THE EPILOQUE & AFTER RANT
THE AFTER RANT: KEITH HATES SHOULD!
That's right folks, the After Rant is back! Happy, lovey dovey Keith can take the week off with his physics and philosophy and the rage flows freely once more. Of course there are many weeks where I could rip off an After Rant but I've become much more interested in finding the positives in life than I am about ranting and raving. It is not that I've transformed into some kind of serene sage. I'm just as angry as ever, maybe even more so. I was just waiting for the right topic.
I've had an issue with should for a long time and instead of waging my inevitable war with AI, I decided to take this on instead. There are the kinds of should that come from us and the kind of shoulds that come from other people and both are bad and unhelpful. Let's start with the personal should. You think about the time you walked into Southern Spirits and there was an amazing store pick and you only bought one bottle, because you know, financial responsibility etc and then when you put that bottle in the recycling bin with sadness you slap your forehead and say "I should have bought 2 or 3 etc." Better to have loved and lost to have never loved at all. I should have learned Spanish. I should have bought stock in Google in 1998. I should have been kinder to my parents when I was a kid. You're beating yourself up for not being psychic, perfect, efficient etc. Your flight got delayed, your hotel room got over-sold, food poisoning at the restaurant and you should have taken an earlier flight, booked a different hotel, and ordered the chicken? How on earth would you have known any of that? Did you ask the waiter if they had any dishes that were pretty iffy that they could take out of the dumpster? Did you select the box on the reservation that said it was okay to sell your room to someone else? Did you fire a bunch of air traffic controllers for no reason?
Okay so suddenly you are given a time machine or three wishes. Would you really use one of your wishes to order the salad instead of the tuna steak? Hey Genie this might sound unusual but could you send me back three weeks ago and book me a flight on United instead of American? I'm going to take this time machine back to 1987 and tell young Keith to keep studying Spanish and when I get back to today I will be fluent! If you believe what most astrophysicists think there probably is a universe in which you did. But you are in this one. So what are we going to do today that makes us happy, alive, in a better place? We already did those other things for whatever reason so now what?
Then there is the second kind of should which I dislike even more. "Hey Keith, I was in Louisville last week and I had a great time." "Did you get a burger from grind?" "No." "Well you should have." What is the point of this exchange? They just said they had a great time. Now you want to tell them they did it wrong? "Hey what's wrong with your arm?" "Oh I fell down and broke it." "Well you should not have done that." "Yes, you're right, well I was going to travel back in time to buy some google stock anyway, maybe I could also stop myself from tripping if I've got enough power for the flux capacitor." "They should not live in the path of the tornado. They should have had their seat belt on, they should not have been a smoker, they should have found a better job." You can blame everyone for every misfortune they suffer but that is the opposite of helpful. We all learn the hard way and it sucks. So quick to drop empathy and pick up blame instead. Blaming makes it easier. No matter how tragic the situation you throw in a few shoulds and its not so bad. She should have never gone to that party. I find it much more rare that the finger gets pointed at the perpetrator. It is not that the thief should not rob someone, it is that you should not have shown your wallet when you were out and about? It is not that you the driver should not have run the red light, it was that you were singing along to your favorite song.
There are not many things that upset me more than victim blaming. These are folks that deserve compassion but instead we add extra misery onto their plate? Let's say you're right, that they should not have done any of these things, that they should be absolutely perfect and make every "correct" decision. Who has done this? DId their life work out, or was it boring and tedious because they took zero risks and have no fun and wild tales to remember? I just eat kale and drink water with protein pills and don't leave the house to avoid the sun's harmful rays and have ergonomic furniture in every room. I don't engage with anyone with strong opinions or too much passion for life in case it is contagious and leads me to break a rule.
If you're reading this, you're probably doing pretty well. You've made a lot of good decisions and have quite a bit of things go your way and it is more than okay to take a moment to appreciate all of that. When you see someone less fortunate than you instead of blaming them you can be grateful that you are in your position and get to enjoy the things you do. There was a time where you did not know where rent was coming from. There was a time when you dreamt of being able to buy Woodford Reserve instead of Kentucky Gentleman. You were scared and had no idea what you were meant to do as an adult. You lost someone and they took some magic from you when they left.
It is true that there are things we should not have done and that we still should not do. There isn't much we can do about the former and the latter remains life's big challenge. But when I think about the word and concept of failure I find the term problematic. Everything that is good came from multiple attempts and happy accidents. Beer was discovered by accident. The Wright brothers had competitors and their own missed attempts at flight. People thought Galileo was a blasphemous lunatic. Rosa Parks was an activist before the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Should she have just shut up? Should Galileo just ignored his conclusions? Melissa Engleman is just now finishing her dream album. Should she have given up years ago? I'm much more interested in the present than the past. Nothing I can do about the one and the other determines everything. I should not have had so many whiskeys and chocolates but not only did I enjoy them, I've paused them now to become healthier. 13 years ago I started this periodical just hoping to get someone's attention at the tastings and new arrivals I was offering here. Today I'm lamenting all of the energy spent on regret and messing with other people's lives. Each week at least one person thanks me for my words and that feeling is always amazing. So if right now you take a ten minute break from beating yourself up for past mistakes then I did something right today.
Well look at that, I didn't stay angry the whole time anyway because helping people is much more important to me than yelling at anyone.
Cheers
Keith