Unfortunately, it isn’t mine. It belongs to the most interesting man in the world, who is most likely the inspiration for the increasingly tiring Dos Equis commercials.
After reading the obituary for John Fairfax in The New York Times yesterday, I realized that men like him will not exist again in my lifetime. If I were to write a fictional novel based on his life, it would be too unbelievable for publication. This man lived a life that even Ernest Hemingway could only dream about.
As someone who enjoys a little adventure in his travels, I know I could never accomplish a fraction of what John Fairfax did. And that’s just what he did before he turned 21.
At 9, he settled a dispute with a pistol. At 13, he lit out for the Amazon jungle.
At 20, he attempted suicide-by-jaguar. Afterward he was apprenticed to a pirate.
I’ve heard of people running away to join the circus, but never to live in the jungle and become a pirate. I also never knew that pirates had apprentices.
While John Fairfax’s life may seem almost insane to most people today, he lived the way he wanted. I certainly don’t plan on becoming a pirate or rowing a boat across any oceans, but I would enjoy at least a fraction of the adventure he experienced in his lifetime. I’ll have to add his memoirs to my reading list now (assuming I can find it as Amazon only has one of the two).
