What We Seek

by Nic Olson

I just got home from driving my cousin Christine to the bus depot at 2am. She flew in today from Mexico and is now bussing to Calgary from Regina. Until the new one in 2009, Regina has officially the sketchiest bus depot of all time, and I’ve been to Delhi. I felt more comfortable in Delhi at the train station than I did in the Regina bus depot. Does that say something about my personality, Regina’s sketchiness, or Delhi’s incredibly nice train station? Do the research. 

Since it is so late, things seem to be clear and simple. A clarity that encourages the profound, or maybe just profanity. Either way, at this time of day, it is much more strong. Poor english? That’s part of the journey.

Thinking about India while lying in bed tonight, I literally started shaking and repeatedly rolling over until I was diagnosed with a very unfunny form of malaria where I wanted to go back to India so bad that I actually nearly seizured and ate a brick of lard. The greatest album of all time (TIME magazine, New York Post, Balls of Rice) says that we are known by what we seek. 
What do I seek in India? Friendships? A life different than the one I have here? Cute Indian girls? Is that honourable or selfish? 
What do I seek in Canada? Friendships? Money? Cute Asian girls? Is that honourable or selfish?

I want to be known as the guy that wanted to change things worldwide, by changing how we think. How do I seek that? Why do I feel that I have to seek that elsewhere? That can be seeked (what is the plural of seek? sook? saked? seekered?) here just as easily.
I don’t want to be known as the guy who seeks out dates at JD’s. 
I don’t want to be known as the guy who seeks travel only for the good times, and not the good to be done.
Should I be concerned with what I want to be known for, or should I be concerned with what I should seek? I think the answer is as obvious as malaria.
Robot Theory: I figure that the ATP (men’s professional tennis tour, stay with me) created a super robot. They were trying to come up with a great practice partner for guys like David Nalbandian and Marat Safin, and instead came up with an unbeatable, very programmable, sometimes cannibal robot named Roger Federer. I love tennis, and I love people getting paid lots of money to play tennis, but I think the ATP might be crooked as the MLB. I think that their super robot Federer was put on the circuit for ratings. No one can beat him, so he gets people into tennis, like Woods does golf (let’s not get into the alien theory with him. That smile can’t be human. It just can’t.). They could easily make him win every single tournament if they wanted, but they program him to lose the odd one, to make it interesting. Then the Russians (it has got to be the Russians) came up with their own super tennis robot, Rafael Nadal, who competes like a champ and opposes the Federer robot. All in all, tennis has been great the past six years, I can’t even pretend that it hasn’t. This is the only explanation. Well done ATP, well done.