, in addition to it being unexpected. I probably don't need to say it, since it's something you can obviously guess, but I've thought about his statement over and over ever since. Remember, this is a guy who's never actually met me in person, and somehow, some way, he was able to capture something of my essence and compliment me in such a great way.

Really, it affirms some of my own thoughts, even though, as they say, we're always our own worst critics. And it's true. I'm always getting on my own case about something. Maybe I left something undone, or I put off a needed task, or I let my usual perfectionism get in the way, blah blah blah. I'd love to be two separate people in those moments, at least split myself off temporarily, so I could kick my own ass. But then, whatever criticism I might offer myself, when it gets right down to it, I'm also an unabashed fan. I stand back and survey my accomplishments and think, "Good God, man, you've truly got it going on!"

But to have some other person like that, someone I complimented for a photo -- I think it was a colorful sunset, or maybe a rustic oak barrel snapped in black and white; it was something -- to just come right out and lump me together with two classes of extraordinary individuals, gentlemen and scholars, that's really quite an extraordinary honor.

Also, it actually came at a point in my life where I was feeling a little down. I have regrets about childhood. I was such a typical kid, playing outside, having a good time with friends, riding bikes, messing around at the creek, fishing, etc., that I didn't always have time for academics. Rather, I didn't take time. Looking back on it, I really wish I could've been a prodigy, like a kid they promote out of kindergarten straight to college. Brainy like that. That's a scholar!

So what was the problem? I guess the honest-to-God truth is I was very much a typical kid, with the average intelligence of a kid about my age. You could probably say I was even lagging behind where I should've been. In sixth grade I probably had the mentality of a fifth grader. Then in seventh, a sixth grader, etc. So about a year after graduation, I went, "Oh, that's what they meant in 12th grade." If I was a scholar, it was very much hidden, buried, a hidden potential.

As to being a gentleman, that was my upbringing. Saying goodbye to people when I left. Saying please and thank you when there was a pressing need, like when someone needed to get the hell out of my way and finally did. As I recall it, I always got high marks for being a gentlemanly boy, then teen, then young adult, then older adult, and now, as I am, standing at death's door. There's no reason to be a bad ass now!

OK, I thought you'd like to hear about the compliment I got. And if you have any other compliments for me -- like if you think I'm a third thing in addition to being a gentleman and a scholar, you can leave it in my comments. But what could it be? A gentleman, a scholar, a great blog writer, a friend to animals, a compassionate person to the down and out, a live wire, a coffee-lover, or all that and more!