Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Happy Wednesday!

What's that you say? Today is Thursday, not Wednesday? That can't possibly be right. If today's Thursday, that means I didn't post anything on Wednesday. So adjust your calendars accordingly.

Since this is Wednesday, the day after Jacob's first birthday, I thought I'd post an addendum to something I wrote a while back. They're a few advice tidbits, most of which I've learned the old-fashioned way: I've dumbed them into existence. For instance, I've got a scar on my right arm from a Kaiser blade, some folks calls it a slang blade, that took a neat slice out of my skin because, in technical terms, I was "being an idiot." That earned me a trip to the ER, seven stitches, and a scar that's only growing less visible because I'm freckle-farming it over. So right there's a lesson I can pass on to my son: Don't be an idiot with deadly tools. Feel free to apply that to your own lives, royalty-free.

As I noted in that initial post, there's a much better collection of advice available. These are just my feeble attempts at putting wisdom in my own words.

If you have a conflict with someone, and you two just can't seem to get along, ask him for help.
I read this in Bear Bryant's autobiography way back in the seventies, and it's never left me. Bryant was coaching at Kentucky at the same time as basketball demigod Adolph Rupp. The campus hasn't been built that could handle both those personalities and egos, and they inevitably clashed. Bryant ended up leaving, but he remarked in his book that he should have asked Rupp for a favor. That would have helped break the ice, would have let Rupp know that Bryant respected him, would have expressed Bryant's humility, and generally defused an explosive situation. (Thankfully for Alabama fans, Bryant's realization didn't come until it was too late for UK, which could have owned both the basketball and football worlds.) When you come to someone for help, you're letting them know that you've disarmed. It'll either work out some of the tension, or it'll drive them crazy. Either way, you're a winner.

Don't top everyone.
Everybody likes being the center of attention, and everybody has what he thinks is the all-time, gut-bustingest, jaw-droppingest, all-around phenomenalest story. When somebody has just delivered his such story, joke, anecdote, or pithy saying, let him win. Don't try to top it with, "That reminds me of..." or "You should have seen the..." Let the other person have his or her moment in the sun. Yours will come later.

The getting is always better than the having.
At least, it'll seem that way. You'll find that sometimes, when you finally get the very thing you've desired--new car, new job, girlfriend, electronics equipment, fabled hamburger--you'll be thrilled up to your uvula. Then, you'll find the strangest occurrence. What you thought was the thing you desired will leave you a little less than happy. A little empty, actually. You might even think you've made a mistake. And that's possible. We do sometimes devote far too much time and money towards something we'd be better off consigning to the "Eh, not so much" category. But most likely, you're just experiencing a feeling common to all of us. As C.S. Lewis (whom you'll love reading, if you're a son of mine) put it in Mere Christianity,
In this department of life, as in every other, thrills come at the beginning and do not last. The sort of thrill a boy has at the first idea of flying will not go on when he has joined the R.A.F. and is really learning to fly. The thrill you feel on first seeing some delightful place dies away when you really go to live there. Does this mean it would be better not to learn to fly and not live in the beautiful place? By no means. In both cases, if you go through with it, the dying away of the first thrill will be compensated for by a quieter and more lasting kind of interest. What is more (and I can hardly find the words to tell you how important I think this), it is just the people who are ready to submit to the loss of the thrill and settle down to the sober interest who are then most likely to meet new thrills in some quite different direction. The man who has learned to fly and become a good pilot will suddenly discover music; the man who has settled down to live in the beauty spot will discover gardening.
So don't be disappointed when the initial buzz wears off. Keep pushing on, and it'll get better.

Even a dead fish can swim downstream.
If everybody is doing it, maybe it's because it's a good thing. Most likely, however, everybody is doing what everybody always does, which is obey a herd mentality. Take it from a daddy who spent time working with cattle, a herd mentality isn't any mentality at all. Cows are dumber than a sack of toenail clippings, and so are people who go along with the prevailing wisdom. Never be afraid to say "No."

Hopefully, Jacob will do a better job of adhering to these things than his pater did.

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