Have you ever noticed that sometimes life is like reading a month-old weekly? It might be interesting but it’s also unconnected, like trying to decide whether the stars are falling or falling asleep.
There are 331 million people in this country, so it follows that there are 331 million ways of looking at things.
For instance, some people retire or cash in and decide they want to run a bed & breakfast in a mountain town where they can make new friends and do things their way, never intending to hurt or annoy anyone. True, they might not have thought things through – I mean, for starters, who would buy themselves a job?
Then I look at us, and that’s exactly what we did. When you work for yourself, your tendency is to be nice to those who can help you muddle through the business world and assist you in success. You never intended to have volunteer partners. But you do and now what? Encourage them? Report them? Take them snipe hunting?
We know that no matter how organized our lists and memories are, we are incapable of dealing with everything because everything is fluid. But we strive. We learn patience and kindness.
Then we run out of both.
On a daily basis, we have to decide whether we prefer more flurry or a ceasefire, knowing we can’t have both. That’s because we don’t work alone. We work in a community, for a community, with a community. We knew that when we turned our lights on. Now, 10 years later, what do we want? Surprise? Recognition? Money? Wine?
None of it. We want what we’ve got – a clubhouse where we can go most days and sift through other people’s apprehensions, choosing which get put on the street and which go to the slush pile.
Then we have the nerve to fish for advertisers so we can keep coming to our clubhouse. We know that advertising with us is effective because we have some businesses that have been with us since 2012, but we’re not great at ‘splainin’ the value of advertising because it feels like we’re Border Collies. “Love me, I’m yours.”
A boxer, surfer, and tap dancer all rely on excellent, but very different, footwork. They each have taken the same two feet with ten toes that they shaped into personal works of art that can be displayed but not sold. They make a living thinking on their own two feet.
We do that, the words and pictures and toes part, but business is baffling. Business was created by someone who thought they could boss others around and get a commission for it. It might work but it doesn’t feel right for us. It feels like being Eddie Haskell.
No wonder the world is behaving so strangely. It’s definitions. Definitions are chasing us with glee because they know we’ll fall for whatever they decide everything means. Definitions are solid, but us, we’re more like steam. Hard to see and impossible hold, but in small amounts we make people feel good.
What we have discovered is that when people get riled at us, we are in disbelief. We might make public and colossal mistakes, but the odds are low. They’re never zero.
Imagine my dismay when a business across the street from my living room decided that very bright security floodlights would be a selling point to those who want gravel driveways to be illuminated from dark to dawn. Why? Do they want to walk around and check on their storage unit possessions in the middle of the night?
No one considered that the lights would shine in my front window, through the living room and bedroom, and out the back window into the yard. At least no one mentioned it. They just did it.
My dilemma is, do I get cranky and uppity and fierce, or do I let it go? I don’t want curtains, never have liked them because they prevent me from looking out, even at night. Besides, why do I have to be the one who adjusts? All I did was get home from the clubhouse but now instead of sleeping in the dark I sleep in what feels like a room full of Las Vegas.
Then I realized that I’m in business so I should have learned by now to be patient and kind.
But all I want to do is write, sleep, and watch the stars fall asleep.
Okay, surprise, money and wine would pair nicely.
This is a keeper! Thanks, V