Day 100 - Salsa Makes a Comeback

Addison and Steele, So Nice.

July 16th, 2015

As I mentioned, I haven’t been going out doing anything overly social since that side of me was spent during the door-to-door "joy" walks. Ricardo wanted to go out tonight. I both said “yes” immediately, and didn’t want to do it. Like I’ve said, I am actually intimidated by clubs (in concept), but am usually fairly comfortable when I get there. Again, the idea of something is more daunting than the thing itself. We rock up to the line to see our French housemate, Assia, walking in before us. She’s nowhere to be found when we roll over to the salsa section of the night. It’s been at least 2 weeks of staying in, I’m surprised at how comfortable I feel in the scene. I strike up conversation with a girl who is standing pretty much on her own. To the side of her is another girl and two guys chatting her up, one getting the number. I figure these guys are idiots (why would they double team the one?) and decide to a) help them, and b) practice talking to strangers. It goes alright, but the conversation fizzled out.

Ricardo introduces me to his Colombian friends, who all have salsa in their veins. The real chunky stuff. I comment to this Croatian girl beside me that we should get a blood transfusion from them and all our salsa problems would be taken care of.

Why? Just.. Why..

We chat for a spell - she’s a teacher, wanted to be a doctor, and the youngest of five kids. I tease her that she won’t be successful, as studies have actually shown that youngest and oldest aren’t as likely to be successful as the middle*. The theory goes that the oldest and youngest are given more than the middles, and doted on accordingly. The first was handled like they were fragile, and the last one is the parents’ “last chance” to go through the ups and downs of child rearing. Sure. This leads me to make a few different saccadic connections.

Bobo's taught us to make plastic bags
into origami triangles

People in shitty situations are more likely to reach the highest of highs than the people in OK situations - if, and this is vital, you can somehow find a way out of that situation. If you can pull yourself out of the muck, then flying isn’t a problem. As put by Tim Ferriss “Pure hell forces action, but anything less can be endured with enough clever rationalization.” People in the middle class can easily get complacent; “things are good enough, I’ve got enough going on and anything more than this won’t really be worth the effort.” That may be true. Then again, I’ve never been in the middle class, myself. I mean, sure, my parents are upper-middle, but me, myself? Been borderline poverty line for a number of years and (not always) on purpose. The way I saw it, I wanted to make myself hungry for more, to avoid the complacency. It’s been said that people should step down from their station and spend one day per month wearing shabby clothes, carrying no money, and asking themselves “is this the fate that I fear the most?” to realize that it’s really not that bad. Concepts are often scarier than reality. I’m fairly comfortable being poor, though the effects are negative on your health, and the stress of making ends meet can also be taxing. You get creative finding ways to spend your time, and focus on skill development. Then again, this isn't true poverty because I'm choosing it and have resources I could contact if I ever truly needed it.

In either case, she helped me connect those dots, which felt like some sort of break-through. Anyway, I lose Ricardo while talking to her, dancing or something, and ended up leaving because he texted me that he was gone. Turns out he was just too drunk and was still in the bar. What a guy!

Australian Observation: They say heaps instead of tons. If you say “how many blueberries did you pick?” I would respond “oh, tons. So many,” but in this crazy land, it’s “heaps.” I think we win this battle of weightier words.

*: Aren't as likely does not mean you won't find any oldest/youngest who are successful. The odds just aren't in their favor.