As a youth, under the direction of Dad and the command of many Catholic school taskmasters, I got pretty good at looking up the answers to my own many questions, as well as the queries of others. I loved the encyclopedia, even though I often had to refer to a supplementary volume—the dictionary—to interpret the full meaning of many topics. At some early point, encyclopedic love shifted to the more compact and easy-to-use dictionary. I fell hard for that book, so hard that I requested and received a Christmas Webster’s from my grandparents at age eight, an autographed gift that my wife found highly entertaining when we combined belongings a quarter century later.
In possession of my own dictionary, vocabulary overtook me quicker than any virus. Looking words up and arranging them my own way provided an escape from the tedium of elementary school, where numbers always had to add up and textbook “facts” required exact recall. Prayers had to be recited as handed down.
Essays and compositions, however, provided much more latitude. I could write at my own speed using words of my own (or Webster’s) choice, limited only by a vivid imagination and ubiquitous school-room page-number requirements, which I often exceeded by large percentages, determined as I was to include every new word that I had worked so hard to uncover.
My favorite assignments involved the rare foray into creative writing. But such opportunities occurred infrequently given the difficulties of grading and correcting such subjective work, not to mention the blank stares and even blanker sheets of paper that often resulted from such instructive prompts. A few timid appeals on my part for more artistic schoolroom expression provoked enough antipathy from teachers and classmates to discourage future such requests.
Instead, I received encouragement to write on my own time. But sitting inside making up stories for no credit while everybody else goofed off outside ran the risk of accentuating several nerdish qualities that threatened to leave me even farther behind the faster-moving herd. So I abandoned my literary inventions to a more socially acceptable, non-imaginary system of numbers and beliefs.
From that point forward, discipline and obedience took precedence over independent thought, landing me in college as an engineer in training, a program that bored me to numerous points of angry rebellion. The details of many uprisings have mostly faded into the haze of substance abuse that prompted the misbehavior in the first place. Other revolts, unfortunately, came in written form, recorded for posterity below my byline in the campus newspaper. Expulsion loomed as a result, but a decision to leave me in place proved far more effective as punishment.
Unsurprisingly to most everyone but me, my post-college years consisted of a spotty work record and several halting, part-time attempts at various grad school disciplines, where my crowning achievement consisted of a fictionalized paper for a linguistics course. The deceptive report detailed a non-existent visit to a campus day care center for the purposes of observing and analyzing preschool speech patterns. I took great pride in my ability to make up the whole scenario because I had neither the interest in nor the energy for reality, occupied as I was by the rapid overdraw of vacation and sick time in the pursuit of less boredom at work.
One corporate subject that did pique my interest: supposedly motivational, inspirational adages reproduced and repeated ad nauseam on magnets, mugs, and mouse pads, pens and paper. Every new affirmation inspired me to early appearances at work for the express purpose of defacing the posters with my own tasteless modifications:
The Dalai Lama suggested: “Open your arms to change, but don’t let go of your values.”
I replied:“Open your arms to change, but expect a blow to the chest.”
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar: “Great players are willing to give up their own personal achievement for the achievement of the group.”
Me: “Great team members provide the illusion of furious activity for the job security of the group.”
Ernest Hemingway: “Courage is grace under pressure.”
Me: 1. “Courage is ignorance under pressure.”
2. “Real courage is grace under pressurized bowels.”
3. “Ignorance is oft mistaken for courage.”
4. “Cowardice is next to clumsiness.”
Muhammad Ali: “He who is not courageous enough to take risks will accomplish nothing in life.”
Me:1. “He who is afraid of risk will accomplish nothing, but we will likely
end up working for him.”
2. “He who fails to take risks will make a great safety officer.”
Andy Rooney: “A smile is an inexpensive way to improve your looks.”
Me: “A properly executed grimace can resemble a smile.”
Paula Abdul: “Keep the faith, don’t lose your perseverance, and always trust your gut instinct.”
Me: 1. “When trusting your gut instinct, prepare to hold your nose.”
2. “Persist in deficiency, demand recognition for consistency.”
3. “Do as you please, explain nothing, collect unemployment.”
Louis D. Brandeis: “Most of the things worth doing in the world had been declared impossible before they were done.”
Me: “Impossibility springs from hopelessness and vice-versa.”
I developed running feuds with Tony Robbins, Colin Powell, and Aristotle:
Tony: “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten.”
Me: “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll continue to breathe.”
Tony: “Stay committed to your decisions, but stay flexible in your approach.”
Me: 1. “Stay committed to your willingness to abandon the approach, but
stay flexible in your willingness to abandon your decisions.”
2. “Stay flexible in the downward spiral toward failure.”
Colin: “Don’t bother people for help without first trying to solve the problem yourself.”
Me: 1. “Don’t bother people for help. Bother them for profit or amusement.”
2. “Don’t bother people for help without first trying to trick somebody else
into doing your job.”
3. “If you can solve a problem yourself, keep it to yourself.”
4. “If you can solve a problem yourself, milk it for everything you can get.”
Aristotle: “Courage is the first of human qualities because it is the quality that guarantees the others.”
Me: 1. “Since when does a cubicle-dweller need courage?”
2. “Fear is the first of human qualities because it is the quality that
identifies the fastest runner.”
Aristotle: “Quality is not an act, it is a habit.”
Me: 1. “Bad habits require dedication, too.”
2. “Bad habits have a quality all their own.”
Aristotle: “He who is a good ruler must first have been ruled.”
Me: 1. “He who is a good ruler must first have been struck by the ruler.”
2. “He who is a good ruler might once have been a yardstick.”
On the subject of less conversation while I was trying not to work:
Unknown: “When someone tells you nothing is impossible, ask them to dribble a football.”
Unknown vandal: “When someone tells you nothing is impossible; ask them if they might possibly shut up.”
Buddha : “The mind is everything. What you think, you become.”
Me: 1. “Think about what you are about to say, then shut up.”
2. “The mind is rubbery. What you think should likely remain unsaid.”
Alan Alda: “Be as smart as you can, but remember that it is always better to be wise than smart.”
Me: “Be as smart as you can, but remember that it is always better to be silent than smart.”
Some advice I should have followed instead of ridiculing:
Yogi Berra: “If you don’t know where you are going, you might end up someplace else.”
Me: “If you think you know where you’re going, leave a number for next of kin.”
Warren Beatty: “You’ve achieved success in your field when you don’t know whether what you’re doing is work or play.”
Me: 1. “You’ve achieved success in your field when a lot of people hate you.”
2. “You’ve achieved success in your field when underlings must obey even
the most ridiculous assignment.”
Jack Welch: “Control your own destiny or someone else will.”
Me: 1. “Your own destiny/some destinies might not be worth controlling.”
2. “The uncontrolled destiny never fails to disappoint or entertain.”
Oprah: “We can’t become what we need to be by remaining what we are.”
Me: “We can’t become what we need to be by reading motivational posters.”
Like the source material, my contributions had no limit. I reveled in the resulting fury. Various supervisors appended to my work their belittling demands for a halt to the disrespectful vandalism, ending their notices with huge signatures, job titles, and office locations where the matter could be discussed in person, like adults. I had learned in college, though, the penalty for both adulthood and taking credit, and my underdeveloped discussion skills left me unable and unwilling to engage in a serious conversation. I usually addressed the problem by departing for ever browner pastures.
A Personal Favorite
Emeril Lagasse: “Life just doesn’t hand you things. You have to get out there and make things happen.”
Me: “Life just doesn’t hand you things. It shoves them up your ass when you’re not looking.”
This crude entry inspired me to make up a non-inspirational novel built around a series of similar affirmations: a forty-years-in-the-making life lesson that I am trying to pass off as a mystery. The real mystery: who would read it? If you slogged through this long blog post, maybe you would.
Whether anyone wants to read the book or not, the make-it-up method provided a tutorial that I never would have seen using the more highly recommended look-it-up process. Imagination brought clarity to reality.
My formula for less failure: make it up ≥ look it up.*
*Disclaimer: not recommended for general use; patience required; equality occurs in roughly four rough decades, in my experience.
I welcome any and all thoughts or advice you might have–good, constructive, or other: