Too Complicated

I've spent most of my adult life living outside of America. Now that I am back living inside America, I am just lost and clueless.

The culture baffles me. Technology is slowing me down, not speeding things up.

Back in the dark ages I worked on the cutting edge of computers. They were going to save us mountains of paperwork and make us productive. Indeed my accounting and tax business took off like lightening when we were the first in the state to utilize a computer for accounting. My income shot up and I was quite successful. At the time, I was faster than the machine. I had to slow down my number punching so as not to jam up the computer. Eventually they made better computers that enabled me to rattle off dates, account numbers, invoice numbers, check numbers and dollar amounts in rapid succession, as fast as my little fingers could go.

There was no cumbersome mouse to slow me down. The computer saved our business time and paper. No more big heavy 36 inch accounting ledgers to push a pen across all day long by hand. I was suddenly super efficient at my job. It was thrilling!

But late in  1987, much to the shock of clients and friends, I gave up accounting and taxes to pursue a life at sea. One of these days I will explain why. It's very complicated. It wasn't a flippant decision, it was one I planned in secret for a year.

Anyhow, speed forward to 2014. I returned to America just before 2010. Computers are used now to spew forth mountains of paperwork and create hassles, not solve them. Or so it seems to me.

I want a simpler life.

I have tons of articles and chapters written for several more books, in severe need of rewrites and editing,  but I am constantly interrupted with patching up this old motorhome, fighting to get well, workamping and dealing with the total chaos of learning to live in a very complicated America.

I keep trying to get off all the junk mail that turns up in my post box. Then I do a dozen things to try to keep the spam at bay that turns up in my email accounts despite all my spam controls. I am suddenly battling unsolicited phone calls on an unlisted phone. As quick as I block the numbers so they can't keep calling, more pop up. When I quit answering the phone altogether it seems I miss an important phone call and end up playing phone tag to reach the person back again.

Some days I try to do a ton of research on alternative treatments for my condition. Many websites assault me with popups to sign up for newsletters or create an account or take a survey. I just want to read the article, but some times there are flashing advertisements competing for attention, talking commercials and videos playing jerkily on my super slow internet access. I try to block the ads, stop the videos and concentrate on the information I am trying to read.

The source is not always accurate, but often self serving, so I am forced into cross checking across many domains. If I could afford all the books I want to read, that would be so much simpler, but I live on an "efficient" erratic income until I get well, so researching on the internet is my option for now.

I've given up on western medicine. The last time I went to see a doctor, they treated me like an assembly line part for a manufacturing plant. I never did get to see a doctor at all but was treated to a long list of folks who claimed not to be "the doctor" but instead had some other title. No one was interested in my concerns or questions or pain.

I was barked at, ordered around, ignored and shuffled from one waiting room to another, as if I had upset their entire day by darkening their door and asking for help. And how DARE I ask each person that came to hastily do something offending to me, if they were "the doctor". These people had on no name tags, no titles, just assorted scrub suits as if everyone was fit to dash off for surgery any minute.

Later I researched some of the titles these people told me they were and discovered the education qualifications for some of them were pretty minimal to earn these titles. More than once I was told to stop asking questions.

Three hours later, I still had not met a single person claiming to be a doctor, but I was pushed out the exit with 2 prescriptions, written by an assistant who was extremely rude to me when I inquired if he was the doctor. My other questions went unanswered and I was lectured and interrupted, over and over never once allowed to spit out one complete sentence or question. I was told more than once "You're time is up! You're time is up!"

It seems to me, I could have just thrown on a set of scrubs and start poking and prodding at the other patients and no one would have been the wiser.

But I digress...

I could get so much more done each day if I wasn't under constant attack in my mail box, email and phone. I just want to get well and be a walking, smiling miracle.

There is a tiny handful of companies and people I want to contact me because I do business with them.

But it seems I spend most of my day sorting through this total chaos of information overload from companies I want absolutely nothing to do with at all, that are relentlessly tracking me down as if I were some sort of rare species to be hunted down with the frenetic energy of paparazzi gone crazy in search of a huge reward.

My key chain is weighted down with dozens of tracking cards for stores that will charge me extra for buying ordinary food if I don't present this daggum card each time. I have to keep my ignition key separate now, the key chain is an explosion of tracking cards I resent mightily. I travel, so different areas have different grocery stores available. I am sick of these silly cards, but it seems there is a financial penalty if I refuse to use them. It's maddening!

Shortly after I arrived in America, I tried to buy a heavily discounted sweater on a very cold day for $3 or $4 cash and the cashier refused to sell it to me unless I spit out my email and phone number. I was new to America, very sick, very cold, a bit baffled and confused by the wild events that lead up to me landing here. I didn't want to give out my information, I just wanted to pay cash, put on the sweater and leave the store. I was terribly weak and exhausted. It had taken me a long time pawing through the clearance rack in the very back of the store, trying to find something that was warm and fit me too.

It was a weird feeling. Not so long ago, my life was vastly different. I could have walked in that store and bought anything I desired. A terrible incident and severe illness had changed my life dramatically. Now I was scrutinizing the haphazard clearance rack in the back of the store ignoring the full priced trendy outfits.

When I refused to give out my phone and email, pushing my money across the counter, announcing I was just paying cash, the manager had to be called. I was on the verge of tears, I was so cold and sick and tired. Ten minutes of harassment later, I was finally handed this 16 inch long paper receipt for my single transaction. I put on the sweater, tags and all, then marched out of the store carrying the bag with the lengthy receipt and several other advertising papers and coupons stuck in it by the cashier.

For some silly reason, I just draped over the steering wheel of my vehicle and cried.

America had become a very complicated place to live and I was clearly way out of my league.

Below is a picture of the secret trail to a special place, I accidentally discovered recently. 
Don't tell ANYONE!

If some corporation finds out about this secret trail, they will require phone, email , address, date of birth and a Facebook account before one will be allowed to walk down it. 
SHHHHHHH...