A single complaint: $5
Tally to date: $60
Learning-the-hard-way-that-complaining-is-a-waste-of-time-and-my-energy- is-better-spent-doing-anything-but: priceless.

For the sake of rounding up, I am rounding up(:) the Perspective Fund to a crisp $100 (I’d be kidding myself if I didn’t think fallen through the cracks of good behavior slipped a few unrecorded complaint tokens.)

No, $100 isn’t a lot monetarily, but the good (humbling) lessons that came along with every dollar certainly has to count for something.

I’m currently considering to which fund to donate. Any suggestions?

Nice little reminder about complaining on kottke.org [thanks for the head's up, J.N.!] Confirms my Perspective Fund is on the right track.

…Speaking of, there have been a few noted incidents of senseless complaining, but I’m not charging myself the five bucks… for good behavior (can she do that?!)

She can. But only because she is launching a project of equally profound and boundary-exploring magnitude. Stay tuned for:

PROJECT MUU MUU

Tally so far: $60

Complaint #12: I’ve been subpoenaed.

Realization: Being in the right place at the wrong time blows. Complaining about it doesn’t change it.

I’m still pissed [statement of fact]. I’m very frustrated that I had to witness a woman fall in the hallway of my San Francisco apartment [fact] and two years later have been called as witness for impending litigation [fact] over something so trivial [calm statement of subjective opinion] which is now becoming a huge inconvenience because the date of the trial hasn’t even been set so I have to plan the next couple of weeks of my life over this effing trial because some chick had to go and fall on her a** right in front of me [Complaint...]

Tally so far: $65

Complaint #13: [Please see above]

Realization: Stop while you’re ahead.

Tally so far: $55

Complaints #8, #9, #10, #11: I just don’t look the same in a bathing suit as I did when I was 20 [expletives deleted]

Realization: Whether it’s the admission that gravity is a force to be reckoned with, or “You mean I’m not a size 2 anymore?!” — sometimes the truth is ugly. Learn how to make it beautiful.

* * *

Complaints #8-11 are just plain expected… I turned 27 yesterday.

I am now “no longer in my ‘mid-to-late twenties’… just flat in my late twenties.” [Thanks, I.G.] To celebrate, my mom took me shopping a couple of days ago. This is not a past time I usually indulge in; However, she offered to buy me a new bra and socks, so how could I turn her down?

We went to Macy’s. (I remembered why I don’t go to malls.)

She had to get a new bathing suit for a cruise trip she’s going on, so I meandered through racks of strange pieces of string meant to pass for bathing suits. I had a few questions:

Have bathing suits always been this skimpy? Why is it okay to walk around in public in one of these things but not okay to prance around in my bra and underwear? And more importantly: How did I used to fit into one of these contraptions?

Well, you can see where this is going: out of curiosity, I had to try something on — ergo, Complaint #8… #9… #10, aaaand #11. It wasn’t that my body looked bad, it just looked… different. I have always been a very slender, almost lanky girl, and the last couple of years I’ve had to realize that I’m, er, a woman.

As I stood in front of the dressing room mirror, $5 complaints falling from my lips, I had to acknowledge the truth: I have hips. And breasts. And jiggle.

After my mom pointed out my $20 mistake, I was determined to make this a positive experience. So I returned to the racks once again to find a suit that made me feel as confident as a 20-year-old — even if I didn’t look like one.

And here’s how I did it: I used my brain. I officially renounced all bathing suits that show more crack that the sidewalks of San Francisco, and went retro — I found a suit straight out of the 1920′s when they were called bathing suits for a reason. The name of this piece is called the –get this– “Jam on it Jumper.” (I would killed for that naming job.)

Oh, mama — now that’s thinking for you:

It’s from a company called b swim and I absolutely love it. On the hanger it may look a little frumpy next to all those barely-there bikinis, but on, my new suit is tastefully cut yet refreshingly sexy. Now this beach season will be no-stress and high-fashion.

I may not have my 20-yr-old, fire-red body, but baby you better believe my mind is hot, hot, hot.

I’m standing by my Perspective Fund and its inevitable teachings — especially the redirection of complaining into action.

I posted about two complaints (#4 & #5) having to do with my current physical condition – chronic shoulder pain and acne – and I used the time I would have otherwise whined like a 2-yr-old to instead call my general care physician for an appointment for both a determotologist and orthopedic (God Bless HMO’s and the run-arounds)*; see an acupucturist (I figure I’ll cover my bases with both Eastern and Western medicine); order an ergonomic keyboard; get a facial; and write on the chalkboard 100 times that Yes, people like me, nobody hates me, and I shouldn’t go eat worms.

And wouldn’t you know it — progress. After a year of complaining about, well, a lot of things, but these two specifically, I finally discovered that a major side effect of a medication I’m on causes acne, and I’m coming off of it. And my ergonomic keyboard arrived today and hoo-boy — what a difference it makes (with a $135.95 price tag, it better).

Who knew that typing hunched over on a MacBook all day would strain the body?

It doesn’t make life perfect, but it sure makes life better; all complaining did was make me feel like a shmuck (and –okay– every once in awhile, better).

Worth the $5/pop lesson so far.

*Sarcasm is NOT the same as a complaint!

Tally so far: $35

Complaint #6: Taxes. Politics. The nation’s healthcare situation. (Yes, it counts as only one complaint, as it was all part of one long rant).

Complaint #7: That a friend pointed out to me that I was complaining, and that will be $5 thank-you-very-much.

Realization: That I’m more fiscally conservative and “economically Republican” than I knew; that talking about the above subjects while going on a beautiful (uphill) nature hike is NOT recommended if you have high blood pressure in your genetics; that telling my friends about my Prospective Fund was a bad idea.

Tally so far: $25

Complaint #4: My shoulder hurts. A lot. STILL.

Complaint #5: I feel like a pre-pubescent teenager with acne.

Realization: Complaining is not a painkiller, nor beautifier. That energy, however, can be put into action (or non-action, as the case may be).

I have chronic shoulder pain, the result of years as a competitive gymnast, hyper-mobile ligaments, and a car accident. In recent years it has been getting worse, and I find myself complaining when the relief I keep expecting doesn’t come, and I think to myself: “I’m twenty-six years old… what kind of pain am I going to be in when I’m EIGHTY-six?”

It’s very frustrating. And painful. (Not that I’m complaining.)

I really am, most of the time, warranted in my bemoaning of my pain — I really do have a pretty fucked up shoulder. However, with my recent Prospective Fund Project, every time I start to complain, I instead take the more economical approach and do one thing which might help remedy my ailment. In the past week, I have done the exercises a physical therapist gave me (twice) which I otherwise ‘forget’ to do (oops), made an appointment with an osteopath, seen an accupuncturist, and got up from the computer when my shoulder was screaming SET DOWN THE MOUSE AND WALK AWAY FOR THE LOVE OF GOD!

Normally, I would just bitch.

I’m finding the money as negative reinforcement is only secondary; at the end of the day, I would happily donate $25 to a good cause. The true benefit of this project is the mindfulness that comes along with it. Where I would normally complain with little to no recognition that I was even complaining, I instead feel a little buzz in my chest right before I open my mouth that whispers is that really what you want to be saying, what you want to be doing, in this moment?

The answer is usually ‘no’.

Now, the acne thing — that’s another story. I suddenly (one day, one month, last year) broke out all over my chin, and it will not go away. I have never had a pimple in my life, and now my chin is chronically red. Stress, you say? Possibly. Diet? I eat like a friggin’ Alice Waters. Hormones? I knew I was a late bloomer, but this is ridiculous.

Well, as it turns out, no one can tell me why — not a doctor, not a dermatologist, not even my psychiatrist. So I have been meditating on the problem, and have figured out that it is life’s way of punishing me for needing to know. Once I don’t care, I reason, things will mysteriously clear up. In the meantime, the Perspective Fund Project is helping me bite my tongue every time I pass a mirror. I have better things to do:

I added up all the moments I would have spent feeling insecure, ugly, and sorry for myself, and instead wrote this blog post.

Tally so far: $15

Complaint #2: That my new gym didn’t show me around when I first signed up, and I therefore didn’t even know where the locker room was.
Realization: Complaining doesn’t help me find it. Ask and let it go.

Complaint #3: General bitching about love and boys.
Realization: That was the best $5 I ever spent.

Tally so far: $5

Complaint: That the Crane Canyon Regional Park parking toll was “too expensive for such a small park.”

Realization: It’s $4. Get over it and hike.

Also, my mother has joined the cause.

After a recent conversation with some friends about the general running of the mind over that which doesn’t need to be run (?), and specifically the physical self in all of it’s glorious imperfections, challenges, and frustrations, I am realizing joyfully that this needless, indulgent cycle has no end — until, of course, we end it.

While I ain’t no Golden-Buddha-Monkey Zen Master than can turn off my superficial thoughts like a light switch, I am putting this rumination to good use.

I have been, as many of you know, the witness of many incidents of loss in recent weeks — a reminder of what a transitory time we have here, and how much precious time and valuable energy we spend worrying about things which are utterly, insanely, fantastically meaningless.

How strange that not even 2 months after the blow of my brother’s death I find myself still bemoaning that elusive 5 “extra” pounds we ladies (& some men? & some men!) love to fret about. 

Oh, the Luxury Worries! 

How much time — (the precious fleeting ticks of our lives!) — do we waste on these trivialities?

To find out, I am starting a “Perspective Fund” (aka, a shoe box) to which I will add $5 every time I needlessly bitch, whine, or complain about a physical problem — love handles, acne, flat hair, saggy boobs, knobby knees, crooked left middle toe — or quotidian problems clearly beyond my control — traffic, someone being late, the price of gas, a hole in my sock, someone mistaking me for an ewok — etc.

Using the equation time = money, this project aims to make me aware of just how much time/money I “willingly” throw away.

At the end of six months I will take accumulated funds and donate to a charity I feel strongly about*[1].

I have encouraged my friends and family to call me on my complaints when they hear them:

ME: “I wish my knees were cuter. They’re so… bumpy. [pout]”
THEM: ”Shannon! That’ll be $5!”

I’ve even encouraged them to consider doing a “Perspectives Fund” themselves. I would pose no less a challenge to you, Dear Readers…

Why does it matter to discover how much time we spend a-bitchin’? Because you can always make more money — but you can never get back time.

*[1] Of course, donating money to charity is hardly “throwing it away;” however, it’s better than burning the money after 6 months wholly on principle, right?