Beware You Have Entered the Twilight Zone

I’ve shed many tears lately…..tears of temporary sorrow from missing my wife, my granddaughter, my family as a whole, and my home town of Pagosa Springs.   If I am being truthful, however, the majority of tears stem from joy as I contemplate all the people who visit my food trailer, and share how they’ve read my blog;  or when I consider the fact that my wife is so very patient as I work through this freakin’ mission;  or when I consider how the locals recommend Eddie B Cookin and just keep sending more people my way.  Most people that know me on an intimate level,  tell me that I’m a metro sexual male.  I suppose that’s true, as I wear my emotions on my sleeve, plus the fact that I really do enjoy foo foo cosmopolitan martini’s.  So here it is….Eddie comes out!!!!  I have to admit that I have shed tears for all the reasons I listed above, and since I’m in a confessin’ mood, I might as well tell you this:  At the end of the day when I’m exhausted and I collapse in my tent for a bit of relaxation and a nice glass of chardonnay (It’s that metro sexual me coming out) I find myself contemplating the magnificent blessings of my life and I well up with tears.  Okay, so I’m a crier…what about it?    Since I’ve plunged into this world of minimalism and surrounded myself with people who choose to live on society’s fringe, I’ve developed a greater appreciation for the simple blessings we usually take for granted.   For example:  The other day a gentleman came out of the desert riding his quad, he had a purpose in mind, he wanted to share with me the fact that he enjoys reading my blog.  I am taken aback by the number of people who show genuine concern as to whether or not I am making it.  I am touched by the person who left a fifty dollar bill in my tip jar, and the person that posted a comment on my blog asking, “hey where you at man,  when is the next update coming?” One thing I’ve discovered about being in the throes of a midlife crises is that emotions become extreme……uhhhh, am I experiencing Man-a-pause??  Woe unto me, so there you have it, my new found sensitivity of life’s simple pleasure of feeling appreciated.

Talk about feeling appreciated, it recently occurred to me that I am probably the only food vendor in this temporary geriatric metropolis doing it all solo, as in no helpers, yet still I am full of Joy.  That’s not to say that all other food vendors aren’t grinding away at trying to make a buck.  It’s just a statement relating to the fact that the mass crowd numbers never really materialized to justify a helper in my world.  By all accounts this is the worst year in memory for Quartzsite, yet I refuse to allow that to bring me down. 

I have to say that I did experience a brief period of busy days … the population did increase as did the traffic, but it was very short lived.  However, after the short lived chaos of the “Big RV tent show” I have to share with you my new perspective of this Quartzsite adventure. The positive side of the perspective; all the goofy, funky, quirky people…..I respect and adore them. To say adore is by no means an understatement, as these individuals are whole heartedly committed to their point of view. The world is full of wishy washy people who are born followers, who live their lives directed by the whims of the media, politicians, televangelists, and bosses. People on the fringe,  however, are immune to that because they come to the realization of how they’ve been exploited in some way or another……….and their mentality becomes, this is who I am, damn it…love me for who I am.  On the negative side of my new perspective is what I call the obnoxious retiree, those who are in search of bigger, better, more grand toys at the expense of others. It’s as though they have a sense of entitlement.  As much as I have been enthralled by the “individualism” that congregates in Quartzsite, after all this time away from “normalcy”  this place is beginning to feel like Leisure World Purgatory.  Sometimes I feel as though I have landed in the middle of "The Twilight Zone":  with all the 10 mph drivers;  the grumpy old folks who want to argue with the cashiers at the local markets and local merchants; The obnoxious retiree’s who are searching for the bigger better motor home (their current $500k jobber just isn't cutting it anymore I guess); the flow of rainbow kids that want to trade weed for food; the parade of million dollar motor homes that like to honk their horns in order to show off their simulated freight train like horn; the bumper to bumper traffic outside my food trailer window;  (yes it got crazy for a few weeks there, lots of people, lots of traffic)  the doo dah parade of handicap scooters, segways, rigged up personal walking aides designed to help seniors get around, the assorted gadgets for those folks with club foot, gout, arthritis, hangnails, and various other poor souls not blessed with the best of health.  Of course we can't leave out the lazy people who just don’t want to use their legs for walking.   What the hell is happening??? C’mon, even here in the geriatric capital of the U.S. excess abounds. Cars with four and five CB radio antennas, isn’t one enough? Motor homes worth a million dollars,….isn’t a quarter of a million enough?  As I witnessed this menagerie for the last two weeks of January I am convinced that mainstream society has still not come to terms with the idea that excess is killing our nation.   

 I am now accepting the idea that I am in fact in the mist of some freaky mid life crises. I mean shit…..four months in a freaking tent…with a little Boston terrier, in the middle of the Arizona desert, where the wind is ever present, and the environment is just dirt and rocks. What the hell am I doing?????. I know….I know…those of you that have been following my rants are saying, “dang, this guy is always saying “what the hell am I doing”. However this time it’s really what the hell am I doing? Again four months….a tent…with a dog….the winds….the dirt…..the rocks….ahhhhhhh. But alas, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. People ask “Eddie, how much longer you going to be here?” My standard reply is, as long as you keep coming here for lunch or dinner. I will ride this adventure to the very end. Besides, how many people can boast of sitting along the road side in a produce tent watching the super bowl?  This is exactly what I did with three other friends.  The best part was what happened the day after the Super Bowl… The story goes like this;  My buddy who has a produce tent set up in the same vicinity as my trailer invited me over to watch the Super Bowl game.  So I decided that I would I shut down early to hang out with the boys.  There were four of us inside this produce tent, my buddy, his helper, their neighbor and me.  We munched on pizza and drank a few beers while we watched the game.  At the end of the night my buddy Tom said to me, “can you believe this….we watched the super bowl on the road side in my produce tent, what the hell are we doing?” At which time he shared with me that he was ready to go home after only six weeks in Quartzsite. In the mean time I’m thinking six weeks….I’ve been here going on four months. The next morning the cops showed up at the produce stand and hauled away my buddy’s helper.  We have no idea why, however the cops did inform my buddy that  his helper won’t be returning. So now we joke about how we could have made the local headlines…..three guys murdered in a roadside produce tent after watching super bowl by a serial killer.  A few days later I was telling the Manager of our particular swap meet about the cops coming and hauling away my buddy’s helper.  The manager replied,  “I don’t think the guy was all that bad….besides if he killed his wife, she probably deserved it.” Where else but Quartzsite!    More Later,  Eddie