Minding the leaks

This fascinates me:

All boats leak

There's always a defect, always a slow drip, somewhere. Every plan, every organization, every venture has a glitch.
The question isn't, "is this perfect?" The question is, "will this get me there?"
Sometimes we make the mistake of ignoring the big leaks, the ones that threaten our journey.
More often, though, we're so busy fixing tiny leaks that we get distracted from the real goal, which is to go somewhere.

Posted by Seth Godin on March 02, 2013

Go somewhere and/or love someone! And only fix the leaks that keep you (one way or another) from doing that!

~vbb

(I told you.)

Sometimes ...

Deciding when to get my haircut is sometimes a drawn out affair. Sometimes it isn't.

Somtimes you'd rather not mess with bangs, and sometimes you're sick of not having any.

I got a haircut last week. My appointment cancelled on me for Tuesday night. I felt anxious to get it done, so I found someone else. Anxiety doesn’t mean we’re totally off our rocker. Sometimes, it just means we’re having a hard time following our own inspirations. 

And sometimes you get a really good cut too. =]

 ~vbb
PS I'm done grading papers for Ashford University for at least a few weeks. I hope to post more on my blog now that I have a little more mental space.

SO, What Will Matter?

My mother sent me this email this morning. After having so much of our lives turned upside down with recent underemployment, massive downsizing in our stuff, and then moving to a very new and very foreign culture, this certainly hits home.

Dear Family,

After weeks of trying to organize all our stuff I came upon this "What Will Really Matter?"

It is just what I need to finish organizing all the stuff we have collected. After another week of stuff, and three boxes of old letters yet to go through, I needed this article. I will file this under, Daily Read Stuff.

Love you all

Mom Broderick

What will really matter?

By Richard Schuif  - 8 Feb 2004

Ready or not, some day it will all come to an end for each of us, this earthly life.
There will be no more sunrises, no days, no hours or minutes.
All the things you collected, whether treasured or forgotten, will pass to someone else.
Your wealth, fame and temporal power will shrivel to irrelevance.
It will not matter what you owned or what you were owed.
Your grudges, resentments, ambitions, plans and to to lists will all expire.
The wins and losses that once seemed so important will fade away.
It won't matter where you came from, or on what side of the tracks you lived.
It won't matter whether you were beautiful or brilliant.
Your gender, skin color, and ethnicity will be irrelevant.

So what will matter?

How will the value of your days be measured?

What will matter is not what you bought, but what you built:
Not what you got, but what you gave.
What will matter is not your success, but your significance.
What will matter is not what you learned, but what you taught.
What will matter is every act of integrity, compassion, courage and sacrifice
that enriched, empowered or encouraged others to emulate your example.
What will matter is not your competence, but your character.
What will matter is not how many people you knew,
but how many will feel a lasting loss when you are gone.
What will matter is not your memories, but the memories of those who loved you.
What will matter is how long you will be remembered, by who and for what.
Living a life that matters doesn't happen by accident.
It's not a matter of circumstance but of choice. 

Choose to live a life that matters.

And to my Mom and Dad:
As we watch your time here with us come slowly around to a close . . .
I want you to know that

YOU and everything you've stood for and fought for and become MATTERS TO US!!

~vbb

A Little Something to Ponder Concerning Seasons

Seasons and Community fascinate me. Here's an interesting take:

A Post-Air-Conditioning World by lskenazy

Hi Readers! Stan Cox, author of the new book, “Losing Our Cool: Uncomfortable Truths About Our Air-Conditioned World (and Finding New Ways to Get Through the Summer),” wrote a great oped for The Washington Post last summer about what life would be like if we still sweltered. As a person who is always freezing, I LOVE the idea of an un-airconditioned world, not just because it would allow me to peel off several (dozen) cardigans, but also because I believe in what Cox preaches: That when we HAVE to go outside for relief, we gain a lot more than a cool breeze. We regain the whole idea of neighborhood. And we regain a season! As he writes in his oped:

Saying goodbye to A.C. means saying hello to the world. With more people spending more time outdoors — particularly in the late afternoon and evening, when temperatures fall more quickly outside than they do inside — neighborhoods see a boom in spontaneous summertime socializing.

Rather than cowering alone in chilly home-entertainment rooms, neighbors get to know one another. Because there are more people outside, streets in high-crime areas become safer. As a result of all this, a strange thing happens: Deaths from heat decline. Elderly people no longer die alone inside sweltering apartments, too afraid to venture outside for help and too isolated to be noticed. Instead, people look out for one another during heat waves, checking in on their most vulnerable neighbors.

Children — and others — take to bikes and scooters, because of the cooling effect of air movement. Calls for more summer school and even year-round school cease. Our kids don’t need more time inside, everyone agrees; they need the shady playgrounds and water sprinklers that spring up in every neighborhood.

Okay — he sounds a little hokey. But only because we’ve become so divorced from the idea that we can stand a little discomfort that we dismiss the idea that we really COULD be happier while sweatier.

I’m not sure how to bring this revolution about, since we already live without a.c. in my house and it’s not like anyone seems eager to follow our lead. (Or visit in July.)  But it’s something to think about, while our teeth chatter next to the A.C. vent. — Lenore