Week I: I probably don't have ADHD, and some other stuff about me

I'm going to write about myself. Today me, tomorrow you. I'm an interesting person, see? Just like everybody else. I'm paradox made flesh. I'm a book of cliches and well-worn phrases that constitute a biography. I'm full of unique thoughts, thought an infinite number of times by the infinite copies of me in this infinite universe. I'm a bag of meat and skin and bone. I'm beautiful inside and out, except when I'm not. I'm vain to think that you'd want to read about me. I'm smart to write about myself - it'll give my friends and family greater insight into my brain. I'm just trying to be honest. I'm just trying to let love in, like Nick Cave.

I'm young, but I've done things. Left home early and moved around and love and heartbreak and children and jobs and school and stuff. It makes me feel older than I am sometimes, but I hate saying that because it sounds like I'm trying to come off being all wise and worldly. I'm trying to be more child-like. Not that I'd hate to be seen as wise and worldly, but ironically, those who are genuinely wise and worldly would most likely be the last to tell you about it.

Life is deeply ironic. And fuck that hipster nonsense, that's not what I mean. I'm prone to say the best advice I've ever been given is this: never miss a good opportunity to keep your mouth shut. Here I go for another 1,000 words. Shut up, dude. It's the most intelligent thing a person has ever said to me. It's a good story, too. Those wise words were some of the only ones I heard come from the mouth of a grizzled old cowboy named Bill. I met Bill when I was guiding horseback rides through the mountains of southwest Alberta one summer. I lived at the horse camp and didn't shower for 12 days. Bill was still breaking horses at the age of 82, and rocked a handlebar moustache that would make lesser men cry bitter tears of inferiority. If Bill is alive, he's 94 years old. Probably hasn't spoken more than a few sentences since I saw him last. "Pass the potatoes," maybe.

Let's switch subjects, I'm good at that. Switched universities and majors 3 times so far. I like to pretend that I have ADHD. It's self-diagnosis, never verified by medical science. I fidget and drum on everything. Random outbursts every day. Sentence fragments. I sit at a desk for five seconds and have to stand up. Looks like an open-and-shut case. But I probably don't have ADHD. I just choose not to sit still and pay attention, right? I've made it this far without Ritalin. I'm trying to meditate more often to make it better. It's frustrating. It's entirely possible that I just need to grow the fuck up and quell my immature behaviour, and pull myself up by my own bootstraps, kid let me learn you a thing or two why back in my day.

I'm interested in everything and life is too short. I live several lives simultaneously. Musician. Father. Student. Worker. Housekeeper. Writer. Friend. Brother. The word "balance" is popular, but it doesn't capture the whole picture. Imagine your life is one of those big brass scales, like the one lady justice holds. Its arms and chains are irregular in length and design. Instead of two balances about a point of equilibrium, there are dozens. Here's a big bag of rocks, go balance it out. I don't want balance always. Chaos is beautiful. Moments of equilibrium are striking and rare and have pleasing symmetry because they're in contrast with the dissonance. Striving for balance is an exercise in futility and silly new-age pedantry. You don't get balance, you're deluding yourself. You don't have control over enough of the variables to make it balance. You still have to carry the big bag of rocks, but you're only allowed to distribute the ones at the top of the bag. Everything else is up to chance. The harmonious balance that I seek is to offset all the randomness with the liberating realization that the universe doesn't give a shit about my plans. See? Much better.

I have bad habits and I procrastinate. I've been handed every opportunity - scholarships, loans, caring instructors, the list goes on. I could sleep earlier, but I play guitar and sabotage my attention span with bite-sized internet humour. I could rise earlier, but I hit the snooze 6 times and forget my lunch when I leave. I talk about fixing these behaviours all the time, but I'm slow to adopt the proposed changes. I could publish a book with all the to-do lists I've left incomplete. My brain is a complex bureaucracy. Good ideas still need to run up the chain of command, and the guy at the top has veto power. Sometimes I'm self-disciplined enough to divert my energy into good habits. Sometimes I need the threat of punishment to get started, like with this blog. My friend Maggie will do something terrible if I don't publish on time. Friends are good for a lot of things. The really good ones are the friends who will call you on your bullshit. Listen to them. They love you, and they wouldn't lie to you.

I'm a drummer. I love music more than anything else in this world. I hear music every second of every day, and sometimes I have to play or sing along. I'm fully conscious of how ridiculous that sounds. I wouldn't change it for anything. I have a soundtrack to my life in every waking moment. My torso is a drum kit when I walk. The world is made of percussion. Desks, binders, notebooks, keyboards, railings, tables, and chairs are everywhere. Things have rhythms and pitches and melodies. Car tires harmonize with wet pavement and the beat changes when you step from the sidewalk onto the bus floor. Music is everything and everywhere, and the best part about being human is that we can touch it for just a moment and take an agonizingly short glance at its infinite beauty. And I'm fully conscious of how ridiculous that sounds, and I stand by it. And maybe I'll expand on that for an upcoming blog, but I'm over my word limit.

And that's me, more or less. Today me, tomorrow you.


Word count: 1,063