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Archive for the ‘shining examples’ Category

reaching your potential…

I’m sure watching so much Olympic coverage is doing nothing for helping me reach MY potential but it has definitely provided lots to think about.  Just finished watching the Canadian women’s soccer (football) team go to the semi-final for the first time – after beating Great Britain on home turf.  Very exciting!  Especially now that I know a little about the game so can appreciate the skills more.  They face the USA in the semi-final.  Definitely dicey but one of the delightful things about the Olympics is the element of surprise.

http://www.ctvolympics.ca/field-sports/news/article/canada-advances-semis-with-win-over-great-britain.html

Which is why I am bored with Michael Phelps.  I feel a bit guilty.  I would never try to belittle his accomplishments.  I never watched anything from the 2008 Olympics because I was working at a level to rival any Olympic athlete’s training schedule.  So I only heard about the most decorated Olympian of all time once he was so famous everyone knew about him, whether you wanted to or not 🙂

That’s the thing.  He’s become so famous it’s become a bit tacky… and kind of boring.  I am far more impressed with everyone else in the pool who has been so successful in challenging him.  Obviously he has trained hard and is an incredible athlete but the commentators seem to have forgotten there is anyone else in the pool.  Yes, the gold medal is impressive but seriously, getting to the top three, even the top five, is a wild achievement and deserves a lot more attention than it gets.

Yet another example of how the media and the public seems to feel the twitter version of the world surpasses The Economist version of the world.  Sorry, people, but you are wrong.  You are missing so many points and illustrating the limited potential most human beings realize.  Because trying hard just seems like too much work.

There is a lot to reflect on when you watch the Olympics.  The irony that the Americans lead in gold medals and show a level of fitness that is world class while average Americans are shooting to lead the world in obesity and Type II diabetes.  The fact that over 200 countries come to the Olympics but most of the medals are won by a handful of rich countries with the resources to finance gold medals in the high technology 21st century.  The pity that only a small handful of athletes and sports will get prime time coverage and be celebrated on the world stage in a way that the Olympics is supposed to honour.

We all have to find our own perspective when we look at the world.  I think it might be partly my Canadian upbringing.  I love a self-deprecating sense of humour.  I love an underdog.  I love a smart analysis.

So one of the most interesting things I have heard so far in Olympic commentary was the comment how impressive it was that Chad le Clos was less than one quarter of a second behind Michael Phelps given le Clos’ lack of freakish genetics that would make him part fish-part man and highly adapted to swimming.

That’s the problem with just watching on the simple “who won the gold medal” level.  It’s all so much more complex.  First, the difference between the top five is normally less than a second or a point.  They are all exceptional and only occasionally is the gold medal winner much better than the silver on any real human scale.  And some are genetically lucky – or their country has more cash – or more interest in promoting their sport.  If they really wanted it all to reflect the ideals they pretend it does, they would handicap everyone to even the playing field.  Points would be deducted for genetic or economic advantage so that it would all reflect the training and effort of the athlete irrespective of the parentage or the country of birth.

Of course, nothing works like that.  And a few have written about Chad le Clos.  Good on them.  And apparently Michael Phelps was his hero.  And inspired lots of young swimmers.  So, maybe I am a little bored with Phelps – and would like to hear more about everyone else in the pool.  My heart goes out to Ryan Lochte, such an impressive swimmer and an engaging guy, but with the misfortune of being born to be in the shadow of Phelps.  But Phelps is an impressive guy and definitely deserves his celebrity a lot more than Snookie!

And more than the Royals.  Apparently if you are a member of the royal family and go to watch an Olympic game match you are a hero.  Seriously???  You don’t have a proper job and it is the least you can do to go out and support the athletes from your country.  In the best seats in the house.  I think there would be a long line who would be willing to do your “job” if it isn’t working for you.  Lucky genes with almost nothing else.  All you have to do is not act like a total jackass and you get accolades.  If only life was so lucky for the rest of us… 😉

But wouldn’t that be dull.  Personally I take my motivation from Chad and Ryan and the Canadian women’s soccer team.  From the less celebrated and more mortal who achieve astonishing feats.  One of my favourite medals these games was Brent Hayden winning a bronze in the 100m freestyle.  Big in Canada but no doubt ignored by the world.  But he didn’t make it to the finals in 2008 and this was his last Olympics.  And he made the podium!  He seemed so pleased and with such a great attitude about it all.

The message we should all be taking away from the Olympics, I think.  Sure, it’s mind-blowing the crap these competitive athletes will go through for a few minutes of glory.  And one should be respectful of their dedication and stamina – both mental and physical.  But in that greater arena we call life, are they any better than the rest of us?  Or are some of them worse?

My gold medal goes to people who make the world a better place.  It’s impossible to measure – even with handicapping.  If they get lucky, it will be acknowledged in the speeches and conversations at their funeral.  But by then, they will be dead…

So the way I measure the value of my life – and whether I am on track with my goals – is whether I seem to make other people happy, whether I am a positive influence, whether I remember to act and promote the concept of civilization.

Civilization, the golden rule and the simple message of “doing unto others as you would have them do unto you” will save the world and is the criteria on which we should all be judged – Olympic athletes or not.  We can all realize our potential to be someone who has the greatest positive impact on the world of which we are capable – and if we do that – every day – we will deserve our gold medal.  There will be no ceremony but it’s the one that really counts.

Category:

life philosophy, shining examples, social commentary

putting the Great in Britain!!!

Mitt Romney, shame on you for trying to claim a special relationship with the Brits.  You are not worthy, dude.  As Danny Boyle has shown us all 🙂

Maybe their most glorious days are behind them and Hollywood captures the collective imagination of the twitterish 21st century world but the accomplishments of the British.  It’s really tough to rival – and by comparison they look like the wise grownups while the Americans look like spoiled children.

I recently read a very depressing book called Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle.  There were some interesting points but the author offered no hope or solutions so for me it didn’t live up to its potential.  I am all about hope – and solutions.

I recognize there are no easy solutions.  But that doesn’t mean we should all throw our hands in the air and give up.  And while the world is not developing into a better place in a straight line, there are always positive developments happening every day – and that is what we need to nurture and celebrate.

That is why I was so wowed by Danny Boyle.  Who else could turn the National Health Service into a spectacle worthy of entertaining – but also enlightening.  And celebrating one of the great tenets of British society.

He also showed suffragettes, the industrial revolution (the good and the bad) and the invention of the world wide web.  All incredible advances in the modern world in which Great Britain played a key role.

He also highlighted the cultural achievements of a nation unsurpassed by any other on the world stage.  What other nation can start with Kenneth Branagh quoting from Shakespeare, put together Voldemort, JK Rowling, Peter Pan, Winnie the Pooh and multiple Mary Poppins in a way that makes sense, flow into a gigantic electronic house party that showcases how Britpop became a word known all over the globe and then showcasing the energy and talent of the Arctic Monkeys.  How many countries have an indie band that good?

From the pastoral bucolic England of William Blake to the high energy multicultural Great Britain ushered in by Tim Berners-Lee’s world wide web, it’s been a place that influenced the world and its history.  There were many history lessons to be learned from Danny Boyle’s spectacle.  A great example of how spectacle can be used to teach, not just to titillate.  I think the most memorable image is the forging of the Olympic rings and their subsequent air flight.

So many things flew!  Or were lit up.  Or sparkled.  Sound, image and motion blended seamlessly from frame to frame, moving so fast, with so much to see, that I know I need to watch it twice to catch everything.

Only two years ago my home city hosted the Olympics.  And we did a great job.  But it was homespun.  We aren’t very famous.  Or rich.  The Queen didn’t come.  We put on a great show for someone in the middle of nowhere.  That’s the thing you gotta learn, Mitt.  You are in one of the most impressive cities in the history of the world, in a country that definitely has its faults (as they all do) but that has also contributed to the world so many of the advances that have made it a better place.

As a Canadian, I share a lot of the British sensibility.  And a lot more than crass Americans like you, Mitt.  We never fled from the mothership.  Even fought for her many times.  Of course King George III was advised by William Pitt to consider trading us for Guadeloupe.  Of course, at the time they had sugar plantations and we just had beavers so you couldn’t totally blame them.

(Discovered some fascinating facts about the American Revolution, the Tea Party (version 1.0) and King George III trying to make sure I had the names of the players right.  Kind of guessing Mitt (and the vast majority of Americans) unaware of these facts (cause Americans appear to hate FACTS… so dull and disconcerting) but definitely fuel for another post…

But tonight we are celebrating the Brits.  Sure, they have some flaws.  We all do, nationally and individually.  But, on the whole, the Brits show many more signs than other nations of being polite to others and worrying about the collective over the individual, valuing literacy and a complex world view and – my personal favourite – having a self-depreciating wit that can showcase humility and arrogance all in the right balance.

You will have to watch the show!  I was privileged to watch it live.  And was shocked by the lack of commercials.  It was hard to even time a bathroom visit 🙂  So much happened I will have to watch it again in prime time.  It was so spectacular it has even inspired a second post 🙂

On a personal note, I’d really like to thank my parents for being such strong proponents of the concept of literacy.  There was lots of flash to the London show and – like any great spectacle – it can be watched on more than one level.  But it was my childhood experience that informed my favourite sequences.

I liked the ones with intellectual content.  With a moral message.  I think my favourite was the tribute to the National Health Service.  Where I also learned about GOSH.

According to Wikipedia, Great Ormond Street is closely associated with University College London (UCL) and in partnership with the UCL Institute of Child Health, which it is located adjacent to, is the largest centre for research and postgraduate teaching in children’s health in Europe.  It is part of both the Great Ormond Street Hospital/UCL Institute of Child Health Biomedical Research Centre and the UCL Partners academic health science centre.  It was apparently the first sick children’s hospital in the world.

Great Ormond Street is known internationally for receiving the rights from J. M. Barrie to his play Peter Pan, or the Boy Who Wouldn’t Grow Up in 1929, which have provided significant funding for the institution.

Watching children reading stories reminded me of MY childhood 🙂  And I know ALL of these stories and characters.  My parents read to us until we could read to them – and finally to ourselves.  Books were revered.  It’s how a great civilization is built.  From the King James Bible to Harry Potter, English books have touched most of the world.  As will the 2012 London Olympic opening ceremonies.

I think they mostly got it all right.  Beckham looked cool and was gracious in his role in the ceremonies, showcasing the best kind of Englishman.  The Queen actually got into a helicopter with Daniel Craig, a few minutes that showed the entire history of the monarchy in a few frames of film, highlighting how she great she is at playing Queen and keeping the monarchy popular when it should be an anachronism.

The only moment that made me shake my head… really, WHO would want to follow those fireworks???  And an aging Beatle with a creaky voice singing “Hey Jude”.  Danny boy, you ended on a low note.  But I guess someone had to pay for all that flash.  And Britain might have the smarts and the talent… but not so much cash.  So I’m guessing Paul flashed some cash and paid for his advertising spot like the other sponsors.

But, hey, London, you have definitely grown up in the last 12 years.  I was there in 1999 for the big Millennium.  It really sucked.  The highlights: Peter Gabriel’s high wire show and Black Adder making fun of English history in the Millennium Dome.  You learned from your mistakes.  A great show by Danny Boyle combining spectacle and intellect.  A very funny Rowan Atkinson as Mr. Bean.  And a real River of Fire on the Thames this time!  You even have the Millennium Wheel working – unlike at the actual Millennium 😉

Now, if you had really wanted to end with a bang, you would have had Paul McCartney sing John Lennon’s “Imagine”.  A song that fits the message the Olympics like to preach at least.  Paul honouring John and saying he is above the rivalry.  And first you would have had a minute of silence for the Israeli athletes killed in Munich in 1972.  That would have sent a message that the Olympics really want to be about more than cash and advertising.

Unlike the American presidency…  Mitt, they kicked ass!  They may make you “eat humble pie”.  That’s “eat crow” to you.  Don’t worry, I don’t think you have to eat actual crows – or offal… but you are in a foreign country so you never know… and there are a lot of pigeons in Trafalgar Square…

 

Category:

artsy stuff, shining examples, social commentary

the lego blocks of self-esteem…

Hopefully life will start to slow down and I can edit the photos from my mom’s 70th birthday and write about it – and start posting more regularly.  And maybe even organize this blog a bit, which has been the intention since the beginning…

But today is what would have been my dad’s birthday.  His 70th would have been last year.  I am a big sucker for birthdays so I will celebrate in my own demented way and he gets a post in honour of his day of birth.

We’ve already talked about him in a few different contexts and no doubt there will be more talk in the future.  He was a larger than life guy, like something out of the movies.   Ours was a complicated, intense child-parent relationship that will supply fodder for thought for the rest of my life.  Some of it was him.  Some of it was me.  Some of it was the generation in which I was birthed.  Fathers played a strange role in those days and many children had complicated, often distant relationships with that parent and suffocating, obsessive relationships with the mothership.  It was just the way it was… but that is a topic for further discussion.

Today we talk about me, my dad and self-esteem.  And it is hardly the easy discussion you might envision.

My father died having never told me he was ever proud of me.  Having spent a good portion of my life criticizing me.  You would therefore likely decide he was bad for my self-esteem.  And, hey, he could have tried a little harder 🙂

But that is not who he was.  And his mother – my grandmother – scared me when I was a child because she was so tough.  So she spoiled him rotten – but teach him how to be touchy-feely with other people… I really doubt it.

My father had a very tough childhood.  He lost his father when he was 10.  All of his other siblings had a different dad.  His was far better but it still must have given him a sense of displacement.  He grew up poor and left school at 15.  He never realized how talented HE was so expecting him to give me self-esteem like an ice cream treat would have just been delusional on my part.

When I was growing up no one worried about children’s self-esteem.  They worried if they had enough to eat and if their parents abused them.  That’s how it still goes down in a lot of the world.  And far too many children DON’T have enough to eat – or are abused.  There is lots to worry about on that front.

But in the west we have all become spoiled in a way no other century could have envisioned.  So we worry about everyone’s self-esteem.  And make it sound like ice cream treats, to be bestowed on others for not acting up.

But this is where we have gone wrong.  How we have created such a crazy sense of entitlement that the western countries are trying to take down the world economically.  We don’t want for anything.  We expect everything.  And yet we still don’t have enough self-esteem if you listen to any random afternoon TV show.

Well… here’s a thought… maybe self-esteem needs to be earned, not given.  My father never gave me any self-esteem treats.  And sometimes he chipped away at it because he wasn’t feeling as confident as he should have.

But what he GAVE me was far more valuable and enduring.  He gave me a simple yet comprehensive life philosophy that comprised the very first lego blocks for building my own self-esteem.

Sure, it’s easy when people tell you they are proud of you.  But, really, that’s a little boring, isn’t it? 😉  And if you really want some solid self-esteem, it is best to collect your own lego blocks and create your own structure.  Everyone will have a different design – and you will need to add and move the pieces as you grow older, to get it just right.

But the starter blocks are someone telling you to be your own person.  That is the invaluable gift that my father gave me pretty much as soon as I could speak.  I was pretty much the only six year old telling all the other kids to just be their own people and not worry about what was popular.  If they liked something or believed in it, that was enough.  Who cared what other people thought?

It was a position that he never waivered on.  And he lived it.  As I got older and he saw me putting it into practice, he supplied the fancy blocks.  It was important to know who you were and what you wanted and not get distracted by the noise of popular opinion or naysayers.  But this did not mean you could use this philosophy to become a dictator.

You needed to be sensitive to other people’s opinions.  You should listen to them – and pay attention.  You should follow your own path without hurting anyone else’s feelings.  And you should make sure your ideas were civilized and good for the whole of society, not just for you.  So you should develop your own personal philosophy, own it, and live it – but make sure it wasn’t a crappy one!

Because, of course, if you got lots of confidence from having a lousy life strategy and bulldozing other people, you would never get any self-esteem.  Because you would be an asshole.

And I wasn’t even allowed to be impolite.

It was all incredible advice.  I have spent my life telling other people about my dad’s ideas.  He had lots.  And many wonderful qualities.  Today we are just nailing the essence of some of the best things he did for the world in his time here.  He gave people the lego building blocks they could use to lead a confident, civilized life – doing interesting things, treating others well and using their brains to try and make the world a better place.

And people, you do that… all of a sudden you realize you have a lot of self-esteem – because you earned it the old-fashioned way, the only way that really works.  Someone should tell Oprah 😉

Category:

life philosophy, shining examples

Star of the East

One of the big highlights of this trip to small town Manitoba for my mom’s big birthday was seeing Elaine.  This is her second tribute in my blog.

I can’t remember what context I gave to my other post but Elaine is in palliative care at the hospital in SwanRiver.  I was really hoping I would be able to see her on this visit.  And sometimes the stars align.  We went to the hospital yesterday.  She isn’t awake that often and she has a lot of difficulty breathing so I knew the chance to interact with her would be a real gift.  But we arrived at just the right time.  Her daughter Jill was there and graciously let us see her as soon as she was awake.

Her physical state is diminished but she is still the same Elaine that played such a fundamental role in my life and who will always have a special place in my heart.  It was such an honour and privilege to be able to talk to her in person.  And hug her.  I tried to convey how important she had been to me.  Elaine is a very humble person though so she would always downplay a message like that 🙂

She and her husband Glen played a big role in my life.  They were always so excited to see me.  They watched a LOT of slides from my trips.  They asked me intelligent questions.  They talked to me about the world – and my place in it.  They both possess this incredibly rare graciousness and warmth that I can only hope to replicate.

A great relationship should involve at least one or two great stories 🙂  My favourite Elaine story goes back to the 1970’s.  My father and Elaine’s husband were both farmers so were in Regina for the Canadian Western Agribition – the big farm show of the year for farmers from that part of the world.  The rest of us came along for the big city holiday.

None of them drank much and the women were pretty much teetotalers.  I have no idea how we ended up in the Italian restaurant.  But my mom and Elaine ordered a carafe of wine along with the food.  I think the men might have been at the exhibitions.  In any event, that evening they were peripheral.  Elaine’s daughter, my sister and I were all teenagers, eager for our lives to be more interesting.

I am pretty sure it was the first time we had seen our mothers a little tipsy.  We all wanted to be staying at the Hotel Regina, with the pool we could see across the street from our hotel room.  So, to console us, they thought they would take us to the bar.  But given that we were underage, that plan didn’t get too far.  And it was likely more fun to just all be cooped up in the hotel room.  I can’t remember if there was a can-can but “Star of the East” was definitely sung.

Both Elaine and my mom have great voices.  And everyone had a great sense of humour.  I was too young to be at the New Year’s Eve dance that year… but apparently my dad (who used to be famous for announcing things on stage) told them he was going to get on stage at midnight and announce they were going to sing “Star of the East” so they hid together in the bathroom until the time was safe.

Whether it was all true, it was great cinéma vérité and it was always one of my fondest childhood memories.

A lot of the time I spent with Elaine – and Glen – was less dramatic.  But that didn’t mean it was less meaningful to me.  I know now how spoiled I was at such a young age to meet someone who taught me so much about hospitality, grace and the beauty of the human spirit.

Elaine is one of those human beings in an elite league of realizing her potential, which the rest of us should aspire to achieve.  And she sings a mean “Star of the East” 🙂

p.s. I finished this late last night so was going to post this morning.  Just before I posted it I found out Elaine passed away last night.  But the legacy of her kindness and compassion will live on.

Category:

life philosophy, shining examples

money for mouse shoes

Money gets a bad rap.  Being poor is honourable – especially if you aren’t poor 🙂  Being rich is vulgar.  But being sort of financially secure is just boring.  The lot of accountants and financial planners.  But some of those boring people know how to use money as a bullet to happiness rather than despair.

That is my goal in life.  Yesterday I used my ability to buy a pair of designer shoes to great effect.  While there is certainly virtue to knowing how to save money, the real hidden secrets of life are in learning how to spend it!

We’ve done a lot of talking about my dad lately but I learned some good stuff from my mom as well.  My mom is likely a little too generous.  But it’s one of those faults that is tough to find fault with.  There are certainly worse negative traits 🙂

No matter how many times I tell her ONE present is enough, I know it will never happen.  Something else will catch her eye that you just have to have.  Long ago she gave up trying to cram all the goodies into conventional Christmas stockings so we all know the plastic bag with our name on it sitting under the tree IS a Christmas stocking – you just need to use your imagination 😉

But the most memorable gift I ever saw her purchase was on a Christmas Eve many years ago.  The store was almost closing down around us but we had to get some more toys.  She was quite insistent about it.  I thought, “oh my god, she has gone bonkers.  There is NO way we don’t already have so many gifts you can barely see the tree!”  But this was not part of the usual Christmas bounty.  Instead we pulled up at some mysterious address and left the toys on the doorstep like some anonymous Santa a little off his schedule.  As we drove away, she explained.  The family was going through tough times and the kids might not have any toys for Christmas.  But it was a small town where everybody knows everybody’s business and people have a lot of pride so we had to make it look like Santa was just a wee bit early.

My mom has always taken great pleasure in doing nice things for other people.  She doesn’t do it for the thanks or the adoration but just because it gives her pleasure.  It’s one of my greatest life lessons.  And it’s really heart-warming to see my niece taking up the torch.

Ask not what the world can do for you but, rather, what you can do for the world.  Give it a whirl.  You may be surprised how great it feels to do something nice for someone else.  And the best news.  You can spend less than $5!  The price is totally NOT the point.  It’s how much thought you put into finding just the right thing to do.

What really turns people on is being noticed.  I used to send my friend Yvonne chocolate covered peanut butter eggs every Easter – cause it was our thing and you could only get them at Easter.

So… the mouse shoes.  I have already mentioned Morgan earlier – she is the teenage daughter of one of my best friends.  She (and her mom) share my obsession for shoes so we spent a lot of time over my birthday weekend+ talking shoes… and anyone who cares about shoes knows about Marc Jacobs mouse shoes.  I think I saw the first version in Paris (the best city in the world to shop for shoes!) back when there was only one.  Over the course of the weekend, we talked mouse shoes a number of times and I learned her shoe size.  As I noted in the previous post, she has emerged into this wonderful young woman doing all the right things despite the fact that she is a teenager.  So I decided she deserved some mouse shoes…

Through the beauty of the internet I confirmed her mailing address, send the invoice to her mom in case she needed to do an exchange and organized for Fedex to deliver a pair of size 8 1/2 gold glitter Marc Jacobs mouse shoes to her front door in Toronto via the Brown’s Shoes website.  I could track the whole process via my computer in Vancouver so sent her a note yesterday afternoon to look for a package when she got home.  And then I got the email.  The shoes had been safely delivered…  Some of the best money I have ever spent!

So, Morgan, I was wowed by your effusive thanks.  But you should also thank my mom.  Without her wonderful example, there would have been no mouse shoes for you 🙂  Given her obsession with everything Disney and the concept that Mickey is more or less one of her children, what could be a more perfect tribute than mouse shoes…

Category:

life philosophy, shining examples, social commentary

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who needs Yoda when you have Yvonne :)

Before Sex and the City popularized the concept, I knew my close friends were like family members.  Many of my friendships now have a decade or two of history… some even more.

Yvonne is one of my oldest friends. She is one of those women who could rule the world… with time left over to have a hobby 🙂  (Women should rule the world of course – but we’ll leave that topic for future posts 😉

We met in the first month of our university education so I didn’t have the frame of reference yet to fully appreciate how impressive she was.  I do remember I was a little intimidated by her.  She didn’t act like she was 18.  She was so much more confident and pulled together than the rest of us.

We have now been friends for 31 years and counting… what is really incredible about the friendship is that we have lived in the same city for maybe 2 years of the 31…  I blame her for my penchant for long distance dating 🙂

There have been many moments that have added glue to our bond but one of the first happened long ago, in our early twenties.  She had a summer job in Lethbridge.  I had a summer job in Calgary.  So one weekend I went down to visit her.  It ended up being a pretty interesting weekend… mostly because I lost her for a while and was the first person in Canada to understand some random Scottish soccer player with a wild Glaswegian accent.  Hey, I loved Bill Forsyth films – and I didn’t need the subtitles!  So by the time I got reconnected with Yvonne I was trying to make sure my new Scottish boyfriend wasn’t going to pick a fight with one of her male friends for talking to me…

But I digress… even though the Scottish soccer player falling madly in love with me just because I could traverse his thick accent is a good story, the memorable part for me was hanging out with Yvonne… and her declaration at the end, “it was so great to see you.  I have met some people this summer but they don’t really KNOW me.  You have been to my hometown, you have met my parents, we dated brothers from the same tiny small town in Manitoba (and we both had a girl crush on their much cooler sister)…

She taught me the true net worth of your life is the sum total of the relationships and the people in it.  It’s the people who know you and participate in your life – in the good times and the bad – that give your life meaning.

Category:

life philosophy, shining examples, travel stories

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the rewards of aging…

Getting old definitely has a bad rap.  Not too much seems to get written on the benefits of getting old.  But today has been great proof for me that reaching an advanced age does have its rewards, no credit cards required…

It was a more or less a typical workday.  This is my busiest period of the year where simply showering has to be scheduled in so dressing up for work really goes to the backburner.  But I am finally beginning to see the rewards of the long to do list from a few months ago being ticked off so decided I would put a little more effort into my outfit.

I own some stunning Alexander McQueen (from his last season) pumps in Yves Klein blue that I bought on sale on a fantastically memorable July 4th visit to NYC.  They get attention practically every time I wear them.  But today they were the catalyst for a bigger conversation.

One of my clients has recently hired a lot of new staff.  I have seen some great work being done by them.  So we talked work but also shoes… and Paris (where I am headed post-birthday).   The conversation was very rewarding and neither had been to Paris even once (versus my I don’t know how many times but I feel like a native) so I have now promised them something from Paris…

But that is the point of the heading – when you get old, you can afford a few random gifts – and can inspire young people 🙂

Every time I do this I think of my maternal grandmother… I remember my mom teasing her that she was flirting with her paperboy or the guy who delivered her groceries.  I have now realized that by that time she was in her 70s.  I was too young to really “get” it then but now I see myself doing it… bonding with young people… cause you are genuinely interested.  And BOY, do they respond.  And your life grows richer at some exponential rate.

She may not have been able to articulate what she was doing but she was reaping all the benefits possible from being old – and maybe a tiny bit wise… but rather than inflicting wisdom on youth, she engaged them and became part of their life stories in the nursing home…  the wisdom was not the goal but the sublime after effect of spending time time with her… I know I received it… without realizing what had happened until decades later…

I bonded with so many young people in a single day some of the adventures will have to find their way into future posts… life doesn’t get much better than that 😉

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life philosophy, shining examples

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