Epiphanies from a watering hole

I’m sure everyone out there has – at some point or another – had some kind of mind-blowing epiphany that fills you with a nice warm feeling akin to lying in the sunshine in a full-length wetsuit. It can come to you at any time, in any circumstance, like when watching the sunset slowly plunge into the ocean, or being on a cliff’s edge overseeing a majestic panoramic view, or maybe even sitting on the pot with your favourite magazine…

For me, it was chatting to the 18-year-old chick behind the bar of my local watering hole.

Classy, I know.

For quite a lengthy period of time, I was of the opinion that a fair whack of the population were self-indulgent, selfish, arrogant, ignorant, pig headed, narcissistic, fuck-their-feelings-because-mine-are-more-important types who all deserved a bullet to the head.

My epiphany changed that opinion - maybe their knee instead of their head...

But maybe I’m being far too harsh upon people. People don’t like to be judged. People can try to do the right thing. People can care. I should leave people alone.

Anyway, this girl displayed a measure of generosity that I had long deemed dead, and genuine-ness that I haven’t seen since gazing into the giant pupils of my friend’s Maltese puppy. After her shift, she sat with me and bought me a number of drinks throughout the duration of the evening. My protestations of how “un-gentleman-like” it was of me to accept these drinks were answered with an emphatic, “Do I look like I fucking care?” Ah... touché.

To see such generosity in someone so young is refreshing.

I think I should, at this point, bring note to the fact that I don’t find this girl in any way attractive, and I can obviously see that I’m far from her “type”. The conversation was candid, insightful, colourful, and foremost genuine. Other bar patrons would join in with our discussions, and generally the atmosphere was far removed from the dank pits I’ve sat in. You know the ones, the ones with patrons who have “Anarchy” tattooed across their jugular in some fancy font that my version of MS Word doesn’t have.

But it was during this chat that I just realised that people, in general, aren’t a too bad bunch. I wouldn’t go as far to say that my cynicism has left me, it’s just that it’s watching over me instead of dominating my actions. Kinda like an overbearing parent that knows that you’re an adult now, and must make your own mistakes.

It’s been a while since I’ve mentioned something that could be construed as slightly humorous... so in order to prevent this from slipping into the realm of doe-eyed preachy-ness, I’ll have to throw out something random.

“It takes two flies to screw in a lightbulb... but don’t ask me how the fuck they got in there.”