The Interesting Life of Charlie Sheen

Charlie Sheen, the troubled actor who has been in the media a lot lately for run-ins with the law for drug possession, aggression and prostitutes, has claimed in an interview that he will never go back to being sober because it's 'boring.' After many messy relationships, drug and alcohol abuse problems that have threatened to make him unemployed, destroyed hotel rooms, health problems, issues with the law and prostitutes, it's pretty clear that Charlie Sheen's life is anything but boring. But then again, how long does anyone live when they have a life which is that interesting?

Rich, drunken playboys have always been popular. They're excellent tabloid reading material and they live out a strange fantasy life that most of us would fall into ourselves if we were given half a chance. Who doesn't want to party instead of holding down a steady job and popping lots of vitamins so that we can live to a ripe old age? Who doesn't want to hang out in VIP lounges with bottles of Vueve Cliquot while hanging off some hottie instead of sitting at home watching the Amazing Race? Real life is incredibly boring. It's repetitive, long and requires discipline and hard work. Yawn.

A lot of us want to work hard and play hard, though. We want to earn our keep, make a good living and then whoop it up with friends. But there's a big gap between the person who likes to get jiggy with it and the train wreck. Sheen is definitely in train wreck territory. He's in danger of losing his career, his credibility (already in shackles for the most part), further estranging his family and even losing his life.

As it is, he's already become sort of a one note late night show joke. His antics and strange quotes are laughable and they'll continue to be that way until his actions finally kill him, which they might. His daughters may not be old enough right now to understand what exactly is wrong with their father, but it's doubtful that they'll be very proud of him when they are. They won't remember their dad as the strong silent type who fixed their dollhouses, that's for sure.

It's maddening to see the people with everything throw it all away for nothing. A person with wealth and privilege, who was living the dream of doing what he loved for a living instead of whatever job he got stuck in, squandering his career because he prefers to booze. A man with beautiful wives and children whom he's abused and estranged through aggressive drug induced behavior. It's a sad story. But not one that we haven't heard before- and not one that we don't know the ending to.

The sober life may be boring, but nobody's asking Sheen to drink diet soda and wear bad sweaters. He should take advantage of his fame to live it up and ride around town in stretch limos with half naked supermodels. It might be good to lay off the drugs and prostitutes, though. They're damaging his reputation, but they're also a danger to his life.

There's a happy medium between knitting at home and wrecking hotel rooms. We shouldn't strive to be boring, but maybe, we also should strive not to be too 'interesting.'