How to Win Friends and Influence People

Why you should keep your mouth shut in class.

A couple of weeks ago my professor assigned us a two-page paper on the proposed Ohio State budget. We were to cover tuition increases, proposed sin taxes, and so forth. One guy piped up.

"Uhh, is that supposed to be single-spaced or double-spaced?"

"Well, there is plenty of discussion about these topics out there right now and they could all affect your daily lives, so I'd say single-spaced" was the instructor's response.

You can imagine how well that went over with my classmates.

So tonight our instructor had just given us a homework assignment and was going over the plan for the next couple of weeks: Chapter 11 next week, Chapter 12 the following.

"Uhhh, do you realize that the week you have us scheduled to cover Chapter 12 we'll be on spring break? Does that mean the test schedule on the syllabus will be moved back a week?"

After consulting a calendar, our instructor's response? "Well, we'll just cover both Chapter 11 and 12 next week. So make sure you've read both chapters before class."

Same guy.

If he raises his hand and says "Uhhh...." at the end of class again I'm pretty sure people nearby will restrain him.

Dispatch from the front

Cold front, that is.

I'm sitting in my parents' living room listening to the sleet hit their huge windows. My mom got a new laptop and my dad rigged up a wireless network, so I'm typing away, connected to the internet world with no tangible connections. This please me to no end, but moreso because it's my parents' doing.

Driving over this morning gave me a couple of hours of alone-time in my car. I enjoy driving that route to Indiana because I know it so well. Today was even better since I got to slice through rain and fog, perfect melancholy weather.

My small group talked the other night about suffering. I was just reading A Circle of Quiet by Madeleine L'Engle and came across this passage descring a writing conference experience:

...

It wasn't long before we all knew each other by name, which meant that Una was Una first and black and militant second; that Jock was Jock first and privileged and Wasp second; that he could say, after hearing Una read a tragic story out of her own experience, "Una, I really envy you; that's awful, all that, but it makes me realize how sheltered I've been." Una, in her turn, for the first time saw some of her experiences as valuable in her understanding of herself and the world around her, saw and felt the extraordinary hope that comes from experience which comes from tribulation. We all asked, "Why is it that we learn from the things which hurt us? Why do we need pain before e can grow?" There aren't any easy answers to this one, but all artists know the truth of it, and not only artists: it was Jung who said that there is no coming to life without pain.

...
I could just retype the whole book here, but I'm not that patient.

It works that way, doesn't it? It takes pain and confusion to really develop a person. It feels so unfair and yet it seems to be the inescapable reality.

When I was younger, maybe 7 or 8, my family hosted our first exchange student. Over the years we had several, some for only a few weeks, some for an entire year. But a select few became members of our family and we all still communicate. Monica, this 17 year old girl from Uruguay, was our first. I remember driving down to the Indianapolis airport in January to pick her up. At that age, simply driving an hour to the big city was exciting.

Monica was ecstatic because we had snow. She'd never seen it before. For a little kid from Indiana that was inconceivable. We still have pictures of that snowball fight.

My mom had a long letter from her on the kitchen counter. Monica was writing about how she had heard from my grandmother some brief comment about marriage and divorce and goings on over the past few years. She was describing to my mom how difficult it is to imagine those little kids (my brother and I!) as adults going through all of these adult things.

It is interesting looking at your life through someone elses eyes.

I've always kept tabs on Monica through my mom, but now I think it's time for me to write a letter.

Once of my goals this year was to visit a new country. This afternoon I'm dreaming of flying down to visit this "older sister" of mine.

Random thoughts

I've been wondering who reads this thing. I look at the stats that I can see and the number of visitors, albeit small, is still surprising. I don't know who this mass of people is, but I know how to make them go away. Stop posting. They're staying away in droves, now. What were small numbers are now smaller.

You can't trust me anymore. I just thought I'd forewarn you.

For some reason I am a jagged bundle of nerves this week. I think it's a combination of sleep deprivation, a bad season of life, and a too-busy weekend--one birthday party, two plays, one acoustic concert and a houseguest that pretty much ensured conversation into the late, late nights...uhhh, early, early mornings).

Since several people have asked (who would only have known from here): no, I'm not dating the girl I mentioned below. We had three dates. Three nice, well, OK dates. I didn't know that you had to have the "break-up" conversation after three dates. But apparently you do. I've never really had to do that before, so I'm chalking it up to yet another one of life's experiences that I'm a better person for going through.

The older I get the more ridiculous Valentine's Day seems.

I'm reading Circle of Quiet by Madeleine L'Engle. My brain keeps flirting with trying to compare her notes on "self-image", particular her allusions to children at play, to Ayn Rand's Howard Roark in Fountainhead. There probably isn't really anything there, but it's what she made me think of.

Not that I'm watching (ahem), but I think Joe will pick Sarah.

I started working for a new client, and I drive to that building now. So I've been taking the stairs (because the elevator is painfully slow). I'm sad to realize how out of stair-climbing shape I am. I'm hoping (against hope) that there is some other kind of shape that I am actually in and it's just a lack of proper cross-training.

Yes, at heart I'm an optimist.

Working at this client has also curtailed my business-hours web-surfing. When I'm outside the safe confines of my home office I'm hyper-aware that my behavior, even web-browsing behavior, is probably being watched. So, no reading and posting for me until I get home--which is usually way-late and I'm well into a brain-fried state.

But I'm redoubling my effort. Expect more frequent, if uneventful, late-night "random thoughts" posts like this.

(I want a bumper sticker that says "Don't trust anyone over 30." Nobody ever gets that joke about me not being trustworthy. That saying must be before everyone elses time.)