I used to have ideas. I haven’t had a good idea in a long time. I stole that sentiment from a spoken word song by Morphine, “My Brain”
My whole brain was out of tune
My whole brain was out of tune
I don’t know how to tune a brain, do you?
Went into a brain shop
They said they’d have to rebuild the whole head
I said, “well, do what you gotta do.”When I got my brain back, it didn’t work right
It didn’t have as many good ideas
Haven’t really got a good idea since I got it fixed
Even when I have had ideas, I’m not sure good would be the operative word. I used to dream of starting businesses – publishing ventures, ways to share stories, nonprofit corporations – all of which would pay me enough to live reasonably and also do some good in the world.
I once pitched a literary journal and publishing venture to Starbucks. They turned it down – though a year or two later they started selling single books (kinda like a book club). A year or two ago I wanted to start a blog about all things related to toast. I was going to link to ads for toasters as a way to generate revenue. It would include essays and poems about toast, pictures of toast – like the ones where Jesus appears on a piece of toast, a glossary of toast related terms. I wasn’t so much interested in the idea of toast – I could care less about toast. I had a post here that always popped up (see what I did there) in google analytics. In that post, I had mentioned the notion of the smell of burnt toast as being a precursor to a stroke or something like that, and because people kept searching it, I wanted to see if I could corner the market on “toast” as a search term. Around the time President Obama was elected (the first time), I wanted to publish a book or blog of letters and poems of hope under the title Dear Mr. President. Also around that time, I registered a domain name Portraits of Poverty. It had nothing to do with Obama. The idea was to tell the story of individuals who were struggling – the real story – what mistakes they had made, what they hoped for, the lives they wanted to live – and then to raise money for them based on their story, provide supports and maybe a sense of community – and see how they make out. This was just before or around the time crowdfunding was becoming a thing. Many people would surely fall back into poverty, but I wanted to normalize the journey and the setbacks. People in poverty aren’t allowed to fail – or more specifically, their failures are used as justifications for not helping in the first place. If I tallied my many failures in life (at school, in relationships, at jobs), people might not give me opportunities…. But I’m able to put on a reasonably nice shirt and coat, I speak well, and I can tell my story and spin my failures into lessons learned. People in poverty aren’t usually given that opportunity, or sometimes, they haven’t learned the art of spin (white, middle class spin). At another point, I wanted to start an organization called pay it forward financial. The premise was a financial tool – like a community bank – that lends to marginalized people at near zero interest rates. I’ve always believed that the difference between interest rates for banks and what they pay in interest to customers vs. what they charge customers was too great. We need more microfinance options and more lenders to accept that smaller profits are still profits. I had spreadsheets and calculations.
On Wednesday night I walked over to the bar near my house. It seems that wherever I live, I need at least two bars and one coffee shop to frequent. I go to this bar for their Cajun chicken cheesesteak and to hang out with Erik if he happens to be there. Erik and I talk politics, dating, and barstool philosophy. We agree on a lot of things, but often disagree on levels of nuance. As an example, Erik doesn’t believe in having bad days, just bad moments. I, on the other hand, think we have lots of bad days (which might just be a different definition of a moment). On Wednesday, Erik was there and we bullshitted for a while. At some point he asked me what my passions were. I said, “You know, I’m not sure… I write every day.” He was quick to suggest that writing was my passion. I was just as quick to hit pause on that. I had trouble explaining that, at different times in my life, I get excited (almost singularly focused) on things. I have often struggled to juggle more than one passion at a time. If I had shared with Erik the number of nonprofits I’ve started in my head, he’d say my passion was helping people. If I had shared with Erik the way I’ve felt in a select few relationships, he’d have suggested that being in love was my passion. If I had shared the number of times I’ve sauntered into a small bar and struck up a conversation with a stranger, he’d have suggested drinking at bars with strangers is my passion. Or travel or music or doing nothing at all.
As best as I can discern, aside from struggling to co-exist with each other, these various passions and sometimes mild interests, have only one or two things in common: they won’t make me any money, and they all relate to creativity, play, or the acts of building, connecting, and sharing. They are the times when I feel most happy to be lost in the moment – however long that moment might be defined. An evening at a bar engaged in conversation, an hour or two of writing, dreaming up ways to help others, running wild with crazy thoughts for silly endeavors, or days, weeks, years in the company of someone I frequently adore.
Even now, as I try to close this post out in some clever way that references not having ideas or my brain being out of tune, I’m reconsidering some of my statements – maybe that’s the out of tune part (the constant tweaks and revisions). My occupation and geography have, at times, felt limiting in pursuing my passions and interests. I’ve felt limited in my idea generation and/or opportunities to play. Writing some poems here and there and my conversations at bars have been a type of lifeline. Perhaps… I don’t want to be singularly focused, but instead want the all-night, all-you-can-eat buffet: the committed relationship, the time to write, the space to dream up crazy things, the time and resources to travel, the chance encounters with strangers at bars, the meaningful work of helping others. “I don’t know how to tune a brain, do you?”