I might end up like Joe.

I’ve lost it.  It used to be no trouble at all to erupt in outrage at the drop of a hat even about the most trivial thing.  For example, I can remember going off because I could never find a ripe avocado at the store for guacamole.  I remember the feeling.  I was completely and self-righteously overwhelmed with the absolute certainty that I and every other human being in that store was entitled to find a perfectly ripe avocado right there, right now.  It was impossible for me to accept any thought that the store should be allowed to do business if they were only able to supply un-ripe ones.  I wanted guacamole.  I wanted it now and there was no excuse for any store that expected my business not to know that and have at least one perfectly ripe avocado awaiting my desire. My expectations were perfectly reasonable to me and I let my rant fly without a hesitation or doubt.

But these days my resolution waivers.  “Who am I?” I ask myself “ to believe that I should get what I want.”   What has happened and why have I turned into such a sniveling wimp?  It is troubling.

Maybe guacamole is not a life changing event.  Maybe it isn’t really important to have guacamole when you want it.  It seems trivial looking back- especially today when guacamole is not my prime directive.  There are ways to handle a ripe avocado deficiency and amazingly most people can survive without guacamole.  My point, though, is not about the importance of guacamole.  It is about rants.  Rants have nothing to do with being reasonable or responsible.  Rants are about knowing that you are important and matter and the belief that because you matter, someone will at least notice.

Definition of RANT

1

a: a bombastic extravagant speech

b: bombastic extravagant language

This is what the dictionary tells us about a rant.  I agree but a true rant is so much more.  Not only is it bombastic and extravagant.  It is also cathartic.  It releases a load of frustration building from an inability to accomplish something you want.  It clearly lets people know that you are somebody with standards and expectations.   Finally, it gets you off the hook for any responsibility for that failure.  The highest quality rants unload all of that frustration and pile it squarely and vehemently on the shoulders of someone or something else.  What a relief.

Well, I’m finding that something has happened.  Those rants that just used to flow naturally from normal day to day life have stopped.  It isn’t that I don’t get frustrated.  It isn’t that bad things have stopped happening.  It isn’t that the world around me has stopped being crazy and dysfunctional.  It is something else.  It’s just that somehow, I can’t summon the energy to let those rants fly and I don’t know why.  I have racked my brain for an answer but the ‘aha’ moment escapes me and if I don’t know what is preventing me from venting a good rant.   I can’t fix it.  The pressure and emotion build up and with no way to let it out, who knows what might happen.  I might blow a circuit and turn into a vegetable, or a serial killer or worst of all, an email marketer.  I need help.

The problem is that this pressure has turned my mind to mush and I’m impotent to act.  The minute I try to analyze the situation, I become mired in infinite possibilities and my mind shuts down.  I need help.  Times like these are when you need a coldly detached intellect to look at reality and tell you what to do so today I’m throwing the question to readers.  Help me out.  Tell me what is preventing me from producing a healthy and cathartic rant and how can I restore my psyche to its old uninhibited state?

This is as far as I can take it.  I will give you my best guesses for consideration but feel free to explore the universe to find what makes sense to you.  So far I have only two hypotheses which are:

1. It is from living in California where nothing functions efficiently, government is against the people rather than for them and the only ‘good’ money is taxes especially if it is from the rich. I fear that because there is so much to rant about and no way that any individual can stop the craziness all around that my rant engine has overheated and shut down.
2. Senility is setting in and my mind no longer demands logic, reason and responsibility in the world.

I have to add that neither hypothesis is appealing to me which may contribute to my inability to reason this out.  I’m waiting for reason from readers to get me past this.  Help me out so I can get back to normal.  It is more than I can handle on my own.

Ralph

Ralph is the inspiration for Cantankerous Old Coots and is our Grand Duke of Cantankerousness

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