Today is the last work day before the Christmas holiday. Originally I had planned on working a full day, 8-5. I am taking an extra day off after Christmas that my client doesn’t. So I’ve got a nice 4-day weekend for the holiday in front of me.
My wife called a while ago and suggested that I might take off early and we could go to lunch and then just play. We’d get an early start on our plans. On the surface this sounds like a great idea but it brought up a whole raft of issues that I need to sort through.
I don’t do spontaneity well. Heck, I have a hard time saying the word. If we are out and about on a Saturday and my wife suggests a trip to a neighboring city I have a very hard time allowing that to happen. It is as if I get up in the morning and decide right then what I am going to do that day. If I get up knowing that we are going to travel then I am fine with it and enjoy myself. But if we weren’t planning on a trip then I react to it’s suggestion with a surprising resistance.
Today this issue is about letting myself take time off from work. I am an independent contractor and therefore I don’t get paid if I don’t work. This really isn’t the issue but it is a convenient starting place. As we say in my house, it’s a great avoidance.
Beyond that initial avoidance is a fear of approval. In my current situation I want the approval of my client and I feel that staying here and working a full day is the way to gain this approval. On the other side of the equation is wanting to please my wife. Taking the afternoon off and spending it with her has the potential to please her greatly, and to be a lot of fun. However, if I take off just to please her, when I privately feel I should be a work, I’ll be passive-aggressive all afternoon and that won’t be fun for either of us.
It boils down to deciding what my mood and motivation is today. Do I need to be at work to feel good about myself? Or am I staying here just because I think someone else feels I should? If I go home will I be doing that because I truly want to, or will I be doing it to try and gain favor from my wife?
If I do either action solely to gain some outside approval then I have failed the lesson. I am the only person who can truly approve or disapprove of my own actions. People around me can comment on my actions all they want, I control whether I am effected by those comments.
The action (staying at work or taking the afternoon off) isn’t the true point here. The true focus is the motivation and emotion behind the action. Being a child of technology (IE a hard science) and a male to boot, focusing on the emotional basis for a decision is not my default approach. Incorporating the emotional side of life is a relatively new thing for me. I like the results when I do it. I feel more balanced. More integrated.
Still it is a new paradigm.
Change sucks.
Well, I’ve made my decision. Time to act upon it.
Enjoy your holiday….
I had occasion to park in a downtown, underground garage today. It is in a central location so it sees a fair amount of business. Upon arriving at the gargare I punched the button and got my time-stamped ticket. Its a small affair, not quite the size of a business card.
When I was finished with my errands and lunch I returned to my car and proceeded to the exit booth. While the car in front of my completed their transaction I momentarily placed the ticket between my lips while I fished my wallet out of my pants pocket. It was only between my lips for 10 or 12 seconds, and it wasn’t really in my mouth, just between my lips.
When I pulled up to the gate and held my ticket out the man in the booth physically backed away from it, as if I’d offered him a live asp. As I continued to hold my ticket out he was looking around his booth for some thing. Finally he picked up his sweatshirt and gingerly reached for the ticket with his hand encased in the material of his pullover. I couldn’t believe it. Once he had the ticket he proceeded to vigorously rub it between the folds of his pullover for 20 or 30 seconds; all the while challenging me to say something with his stare.
Finally, when I didn’t rise to his bait he fished the ticket out of his makeshift set of gloves using only his fingernails on the smallest possible corner of the ticket.
I was thrilled to be able to pay him with the slightly damp paper money I’d gotten in change at my lunch a few minutes earlier. Oddly enough he didn’t treat the money as a toxic waste. I guess money is safe from germs, I mean, its only in and out of pockets all day. Whereas my parking ticket had touched my lips for the briefest moment and now was a carrier of who knows what plague.
For some 17 years I have made my living working with computers. I have been writing software of one form or another for 23 years. While I am not holding myself out as a guru or expert I like to think that I know more than the average home computer user. What I want to know is what does the average Joe do when faced with the always cryptic messages and dialogs that appear when the denizens inside the computer decide not to get along.
Most people view their computer as “one” thing. Sure it has 4 physical parts (the keyboard, mouse, monitor, and CPU), but they all work together, so it’s just “the computer.” However, inside the computer are several different electronic parts containing a few hundred components, and running on this hardware is a vast collection of programs. Each program is its own universe of complexity. Just the operating system on most computers is a miracle of modern engineering. Millions of lines of code working in forced harmony with each other to provide you, the computer user, with an unparalleled experience playing Solitaire.
So when “it” breaks where do you start?
Recently I bought a network router for my home computer network. Basically this gizmo (a highly technical term meaning I know what it is but not well enough to explain it in English) allows all the PC’s on your network to share one Internet connection. If you work on a PC in an office setting you are most likely using a router without even being aware of it. At home I have a nifty cable modem which allows hackers and other nefarious types 24-hour a day access to my valuable personal files (mostly my FreeCell scores). Prior to the router we had been using a software solution the required two network cards in one of the PC’s. One to communicate with the Internet, and the other to communicate with the LAN. This solution worked, but it made the one PC very unstable. Frequent daily crashes were not uncommon, and to make matters worse it often took multiple re-boots to get the whole thing up and running again. A better solution had to be found. Enter the router.
(One of the joys of a dedicated, high-speed Internet connection is that it works both ways. You can send and receive data to the Internet, and the Internet can send and receive data from you. If you are worried about such matters, and I am, you install anti-virus software and things like firewalls to keep the Internet out unless you invite it in. In my case the combination of the firewall and the software that shared the connection was more than my elderly computer could handle.)
This router gizmo is in effect a computer. There is no interface other then the various ports where the network cables can be inserted. The idea is simple. You hook the Internet connection to the router and all the PCs to the router and magic happens. All the PC’s on the network appear to have their very own connection to the Internet. No longer is the whole thing dependent upon one PC’s shaky stability. And, as a bonus, the router acts as a firewall by hiding all the PC’s on the local network from the Internet. (Who knew that as kids playing “hide-and-seek” we were really practicing for life on the Internet?)
The first step was to remove the extra network card and associated software from the shaky PC. Then make all the hardware and wire connections and hit the power switch. Almost immediately the connection is configured and we are on the Internet via the router. Excellent. Now on to the other PC on the network.
Make the connection between the other PC and the router using the brand-new cat-5 cable, turn on the PC and, no connection. Okay. Now what? Read the directions for the first time. I am, after all, a guy. We “know” how to do this stuff without the directions. It’s just like hooking up the cable, TV, VCR and stereo. And that works just fine. Well, sort of fine. Okay, it works some of the time as long as you understand 45 buttons on three different remotes. But that is another article.
The PC booted just fine. No error messages, no cryptic messages, and no Internet access either. First I redid all the connections. If you do them harder the second (third, fourth?) time it’ll work. Still no connection. Now, I know enough about networking and the arcane language of network addressing (TCP/IP) to be really dangerous. I was able to figure out that the network card in the second PC didn’t have the right address. But for reasons I couldn’t figure out it wouldn’t take the right address even when I entered it. Oh, I could change it to anything I wanted it just wouldn’t talk to the router. I even swapped cables to make sure that wasn’t the problem.
Several hours passed. My simple little change that was going to improve our home connection to the Internet was just going to “take a few minutes, Honey.” Ha! By now, of course, it is past the time that the “customer service” people go home. No matter when you finally throw in the towel and decide to call for help it is just past the quitting time of the person with the answer. But I called anyway because I love spending 10 minutes listening to various cryptic phone menu choices and canned elevator music. In the end I went to bed.
The very next day I started all over and got the same results. I repeated this a couple of time just to make sure the computer was playing a joke on me. My wife tells me that doing the same thing over and over expecting a different result is the definition of insanity. Reminded of this fact, I decide to call the support people again. After 30 minutes on hold I get to leave my name and number for a callback within 2-4 hours. This never materialized. Support people get their jokes from the same place as the PC, apparently.
Finally, with the help of a friend who wasn’t personally involved with my battle-to-the-death, we were able to sort it out. Turns out there were two problems. The cable was bad, but the network card was also setup incorrectly. With the card wrong I couldn’t see any difference in the cable used. With the card right and the bad cable in place it looked (to me) like the card was wrong. Once the card was right, swapping the cable completed the connection. Now my wife can get all the spam she wants again.
The moral of the story is this; never buy a computer. Seriously, computers are a massively complex collection of hardware bits and software bytes. Getting so many different pieces from many different vendors and manufacturers to work at all is a minor miracle. Getting them to work long enough for you to play along with ABC’s “Who Wants to Be A Millionaire” is a major miracle.
My advice is to cultivate a geeky friend who spends all of his or her time immersed in the depths of computers and the Internet. When your setup fails skip all the phone calls and troubleshooting and invite your personal geek over for Jolt-cola and pizza, and while they are there casually mention that your router gizmo isn’t fram-a-staning with the network wonky-do and could they sacrifice a sheep for you to fix it?
Today I lost my job. This is my birthday weekend and I had taken Friday off as a present to myself. Midway through the morning I got a call from a work mate suggesting that I might want to come in to the office. When I asked why he said they were letting people go. He had been let go. I lost all the feeling in my limbs. In that moment I entered a free fall, the elevator cable had snapped. The world, once sharp and stable around me, had suddenly become blurry and frightening.
The drive into my office passed quickly. There was a small group of my fellow employees by the door as I drove past to the parking lot. The knot in my stomach grew at the sight of them, and I couldn’t bring myself to look any in the face. As I walked into the building we all muttered furtive hellos. We were all unknowns to each other. I didn’t know if they were staying or going, and they didn’t know that about me. Suddenly people I had worked with were strangers. They were ’them’. And I was a ’them’ as well.
Upstairs I searched out my immediate supervisor. The room felt chaotic and tense. Walking up to him I bluntly asked, “Do I pack or do I stay?” I could tell by the instance of pain on his face that I was packing. The free fall was now complete. No parachutes, no way out, please keep your hands and feet inside the elevator until it completely crashes in the basement.
Things that had been important only a few hours ago no longer mattered. The dentist appointment two days out was no longer looming large in my anxiety. My fears about my latest work assignment melted away. I no longer had any work assignments.
My anger slipped a few times getting through the severance process. I had little or no patience for the party line about why this was necessary. Looking at the corporate hatchet man I said, “I don’t need to hear your confession, I can’t give you absolution. You have to live with what you’ve done to all these lives today.”
Coming home and telling my wife that I had lost my job was devastating. It felt like I had failed us, like I had failed her. She spoke the only words that could have made a difference, “I love you. I believe in you.” The process of understanding had begun. We spent the rest of the day exploring our rage, tears, sorrow, laughter, fears and hopes. We believe in the TAO, that all things happen for a reason. We know that all events, joyous or traumatic, bring with them a gift. The trick to growing in this lifetime is to discover the gifts and incorporate them into you.
I have yet to discover what gift this trauma brings with it. I know that I will pass through the fire and emerge on the other side stronger for having been tempered by its heat. Yesterday is only a memory. Tomorrow is still a dream. Here and now all I have is today. Here and now I lost my job. Here and now I have gained my freedom to explore and grow.
“Line up!”
With that single command the test had begun. I raced to my spot on the floor. Once there I stood firmly at attention. My focus both inward and outward. Four and half years of training, four and half years of blood, sweat, and tears, four and a half years of my life was coming to an end. If I were successful, the end of the day would see me a black belt in karate-do.
Four and half years earlier I had begun a journey towards myself. The external, visible part of this journey could be seen in the movements of my art as I moved back and forth, across the floor, in time with the shouted commands from my sensei. The internal, personal part of this journey could not been seen by anyone by me.
The warm-up exercises completed and the test moved into kihon, or basics. The ritualized movements to the steady tempo of half barked commands was familiar and new at the same time. Well-practiced patterns of muscle and mind seemed to happen without thought, without impetus. The mind of no-mind. Mushin. The primitive mind takes over, freeing the higher mind. The focus and concentration act like a lens to sharpen thoughts and ideas. The sweat acts like a lubricant for the gears of the mind.
The basics are completed and my mind is clear and sharp now. All the worries and troubles from the outside world have ceased to exist. I have completed the transformation from my outside self to my inner self. I am lose and free, ready for the challenge ahead.
Kata, the forms of karate-do are next on the schedule. The sensei invites someone to start and I spring to be first. I assume a starting position in the center of the floor. Composed and calm I prepared inwardly for the kata I’ve chosen to perform. The kata is only several dozen moves, some fast, others slow. In my mind time stops, all external stimulus is gone. The kata is my beginning and ending. I start where it starts and I end where it ends. I finish, remembering and not remembering the preceding two minutes. I know that I have performed one of my best katas. Returning the line to wait while the others completed their forms I feel more completed than ever before.
Self-defense is next. Working with partners, grabbing, holding, and breaking free and grabbing again. The shared energy between two people, united and opposed, in one purpose. Ying and yang. Positive and negative, opposite and the same. When you are on, and your partner is on, the result proves that the sum of the parts can be greater than the whole. The physical forces are great, the air crackles with the meeting of our two spirits. Giving yourself completely to the waza, or technique, is the only way to complete it. Total trust in your self and the other. Only by utter giving up control can you be totally in control.
The test concludes with sparring. For me the toughest test of self, for it requires that I go to places inside myself that are darker, more feral than what I want to admit exist. In order to dominate the match I must first dominate my own fears. The feelings skate dangerously close to anger and they frighten me. The struggle in the ring is matched by the struggle within me. In order to win the point I have to accept that I have defeated the other. My success is equal to their failure. It is only sport, but it mirrors the outside world. It is the only time that I feel the pressures of living in today’s competitive world intrude on the sanctuary of the dojo.
The test is completed. My body is now tired and spent. I have given my whole self to the challenge and for that reason I cannot fail, regardless of the outcome. The review panel retreats to discuss and weigh our performances. In previous tests this is where my belief faltered and I questioned myself. Today I don’t have these doubts. I have finally mastered my need for control and given it up to the Tao.
Finally the review panel returns and we line up again. We have all been transformed by the experience. The metal of our spirits has been strengthened on the forge of this test. Sensei calls my name and I move quickly to a spot in front of him. With great emotion in his voice he extends his hand to meet mine and congratulates me on successfully completing my first step towards spiritual maturity. The rush of emotions floods through me. I managed to complete the ritual of passage and return to my spot. The same spot I started in hours earlier. I am the same and not the same.
The boy-man who began this journey over four years before is now a man. The enormity of my accomplishment overwhelms me and I cry. I cry tears of joy and tears of ecstasy.
Come live with me and be my love, And we will all the pleasures prove That valleys, groves, hills, and fields, Woods, or steeply mountain yields.
And we will sit upon rocks, Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks, By shallow rivers to whose falls Melodious birds sing madrigals.
And I will make thee beds of roses And a thousand fragrant poises, A cap of flowers, and a kirtle Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle;
A gown made of the finest wool Which from our pretty lambs we pull; Fair lined slippers for the cold, With buckles of the purest gold;
A belt of straw and ivy buds, With coral clasps and amber studs; And if these pleasures may thee move, Come live with me, and be my love.
The shepherd’s swains shall dance and sing For thy delight each May morning: If these delights thy mind may move, Then live with me and be my love.
~Christopher Marlowe 1599
1 pot 3 cans chicken stock 2 carrots, cut into slices 2 stalks of celery, cut into slices 1 handful of chopped onion 2-3 chicken breasts, cut into chunks salt and pepper to taste rosemary thyme secret seasonings vegetable bouillon cube flour 1 cup of rice
Pour stock into large pot. Slice carrots and celery and add to stock. Season with salt and pepper. Clean and slice chicken, season to taste, and add to stock. Boil water and dissolve bouillon in 1 c. of water. Add to stock. Bring stock to a boil, lower heat and simmer.
30 minutes before serving prepare rice and add to pot. Taste and re-season if necessary. Mix flour and cold water and thicken soup to desired consistency. Return to boil, then reduce heat and serve.
Makes the soul sing, and raises the spirit. Good for all that ails you.
All of you who love someone, raise your hand.
Now, keep your hand up if that person has ever been really sick. Sick enough that you consider calling 9-1-1 and asking for an ambulance. Scary stuff.
Robert Fulgum once said that one sign you are an adult is when you have to clean the goop out of the sink plug after doing the dishes. When you where a child your mother did that for you. As an adult you are on your own. I’d like to add caring for your spouse when they are really sick to his list.
You have no one to turn to for help. Your helpmate is the one who is sick. You discover that your ability to think coherently goes right out the window. This is one of those “things” that you normally decide together. Only now you can’t.
She’s sick. She needs me. I need her. Oh, how insignificant does the world and its problems seem now, when my heart is aching for her to be well. I can’t do anything for her, really. I fetch water and supplies as they are needed, I wash clothes and sheets, and fix meals. Things that seem small to me, but are huge and loving to her.
I want her to be well again. I want her to laugh and play and walk soft and touch the moon with me once again.
Love isn’t what happens before the wedding ceremony. It isn’t what happens when things are good, and life is calm. Love is what happens when that other person needs you to be tender and caring no matter what. Love is truly putting them first - ahead of work, obligations, even yourself.
I love my wife more than ever before. She trusts me enough to allow me to help her get clean, and to hold her when it is really tough. I am honored to be her husband.
Go home and kiss your loved ones. Be thankful that you have them. Tell them how you feel.
I was raised by list makers. Growing up I could determine the importance and duration of future events from the list making activities of my parents. Grocery lists, gift lists, book lists. Lists of books to buy, lists of book already bought. Yes, even lists of lists.
Growing up in that alphabetized and ordered world I learned to make lists myself. For a time I stopped making lists. My little rebellion against the ordered world. It didn’t take as I still write things down. My wife will tell you that I write everything down and then keep all the little scraps of paper. For a time this was really compulsive. For years whenever I would move to a new apartment or house I’d take along boxes filled with old scraps of paper. Stuff I hadn’t looked at since I wrote it down, but nothing that I could bear to part with.
Today I am more relaxed. I don’t feel the need to write as many things down, and I’ve learned to empty my pockets into the trash can at the end of the day. The only list I really use anymore (on paper, anyway) is the grocery list. I have a page-a-day calendar on my desk and I use the old pages as a note pad. I carefully write out all the things we need and then stick it in my pocket. When I come home, with all the items crossed off I hesitate at the trash can. Do I need this list?
Hmmm.
Milk Eggs Romain Lettuce Cucumber Celery Garlic Onion (red and white) Chicken Rice Soda
Go get 100 pennies. Go on, get ’em. I’ll wait.
…
Now start counting them. What number did you start with? If you are like most people you started with the number one. Not zero, but one. Hmmm.
Do you suppose that one thousand, nine hundred and ninety-nine years ago they counted the same way? I’m willing to bet that they did. This means that the first year AD was 1.
Now. What’s a century? 100 years. So. If you start with 1 and continue for 100 years you will be at year 101. Year 1 is the start of the 1st century. Therefore it follows that year 101 is the start of the second. 201 is the start of the third. And so forth.
Guess what?
Year 2000 is the last year of 20th century. And Year 2001 is the first year of the new century.
And, oh by the way, 2001 is the start of the new millennium. Like it or not.
Not that any of this really matters. Like everyone else I like seeing the odometer roll over to a number followed by all those zeros. And for most of us the start of Year 2000 is the biggest roll over, calendar-wise, we are likely to see. However, I just cringe at the thought of going through all this media millennium hype again next year when all the advertisers figure out that they can have another millennium this or that.
Happy New Year.