Sunrise Mojo

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Los Angeles 27 Years Old

Longboard wheels hum through orbs of amber streetlight, glancing up dusty Hollywood alleys under the rumble of midnight planes in the dark.

The night is warm and balmy…why are so few out? Right now in Ohio it’s sleeting…don’t y’all know we’re in paradise?

I stop on a bench and lean forward to stretch the hammies…tired from the daily commute…5 miles each way, weave and sway on a rusty bicycle through windblown human slalom, a rabbit dancing in the dense, urban overgrowth.

All day pushing an overloaded dolly up California hills past beauties, bosses, and bums to sling smiles and 40-pound boxes at retired Playboy babes.

Hefting, grooving, moving, this feels a little more like how life is meant to be.

From 100 yards up the sidewalk comes a gift…

Left-eye peripheral catches a new form moving unlike any living thing I’ve ever seen.

He’s about 70, prancing, shirtless. Wispy white beard brushes wispy white chest hair.

I skate across traffic to catch him.

His third sentence: “You want to know the secret? Be crazy. Wake up, be CRAZY!”  

Evening temperature: 48 degrees. Me: jacket, pants, boots. Him: barechest, running shorts, coke bottle glasses. He limps a bit in his well-traveled gym shoes, but stammers forward with incredible pace.

Three blocks pass in whirlwind coescalation, yelling back and forth like on the brink some discovery, an eager seeker and a grimy genius.

Now he’s telling me his five laws of living:

“Number 1. Never waste your energy on negativity.” “NEVER!” he yells, wagging a finger at humanity.

“Number 2. Never complain, never give up. But it is more important to never complain.”

“Number 3. Only three things matter: time, friend who will take your bullet, and information. In that order.”

He hobble-sprints across bustling Hollywood Blvd, no crosswalk. Traffic parts like a stream around a boulder, if that boulder was a homeless tent-dwelling earth-alien zinging wisdom in all directions, with hair like Einstein and a personality like holding a fork in an electrical socket, wearing a fanny pack.

Not wanting to fail Rule 3 before even hearing all 5, I jog in his wake, carefully mediating traffic both ways at once.

Number 4. “No junk food, no junk drink, no junk people.”

And Number 5. “If you do nothing, you get nothing.”

He stops and looks at me square in the eyes.

The vibrant reality of his wild wisdom is a rush, awareness beyond superficial delusion, a stone weathered smooth until all thats left is the core.

So far I’ve said just 3 choppy phrases, but a look in my eye and he knows…

He knows I’ve been alone in this junk city for weeks, simulating friendship with podcasts and books.

Having sparkling dreams about simpler days…21 years old, dipping through cool valleys on motorcycles with my closest buddy on the way to a summer BBQ.

A little game of whiffle ball with a fat red bat, early rays of summer speckle sacred beams on fresh cut grass through swaying leaves.

A boombox and a 30 pack of burgers…guys and girls trot and banter. Didn’t take much organization - we all lived close. A dream it seemed would never end.

But an hour later the dream is gone and I’m waiting for a taxi on some hot smutty corner - trash everywhere. Subversive billboards stare in silent urging, beaming envy and lust from above, stifling the warm heavenly vitamin sky.

There’s a screen in the taxi and the news lies to my face, I chat up the driver but both our social filters are too strong, we can’t get soul to soul.

Guys roll by in big loud trucks with girls who look like barbies and I start wondering if maybe I need a big truck or a barbie.

I start to feel confused about what matters, distracted from the already fullness of Life, sucked back into the concerns of civilization…lost again in false riches.

Drowned in craving for words and things, overindulged in the material world, a stumbling zombie starved of love, lost in separation. I can sense my heart depleting.

He knows we wake in the night, alone, deluded and empty, chasing nothing. A whole generation lost and wandering, all across the world.

I glance again at his dirty shorts and floppy shoes. How complicated is survival, really?

What do we need, really? Water, food, shelter, bed, toilet, shower.

Why do we swap our shining souls for logos and cash? Who do we become if we worship “things” instead of The Great Blossoming Force Behind it All?

What good is all this money if we lose our glowing curious souls to get it?

We set off to chase promotions and better salaries, and get them, but stifle the aching pit in the belly, the loneliness that is lack of community.

Soul connection is the only thing that fills the void. Real, deep, prolonged human connection.

He sees it all in one quick glimpse, this white-bearded wandering shaman.

The calm passion in his vibrant eyes confirms my curious inkling to break ties with stale ways. Hold sacred the few things within my control, and put all energy there.

I’ve lived in quiet hesitance for too long. A new and boundless opening.

I long to live again with my soul plugged into the sloshing river. Deep in the woods in the slow mushroom drip…brazen squiggly squirrels, and a billion leaves aflutter.

Running up orange mountains at dusk, flourishes of wild creativity and generosity, napping in the hammock breeze, no one’s integrity to live for but your own.

Even if I have to stay minimal forever and eat from cans and drink from my old gallon jug. I will not trade my favorite simple things in life for the comforts of overindulgence.

Why do we abandon what matters to do something less enticing? How did we get to this place where no one has time to sit back and relax?

It is time for a new adventure.

“Go…” whispers the voice.

“Wake up, be crazy.”

Thank you universe. This was everything I needed.

I will.