Search This Blog

Friday, August 26, 2016

Life's contents


I watched the War Dogs movie today and heard a really true line from it.  The setting was a funeral in the movie.  The priest conducting the funeral began the graveside speech with "Life does not come with a table of contents.  Each new chapter is a gift."  The priest went on to describe the man's chapters of life.

Well said whoever the script writer was.  I didn't stay to see the credits, so I don't know who to give credit to.  I like the analogy because some changes in our lives are abrupt, so the chapters come to an end in the same manner, and it is easy to see the next chapter.  Other parts of our lives blend more naturally into each other, but still chapters are discernible because some of the characteristics of the chapters change only slightly.

And the part about each new chapter being a gift is really true because the events in our lives define us.  They become who we are, how we identify ourselves.  Those changes are gifts to us, and we impart that gift as we see fit to the people in our worlds.

And how true is it that Life doesn't come with a table of contents?  Absolutely right.  I haven't ever thought to do it, but I might someday.  I should sit down and write the chapter titles to the chapters of my life and create a table of contents.  It just might help me see the gifts that have been delivered to me by life.

Thursday, August 25, 2016

Good performance

Finding a good plumber and a good car mechanic are two of the very hardest searches you can make.  They have a less than decent reputation.  There's a reason for that.

Over the last 5 years I have had to locate a mechanic and plumber because I lost the ones I had been using.  I have been to 6 mechanics and finally I have found one, two actually, but one is farther from my house than the other.  I have this rule when I take a car in.  If I have a mechanical problem that I didn't have before taking the car in, I will not return.  Even if the problem that surfaces is related to the one I took the car in for, I still don't return.

I have had less luck with plumbers.  My rule is the same, so the fact that I still am looking for one tells me that that profession my have fewer honest souls working in it.

I think there are several factors that make the people in professions the way they are, but one is the level of incentive to work.  Plumbers seem to be in a perpetual state of "just passing through" and they need their jobs just to eat for the time being.  I haven't ever met one who really liked what he was doing.  Even the plumbers who have their own business seem to have resigned themselves to doing what they know to do rather than enjoying what they do.


I appreciate more and more the people who do what they both know and enjoy.  People are good at what they do when they enjoy solving all the problems that crop up while they are performing their profession.  I truly hope that people see in my work both the knowledge it takes to perform it and the enjoyment I get from sharing that service with those who need it.

Tuesday, August 23, 2016

Cutting out paths


What do most people really choose?  Paths that lead to success?  Hardly.  That is because there is challenge, hardship, long hours, inconvenience, sacrifice, and willingness to trade off important times and events.  Most people will go only so far down the road to success.   At some point they turn back since they follow the path of least resistance, not the growth characteristics listed above.

People who do choose success know the path by heart.  They spent night hours to accomplish some of the tasks along the way.  They gave up a weekend or two of leisure to make the next goal.  They traded off some of their children's activities for a time to totally enjoy them at a future point.  They didn't shrink back from chores that were more than difficult in order to learn how to clear the next hurdle.  They know how to lead because they can tell you where the mines are along the path that can kill you.  They also know that you can't get where they are because you are unwilling to go very far down the path.

My admiration goes out to people who know the way.  Frauds and wannabes are easy to spot.  They turn from inconvenience and sacrifice at the drop of a hat.  Those who have been halfway can only rise to half of the challenges.  And conversations with the uninitiated to provide insight, get put off because the foundation for such insight is lacking.  I will walk with those who glide ahead providing light for my path.

Monday, August 22, 2016

Raging storm

I don't think that anyone expects to hear a grown child angrily yell at his or her parents that they are responsible for the messed up life they live or hear specific charges in the crassest terms available that the parents failed at some of the basic duties in his/her upbringing.


The scene was a storm of words by the child - total outrage.  The father tried to speak to say that the memories presented didn't represent his own memory of the particular situations.  The mother was taken completely off-guard, but managed to say she was sorry the child felt so strongly about her bad memories and apologized for the less than 20/20 vision in raising her child.

Storms pass, most of the time without damage, and usually come again from predictable directions.  But it's still a shame that a child would vent such venom against those who so lovingly cared for her during the time when a child has little memory.

Sunday, August 21, 2016

I still play it

Growing up, I heard the word ain't very little because it was stigmatized speech.  English teachers actively taught against its use, even saying that it wasn't listed as a word in the dictionary.  Twenty years later I began hearing it more often.  I think there were two reasons for that, one of them not being that English teachers had destigmatized it.  First, my circle widened greatly, and I was exposed to a greater diversity of people.  Second, there was a movement among linguists against the prescriptive nature of language and in favor of describing the varieties of language found.  Sociolinguists in particular began referring to standard English as presitge English.  The war was on.


I still don't hear it that often so when I do hear it, ain't is noticed.  I take note of the people who use it and the situations in which it is heard.  As far as memory goes, the amount of use and the situations of use are the same as when I was growing up.  I also understand a language principle much better.  Whatever our speech was as a youth tends to return after age 40, after one's ambition in the workplace has begun to subside.  The term "linguistic marketplace" was coined in the 1970s to speak of the effect of marketplace on one's economic situation in society.  By the time the next decade arrives there is a comfort level in life that one has achieved about all that is going to be achieved in a person's economic circumstances.  It is then, when people regress to using ain't if they used it as a child and teenager.

I never used it in my youth, so I still don't.  It's not a part of my psyche of being comfortable, and I never had to fight against it during my most ambitious years to get ahead with my money.   So, when I hear it from adults, I know it marked them in their youths, and it helps identify them as being from certain areas and educational levels.  Language is still a game, you know.  And I still play it.

Saturday, August 20, 2016

"Place" for learning

There is so much available on the internet that it has become a virtual world log of everything that happens (and that has happened).  It has much to offer for any profession that to ignore it would be certain death of the profession.

And if I were a student in this modern world, I would seriously consider the handicap that a schoolroom represents.  I can find anything I could possibly want to learn in the virtual world.  Some might say schoolrooms offer the teacher/student relationship as a way of providing guidance and discipline.  I would like to see a study on that because I think it is not true.  They might say that schoolrooms offer the core body of knowledge by way of a textbook as a base for progressively learning what lies at the heart of being a good American citizen.  That statement is false on its face since textbooks are the most restrictive way to learn the basics, and the discipline of the student is relied upon to read it.  And some might say schoolrooms put in place the social development necessary to relate well to others in the world.  Given the fact that the wealthy don't follow this advice, that the poor don't follow this advice, that immigrant children don't follow this advice and that military "brats" don't follow this advice, it seems narrowly applicable to middle class families who live in one place mostly.

I would seriously consider, and probably would follow a path of meaning to me so that I could accomplish my desired goals.  The internet would provide unrestricted access to my desired goals, would change as I change or as my goals would change, and would allow access to many who want the same for themselves from any country in the world.

Really, what is a schoolroom for?



Friday, August 19, 2016

Pesky comments

I find it always amazing the types of matters people divide into male and female characteristics.  Yesterday I submitted some paperwork for a report to be compiled.  The papers weren't divided the way the woman taking the reports was thinking they should be divided.  There were not any instructions on how to submit the papers.  I didn't really know the woman other than to have seen her a few times in passing.  I couldn't read her mind.  So, I just divided the papers in the way I thought they should be. (This would have been a perfect environment for an experiment, but it wasn't one.)

The comment I received from the lady was "You need to divide the papers into two groups."

"I did," I said.  I explained the way they were divided.

"Men!" she replied.  The aide that worked with her took the papers, handed them back to me, and asked for me to clip the papers together that belonged together.  Who would've known!  Simple solution, but one that was customary to her, not to me.  I have never thought of, mainly because I haven't seen evidence for, a man's characteristic to be associated in any way to how groupings of papers should be divided into two recognizable stacks.


Language - yes.  Language has features that men and women used separately from each other.  Society's assignments of expected roles in social groupings - yes.  Role assignments are common across the world.  Types of jobs women and men decide on - yes.  Jobs can follow society's expectations or typical interests of men and women when a majority follow those featured interests.  But how papers should be divided - never.

I guess I should take the woman's response and just answer with "Women!" But I won't because how papers are divided is more relevant to personality, experience, formality level, and incentive than to gender feature.  So, I'll chalk the experience up to a difference in our experience of life, setting, and incentive level.  I'll be able to let the matter go without another thought.

Sunday, August 14, 2016

Nothing but expletives

My sister-in-law wanted me to meet a new acquaintance of hers for all her own reasons, but because she thought her friend was similar in her approach to analyzing people's motives.  So I went.

The conversation went well through the greetings part.  We sat down at a table and began to talk.  I thought we would be having a collegial time to talk, but within the first 5 minutes of the conversation, it became clear that my sister-in-law's friend wanted to analyze me.

I have a standard MO for those who desire to do such a thing, so I went into that mode immediately.  I also decided to redirect at the first available opportunity.  When I did so, I did it by trying to identify with her through knowledge of someone of notoriety at her university.  She began to deemphasize the man's importance and to once again try to initiate analyzing me.

I soon excused myself.  My sister-in-law and I haven't spoken in the nearly 3 months from that time for deliberate reasons on my part, but when that dialog happens to spark itself again, I have something I want to offer her before we carry forward our own give and take.

Expletive is the word I'm thinking of starting with.


Nothing but decaying dung.

Saturday, August 13, 2016

Together one


Brave New World was one of the first fiction books to incorporate the idea of a one world government.  Since that time the idea has surfaced many more times, and increasingly so in books of the last 25 years.  I am an advocate of such a thing happening, and I try to speak about it on every occasion that halfway presents itself.

About a month ago, I couldn't help but notice an information system for students of a political science class that included a whole section on globalization.  I say information system rather than textbook because the section was in an online, app controlled section reachable by phone, tablet, or computer accessible for students by a school offering the class.  Nothing was offered to the students in the way of paper and print, only online sources and resources.

If anything can begin to bring about a global civilization, it will be the internet for sure.  It allows immediacy and a degree of transparency and authenticity.  The world would have to be seen as one place before anyone would consider coming together.  The development of seeing such a section in a political science class information system encourages me.  It may take another 75-100 years.  But, I'm optimistic.  The young people over the last year that I have talked to from about 20 different countries have certainly bolstered the idea as well.  Viva the planet coming together!



Saturday, August 06, 2016

One-up


It was an unprecedented phenomenon for me.  I went to a taco place today about 3 miles from my house at 7 in the evening.  It was still registering 100 degrees on my car thermostat.  That's not the phenomenon, though.  Many days are 100 or more  in Texas.  However, it was 7:00.  I was there for about 10 minutes, then made the trip home.

Now a person would think that, if anything, the temperature would take a degree south the longer time went by into the evening.  Oh, no.  As I went the three miles home, the temperature moved north to 101 degrees.  No joke.  On the way down - all the same temperature.  On the return trip - up one.

If I apply this to life, I know there's a direct analogy.  Often at work just when you think some crisis or pressurized matter is just about over - it's in the waning stages - then, yes, something prolongs it and you enter the one-up phase of the issue.

I remember a time when a man wanted something for an individual that I had denied to that person.  He came into my office wearing a gun around his waist, which he had never done before.  He asked that I change my mind.  A few days passed.  I thought the whole episode was over.  But no, I was directly accosted by the person I had denied earlier in a place where he had about 120 seconds to do anything before people around would notice anything out of order.  Close call.  He backed down after a minute (literally) and left.

Things can heat up in a hurry, but it generally takes a while for heat to subside.  I learned that then.  I still know it now for there were other times.  But the unexpected one-up phase from something intense is rare.

Friday, August 05, 2016

Another viewpoint


I spoke with a young man from Nepal today.  He was proud of his heritage and wanted to return in the near future to help his country.  He really missed his way of life there.  Mostly he missed the slower paced way of life.  He mentioned that he didn't want to try to keep up with the frenetic workday pace of the U.S.

Among other things, he also mentioned that young people here were on their own way too early in life.  Young people in Nepal stay with their parents into their early 30s.  That way they are sure to have a stable life when they leave home.  The young man thought the family structure and the work world would be better off if people didn't feel pressure to leave their homes at age 18.

The Nepali young man, 23, had already received his university education in his country, but the U.S. doesn't accept foreign university work as a general rule if a student arrives and wants to take graduate work here.  So, the young man was having to start again with his education in the U.S.  We talked at length.  He was good-hearted since he took an overnight train to the earthquake area of Nepal to help people there rebuild their earthly possessions and their lives.  He had already participated in government primaries for elections at his young age.

I try to learn things from people from other countries.  From this Nepali young man, I learned that there was a way to conduct one's life in a fashion that was slower-paced, yet enough to get things done.  And, perhaps, that family expectations about children shouldn't have to be drawn from what is the norm in a country.  I have not worried about that too very much after age 40, but to the extent that I ever did, I have learned that the U.S. norms shouldn't rule my own expectations.