And Here's to You, Mrs. Robinson

THE GRADUATE

Brace yourself, readers. You're about to see a really big picture of a dog.



Yeah, that's Luna in her graduation cap. She didn't get a gown, but then she's black, so she looks like she's wearing one all the time, anyway.

Part of the deal you make when you adopt a greyhound is that you'll enroll her in obedience classes, so we signed up for the beginner training at the PetSmart between my home and office. The final exam was Saturday, and, frankly, I was a little nervous because while Luna had fully mastered sitting on command (easy for most breeds, but very difficult for a greyhound), she was totally uninterested in my tips on how to answer multiple choice questions. But she pretty much aced the final, and now she can start applying to grad schools.

Still no luck getting her to yell "Elaine!" but we'll keep at it.


THE PURPOSE-DRIVEN LIFE

I was reading this Instructable about how to walk across America. As with many Instructables, it's fun to read even if it's something you have no desire to do yourself. Actually, I would have thought that how to walk across America would pretty much be "look west, put one foot in front of the other, stop when you get to the Pacific Ocean," but it turns out to be somewhat more complicated than that.

I'm not trying to mock this guy or his Instructable (though it could maybe use some editing). I think it's pretty cool when someone decides to walk across the country, though I myself would not attempt it, unless maybe the country in question was Liechtenstein, and even then, I'd look for the shortest possible route, and probably hop a bus halfway through.*

What got me was that he says that the most important part of preparing for the walk is determining why you're walking. And as part of making this determination, he suggests this site, which purports to tell you how to discover your life's purpose in half an hour or less. Wow. I mean, I always knew that all that time I spent in Sunday School and church services as a kid was wasted, but I had no idea just how wasted it was. Two hours every Sunday for eighteen years of my life, and all I needed was a half-hour and a blank sheet of paper. Well, and a pen, I guess.

See, that's how you determine your life's purpose. You sit down with a blank sheet of paper, you write something -- anything -- down, and then you keep trying out different variations of your personal mission statement until you cry. Because once you've written something that makes you cry, you're done: that is your life's purpose.

So I'm reading this, and I'm thinking, "Damn, Skippy, that just sounds a little bit too easy to me, what life's purpose did you come up with out of that?" And then I read a little farther, and he told me:

Here was my final answer: to live consciously and courageously, to resonate with love and compassion, to awaken the great spirits within others, and to leave this world in peace.

Well, I'll give him one thing: if I'd been working for half an hour, and that's what I'd managed to come up with, I'd probably cry, too. Vague much? Also, if I had to think about that purpose on a daily basis, I'd probably want to gnaw out my own intestines. I mean, if I'm at the McDonald's drive-thru, do I have to attempt to awaken the great spirits within the person taking my order? Do I have to worry about how the fries are going to help me resonate with love and compassion?

As it happens, I don't believe that anyone's life has an inherent purpose. You can choose a purpose, but it seems like a lot of work. It probably makes more sense to establish a few simple principles. Things like having more fun and being good to the people you care about. You get the distinction, right? "Don't be a dick" is a perfectly good rule to live by, and you can live by that rule whether or not your life has a purpose. I wish the organized religion folks would understand that.

*Gmap-pedometer says that a walk across Liechtenstein is about 3.5 miles, so maybe I'd even do the whole thing. Unless I got distracted by a pub, which seems likely.