YOU ARE THE COMPANY YOU KEEP - Brittlestar’s Weekly Newsletter - Issue #35
The newest episode of my podcast is out and this week’s guests are Brent Butt and Nancy Robertson (Corner Gas). They are truly a dynamic duo and I haven’t laughed that much in ages.
If you don’t listen to podcasts yet, try putting this on while you’re cleaning or doing the laundry, etc. Podcasts make boring things finish faster.
Get it here: ReallyGreatPodcast.com
YOU ARE THE COMPANY YOU KEEP
A few weeks ago I posted a video and song I created called You Are The Company You Keep.
It’s a bit of an homage to an Eric Idle style tune with the added benefit of me dressing like he does in the Figment ride at EPCOT (which Eric has no memory of filming… which kind of makes even better).
The gist of the song is that you can be judged by the people you count as friends. Most people got the general message and agreed, but some took issue and said it was just lending itself to encourage the further divisions we see in society today.
I understand what they mean… there is a tendency to paint each other with big brush strokes of perceived intent and that doesn’t help encourage dialogue.
Saying someone is part of the “Right” or “Left” and taking issue with that as opposed to individual ideas and acts. It’s tempting to get into a “Them” and “Us”. It’s way easier on our brains.
Some people would reply to the song post saying it’s important that we keep talking to each other.
I agree with that whole-heartedly… but that’s not what the song is about.
The song is directly aimed at those who turn a blind eye to the worst behaviour of their “friends”. It’s aimed at the people who are okay with people behaving terribly as long as they can count them as “friends”.
When I was in high school, and I know you’ll find this hard to believe, I was a die-hard New Waver, or Spinner as we were called. Wacky haircut, make-up, ummm… interesting fashion choices, the whole bit.
One of my good friends at school was Dan. Dan was (is?) a Heavy Metal guy or Metaller as we called them. Long hair, rock shirts, tattoos, the whole bit. We had precious little in common… except I knew that Dan was a good guy. He wasn’t racist, he stood up for people, he treated his girlfriend like a queen. He was (is!) an all-round solid dude.
Standing side by side we must have looked like Bizarro world versions of each other, but I was happy to be his friend and I hope he was happy to be mine. We each reflected each other’s values.
We were undeniably very different but I was (am!) glad and proud to have him as a friend. If you knew what kind of guy Dan was you would have a pretty good idea of what kind of guy I was… except I had better taste in music (don’t tell Dan that) and new how to blend foundation at the chin line.
The point of all this is to say… we CAN be different. Different is VERY fun actually.
However, we need to make sure the person the world sees standing in a crowd is the person we are.
So take a look at the crowd you’re in. What does that crowd say about you? You don’t have to be identical, but you should set the bar as high for them as you do for yourself.
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Dan on far right... of the picture.
Author and human mushroom cloud