Nobody actually asks these questions of me, but I wish they would. That’s what an Internet FAQ is. No one actually has ever previously asked the questions that have been compiled into a FAQ. The FAQ is merely a compilation of the desired conversational topics of the person compiling the list of questions. It’s an agenda for the future conversation instead of a chronicle of past queries.
Everyone knows this is the true nature of a FAQ, but no one writes I Wish These Were More Frequently Asked Questions. IWTWMFAQ doesn’t serve the purpose of brevity.
Q. Where are you from?
A. I am from my mother’s womb. Since then, in order to be with you today, I have lived in the following places, roughly in order:
- Decatur, GA
- Asheville, NC
- San Francisco, CA
- Carmel Valley, CA
- A palmboard shack in a sugarcane field, Dominican Republic
- Tucson, AZ
- Seattle, WA
- San Francisco, CA (same same, but different)
- Bloomington, IL
That’s nine places I’ve lived more than a month between 1997 and now in 2007. It’s an average of a new domicile every thirteenth month.
Q. Of the places you’ve lived, which did you like the most?
A. I have constantly felt like I should be someplace else, no matter where I’ve gone, with the exception of San Francisco. In San Francisco, however, I was still haunted by the feeling that my life should be different. So even when living in this city, I felt like I needed a different apartment, or, more often, a different job.
Actually, I should take that back. When I lived in the Buddhist community in Carmel Valley, I didn’t think I should go anywhere else. But I left anyway, primarily because my parents believed that Peace Corps was a more responsible thing to do. My mom still counsels me to prefer activities and a lifestyle that is “responsible.” Whatever responsibility actually means, to her it means education, career-oriented jobs, and conventional living arrangements. By her accounting, I should already not merely look like a model from an LL Bean catalog, but actually embody the very essence of a pair of LL Bean chinos. Finding my own voice, and answering the ingrained parental critiques of my choices, will be an important task for me in the next few years.
Q. You seem to have lived quite an adventurous life.
That’s not a question, but I’ll answer anyway, knowing that the idea of this list being a compendium of frequently asked questions is mere conceit.
I did not set out to be an adventurer. Nor did I realize until recently that I had, indeed, adventured far and wide. There is more than a little irony in the fact that I would probably have enjoyed my ramblings a lot more if they had been a product of planning or intent as opposed to restlessness and angst.
Q. What caused this restlessness?
A. My own deep fount of self-disappointment would be the largest cause of my itinerancy. I believed, and sometimes still believe, that something is very, very, wrong with me, and this assessment expanded outward to everything else in my life that I could come in contact with.
From my perspective at the time, it was as if I had a reverse Midas touch, where everything I put my pasty white fingers on turned to shit. In fact, nothing was wrong with me except for an inability to be appreciative, and the amount of manure in my life was minimal.
In the future, movement will be motivated more by intent, and the sense that it’s never too late to have a happy childhood.
Q. What have you learned about people and social relationships from your adventures?
A. The intent of relationships is more important than the content. You don’t have to be my long-lost twin for us to be friends. It is fine to form relationships based on good times and small talk. Depth is not a necessary component of social relationships, while being human and wanting company most certainly is.
The literal meaning of your words is less important than what you’re trying to achieve with them. Every utterance is an attempt to connect in some way. It is okay to ask questions about sports, weather, jobs, or anything at all, if the intent is to communicate a willingness to continue the exchange despite the risk that nobody cares about weather, jobs, or what-not. Relationships don’t have to be about intimate details to be meaningful or even intimate.
The most important thing is to be warm.
Oh, and at some point, too, I’ve learned that most people actually do like me, or at least aren’t bothered by me enough to rebuff me immediately in my efforts to connect with them. There’s a lot less risk in the long-term in trying to be friendly than in the alternatives.
–Written at Third World Café, 53rd at Kimbark, Chicago
