X-treme America

So some have asked if I am looking for a job now. While I would like to say that my daddy surprised me with a trust fund and I can continue to be a lady of leisure, I'm afraid that the party is over. It's back to the old 9 to 5er (or the 6:30 to 8:30er)...in September. At least, I hope. The problem is, there aren't alot of openings for high school Social Studies teachers and those places that are hiring, even if you've had TWO years of experience there, are under new administration and not making this an easy process. Keep your fingers crossed.

But as a fighter and half glass full kind of gal, I'm looking at the positives, like breaking into a new career. When I am not blogging or at the grocery store, I am brainstorming new careers. This is the list so far:

• Arby's manager - they are currently hiring at up to 10 dollars an hour. The signs they have on the side of the road are designed to trick some people into thinking jobs start at $10/hour. Those that aren't tricked get the manager positions. I think that's how it works anyway.
• Bollywood dance/pressure cooker instructor - with my teaching degree, years of dance experience from grades 1-8, and recent trip to India, I think I can charge at least $15/hour.
• Personal trainer - we joined a gym here. As part of the membership, I got one free session with a trainer. His name was Damian and he thinks that just about everything from squats to me living with my parents is "pretty cool." Aside from his refreshingly enthusiastic take on life and fitness, he did seem to know what he was talking about but I'm pretty sure, after reading 3 to 4 fitness magazines, I could do what he does.
• Personal organizer - As long as I don't have to organize my own stuff, I think it's fairly easy to advise others on how to do so. For starters, I will tell you, the less stuff you have, the easier it is to organize. I think the next logical argument is that the more organized you are, the more efficient you can be. At life. After all, isn't that what it's all about. "Here lies Jane Doe leaving this world having been a model of efficiency."
  

I'm only half kidding. Maybe you read that article in Time magazine about this guy, Dave Bruno, who is on a mission to pare all of his belongings down to just 100 items. He has created a "cult following" of believers in eliminating all the excess. How you count your "items" is up for discussion but the point is, the less you have, the more simple your life becomes because you are only concentrating on what really matters. Coming back to this country from a third world country where people thrive on much less, I am still trying to adjust to all the excess here so I like Dave's sentiment. I know there are lots of things I could stand to part with and find my world has not fallen apart. I also totally understand that much of what we think we cannot live without really has more to do with our psychological and emotional attachment to our things. I know that I know that the wall hanging from India will not bring me back there nor add or take away from my experience there. But it reminds me of a good place and time and is that so bad? I'm sure Dave would tell me that I can remember that place and time without anything physical which is true but also brings me to the real point of all this.

I think the larger problem here is a problem with extremism which, I think, is a uniquely American issue - though I'm willing to be proven wrong on this. I think there is a tendency in the US to take ideas and practices to the extreme. Whether it is about diet and exercise or personal organization. People hear a good thing and take it to the extreme. Instead of eliminating all white foods or all cooked foods or collecting massive piles of junk or eliminating all your junk, why not try living somewhere in the middle. What happened to the age old rule of "everything in moderation?"

George says it's all just people being disciplined. I suppose it is to some degree but living in moderation is being disciplined too. Dave Bruno is at the point where he says he's not sure he can get down to 100 things. He's made his point and people are listening so why continue if it's at the point where you might actually regret getting rid of something else? I think it's great to have goals and to push yourself but it just seems that in some cases, we are setting the goal so high or low that we are doing more harm than good and losing the original point. And I'm really not just talking about personal choices and goals. As a society, I think we are prone to extremism. Why, if one reality show works, do we have to recreate it in ten slightly different ways? (The same can be said about game shows.) Why do we insist on putting green tea and ginseng in everything? Is my skin really going to notice when I rub lotion that claims to have ginseng in it? And if everything contains "zero trans fats," why bother flaunting it? (I think some clever junk food marketer must have come up with the whole idea of "trans fats.") We are over and/or under-saturating ourselves with fads and trends and "the latest" to exhaustion.

Or maybe I'm just old. The young hipsters seem to be drawn to anything billed as "extreme" whether it be a sport, a drink or a video game. Maybe I should rework my resume to say I am an "x-treme" employee and come up with impressive stats about how all my students got A's because I taught so well and they all got every word I said. (Or maybe it's that no one got above a C because I taught so well and held them to high standards?) Or maybe I just scrap the whole teaching thing and come up with the latest fad and market it until I have a book, a TV show, a food line, a clothing line and other miscellaneous merchandise to remind you how my fad is the best.