Storytelling

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Living in a Van down by the River

It’s Open Mic Night for motivational speakers.  I’m up…

Mission statements are lame.  So dumb.  Glorified BS.  They don’t motivate me whatsoever.  I remember in 8th grade our middle school bought a big banner with our new official mission statement on it and posted it near the main office.  To mock the concept, I memorized it and quoted it as fast as I could like that Micro Machines guy from the ‘80’s, every day as I walked to lunch with Mrs. Ray’s English class.

Ultimately what every mission statement boils down to is this: “I will do my best to please The Man, therefore The Establishment and The System, and by successfully doing so, ultimately, I will please Society.”

Not that there’s anything wrong with that.  That’s just how life works.  Simple American reality.  It’s that mindset that helps a random group of people find a focus that will keep them unified and motivated.

I don’t need a lofty mission statement.  Just tell me the rules.  Tell me the expectations.  Give me a chance to learn the culture.  Then once I fit in, I can focus on utilizing my actual talents and skills in order to show my worth in that society, in addition to getting the job done.  That makes me an individual, despite having to confirm to the norm.

The Man is good.  Thank God for the man.  He gives me the opportunity to make money without having to depend on starting my own business and having to keep up with all that overheard and stress.  Until I can find a way to make a good living off of this website or end up writing a successful book, I depend on The Man.

I like The Man.  But I am not The Man.

The Establishment and The System are great too.  They are the structure to my means of earning a living.  If The Establishment or The System only allows me to wear jeans on Friday but not Monday through Thursday, then I will go along with that silly Simon Says game.  Individuality has its place, but rocking the boat outside of a moral issue isn’t cool.

And Society.  The good with the bad.  Enough capable people these days are choosing not to reach their full potential, which provides an opportunity for an average guy like to me step in and become qualified for a role in society that I wouldn’t normally be eligible for.

Which gives me new experience.  Which earns me new skills.

And for those in society who are the overachievers, well, they become my role models.  I watch every move they make so I become like them.  So, yeah, society is a good thing too.

I should become a motivational speaker and take my “No BS Mission Statement” idea to the road.  Power point presentations.  Laser pointers.  Wearing a suit jacket with jeans on the last day of the conference.  I can see it now…  (Looks up, turning head towards Stage Left with glazed over eyes, hands clasped together up to chest, while a harp-like sound effect begins.)

“Try to picture the man to always have an open hand and see him as a giving tree.  See him as matter, matter of fact he’s not a beast.  No, not the devil either.  Always a good dead doer.  And it’s laughter that we’re making after all.”

– “Live High” by Jason Mraz

Related Posts by the Same Author:

The Modern Day Tortoise  http://wp.me/pxqBU-kP

Life is Just Simply Showing Up  http://wp.me/pxqBU-kf

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Russian Roulette with a Made in China Cap Gun

I’ve heard the phrase “we’re not promised tomorrow” enough throughout my lifetime that it’s become a cliché. And what else can I really do to truly “live my life” and “make the most of it”? My issue is that I’m too aware of how short and precious life is.

During the summer of 1998, right before my senior year of high school, I spent a few weeks at a music camp in which us kids stayed overnight in the dorms of the college at Snead State in Gadsden, AL. I wasn’t the kind of kid who looked for trouble when not supervised. So instead of sneaking out at night, one of the things us teenage boys did in that dorm was play Russian Roulette, with a toy cap gun that was made in China.

Because, what else would we do?

In other words, the seven of us staying in that hall gathered in one room around a toy gun that we loaded with its accompanying ammunition, the equivalent of Snap and Pops. It had a barrel just like a real gun and we would only place one “bullet” in at a time. Meaning that there was only a one-in-six chance that the toy gun would make a big “POP!” when the trigger was pulled.

We all took a turn, passing the toy gun to the next guy after we pressed it to our own temple and pulled the trigger. If it was just a “blank”, we stayed in the game. If it went off, we were out.

It was a very entertaining game. Actually addicting.

But at the same time, it made us nervous. Our hearts would speed up in the anticipation. All over a popping sound from a toy gun bought at a gas station.

Just a dumb game we played that summer. But for me, it brought some reality to the fact of how true that analogy is in every day life. I do everything possible to eat and drink healthy, to exercise regularly, and to reduce stress. Preventing disease and cancer is a lifestyle to me.

Yet, as people who smoke cigarettes and who regularly eat fast food and who don’t make an effort to exercise daily all tell me, “we all gotta go sometime”.

There are still car accidents. There are still those random deaths like an unexpected brain aneurisms, and I don’t even know that that is.

I am completely over-aware that every morning I wake up, it’s a game of Russian roulette. Maybe not a one-in-six chance of life ending. Maybe more like one-in-a-half-a-million.

But to me, I’m only alive another day because God let it happen. So really, it’s not a matter of any chances. Not one-in-an-anything.

And that truth is one of the most sobering, frightful, and yet grace-filled thoughts I can think of.

 

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To Catch an Audience/The Center of Attention

It’s fun to pretend we’re psychologists. To think we’ve got someone figured out based on their OCD or their “middle child syndrome” or their relationship with their father. We can look at personality traits and family history as clues as to why a person thinks they way they do. And often when we do this, we can correctly analyze them. Without a psychology degree.

I am one of those people who likes to study personalities as hobby. Currently I am on my 2nd book written by Dr. Kevin Leman, who specializes in birth order and how it determines a person’s personality. While it is fascinating to learn about everyone else in this world, it’s also interesting to learn about myself. I want to know why I think and behave the way I do. What sets me apart from others in my unique perspectives?

Here is what I recently learned from Dr. Kevin Leman:

Some people need an audience.

That is me.

But here’s what sets me apart from the obnoxious “attention hogs” I’ve met throughout my life. Because of my drive to constantly accomplish something admirable through hard work to gain the approval of adults (a first-born burden), I only want to be the center of attention if I’ve earned it.

 

I know when to be quiet. I can easily go long periods of time without speaking. I do not speak in a group setting unless I have something relevant and worthy of saying. I, unlike many centers of attention, do not like the sound of my own voice. I am “a” center of attention, not “the” center of attention.

Looking back on my life, here are some of the things I’ve done to make sure I had an audience: In Elementary School, I created my own cartoon characters and stories as a kid (eventually getting published in the school newspaper in 4th grade), as well as headed up the Nickbob Ability Test (click here to find out what it is http://wp.me/pxqBU-r9). In high school I fronted an alternative rock band (and for what it’s worth we played out of state a few times). During college I taught elementary school and Junior High Sunday School, while recording three CD’s of music I wrote, playing small shows in the coffee shop circuit. And for the past 4 ½ years, I’ve been writing my “commentary on life” web posts. And of course, as mentioned in Stage Presence (http://wp.me/pxqBU-2m), I grew up being in plays and musicals.

There has always been an audience. My subconscious had made sure of this.

This past weekend as my wife and I were reminiscing how it was three years ago this month that I asked her on our first unofficial date, she said it was the fact that I always had something interesting to talk about that made her feel so comfortable with me. A lifetime in training of capturing an audience ultimately led to me meeting and marrying a girl I have always felt was out of my league. It paid off.

It’s always been hard for me to understand America’s fascination with sports and particularly a man’s ability to keep up with all that trivia about which teams played each other when and the scores and the names of the players. Another Jewish trait I have is that I’m not good at sports (and never cared about them). So I’ve channeled that energy into entertainment.

I have made myself an expert on 1983, the heights and ethnic background of celebrities, the meaning behind all lyrics of the Beatles, holistic and clean living, Intelligent Design, and Jews in American entertainment, just to name a few of my specialties. I always have “random conversation material” in the archives and in the works.

I was quite hesitant when I first tried to process that idea I have to be the center of attention. Because it makes me think of conversation hijackers, drama queens (and kings), and any person I’ve ever met whose whole demeanor screamed, “Look at me! Look at me!” People who appear needy.

 

I have to be found. That’s how I operate differently. People have to find me. They have to come to me. Because typically those are the exact people I want to entertain. Takes one to know one.

In a party, I’m never the real center of attention. I wander to the back corner of the room, next to the food, and recruit party guests for random conversation. I have this desire to be the alternative choice in entertainment.

In fact, there have been times where people have tried to elevate me to the center of attention position, and I have escaped it. I have to be able to think in my mind that I earn when I get. For example, in high school, one of my good friends Allison Hardin was planning a surprise birthday party and I found out about it. I found a way to keep it from ever happening. Because I strongly resist the idea of being the center of attention when it’s obvious that I am.

I don’t want to be the official man of the hour. It’s too much pressure. I function best in my ad-lib form. Recruit, entice, inform, motivate, entertain, and provoke thoughts in others. On my own terms. That is my niche.

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The Nickbob Ability Test

 

In the spring of 1992 in 5th grade, I decided to make recess more interesting during our “free play” days outside on the playground by inventing a secret society.  I would recruit 1 to 4 of my friends to take the Nickbob Ability Test during each P.E. class.  It was a combination of physical skill, physical agility, and artistic effort:

Physical Skill: With hula hoops laid out flat strategically on the asphalt, the recruits had to throw rocks from a certain distance and land them in the hula hoops.  There were five levels of difficulty they had to complete to make it to the Physical Agility portion.

 

Physical Agility: Using my friend Michael Brooks’s stopwatch, I would time the recruits as they ran through the playground.  They had to make it through the “obstacle course” within a minute and 45 seconds.  Then they could finish the last portion of the Nickbob Ability Test, the Artistic Effort portion.

 

The Artistic Effort portion simply meant the recruits had to draw and color a picture of themselves and give it to me.  I kept them as a collection of those who passed the Nickbob Ability Test.

 

All together there were about 30 of my classmates who participated.  I know for a fact that the following people took and passed it:  Brian Winkles, Amanda Duckett, Meg Guice, Susan Johnson, Alex Igou, Jenny McElroy, Michael Brooks, and Jonathan Grupp.

 

The few.  The proud.  The… Nickbob Ability Test Takers?…

 

 

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Red Foxes are Majestic, Magical, Medieval Creatures; Especially When It Snows in the South

When people from outside of the South think of the weather down here, my guess is they probably assume we hardly ever get snow. And while our precipitation amount doesn’t compare to New England or the Midwest, every year I’ve been alive it’s snowed at least once during the winter season. (It even snowed once in April of 1988; I got out of school early that day).

 

And yes, it only takes an inch or two to shut down the whole town because most cities only own one snow plow, if that. Plus we’re not used to driving in it. There’s no shame in that.

Yesterday as I walked through Aspen Grove Park to Border’s as I do every day during my lunch break, I noticed that my footprints were the only ones in the snow. This mental image popped in my head of a Red Fox. Evidently I associate Red Foxes with snow and woods.

 

A little while later as I walked back through the park to my office, I saw animal footprints I wasn’t familiar with. I was used to seeing people walk their dogs there, surrounded by all the squirrels on their apparent cocaine highs. So I assumed these were raccoon prints.

About 45 minutes later back at my desk, one of my co-workers who was on the phone at the time, started pointing out the floor-to-ceiling windows we have as walls in our office. It was a big Red Fox. Less than a 100 feet away. Coming from the park I just got back from, journeying all the way around the building with its glass walls.

 

There is just something truly mesmerizing about a Red Fox. It’s so rare to see one in real life, especially right around the corner from a Starbucks. Watching that fox make his way around our office made me feel like I was in a magical medieval movie like The Princess Bride or something. Watching a fox trot through the snow in a business development is enchanting.

 

I can’t stop thinking about that beautiful, rare, red creature. I want to tame it. Make it my loyal pet. Man’s best friend. The Red Fox.

In fact, I’m having trouble thinking of a more beautiful animal in this whole world. Magnificent and majestic. It’s no coincidence that Red Foxes have been a part of folklore for centuries.

And in more modern culture like the recent movie, Fantastic Mr. Fox. And the 1973 Walt Disney Robin Hood cartoon (where Red Foxes took the place of people). And Star Fox for N64. And in the ‘80’s cartoon show, David the Gnome, he rode on Swift the Fox, who was always getting a splinter in his paw.

Looking at a Red Fox in real life can be confusing. Am I actually looking at a real fox or is it an anthropomorphic clone that escaped from Chuck E. Cheese’s? Yes, foxes are that awesome.