It is going to be difficult to get a sense of who Connor Lonning is, and more importantly why, in a few censored 1000 word articles. But, an attempt must be made. Before diving into his past, I figured it was appropriate to try to convey how he chooses to live his life. The following in a filtered attempt of just that. About a month ago, I watched Connor board a plane at O'Hare International Airport. The final destination of his one-way ticket was Cameroon. After weeks of procrastinating this tall order of quasi-journalism I'm ready to make a go at it. I began planning the multi-article anthology when I realized that the series is a continuation of an article that premiered in The Racquet on Nov. 8. The article, Raised by eagles, written by Jim Dunn is an introduction to The untold adventures of Connor Lonning. Mr. Dunn killed it. Find it. Read it. Continue.
Connor Charlie Lonning is the guy living in Cameroon, West Africa. It's 11:24 p.m., only a few hours before the 7:30 a.m. deadline. I sit on the commode, shirtless, with my sweatpants down near my ankles: exactly the spot where Connor would expect me to write about his life. My MacBook warms my lap and slaughters my seed as I revamp a story that I began writing on Sunday. Connor and I have been friends for a couple of years and I'm pretty sure he's never read Huck Finn. Either way, the plain and short of it is this: Huck was taught that slavery is natural and that abolitionism is wicked. In time, he befriends Jim and decides to help him escape.
My story with Connor is similiar. He was raised to respect certain morals and values, many of which he's shed over time. He's not a bad person, but he revamped his perspective to suit his needs and his values in life. If you're reading this and haven't learned to think for yourself, keep reading...you may learn something.
Dunn believes the status-quo is another excuse for not living free and the time to change is now. Characters like Huck and Connor guide us away from the expected next step and toward a journey focused on happiness. If he is Huck Finn, then I must be Jim. Over the span of our friendship, Connor has led me on numerous adventures in search of something special. The remarkable thing is, we always tend to find it. What ‘it' is, I still do not entirely know and can most certainly not explain.
My story starts and ends in Portland, Oregon. January 2011 marked my first trip with Connor and our destination was The Rip City. Our trip was already more than everything we imagined. We stood front row at The Head and the Heart concert, we worked out with a Nike athlete that is the American recorder holder in the mile, crashed on the floor of his home, we snacked on Voodoo Doughnuts and of course Connor found time to Karaoke Natalie Imbruglia's Torn
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