Sweet, Sweet Freedom
visual representation of how I feel most of the time.
Yesterday I found myself facing the eternal question, “What should I write about for the website today?” Usually when faced with that daily dilemma my answer is to head over to my Patch Adams clipboard and choose a Control Nathan Rabin 4.0 nominee.
That’s because Control Nathan Rabin 4.0 pays the bills and keeps this site in business but also because I have a sizable backlog of Control Nathan Rabin 4.0 movies to get through and I want to keep my most loyal and generous patrons happy.
That’s just good business and while I am not a natural businessman by any stretch of the imagination I’ve stumbled my way into having a modestly successful small business by following two primary directives.
The first is to do work that I find creatively satisfying, stimulating and challenging, that speaks to who I am and how I see the world. The second is to keep my readers happy.
In my mind these two objectives are fundamentally the same. I feel like the way I can keep readers happy is by doing work that I find creatively satisfying, stimulating and challenging whether it has any kind of audience or not.
So, to satiate a very weird, very personal itch I decided to spend the workday reading and writing about a lovingly assembled coffee table book about penis-faced humanoid cigarette spokes-camel Joe Camel, who at the height of his popularity was as recognizable to six year olds as Mickey Mouse.
If I’d pitched this book literally anywhere else I would have gotten a firm “no” on the grounds that it’s some random ass bullshit that doesn’t have anything to do with anything.
That’s true but that’s also precisely why I decided to write what would undoubtedly be a modestly read article about a book at one point only available for purchase through Camel Cash. I have given myself the perpetual green light to write about random ass bullshit that doesn’t have anything to do with anything beyond my desire to write about it.
Here at Nathan Rabin’s Happy Place I am that rarest and most wonderful of creatures: a legitimately free person, doing what I love exactly how I want to do it whether it makes me money or not.
That freedom is wonderful and precious but it comes with an undeniable cost. I’ve sacrificed stability and security, not to mention benefits and a steady paycheck to follow my own path. It’s been exceedingly difficult at times when the numbers are stubbornly going down rather than up.
It’s easy to doubt yourself and the choices that you’ve made. But then you realize how lucky you are to be doing what you were put on earth to do, to the best of your abilities, with complete creative freedom and control. That is precious and rare and worth fight for.
That’s why I’m putting together The Joy of Trash: I want to share this website and its wonders with the world. Also, I need the money. But mostly I want to evangelize on behalf of the Happy Place and its amazing readers and commenters.
I honestly don’t feel worthy of the commentariat here at the Happy Place sometimes. It is downright embarrassing how often commenters contribute thoughts that are smarter and more interesting than the articles that they are commenting upon.
I feel like I’ve carved out a special little niche here with the Happy Place, a website dedicated to following its own wandering muse rather than chasing page-views or popularity.
The older I get, the more I believe that you can’t be too appreciative towards the people who allow you to live your dream every goddamned day of your life, even if that dream is as silly as writing about Joe Camel’s bizarre, unfortunate but endlessly fascinating existence if the spirit strikes you.
It’s a special goddamn thing to be able to wake up every morning and feel excited and optimistic about the day’s work. That’s what I have with the Happy Place and it’s because of all of you beautiful people.
So thank you for letting me be me. In return I will continue to do the best that I can to make the world a weirder and more interesting place.
Pre-order the Happy Place’s second book, The Joy of Trash: Nathan Rabin’s Happy Place’s Definitive Guide to the Very Worst of Everything here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/weirdaccordiontoal/the-joy-of-trash?ref=project_build
Help ensure a future for the Happy Place during an uncertain era AND get sweet merch by pledging to the site’s Patreon account at https://www.patreon.com/nathanrabinshappyplace
Also, BUY the RIDICULOUSLY SELF-INDULGENT, ILL-ADVISED VANITY EDITION of THE WEIRD ACCORDION TO AL, the Happy Place’s first book. This 500 page extended edition features an introduction from Al himself (who I co-wrote 2012’s Weird Al: The Book with), who also copy-edited and fact-checked, as well as over 80 illustrations from Felipe Sobreiro on entries covering every facet of Al’s career, including his complete discography, The Compleat Al, UHF, the 2018 tour that gives the book its subtitle and EVERY episode of The Weird Al Show and Al’s season as the band-leader on Comedy Bang! Bang!
Only 23 dollars signed, tax and shipping included, at the https://www.nathanrabin.com/shop or for more, unsigned, from Amazon here