It’s important to stand for something.And I don’t mean this in terms of standing for a theory or some dogma that’s been passed down. I am not talking about standing for an organized bullet-point list or a party line.Every time I try to align myself with a political party, religious group, social movement or even a music scene, I fall flat on my face. Over time I’ve come to believe it’s because I am – both by choice and necessity – an outcast, a space cadet, a burnout.

So I circle around the fringes and meet some really interesting people, and together and we huddle in small groups around the trash can fires of the social world while the glamorous pass by in their shimmering stilettos of success and stability.

But one thing sets me apart from other burnouts – I have a voice. I don’t know how, but I keep getting websites and papers to publish me. I keep getting bands together that get a shot to play shows, and even if we never fit in at any venue, at least they have to hear us out.

So, I try to use that for the one constituency of which I am a member. That group is the burnouts.

If I stand for anything in this life, I want to stand for the burnouts, because they are more real and interesting than anyone else could ever be.

In my book a burnout is a cracked-out ‘little engine who couldn’t’ but keeps trying anyway.

A burnout is your friend who gets into credit trouble and has to move back in with his folks.

It’s the weird uncle everybody holds their breath around at family gatherings. It’s the affable gal who is ridiculously late to everything.

A burnout is a middle-aged comic shop clerk who insulates himself from the world because there are no heroes out there to make his loneliness subside.

A burnout is someone who has something important to say but has been ignored or mocked so many times they’ve lost confidence to say it any more.

A burnout is one of millions of young people with an esoteric degree who is now a wage slave in some tucked-away town where they are not appreciated.

A burnout is someone who lives vicariously through their more confident friend. It’s the person invited to a party as a filler.

Or, like me, It’s the person who tries to be the life of the party to get someone to notice them but just makes an ass of himself.

It’s the person who was ambitious in high school and can’t figure out why they’re a nobody at 26.

“All the lonely people, where do they all come from? All the lonely people, where do they all belong?” Those words from the Beatles’ “Eleanor Rigby” reverberate in my mind.

We are all here and just want to come in from the cold and join the party. There’s more to us than you think.

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