NO REGRET LIFE FOR LIVING WITH REGRETS

Life with no regret, not one, is a life worth living.

If you hear someone say they have no regrets about anything, it’s not your job to find something for them to regret.

But it is your job to know how words work, beginning with definitions.

Your understanding of regret might need an update:

Regret: a feeling of sadness about something sad or wrong or about a mistake that you have made, and a wish that it could have been different and better:

Maybe you’re more like, ‘I don’t carry much personal regret, but there’s a couple of times . . . ?’

What my life experience has given me is insight into regrets, others’ regrets. For example:

I’ve watched and listened to the Beatles Get Back nearly three times with plans for more.

Why?

It’s full of regret.

In 1970 I was fifteen. John, Paul, George, and Ringo were nearing thirty. When they broke up the band it didn’t register with me. I first saw them on Ed Sullivan.

Were they the Beatles or Sergeant Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band?

I was confused. Weren’t they already broken up?

Whatever the case at the time, regret songs topped the hits list in 1970:

“Let It Be” couldn’t compete with the work from The Jackson 5, but those are someone else’s regrets.

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The Beatles signed off with sadness that’s been highlighted in Get Back.

At the age of sixty-seven I’m apparently a fan of sadness and regret. It started early.

The sadness of Get Back is hard to watch; you see it in every face.

George is the saddest of all because he has more to offer the band. 

He’s got more based on what he contributed in the past, what he was allowed to contribute.

What’s clear in the second part, when John and Paul talk alone with a mic secretly planted at their table, was the dynamic between those two.

They felt sorry for George, who’d up and left the sessions. 

Paul and John knew they’d crossed a musical line with George. Could they continue without him?

Could they continue with him?

Paul said John had always been the boss, and that’s the root of the Beatles break up.

Portland Regrets Oregon

Too many Oregonians who cherish their ‘way of life’ see Portland as the ‘shithole city of drugs and crime.’

I’m not saying they’re wrong, except a negative opinion from a lifelong resident in a one-stop-sign-town isn’t exactly a clarion call for change.

Time says, “Portland, Ore. All are welcome.”

Portland is the last place on the list. And it’s not an alphabetical list. Google “time greatest places 2022.”

The Time image is Flanders Crossing over the 405.

The question I see is the welcome mat. Are all welcome in Portland, Ore? 

Sure, come on down. Look, there’s Governor Tom McCall. Is that Portland Mayor Neil Goldschmidt?

Portland, OR might be a problem, though. 

Could someone remind Time we’ve moved past the Ore of shortened Oregon for the even shorter OR?

Or, I’ll grab the nearest pigeon and tie a note to its leg.

Portland is used to being a backwater destination, and Time agrees. They want to show the world a place in the heavily wooded Northwest by noting a freeway bridge as if to say, “See, they do normal things out there.”

Normal?

Ask the average person east of the Mississippi where Oregon is and wait for an answer. 

Keep waiting. I did.

“Near Wyoming?”

Close enough, just like groundbreaking bridges showing off the world’s greatest places are enough.

The welcome part is a big question though. Portland already has enough people willing to trash the place and doesn’t need anymore help.

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Imagine a city of thin, rich, hippies lounging around eating berries and nuts, sending their kids to Reed, gathering at Saturday Market, the Blues Festival, local Farmers Markets, the organic co-op, vineyards, tap rooms, and the latest hot restaurant where they sit on rickety chairs at tiny tables covered in food from a country they’ve never heard of, but the lamb ‘Is To Die For.’

Everything was nice and clean, a gateway to middle-age and beyond with visions of cotton candy and carmel korn.

When it was their city it was every bit the dream they’d all shared.

They moved to the countryside of Eastmoreland and Alameda for the best views of the distant city skyline.

Friends from their other lives visit and compare the Portland skyline view to looking at Manhattan from Brooklyn.

“It’s nice, but we could never leave the city for this,” they say.

Until they do, then the story changes to, “The best decision we ever made was moving to Portland.”

With no regret, of course.

In Portland, you’ll need to earn $140,447 or more to be considered a “rich” person in the top 20% of the city’s more than 645,000 residents. However, the average income of the top 20% is $241,724.

The ultra-rich, or the top 5% of earners in Portland, make way more: $411,647 on average, according to the analysis.

Move to Portland to save money, man.

No Regret Life Lessons

The one that got away?

What do you do when your girlfriend breaks up with you at the end of high school?

After she dumps you for a scrappy little guy, what’s your next move? You’d make plans together to go to the same college. You had plans to walk together in the graduation ceremony. 

Now what?

Now what nothing.

You wish them well and do the graduation walk the day after they married their new guy. 

You don’t like the idea, don’t want to do it, but you do it anyway. Then you realize you just turned into a man.

If she gives you a graduation gift of a dozen rainbow condoms, hand them out to the twelve student-scholar guys who made the all-star list each month of senior year.

You’re welcome.

Don’t get someone to buy a fifth of cheap vodka and chase it with unsweetened orange juice in a can until you puke your woes away.

Save that one for more important events, like losing a wrestling tournament in Coos Bay to a Marshfield Pirate.

Hey, Ronny.

2: Still No Regret?

Peggy Sue ran off and married some other guy in high school?

Sweet Loretta graduated from college and left you for someone better?

To all the men pining away for their lost love:

Get out of your own way.

If you’ve got love to give away, find the right recipient.

Who is that? The one who shares your love and lets you share theirs.

Whatever the question, think of love for an answer, not regret.

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

Number one with a bullet? Regret for not being true to yourself?

You don’t need a near death moment to realize how big expectations can be.

Get married and have kids and you’re expected to stick around and pretend you want to be there instead of the beach, the lush valley, the wind swept mountains.

Wilt Chamberlain died true to himself, neglecting any and all of those he contacted during his self reported 20,000 ‘romantic’ encounters.

Steve Jobs seemed true to himself. When he died lesser people called him out as a jerk.

Henry Ford followed his own vision and drove his only son Edsel to an early grave.

Our surroundings influence us. People we love influence us.

Bruce Springsteen showed a sort of courage in a song with, “Got a wife and kid in Baltimore, Jack. Went out for a ride and never came back.”

The father of A Boy Named Sue had the courage to live life on his terms.

Is courage more than ditching the life you’ve built to avoid expectations?

Try this instead: identify the expectations others have of you. Exceed those expectations every day.

If that’s not good enough to earn the freedom you want then you live with over-controlling punks.

Follow me for more advice on the No Regret Life.