Traditions are at the core of our daily life.
I don’t know whether the appropriate word is tradition or ritual but the concept is similar in this context. There are certain things we do every day/month/year on a certain date to celebrate an occasion or to remember something or even to forget.
To me, Jewish religion has always been all about the traditions. My family isn’t very religious so I never learned Hebrew. (Well, actually, I did speak it fluently when I was four, but that was mostly cause we spent an entire summer in Israel and I was enrolled in kindergarten, but upon our return to Istanbul I promptly forgot all of it.) We didn’t go to synagogue much or light candles on Friday night. But we did observe the major holidays and we told and retold the stories. Today, when someone asks me why I still fast on Yom Kippur or suffer a week without bread during Passover, I can recite the full story of why we observe that specific holiday. I still recognize and appreciate all the people who suffered so that I could be here and I agree with the idea that we need to remember our past and not take things for granted. But, to be honest, I don’t observe the holidays for those reasons.
I do it cause it’s become a personal tradition.
Both my mom and my sister suffer from health problems that disallow them from fasting. My family is miles away and I am often alone on the eve of Yom Kippur, but I fast. Cause I always have.
It’s so engrained at the core of who I am that I don’t even see it as an option anymore. It’s not something that can be reconsidered; it’s a part of me.
But religion is an extreme example for my point. I realized this week that we have little self-traditions that at one point became something that we don’t consider from year to year, we just do them. For Jake and me, coming to Martha’s Vineyard to celebrate Fourth of July is one of those yearly rituals. The entire family collects at the island house and often there is a guest family as well. It’s very low key but it has become a tradition.
I didn’t appreciate the strength of this tradition until this year. As I mentioned a few days ago, I recently found out that I most likely have a third herniated disc on my back. My neck is causing large quantities of pain over my back, my arm and my spine in general. I’ve been depressed and grouchy. So when Jake mentioned our plans, I told him that maybe going to the Vineyard when I felt so crappy wasn’t such a good idea.
Hell broke loose. (Well, it didn’t. mostly because Jake’s such a wonderful person and didn’t give me the guilt trip that I was already feeling.) I could tell he was sad but I was so busy feeling sorry for myself that I didn’t spend enough time caring about his feelings.
As Saturday got closer and closer, I realized that I got depressed at the idea of not going, too. We always went to the Vineyard this weekend and now I was the reason we weren’t going to go. I realized that breaking this tradition meant that I was admitting something was seriously wrong with my body. And I didn’t like the idea that something was so wrong that we would alter a tradition. So what if my back hurt some? Staying in New York represented caving into my sickness and it would be downhill from there.
So I didn’t.
I bought a neck brace and we took the trip slowly. As I stare out the window to the endless water and trees, I am really glad we came. My back already feels better, my nerves are calmer, the wind is caressing my face and the kitty is giving me curious looks. There’s a reason this trip became a tradition.
And you don’t mess with traditions.
Previously? Horny.
Some people are turned on by power.
Others, by money.
No matter what people tell you, there’s something non-physical about their partner that turns them on.
I don’t mean to undermine the importance or relevance of physical attraction. Often, it’s the first thing that people notice and at times it can completely nullify your chances of seeing someone more than once.
Physical attraction is extremely important, but for me, it’s not necessarily the outcome of a physical trait. There are certain personality traits about a person that can make me physically attracted to him.
Love is one of those things. With every boyfriend I’ve ever had, I’ve gotten more and more attracted to him as I fell deeper and deeper in love.
Power doesn’t turn me on; neither does money, not even education necessarily. I’ve met some extremely well educated people who make me want to puke as soon as they utter a word.
Kindness turns me on and strong family values. I think I’m not the only woman who likes men who are kind to dogs, babies and the elderly. I am turned on by patience. By someone who’s truly interested in what I think. Someone who makes me laugh and doesn’t have a bitter and cynical look on life.
Yesterday I found something new.
One of my teammates and I went to a meeting with a research person who wrote an application that we’re supposed to use for our client-side applications. This one hour meeting grew to four and a half hours as the guy gave us a full background on why they had built this package and how excited he was about it and some of the problems they were aware of, etc. While I could tell that my teammate was about to pass out from boredom, I was so excited that my neck pain disappeared for some time.
I discovered that geeks turn me on.
Actually, that’s not entirely true. There are several kinds of geeks. One kind thinks he’s better than the rest of the world and looks down at everyone who asks questions. This breed is often bitter and condescending.
The other kind, the one that excites me way more than it should, is the kind who is so thrilled by the work that he wants to share it with the whole world. He comes into your office and says, “Look what I figured out, isn’t it neat?” He’s not showing off, he’s like a little kid who discovered a new toy. He’s giddy.
Maybe that’s what really turns me on. The giddiness. The intoxicating level of fascination with something that is obviously driven by large doses of passion. And that turns me on.
It’s contagious.
It’s not the intelligence or the technology. It’s not the knowledge.
It’s the child-like ability of exercising pure joy.
And this guy had it. I sat there, getting drunk by his love for it. At that moment he was much hotter than Tom Cruise. (Okay, so Tom doesn’t do it for everyone. Put your own hottie here, since that’s not my point anyhow.)
My list of favorite people just got incremented by one.
What turns you on?
Previously? Durable.
They say girls have a soft spot for their dads.
I’m not sure of the accuracy of that sentiment but it definitely applied to my mom.
My grandfather passed away eleven years ago. He got an extremely rare disease that practically made his bones melt. He was fine one day and gone within a week. In the week after my grandfather’s passing we had many visitors but my mom was mostly in a daze.
One of her clients approached her and said, “May God never give you as much pain as you can endure.”
I still remember the surprised look my mom gave the woman. She thought the client was inappropriate and uncaring.
It took us years to fully understand the depth of the woman’s wisdom.
Humans are capable of handling large doses of pain. Really large doses.
I spend hours of my day worrying about the stupidest things. I worry about work and performing well. Increasing the speed of a stored procedure. Laying out a usable interface. Debugging an executable that keeps hanging.
On the weekend I worry about the day ending. Not spending enough time writing my novel. That I still suck at the saxophone and that I’m out of milk.
I really do worry about the stupidest things. I get upset and I let it get to me.
Last thanksgiving I hurt my back, without doing anything. After a month of struggling with doctors and turning suicidal thanks to steroids, I found out that I had two herniated discs on my back. I spent the last seven months making twice weekly trips to the physical therapist, taking pills that ate the lining of my stomach, and getting poked by acupuncture needles that caused my body to react in the most unusual ways. I felt like crap. I got better. And I felt like crap again.
Last night, my neck started hurting. I felt like someone was sticking a wooden pole where my skull met my neck. As Jake told me about his day, my left side slowly started to fall asleep. It was as if thousands of ants walked up and down my arm.
I took some Vioxx and went to bed. I figured I must be exaggerating or hallucinating the pain.
Well, the morning greeted me with a big smile and even more pain. Less awareness on my left side, acute pain on the arm. Three hours of begging on the phone and my doctor said I should go over there. He said back pain doesn’t move up the spine and had I been to a neurologist yet?
Not what I wanted to hear.
I go to the doctor, I wait in the office, I walk in, he pokes me with paperclips. He says it looks like I might have another slipped disc, this time on my neck.
Suddenly, everything else doesn’t seem so worrisome anymore.
I only hope I don’t have to have as much pain as I can endure.
Previously? Museum.
Some things are best done alone.
There is a long list of actions which are more fun with a multiple people. For me, traveling, dancing, going to the movies and dining are some of those.
Then I have the ones that I often do alone but enjoy much more in couples. Like bathing and sleeping.
Finally, I have a whole set that I prefer to do alone. Reading, writing my book, and watching people make that list.
So does going to the museum.
After I left the hairdresser, I decided I had to finally see the Blake exhibit at the Met. My hairdresser is six blocks from the Met and it was a lovely day so I started strolling along Fifth Avenue. The Blake exhibit had just closed but thanks to a recent post in photographica, I knew my first stop would be the roof garden, displaying the works of Shapiro.
   
Up until recently I didn’t know much about African art and hadn’t had any exposure to it. Last fall, in my art class, our teacher talked so much about tribal arts that I became completely fascinated with these works. I love the incredible level of detail given to each piece. These works are symbolic and most were used as part of a performance. They represented so much of the culture and belief system that we can deduce a lot about their priorities through these. I can sit in the room and stare at these carvings for hours at a time.
  
  
I believe that enjoying a piece of art is an experience best lived individually. Each person gets something different from being in a museum, especially one as large as the Metropolitan. There are pieces that I just walk by and ones that make me want to sit and stare for literally hours at a time. When I’m with someone else, I feel pressure to enjoy each piece equally. I worry about my friend being bored or feeling rushed. It’s one thing to visit a small showing of a few paintings, though I would still probably prefer to go to it on my own, and a completely different one to visit a large museum with some of the world’s most awe-inspiring works of art.
Today I felt really glad to live in New York City. Glad that I could just walk a few blocks and take however long I wanted to look at the brushstrokes of Seurat. I didn’t have to rush it into a weekend and drag my friends along.
I had the luxury of enjoying it on my own.
Previously? Movies.
This was an imaginary compilation that I was assembling in my head; all my happiest and proudest moments, cut together into a five-minute edited greatest hits of my life.
“What would you have in your lifetime highlights video, Neal?” I asked him.
He thought for a while and said nervously “Getting a B in my geography O’ level.”
He looked hurt when I burst out laughing.
“Oh come on…” I said, “You’ve got to do better than that. You can’t have that on your tombstone – Here lies Neil Evans. He got a B in his geography O’ level. What have you done that you really loved and will always remember? What are you really proud of?” – John O’Farrell, Walking into the Wind.
Reading the above dialogue made me think of what would be in my five-minute movie.
Happiest moments are easy: getting into Carnegie Mellon, getting my green card, most of my days with Jake, and my sister’s giving birth to my twin nephews.
Most of my happiest moments revolve around school, reaching a goal I’d been striving for for a long time, and my family.
The proudest, however, are a bit more complicated. I’m proud of my family and their accomplishments, most importantly their incredible capacity for love. But this movie is supposed to be about my proud moments. So I’m not sure their achievements qualify.
My first proud moment would probably be the same as a happy one. Getting into a college in United States, especially one that has a good reputation for computer science, was a huge accomplishment for someone with my grades and it was something I’d been dreaming about since I was twelve.
During college, I’ve done a few things I’m proud of, but one of my most taxing moments was when a male friend of one of my residents (I was a Resident Assistant on two floors of an all-girl section of one of the dormitories) was depressed. Suicidal is probably more accurate. I didn’t really know this boy all that well but he’d been on my floor before and I spent most of the evening talking to him and I stayed in that room and listened to him for hours. While I’m totally aware that it most likely has nothing to do with my actions or words, seeing that boy around a few days later and having him hug me made me feel proud of myself. That would probably make it to my video.
So would graduation. I am the first member of my family to graduate from college. My mom dropped out of high school and my dad out of college. My sister didn’t even attempt at college. So graduating and getting my undergraduate and graduate degrees simultaneously was a very proud moment for my family and me.
Most recently, I am proud of the fact that I didn’t let New York and the investment banking life get to me. That I had the balls to give up a lot of money and reduce my work to part-time so that I could do more volunteer work.
I have a long way to go. I want my life to be full of happy and proud moments. I want to look back and say that I had a great life and I did everything I wanted to do. I want to make sure I had the guts to live it to its fullest.
What would go on your five-minute film?
Previously? Intelligent.
It’s amazing to me how many people use words without really thinking about what they’re trying to say. Especially adjectives and adverbs, we’re so fast to pile them up. One of the guys I work with always utters the word “interesting” which makes my skin crawl.
It’s not that I don’t like the word interesting, it’s just that it means nothing whatsoever in the context in which he uses it. I say, “One of the reasons we want to split up these services is to ensure we can have deals where each tranche can offer a different product.”
He goes, “Hmm, that’s interesting.”
Huh?
Recently, especially during this seemingly unending design phase, interesting has become my least favorite reply. “Strangle” isn’t the right word, but it’s the first word that comes to mind. (that’s what I get for reading Choke in one sitting.)
I’ve also been thinking about the use of “intelligent” a lot lately. What do you think qualifies someone as intelligent?
Since I am a programmer and grew up with a strong math background, I’ve always heard people tell me that my ability to add up two numbers in my head quickly makes me intelligent. Or the fact that I scored high on the Math SATs and GMATs. I must be intelligent if I know how to code or if I did well at school. If I can speak several foreign languages. For some reason, people surrounding me have always associated intelligence with either math or sciences.
What about people who are extremely good with history or geography? Are they not intelligent?
How about artists and musicians? Poets?
People at the top of an artistic field are often referred to as geniuses. Leonardo Da Vinci was a genius. But then again, so was Albert Einstein and I don’t think his artistic skills were well developed ( though I could be wrong about this as it’s just a guess). So genius, I think, is used for people whom we consider at the very top of their field. Someone at an extraordinary level. Which gives me the warm fuzzies cause it doesn’t seem to discriminate on topic.
Intelligence, however, doesn’t work that way. At least not in my experience. You’re a genetic engineer? You must be intelligent. You wrote an award-winning fiction novel. Well, you’re great but not necessarily intelligent. It just doesn’t seem all that fair.
I must say that I have the highest respect for people who know the words that show up in the GREs. I’ve been trying to memorize some of those words and my brain simply refuses to cooperate. The math and analytical sections are no problem at all but as soon as I hit the antonyms, I’m ready to give it all up. I don’t need a PhD that bad. Really.
If intelligence was all about math and analysis and GREs were supposed to test your level of intelligence, why have those stupid words at all?
Now I know you’re telling yourself that I have two flaws in my logic. One being that I assume the GREs are worth anything. And you’re right. I don’t think they are and I think that’s pretty common knowledge. But I was just using it as an example and not as a basis for my argument on why non-math and science oriented topics should also be included in measuring someone’s level of intelligence.
The other flaw you might want to point out is that I assumed that a strong vocabulary isn’t a sign of intelligence. And that’s exactly my point. What is intelligence? What makes you define someone as an intelligent person?
I guess I define it as someone with strong deduction skills, a solid and well-rounded set of knowledge and an ability to apply the knowledge to their life and work.
What do you think? Tell me.
Addendum on june 24: this article seemed to be adressing exactly the issues I was trying to raise, so I thought you might find it interesting.
Previously? Alone.
I used to be a very private person.
I always thought that my problems were my private business and that no one needed to know those things about me. My mother, on the other hand, believes on the public distribution of information. No matter what the issue was, she’d find a way to bring it up in conversation.
“I was talking to Stella today and she was talking about how she just had a breast reduction and how her doctor was so great….”
“Rita just told me about how her son had his herniation fixed. She says it’s a real simple operation”
Whatever my concern might be, it just so happened that someone else would mention it to my mom that very day.
Yeah, Right.
We’d fight endlessly about how she couldn’t possibly keep anything to herself. Privacy wasn’t something my mom understood very clearly.
Recently I’ve been having a bit of a change of heart on this matter. I still believe in the importance and relevance of a right to privacy. If I want something kept a secret, my family and friends who happened, for one reason or another, to find out about it, should respect my wishes.
The part I’ve been rethinking is the desperate need for secrecy.
While we glorify individuality, I think we all, on some level, feel the need to be a part of something. People like to be able to relate to each other. We feel most alone when we think we’re the only person who’s been faced with an unfair disadvantage.
How come I’m the only person who develops cancer at the age of twenty?
Why do I have to wear braces as an adult? No one else does, I will look like a freak.
The thing is, you’re not alone. You’re never alone. You’re not the only one who has cancer or wears braces as an adult. You’re not the only one who lost a loved one or can’t have a baby. You’re not the only one who’s been cheated on or married an already married person.
While everyone handles a situation in his or her own individual ways and there are no clear-cut solutions to a problem, sometimes all you need to know is that you’re not the only one. And putting aside the emotional benefits, at times there are even practical reasons for sharing.
If you’re suffering from an unusual illness, it might benefit you to share that with someone because they might know of a new cure that’s being tested or a doctor whose specialty is your disease. Why not benefit from that? And you’ll never know about all this information and sources around you unless you speak up.
While I still don’t condone casually bringing up a subject you might be touchy about, I do think that using the people whom you trust around you and sharing isn’t really a bad thing. It’s surprising how much you’ll find out just by saying a few words. It’s amazing how many people are going through or have already gone through the very same thing.
If you knew they could help you, would you talk then? If your answer is yes, then remember that life is not an open notebook and nothing is for free. You must give some to get some.
And if your answer is no, I’d challenge you to give it a try next time. Start with just sharing it with one person. See what happens.
You might be surprised.
Previously? Not So Common.
How common is common sense?
I’ve always thought that the idea behind common sense is that there is a well of information out there somewhere that all humans are somehow tapped into. Or even something genetically transmitted from parents to children.
At least that’s how we behave when we run into someone who we think lacks in that department. We wonder, ‘where was this person raised, in outer space?’
So I’ve been thinking about what goes into what we consider common sense. I tried to think of examples of what I consider common sense and see how and where I learned them.
The first one that sprung to my mind was the ‘make sure to be aware of your surroundings when you walk’ idea. Anyone who’s been raised in a city knows that it’s crucial for your personal safety to know this bit of common sense. It’s extremely common, however, for a small town person to not have this bit of information, which is something they quickly learn once they’ve been in the city for a few days and are mugged. (Okay, so I’m exaggerating a bit.) It looks like we pick up some amount of common sense from the environment in which we’re raised.
On a similar topic, I’ve worked with a girl who never notices subtle hints. If I’m upset and ask a friend to go for a walk, she’d jump in and say “Can I come along, too?” Not that we didn’t like her or enjoy her company, but she didn’t seem to realize when it wasn’t really appropriate for her to invite herself. I kept wondering how she’d managed to make it through her teenage years without having been totally burnt. Learning when to talk and how to act is a series of common sense tricks we pickup from our family and surroundings. These bits of information sometimes sting so hard that we never forget how we developed this piece of “common sense.” (And we rarely forget the “friends” who taught us this lesson first hand.)
Another example I came up with was building common sense through education. As I learned American Sign Language, many of the signs seemed common sense to me and so I’d retain them easily. Same for Japanese grammar. Even math felt like common sense to me. It seemed the more I learned, the more stuff appeared to be common sense.
Here’s what I think it all comes down to: common sense is a combination of what you learn from your environment, family, friends, books, school and all your deductions from this knowledge.
Next time you meet someone who seems to lack what you consider common sense, remember that it’s not a centralized resource pool in which we can all tap.
Just like most anything else in life, it stems from personal experience.
Previously? The Itch.
Ever heard of the term “too comfortable”?
When I read Heather’s Miss fiddle twiddle pick bang, it hit close to home. I’m fidgety, too, but on a much larger, non-athletic scale.
It seems I’m allergic to the steady state.
I constantly need to be planning the next step, the new challenge. As soon as I reach one goal, I start planning the next. It’s like enjoying the good times never even crosses my mind. I wrack my brain, trying to come up with yet another seemingly unattainable task.
In the beginning, it was easy. I decided to come to the United States. My teacher said I couldn’t, so I had the double advantage of reaching my goal and proving her wrong. Once I got to school, it was all about declaring a minor in Art, making sure I got all my credits right, getting the Resident Assistant job, becoming an editor, a sexual assault counselor, teaching computer skills, and so much more. School’s an easy place to set goals.
Fall semester of my junior year, I realized I was almost ready to graduate. By the end of spring semester I’d be done with all my credits and required courses, except one. In my major, there is a class only offered in the fall semester of your senior year. So I couldn’t graduate. The intelligent thing would have been for me to take it easy and enjoy my senior year like most students. But instead, I applied for a brand new master’s degree and bugged the head of the college until he relented. In the next three semesters I completed my undergraduate and my masters.
Then I worried about getting a job. As a foreigner, it was crucial that a company employ me so that I could stay in the country. Once more, I had a purpose. Something to occupy my time and make sure I didn’t stop worrying and get too comfortable.
Once I got the job, there was moving to New York City, furnishing my apartment, completing a bunch of projects, taking a three-month trip to London, and another for six months in Tokyo. Learning a new programming language, figuring out how to build applications the right way, learning Japanese. I spent hours sweating over my green card application. I found out all there was to know. I did it all. I got my card. During those years I also set goals outside work.
There was learning to live with Jake. Drawing in 3-D, Italian, French, Sign Language, writing a novel, yoga, and so much more. Anything not to stop.
About a year ago, I was ready for a new challenge; my job was too easy, I wasn’t learning anymore. But just taking another job wasn’t hard enough, I decided to push the limits again. I wanted a part time job. Only three days a week. So I started interviewing. I found a job inside the same firm. A great job. I started volunteering with the Deaf. I took eight new classes. I picked up the saxophone. Just cause I wasn’t working every day didn’t mean I’d lie around lazy. I did my job well, I got promoted.
And here we are. In a perfect situation. I have a great job. A relaxed summer with only three classes and I get to volunteer. My boyfriend and I are getting along incredibly well and I am head over heels in love, even after seven years.
But I’m starting to fidget once more.
It’s all too good. I can’t think of any goals anymore.
So now, I’m making them up. I want to get a PhD, I think. Start my own non-profit firm. Do some good for the world. I want to move to San Francisco. Make a huge change. Start over. Start different. See if I can still reach seemingly unattainable goals. See if I can keep raising the bar.
I’ve got the itch.
Previously? Gender Bias.
I used to be one of those girls who brag about not being friends with women.
Well, I didn’t brag, really, but I would always point out that I have much closer male friends than female ones. I grew up with discouraging female friends. All the women around me were catty and self-centered and shallow. To be honest, so were the men. But as soon as I broke off from that crowd, I consistently picked men as best friends.
By high school, I had a few female friends, but with the exception of one, I had problems with all. I don’t know if it’s due us being the same gender and thus allowing for more comparisons, but I still thought that women were less trustworthy. A few of the women whom I considered close friends have regularly, over the years, let me down when I least expected.
I’ve considered women as more calculating, more out-for-herself type and backstabbing. God forbid anyone who stands in the way of a woman who’s determined to reach a goal. Even if that person is her supposed best friend.
I’ve had close friends date my exes, bash my boyfriend to his face, talk bad things behind my back and just be outright cruel at times.
A male friend has never done any of those things to me.
My male close friends, and I’ve had quite a few, have mostly been less intense and generally couldn’t relate to certain “female” issues I had, but overall they were more reliable, a whole lot more fun and less likely to ditch me when they found a significant other.
Today, my closest friend is Jake, but other than him, I have friends of both genders. I’ve realized that different genders offer different benefits and points of view to my life. Depending on what my problem is, I reach out to whomever I believe will support me and whomever will give me good insight.
I’ve stopped believing that it has anything to do with gender. People are just people. There are women who make crappy friends and women who make fantastic ones. A woman who might be a terrible fit for me, could easily be the best buddy of someone else. Same goes for men. I don’t think only being friends with the opposite gender makes me sound cool.
At least, not anymore.
I think it makes me sound immature.
Previously? First One.
I’ve always been fascinated by people who claim to be the first to do something.
“Oh he is always the first to discover a new book or a trend.” And for some reason people think that this is a sought-after trait.
I just fail to understand the importance of this trend. Why is it important, or desirable, that a person be the very first to read a new novel or see a current movie? What exactly does that really say about the person?
I’ve been racking my brain and I can’t come up with a good answer. I keep thinking that ten years down the line who will still care that this person was the first to have read a certain novel if by that point we’ve both read it? How does it matter that you went to Denmark before I did, if we’ve both been there?
I see the advice-oriented benefits to having already done something. If you’ve already been to Denmark, you might be able to tell me where to eat or which sightseeing tours not to miss, but that’s about all. Same goes for a book or a movie; you could tell me what you thought about it. Even then, it might say nothing about what I will think about it.
In many industries, especially technology, being first sometimes actually has a negative correlation with being the best. America had analog cell phones much earlier than many countries, including Turkey. But as a late-adopter Turkey was able to invest into the latest and greatest digital technology, which had been invented by the time cell phones made it to Turkey. Today, digital phones in America are much more expensive and not as reliable as their counterparts in Turkey.
Software programming is also similar. Someone who learned how to code many years ago might have been the greatest Fortran or Cobol programmer ever, but for these people making the leap to Object Oriented Programming has been much more difficult, causing them to lose their jobs to latecomers.
So being the first is not always the best and I really can’t see why it’s such a ‘hot’ trait. Why does it matter that she was the first to use the color orange? Why does it matter that he wore a turtleneck way before many others?
It all just seems so trivial to me.
But if you have any useful insight on this matter, I’d love it if you shared it.
Previously? Family Values.
I work on wall street where many people make more money in a month thanothers have in a lifetime. Some of these people pay a monthly rent that’sclose to my yearly salary.
Most of the above mentioned people, however, come in to work before dawn,some even as early at 4:30am. They stay here until 8,9, sometimes even 10 orway past midnight. (at the lower ranks of the firm there are many analyststhat simply go home to take a shower and come back, but these poor soulsearn very little for the enormous time commitment that they call a job.)These really high level managers never really get to see their children growup. How could they? They’re never home.
Some of these men (as they almost always are) are more than happy to admitthat they like the money. They want the money. They want the prestige. Ihave no issues with such people.
My beef is with the other set. The ones who claim they’re doing it for theirfamily. The ones who spend up to sixteen hours of their day away from thevery family for which they’re trying to provide opportunities.
I don’t know who they think they’re fooling but it’s not me and I bet nottheir family either.
I don’t mean to imply that money isn’t important or that it doesn’t allowfor amazing opportunities. But I think our society strongly undermines theimportance of shared time.
I grew up in a pretty decent household, money-wise. My parents were kindenough to get my sister and me almost anything we asked for. We neverreally wore brand names or had cars, but we didn’t ever feel deprivedeither. While I spent countless hours playing with the toys my parentsbought me, some of my fondest childhood memories are from times we spenttogether as a family.
My father would spend days planning our birthdays. He was famous in theneighborhood for throwing the best birthday parties ever. My sister’sfriends to the day tell him how awesome the parties were. My mother wouldbribe me to ditch school so we could spend the day together and go shopping(all right, that might not be a good example setting, but it was qualitytime with my mom). One of my favorite vacations ever was when I was thirteenand we went to Disney World as a family. Another one a few years ago when Imet my sister and my mom in Rome and my dad joined us after three days. Orwhen I was in London for work and my mom came to hang out with me.
None of the presents I ever got is more valuable than the memories I havewith my family. Money might be able to buy presents and toys and vacationsand exotic trips but if your children don’t get to spend them with you,you’ve deprived them of the thing they need most.
This doesn’t go just for parenting. When was the last time you called a goodfriend and asked to hang out? We take the people around us for granted waytoo often. We think they’ll always be there. What if your friend who lives afew streets down, and whom you never see but you always could cause he’sright there, decides he’s moving across the country?
Why wait for an occasion? Call now. It doesn’t matter what you do, only thatyou do it together.
Previously? Oxymoron.
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projects for twenty twenty-six
projects for twenty twenty-five
projects for twenty twenty-four
projects for twenty twenty-three
projects for twenty twenty-two
projects for twenty twenty-one
projects for twenty nineteen
projects for twenty eighteen
projects from twenty seventeen
monthly projects from previous years
some of my previous projects
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