We were young, dumb, and full of anticipation for our shot at the American Dream! Most of the Yahoos chose to attend college and/or serve in the military after high school. I chose my own adventure, guided by three simple rules:
- If it ain't fun, forget it
- Make shit happen
- When in doubt, see rule #1
Designing and selling t-shirts had taught me more than four years of fancy book learning. Instead of becoming a fleshy cog in somebody else's machine, I fled the godforsaken hinterlands with a diploma, a particular set of skills, and a decade of sales experience. Now the captain of my destiny, I charted a course back to Chicago.
Shenanigans ensued.
During The Summer of Love, as my pocket filled with loot earned from door to door sales, my soul filled with purpose and I began to think like a pirate. Live to sell! Sell to live! Yet sharing my goal to become a sales manager with my high school guidance counselor, she suggested studying HVAC repair ‘just in case.’ Yikes! Selling was fun and easy for me, and it promised a life of adventure, so, with a heave and a ho, I set out, fueled only by my desire to parley.
Learning while earning at gigs with on-the-job training introduced me to life-changing gurus. Applying their lessons turned work into play. Pursuing my passions for over fifty years, I've stumbled up into management more than once, and on a dare from a client, gone into business as a marketing mercenary. Now, in the third half of life, it is time to give back and share the lessons learned pursuing my own American Dream.
Like P.T. Barnum, I'm shamelessly giving away my autobiography, The Life and Times of Grizzled Adman. New content gets added as statutes of limitation expire. In the future, everybody will be famous for 15 megabytes. If shenanigans like starting a religion, reviving a political party, or training stark, raving capitalists sound like fun to you, join the crew. With another few chapters still in me, if we conspire they may include you.
Think like a pirate. Have fun, be lazy, and cheat.
--
Roger Leeper, Rip-Off Artist
merch @ leeper.net
