2 Life Lessons from the Universe

 The used RV lot was a graveyard of “character.” Faded paint, sagging ceilings, and smells Leonard couldn’t identify but hoped weren’t permanent.

“This one’s perfect,” the salesman said, patting a particularly battered RV. “It’s got personality.”

“Personality,” Leonard repeated, his tone dry as sandpaper. “That’s what people say about cars that don’t always stop when the brakes are applied.”

Still, he bought it. Not because it was perfect, but because it wasn’t. The scuffs and scratches, the faint smell of mildew—it all felt like an honest reflection of where Leonard was in his life. Damaged, but functional. Worn, but still capable of going somewhere.

That first night, parked in the quiet desert with the distant hum of crickets and the occasional coyote howl, Leonard felt the kind of silence that crept into your chest and took up residence. He didn’t like it.

He rummaged through the tapes until he found one labeled “Finnlagh vs. the Storm” and popped it into the cassette player.

The tape began with laughter—his friend’s voice crackling with amusement. “So there I was,” it started, “back at the dock after a storm had blown through. Finnlagh was on his boat, rocking with the waves like he didn’t have a care in the world.”

Leonard leaned back, the corners of his mouth twitching. He liked Finnlagh. The man was chaos wrapped in duct tape and whiskey.

According to the tape, a Category 5 hurricane had been barreling toward the coast, and evacuation orders were issued. Most people packed what they could and left, but not Finnlagh.

“I asked him why he wasn’t leaving,” the voice on the tape said. “He looked me dead in the eye, holding a bottle of whiskey, and said, ‘If the wind’s already gonna blow, might as well let it push you somewhere worth going.’ Then he laughed like he’d just cracked the secret of the universe.”

Leonard laughed so hard he almost spilled his coffee. “Now that’s a man with priorities,” he said, shaking his head.

The story continued. While the docks were deserted, Finnlagh rode out the storm, tying himself to the mast like some kind of Irish Odysseus. When the hurricane finally passed, he emerged on the deck, soaked and triumphant, yelling, “The storm’s got nothin’ on me, but the hangover’s a killer!”

Leonard replayed that line—“If the wind’s already gonna blow, might as well let it push you somewhere worth going.”

He stared out the RV window at the endless stretch of desert, the horizon blurring into a distant promise of something new. Maybe that’s what Finnlagh understood. Storms didn’t care where you ended up, so why should you? Maybe anywhere was just as good as nowhere and it really didn't matter as much. In an odd way that felt like a relief. A huge burden shed. You didn't need to put down on a house, get married, have kids, etc. You could buy an RV and roam around aimlessly with your turkey while you slowly become a taxidermist for electronics, turning your roomba into your dead friend to keep his story alive.

Leonard thought about his own storms—the years of guilt and self-doubt, the endless projects that filled the days but not the void. His life had been anchored to the past, to a house that was more mausoleum than home. But here, in this battered RV, with Finnlagh’s whiskey-soaked wisdom echoing in his ears, Leonard felt a flicker of something he hadn’t in years: possibility.

As the tape played on, Leonard realized something: Finnlagh wasn’t just a man riding out hurricanes. He was a story.

And stories weren’t just entertainment. They were lifelines, connections, pieces of ourselves we handed off to others. Leonard’s friend had collected these stories like treasures, holding onto them not because they were perfect, but because they were true.

The world wasn’t made of rules, Leonard thought. It was made of stories—of oddballs like Finnlagh who lived their lives on their own terms and left pieces of themselves behind in the tales they inspired.

Leonard leaned back in his chair, the tape clicking softly as it ended. Stories could do more than entertain. They could connect people who’d never meet, bridge gaps that seemed impossible, and help you see the world—and yourself—differently.

Maybe that was what his friend had been trying to do all along.

The thought stayed with Leonard as he stared out at the dark desert. Maybe it wasn’t just about writing his own story. Maybe it was about collecting them, sharing them, creating a way for others to hear the voices they needed at the exact moment they needed them.

The wind rattled the RV, a faint echo of Finnlagh’s hurricane, and Leonard smiled. Maybe, just maybe, the storm could push him somewhere worth going.