Naw, I'll do it tomorrow

Hello Planet Irf. 

I am becoming increasingly more spontaneous. I think that as a man gets closer to middle age (I'm 30, but seriously look at me, I look not a day older than 20...those pectoral muscles didn't get there by chance...that's 2 hours in the gym everyday and a heavy diet of cookie dough and booze) you start to feel like you need to leave some sort of lasting legacy. 

Now I don't think that this blog, the millions of digitally fingerprinted F-bombs I've typed or said while operating on blogs, magazines, or Internet radio shows are the best example of me. 

My friends see me as a guy who is always going for the joke, my family sees me as a guy that helps in time of need and a good person, my girlfriend sees me as the guy who occasionally washes our comforter with our towels causing fuzzies and no sex. I have created multifaceted versions of a douche bag. 

With these thoughts in mind I went to the local grocery store to pick up spaghetti sauce and cookie dough. I trot through isles like I'm a lost kid, I never look up at the signs, I think it's way more fun to hate yourself for thinking the bread is in isle 2 when it's really in isle 10. 

Here's the prime example of how shitty I am: As I'm walking out of the store and to my truck I notice that an older lady has finished with her shopping cart and she's about 100 yards away from the shopping cart corral. 

I walk up to her and tell her not to worry about taking it back and I grab it and start walking it toward the corral. She runs up behind me and apologizes for not taking it up there herself. I was a little confused but I managed to actually listen to the way I talk to people, my intonation, my subtle voice inflections, and I realize that although my actions are actually quite valiant, my tone is filled to the brim with sarcasm. 

I stop myself mid explanation and tell her that I thought I was doing a good thing, but the way I talk makes it sound like I was trying to let her know I was doing her a favor. She asked why I would think she needed someone to take a cart up for her, and I replied with this statement: 

Well ma'am, I noticed that you're parked in a handicapped parking spot, use a cane, and are a little older than me. Lately I've been looking for ways to improve who I am, and I thought since there haven't been any recent events of damsels in distress, dragons, or burning at the stake, I figured I would help an old lady get on her way. 

She told me that it was a nice thing for me to do but she actually enjoyed being able to do these things but really appreciated my attempt at becoming a better person. 

That sentence "the attempt at becoming a better person"..brilliant.  Isn't that our plight? Isn't that our plan? Aren't we supposed to make an attempt at becoming a better version of ourselves each day? I can tell you with all honesty I haven't been too good at pursuing that lifegoal. 

I actually kind of pride myself on being incurably miserable.  I'm sure in the celebrations after a Sabres Stanley Cup win, or some other monumental occurrence, if I stubbed my toe, I would be worse off than I was before the victory. I actually enjoy being mad. 

Well I encourage you all to try, to make that attempt at being a better person. Even if you end up worse off than you were before - make the attempt. 

I don't want to start some bullshit "pay it forward" kind of movement, I just think that in these times, this world could use a few more "good" people. 

As for me, as I sit in the Charlotte airport listening to the beeping of the handicarts, the incurable assholes chewing their gum way too loud, and the babies crying for no apparent reason - I will resume my attempt tomorrow.