I had lunch with a friend yesterday who recently asked her kids what their goals were. Her 12-year old son said, "What are you talking about?" Her 15-year old daughter responded, "Mom, you're always putting so much pressure on me," and stormed out of the room. She laughed and asked if that made her a bad parent.
The world is changing. Now wait a minute. Take it easy. I didn't say the sky is falling, I said the world is changing. And that, by the way, is nothing new.
I watched the movie Up In The Air this weekend starring (much to my wife's delight) George Clooney. In the movie ol' George plays a corporate terminator, who other companies hire to come in and fire employees during downsizing. Much of the movie is Clooney's character sitting down in front of workers and letting them go. We are shown the emotional and financial impact on the terminated, and their reactions to the news. Some of it funny, some of it sad, all of it much too real. Unfortunately, there has been a lot of this going on in the world lately.
I was driving through the Target parking lot yesterday, and apparently the happy lady coming from the other direction was a tad bit upset with my driving. Sure I moved over in her direction a little (at 5 mph and accidentally). And she flipped out. Arms flailing, yelling (which was extremely effective in her car with the windows rolled up, but I could see her jaw flapping away).
I stopped in at my office yesterday afternoon to use the bathroom. I was running errands, and needed a little pit-stop. There's only one stall in our men's room, so choosing one wasn't difficult. I walked in, closed the door, and bam...no toilet paper on the roll. There were however two new rolls sitting on top of the toilet. Apparently the last occupant felt as though it was my job to change the roll. Who does that? (I'm afraid of the answer.)
I just finished reading The Art Of Racing In The Rain, by Garth Stein. Great story. In it, one of the characters is dying of cancer and was told she had eight months to live. She had a party the day she exceeded the 8-month mark proclaiming, "Today is the first day I'm not dead!" That is gratitude.
A while back I stopped at the store on the way home from work to grab some beer. (Which will come as a surprise to absolutely no one.) There was a table out front with a nice man sitting at it. He had a clip board and some pens on the table, and a big sign propped up behind him that read, "Sign up to receive the newspaper for FREE for 60 days, and get $10 in FREE groceries." What!?!
After making calls to hundreds of businesses this week, I am dismayed that very few people return calls anymore. (Well, sure I am one of them...but that's not the point. Or is it?) And yes, I completely understand that our lives have become dumping grounds of unsolicited sales pitches, marketing messages, and "once-in-a-lifetime" offers. And yes, I get the fact that 99.99999% of the time the communication probably is worth avoiding.
Not sure where I heard this theory, but it is so very true. Start your day by eating the frog, and you are empowered to take on the rest of the day. What? Really? Ribbit?!?
I was talking to a co-worker yesterday about a new task she was trying to get comfortable with. She was frustrated and lacked confidence because she didn't feel comfortable with her new role. She was trying hard to learn, but was dissatisfied with how quickly her grasp of the duties was coming along.
I rolled into the drive thru at a fast-food restaurant here in Bozeman last week to grab a bite for dinner. It's not that I couldn't have prepared something good to eat at home, I just had the itch for a three-piece meal with a biscuit and mashed potatoes.
My wife and I lead a pretty exciting life. On Friday night's we usually come home, make a couple of cocktails, and clean the house. If that's not enough excitement for us, we might even throw in a couple loads of laundry
