I write essays often to lay out a way of thinking. I often sense that people are wandering around in life with a nickel-compass in their pocket, no map, no sense of direction, and just accidentally arrive upon some destination. So this is simply advice:
1. There's a great quote by Will Rogers: “Live in such a way that you wouldn’t be ashamed to sell the family parrot to the town gossip.” I like the quote because you can lay out a very positive path in life....if you just tend to avoid negative situations, or bad associations. Course, this means recognizing things as they are, and keeping sluts and dimwits at an arm's length.
2. When faced with an enormous and impossible decision....just use the simple logic of picking the solution that is less complicated.
3. Never hesitate to pick up and move. Maybe it's for a better job....a better landscape....fewer idiots around you....less drama, but don't anchor yourself to never leaving a place.
4. Things that get described as 'too-good-to-be-true'.....probably (90-percent chance) not that true. It's like a blind date occuring and you have some crazy idea that this was the one in a million blind date scheme that actually worked.
5. Being skeptical is a wise skill to develop. It's ok to be skeptical of politics, romance, banks, religion, news folks, and CEOs. Imagine if Bill Clinton had just been skeptical of a second date with Hillary.
6. Mark Twain wrote 'Tom Sawyer' and was pursued to write his next great novel....which he seemed to be lacking in the next great story idea. So he went off to Germany for a fair amount of time. After coming back....something clicked, and he never seemed to run out of ideas after that trip. Sometimes....a simple trip is all you need reshape your thoughts and lay out a fresh new path.
7. The key to a path in life is education, a job, and refusing to anchor yourself to bad decisions being repeated. If you quit high school, and your present job for eight years has been burger-flipper for Burger King....well....you appear to be a boat anchor guy.
8. Either fix your problems, or be willing to just accept them. If you go to the third stage of allowing the problems to exist forever but never able to reach a stage of acceptance, then your frustrations will dissolve a clear path ahead.
9. Anyone who says that your purpose in life....is to 'save the world'....is likely a cult guy.
10. Lot of folks walk around with 'demons' in their pocket, and occasionally....they'd like to have some confession moment to dump forty tons of pain, suffering and woes. Give them five minutes of your time and hear the confession, and offer some wit or wisdom. But don't attach yourself to their sorrow, and be their continual 'save the world' guy.
Thursday, 17 May 2018
Change
When I left Alabama in 1977....I had this mental image in my mind over how things 'existed'. Occasionally, I go back, and I will stand there admiring the scenery and eventually come to the concept of 'change'.
The regional airport in Huntsville? At best in 1977, I doubt if there were more than a dozen flights a day that ventured into Huntsville. Today, there's 225,000 folks who leave Huntsville for Atlanta. There's 74,000 folks who venture to Charlotte, NC.
As a kid in my local town of Florence, you basically had around twelve establishments to eat at in 1977. One of them was the pool-hall in town (they made great greasy burgers). There was one single establishment making pizza. There was one single McDonalds and Burger King. Today, there are probably in the range of forty restaurants now. You can actually eat Chinese if you desire. The local pizza guys? They have over 1,200 combinations of pizza that you can order.
The 'dry' factor? There's actually a decent pub/bar existing within a 15-minute drive.
K-Mart in the 1970s probably had a max of twelve types of soaps. You walk into a Wal-Mart today, and there's probably sixty types of soaps laid out.
Locals used to hype up their summer trip in the mid-1970s....they were going off to Gulf Shores, the Smokies, Nashville, a Braves game in Atlanta, and some fishing trip to Lake Guntersville. Today? They talk about Aruba, Las Vegas, NY City, the Grand Canyon, some Alaskan fishing trip, or some Braves game in Atlanta.
In the mid-70s....guys wore $9 work jeans and a $2 T-shirt that they got from K-Mart. Today, the guy is wearing a $60 pair of fancy Docker pants, and a $30 cotton shirt made in Vietnam. The gal has on a pair of $110 fancy shoes that has an Italian label that you can't pronounce, and a pair of unmentionables that runs around $40 from Vicky's 'secret-place'.
In the mid-70s....if you did drink beer....it was usually PBR, Michelob, or Bud. Today, locals drink Samuel Adams (trucked down from New England), or sip on some kinda Germanized custom beer that makes your eyes moisten up because it's so good.
In the mid-1970s....if you were really lucky in a single year, you might have met one single 'foreigner', and it was typically some New York guy. Today? There's a thirty-percent chance on a daily basis in Huntsville that you will bump into a Mexican, and ten-percent chance it'll be a Chinese guy named Wang.
In the mid-1970s....you had four basic channels to watch (CBS, NBC, ABC, and PBS). Today, with cable and satellite.....you have potentially four-hundred channels.
In the mid-1970s....if something broke on your farm equipment, it meant looking at some 1960 operators manual with no clear instructions. Now? You get on the tab....find some guy with the same item and problem and ask him how he fixed it. The odd thing is that this guy might be living in Montana, and there's never going to be any face-to-face meeting.
In the 1970s.....you might have a total of seven banking options within driving distance of the farm. Today? With the ATM business, and internet options....you could have your bank in Iowa if you desired.
The thing is.....change has occurred, and most people don't even recognize it.
The regional airport in Huntsville? At best in 1977, I doubt if there were more than a dozen flights a day that ventured into Huntsville. Today, there's 225,000 folks who leave Huntsville for Atlanta. There's 74,000 folks who venture to Charlotte, NC.
As a kid in my local town of Florence, you basically had around twelve establishments to eat at in 1977. One of them was the pool-hall in town (they made great greasy burgers). There was one single establishment making pizza. There was one single McDonalds and Burger King. Today, there are probably in the range of forty restaurants now. You can actually eat Chinese if you desire. The local pizza guys? They have over 1,200 combinations of pizza that you can order.
The 'dry' factor? There's actually a decent pub/bar existing within a 15-minute drive.
K-Mart in the 1970s probably had a max of twelve types of soaps. You walk into a Wal-Mart today, and there's probably sixty types of soaps laid out.
Locals used to hype up their summer trip in the mid-1970s....they were going off to Gulf Shores, the Smokies, Nashville, a Braves game in Atlanta, and some fishing trip to Lake Guntersville. Today? They talk about Aruba, Las Vegas, NY City, the Grand Canyon, some Alaskan fishing trip, or some Braves game in Atlanta.
In the mid-70s....guys wore $9 work jeans and a $2 T-shirt that they got from K-Mart. Today, the guy is wearing a $60 pair of fancy Docker pants, and a $30 cotton shirt made in Vietnam. The gal has on a pair of $110 fancy shoes that has an Italian label that you can't pronounce, and a pair of unmentionables that runs around $40 from Vicky's 'secret-place'.
In the mid-70s....if you did drink beer....it was usually PBR, Michelob, or Bud. Today, locals drink Samuel Adams (trucked down from New England), or sip on some kinda Germanized custom beer that makes your eyes moisten up because it's so good.
In the mid-1970s....if you were really lucky in a single year, you might have met one single 'foreigner', and it was typically some New York guy. Today? There's a thirty-percent chance on a daily basis in Huntsville that you will bump into a Mexican, and ten-percent chance it'll be a Chinese guy named Wang.
In the mid-1970s....you had four basic channels to watch (CBS, NBC, ABC, and PBS). Today, with cable and satellite.....you have potentially four-hundred channels.
In the mid-1970s....if something broke on your farm equipment, it meant looking at some 1960 operators manual with no clear instructions. Now? You get on the tab....find some guy with the same item and problem and ask him how he fixed it. The odd thing is that this guy might be living in Montana, and there's never going to be any face-to-face meeting.
In the 1970s.....you might have a total of seven banking options within driving distance of the farm. Today? With the ATM business, and internet options....you could have your bank in Iowa if you desired.
The thing is.....change has occurred, and most people don't even recognize it.
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