Is that all there is….?

Do you ever find yourself …disappointed with life…?

You see something advertised which looks like it will change your world…yet when you get it…its just a little – ‘…mwuuh..’.

It could be a car, it could be a watch, it could be a DVD ..or it could be something a simple as …a Pizza.

What’s it all about? Are we just programmed to pursue the next ‘thing’ and the next ‘thing’ until we spontaneously combust in a plume of smoke – or just disappear up our own backsides?

I have had various phases of this in my life.

Marbles – probably my first big passion. Only a little bag of about 30 or so coloured glass balls but boy did I love them. Swap, trade, upgrade …always on the lookout for the perfect sphere of glass. Of course one day I just woke up and thought ….huh… marbles what’s the big deal

When I was a little older I was obsessed with James Bond – books/films/toy cars – I had to have everything I could that related to Bond. I had all the paperbacks, I had the toy Aston Martin DB5 with the ejector seat and the bulletproof steel bumper. I queued to see the films and waited with baited breath at the end of each premier to see what the next movie ‘James Bond will return in…’

Following on from my Bond obsession I then became very aware of music as an influence in my life. I was into anything by ‘Stiff’ records. I collected vinyl albums in various colours and picture discs – the rarer the better. I relished showing friends albums from artists they’d never heard of…each record was filed and kept under a system that only I would understand.

My obsession cost me dearly as the music shops new of my addiction and whenever I walked in they would say … ‘pssst… how about this newly released single from the Stranglers in white vinyl* …only 100 copies made’ – aaaaarrrggghhh …this would result in no sleep until I had a copy of said single in my collection.  (Nb this was a version of ‘Walk on by’ – with a live version of ‘5 minutes’ on the flip side).

The music obsession was pretty much dead in the water after all of my music collection was stolen in the final days of college. Flat emptied and every piece of music that I’d ever owned – all gone in one go – :-/ …

Moving on from this stage I got into the obsession which has probably cost me the greatest amount of money over the years ….cars…

Cars cars cars….I used to lie in bed just dreaming of the day I would own the vehicle of my dreams. If only I could have this four wheeled magical contraption I would have the world at my feet. Women would throw themselves at me, grown men would cry with envy as I drove past, and children would point and shout out at mere sound of my car coming down the road…

I wanted SAAB’s then I wanted Audi’s… then I wanted Porsche’s… then I wanted Aston Martin’s…I had posters and pictures of all my favourite vehicles stuck on my wall – with timescales of when I would get them…ambition and a target that I could see fueled my burning desire to have these objects.

With each of these cars came additional costs as I quickly became bored with having a standard SAAB or a standard Audi – so came the years of tweaking and tuning and increasing of horsepower. Lowering, widening, modifying and generally pimping up the car until they barely resembled the original purchase…all in the name of being unique – having a ‘one off’ than nobody else had.

Unfortunately what you realise after doing this for a few years – is that its never enough.

Never quite quick enough, never quite enough power …and just when you think you’ve actually got something that you consider to be perfect – you realise that because you’ve been using it…its now a bit worn and not quite as nice as it used to be….

So going back to the question – … ‘is that all there is?’

I would respond by looking at what in my life has actually been a valid investment that has aged well and never bores me?

It still looks good most of the time and… though it does require regular maintenance….still hits all the right spots..???

That would be my wife.

 

Mike C