Summertime
Summertime makes me particularly prone to nostalgia. I'm pretty sure that I'm not alone in this-- those Country Time Lemonade commercials are basically nothing but nostalgia overload, right?
The nostalgia coupled with the basic laziness of the season makes summer the perfect time for revisiting old favorites-- books, music, perfumes, foods, perspectives. So, here's a poem from one of my most favorite books growing up: Hey World, Here I Am! by Jean Little.
The nostalgia coupled with the basic laziness of the season makes summer the perfect time for revisiting old favorites-- books, music, perfumes, foods, perspectives. So, here's a poem from one of my most favorite books growing up: Hey World, Here I Am! by Jean Little.
Today
Today I will not live up to my potential.
Today I will not relate well to my peer group.
Today I will not contribute in class.
I will not volunteer one thing.
Today I will not strive to do better.
Today I will not achieve or adjust or grow enriched or get involved.
I will not put up my hand even if the teacher is wrong and I can prove it.
Today I might eat the eraser off my pencil.
l'll look at clouds.
l'll be late.
I don't think I'll wash.
I need a rest.
Zuckerberg vs. Thoreau
Portfolio has an interesting article by Simon Dumenco about Facebook's impact on CEOs. Basically, the main thrust of the piece is a comment by tech CEO Michael Fertick:
This really stood out to me, in large part because it so closely echoes a similar theory my college roommate Katie and I formulated circa 2004:
Granted, we were looking for prospective dates, rather than business partners or employees. And, of course, it's a complete generalization-- I can think of a number of compelling, descriptive, and well-filled-out Facebook profiles of genuinely cool people I know. But most of the time I feel more comfortable keeping my Facebook profile a bit, well, lower profile.
Maybe it all goes back to the first time I read Walden (to this day, one of my favorite books, although it isn't listed on my Facebook profile as such.) Among many of the highlighted, underlined passages in my nearly 10-year-old copy:
Makes you wonder what Thoreau would say about Twitter, no?
“There's almost an inverse relationship between seriousness and how much you participate in social networking."
This really stood out to me, in large part because it so closely echoes a similar theory my college roommate Katie and I formulated circa 2004:
"The length of your Facebook profile is inversely proportional to how cool you are."
Granted, we were looking for prospective dates, rather than business partners or employees. And, of course, it's a complete generalization-- I can think of a number of compelling, descriptive, and well-filled-out Facebook profiles of genuinely cool people I know. But most of the time I feel more comfortable keeping my Facebook profile a bit, well, lower profile.
Maybe it all goes back to the first time I read Walden (to this day, one of my favorite books, although it isn't listed on my Facebook profile as such.) Among many of the highlighted, underlined passages in my nearly 10-year-old copy:
"Society is commonly
too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any
new value for each other... We meet at the post-office,
and at the sociable, and about the fireside every night; we live thick and are
in each other's way, and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus
lose some respect for one another. Certainly less frequency would suffice for
all important and hearty communications."
Makes you wonder what Thoreau would say about Twitter, no?
Certain gentlemen of other days...
I went out for a few rounds of drinks last night for a friend's birthday, and was reminded of an inscription in the Old Waldorf-Astoria Bar Book:
'Recalling certain gentlemen of other days, who made of drinking one of the pleasures of life-- not one of its evils; who achieved content long ere capacity was reached or overtaxed; and who, whatever they drank, proved able to carry it, keep their heads and remain gentlemen, even in their cups. Their example is commended to their posterity.'
It's not very often that I go out on Friday nights-- and I consider myself someone who really thrives on social interaction. I think the above quotation, and the fact that it is recalling an earlier time and obviously not the present, could have something to do with this. What is up, these days, of gentlemen, and ladies, who are well into their legal drinking years and not yet knowing their limits or proving "able to carry it"?
N.B. I am very happy to report that the friends in our party were all of the sort that make drinking "one of the pleasures of life." Happy birthday, Jeff!
'Recalling certain gentlemen of other days, who made of drinking one of the pleasures of life-- not one of its evils; who achieved content long ere capacity was reached or overtaxed; and who, whatever they drank, proved able to carry it, keep their heads and remain gentlemen, even in their cups. Their example is commended to their posterity.'
It's not very often that I go out on Friday nights-- and I consider myself someone who really thrives on social interaction. I think the above quotation, and the fact that it is recalling an earlier time and obviously not the present, could have something to do with this. What is up, these days, of gentlemen, and ladies, who are well into their legal drinking years and not yet knowing their limits or proving "able to carry it"?
N.B. I am very happy to report that the friends in our party were all of the sort that make drinking "one of the pleasures of life." Happy birthday, Jeff!
Thomas Wolfe on travel
Some people can watch the same movie, or read the same book, over and over again. These are the kinds of people with nice DVD and book collections. I am not (typically) one of those people.
But right now I'm re-reading Thomas Wolfe's "You Can't Go Home Again," and I am enjoying it immensely. I'd say this is partly because it is a work of real genius (trust me, read it-- there is not one throwaway sentence in the whole thing) and also because the time in which it's set (late 1920's early 1930's) and the surrounding macro-economic issues resonate today. Not that it wasn't relevant back in 2004, when I first read the book, but now I'm old enough to understand more of it.
The book was published posthumously in 1940, two years after Wolfe died at the age of 38. The feverish, brilliant way it's written makes me think that somehow, he knew this would be his last hurrah. It has that much of a passionate, almost polemical feel.
I've been so fortunate to have a job, and a lifestyle, in which I've been able to travel so much more than the average person. Since the first time nine years ago I boarded a plane solo (for a church convention in Denver, also the trip that I eased my way into becoming a coffee drinker with daily Frappuccinos), I felt what Wolfe describes in the book:
But right now I'm re-reading Thomas Wolfe's "You Can't Go Home Again," and I am enjoying it immensely. I'd say this is partly because it is a work of real genius (trust me, read it-- there is not one throwaway sentence in the whole thing) and also because the time in which it's set (late 1920's early 1930's) and the surrounding macro-economic issues resonate today. Not that it wasn't relevant back in 2004, when I first read the book, but now I'm old enough to understand more of it.
The book was published posthumously in 1940, two years after Wolfe died at the age of 38. The feverish, brilliant way it's written makes me think that somehow, he knew this would be his last hurrah. It has that much of a passionate, almost polemical feel.
I've been so fortunate to have a job, and a lifestyle, in which I've been able to travel so much more than the average person. Since the first time nine years ago I boarded a plane solo (for a church convention in Denver, also the trip that I eased my way into becoming a coffee drinker with daily Frappuccinos), I felt what Wolfe describes in the book:
Perhaps this is our strange and haunting paradox here in America-- that we are fixed and certain only when we are in movement. At any rate, that is how it seemed to young George Webber, who was never so assured of his purpose as when he was going somewhere on a train. And he never had the sense of home so much as when he felt he was going there. It was only when he got there that his homelessness began.
