DON'T READ THIS AT LUNCHTIME

or How To Use The fact That Life Is S**t To Your Advantage

Life can be sh!t.
In fact, it turns out it actually is.
Literally.

It was during the explanation of neutralized biosolids part of our tour of the sewage treatment plant that it hit me.

(I told you not to read this at lunchtime.)

Not the smell.
I can’t really smell anyway but Shannon assured me there was essentially no smell.

Shannon LOVES touring public works. I was flying to the UK in the afternoon but Shannon felt there was entirely enough time for a quick one hour tour.

I was flying Economy later that day and felt that the juxtaposition of sewage may make coach class seem more pleasant.
I was wrong… but that’s another story.

Our tour guide and plant manager, Anton, was quite matter-of-factly explaining that everything in the huge storage of biosolids and the clean water that had been organically filtered out of it and was running back to nature had all been in us at one point in time.

He really knew his shi… okay, the jokes are too easy.

Anton, the full-time sewage treatment plant manager and apparent freelance philosopher, wasn’t making a crude “everybody poops” joke but rather he was referring to the notion that all of the minerals, microorganisms, and sundry were all on the planet essentially since the get-go and we’re just part of the cycle.

All of the stuff on the planet, and in the cosmos, makes up all of the stuff on the planet and the cosmos.

There may be new combinations but it’s all the same ingredients from the same cosmic cupboard, continuously cycling through various forms.

He didn’t say that the only difference between me and the vat of biosolids was that I have an iPhone, but that’s how it hit me and some days it feels very accurate.

So, let’s cut the crap… sorry.

In that moment I felt entirely inconsequential.
Not in a resigned negative way.
I felt inconsequential in the same way that you feel when you win a game of chance. You couldn’t have designed or even forced the outcome but hey… isn’t this awesome.

Kind of like… well, you got lucky.
In this moment of space and time you could have just been part of a olympic swimming pool sized storage of biosolids…
But you’re not.
You’re here.
You probably own shoes and wear pants sometimes.

You’re not a pile of biosolids waiting its turn to be on top of the cycle again.
You’re there.
You can make your life and the life of others better.

So, what are you going to do now that you’ve already lucked out?

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(Pictured: Author sits in Economy wishing he was back at the roomy sewage treatment plant)