Catsup

There is a web service called Plinky where you can get a question of the day to help you with your blog content. Today’s question is “What book have you read that has affected you and how?” 

I think that kind of thing is a bunch of bullroar and should be left for Facebook updates and remedial Journaling for Healing type classes. Top five favorite Kayekilla Blogposts Widget coming soon to your homepage.

I want to talk about my favorite topic of conversation: ADVICE. Partially in honor of my friend Derek’s new advice service and mostly because I love to give advice and even more mostly because I love to think about the shitty small-town-hay-bailing-KKK-worshiping advice I got as I grew up in a little agricultural village in southeastern Michigan.

Aside from the, “boys only want…” and “owning your own home is the greatest accomplishment a mediocre person can ever achieve” type of advice, I would say that by far the most repeated advice I got in my youth was, “enjoy it now, this is the best time of your life.” I got this radical advice from:

1. A 300 pound 35 year old lady and small town high school graduate (same one I attended) at local bank (I was 6 and waiting for some free Brach’s candy while my mom was depositing a check from work).
2. Basketball coach(es) in 8^th, 9^th, 10^th, 11^th, and 12^th grade
3. Art/HomeEc teacher (in most small towns the cooking/sewing/oil change teacher is also the fine arts instructor)
4. Priest at St. Agnes
5. Dairy Farmers (two)
6. Countless middle age divorced mothers of school friends (advice given while gazing at the legs, chests, and underdeveloped deltoids of the FHS boys JV basketball team through crêpey crows feet)
7. Four auto plant workers
8. Boss at Fowlerville Farms restaurant
9. Manager at Franks IGA
10. Butcher/Bottle return supervisor at Franks IGA

The reason that I like that piece of advice in particular is because everyday I discover even more ways that it is worthless.

I like to imagine how each one of these people would go back and enjoy their young life in a more enjoyable way. More cake? More fun? More… banking? What?