Can you still make it from scratch in America? That’s the question that Adam Shepard asked himself in college. On graduation, he took a train to Charleston, South Carolina and started out with nothing but $25 and a backpack. A year later, he had a car, and apartment, and $2500 in the bank. How he did it — and what he learned along the way — is the story of his new book, Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, and the Search for the American Dream.
See, the thing is, though, the book really ought to be called “Me; $25; a firm grasp of the English language; a good understanding of appropriate business and social etiquette; a clever brain and healthy and attractive white body [assuming the cover illustration is meant to depict the author]; the self-possession that comes of having been raised by a family that loved me, paid attention to me, and was able to provide for me; the social skills that come from having been brought up in a safe community where I enjoyed a stable support network of friends and family, and a safe and decent school with adequate funding; the freedom of being unaccompanied by any dependent children or ill or disabled relatives; the confidence that comes from knowing if my little low-stakes gambit here fails miserably I can just go back to my nice home; a college degree[!!!]; and the Search for the American Dream, which I have already extensively benefited from, and everybody who meets me immediately knows it, even if I am dressed in a potato sack and boasting proudly of how I have temporarily elected to live like the poor folk do in hopes of scoring a book deal.”
But then, that’s a lot to fit on a book jacket.
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Also, apparently old people don’t particularly like being talked to like they’re babies, even when they’ve totally lost their minds:
“The main task for a person with Alzheimer’s is to maintain a sense of self or personhood,” Dr. Williams said. “If you know you’re losing your cognitive abilities and trying to maintain your personhood, and someone talks to you like a baby, it’s upsetting to you.”
(via Feministing)
I understand that. I absolutely hate being talked to like I’m a baby. A lot of men like to talk to attractive young women like they’re babies – I seriously can’t count the number of times when some older man I barely know has explained to me (affectionately) that I am such a sweet, sensitive young person. What he clearly means is, ‘You’re pretty, but I know it’s inappropriate for me to be attracted to you, so I’m going to treat you like you’re my precious little daughter.’ Which, besides being presumptuous and offensive, is even more amazing in light of the fact that I am cranky, standoffish and self-absorbed, especially upon first acquaintance. That’s maybe a little hard on myself, but at any rate, I could not possibly be mistaken for a cuddly, approachable people-pleaser…except by men who are bound and determined to believe that all pretty women come prepackaged with Disney princess personalities.
At any rate, if actually becoming cranky old people won’t save us all from being cooed at and patted like we’re puppies, what the hell will? I hope I don’t get dementia, because I’ve already decided that if I make it to my 80s and don’t have anything more I really want to accomplish, I’m going to spend the rest of my days trying every possible kind of super hard-core drug. That will be my Earthly reward for a life full of self-denial and jogging, and I sure hope Alzheimer’s doesn’t rob me of the opportunity, or I’m gonna be pissed.
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Two funny things:
First of all, I think this is my favorite liveblogging of a debate thus far…
…and Chuck Klosterman’s A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century is hilarious, if long (via Kottke).
