When God was handing out mechanical skills to the line of souls about to be born, I must have been off somewhere watching football.
It's not just that I don't like putting things together. I have a superhuman ability to screw up even the simplest of household projects. I manage to mangle even things that normal people wouldn't consider worthy of being labeled a household project. I once spent an entire night trying to connect the vent hose to the back of my dryer. When my weedeater runs out of string, I can never figure out how to replace it, so I just have to buy a new one.
So I had mixed feelings today when I found our new coffee table packaged in a box outside the front door--happy that I would finally have a place to rest my beverage but terrified of having to put the thing together.
I came to need a new coffee table in the usual way. I accidentally smashed our old one to bits.
It happened on the night my wife's best friend and nephew were in town for a family wedding and staying with us. It was late; her friend had gone to bed and her nephew had decided to crash on our couch. I was wrapping a fitted sheet around the couch's edges when I, myself, stumbled and crashed into our glass-top coffee table.
It broke into a thousand pieces.
I have partial excuse that our floors are old and uneven and I had been fully participating in the spirit of the festivities all evening, but when the DVD of my greatest moments as a husband gets released, this episode won't make the cut.
Against that backdrop, I felt that assembling the 38 pieces that came today into a functional piece of furniture would be an appropriate punishment for my sins.
My theory on assembling things is that nothing should ever come in more than four pieces. When it gets beyond that, the little instruction manual that comes in the box with the pieces is useless. Most of these things, including the one that came in my box today, don't give you any written instructions, just a series of informational diagrams that no normal person can decipher.
The first diagram is always mishmash of microscopic pictures labeling each of the indistinguishable component part with its own letter. The second box show them all magically coalescing, and a caption condescendingly telling you to "fits parts together" or some similarly useless directive. The third shows a the finished product, for the purpose of taunting you.
And this is the best case scenario.
The worst case is when the manual actually writes out the instructions, and you get helpful tips such as: "Insert crescent socket into H-nut and rotate using fen screw. When screw is aft, coagulate block strip adjacent to moop deck."
And that's just step one.
I keep hoping that eventually, one piece of unassembled furniture will actually arrive with comprehensible instructions.
That day wasn't today, but I managed to survive nonetheless. I screwed something up (literally!) early on when the diagram instructed with no further detail to connect three pieces together and I did them in the wrong order. But after about half an hour of my frustration, my wife looked up from across the room and suggested that this might be the problem. Things went smoothly from there.
There's a reasonable chance our new table will fall to pieces the moment I set a book on it, but until then, I'm proud of myself for completing a project like this in less than six months. And our table even looks like the diagram in the instruction manual.
But if you ever come over, please don't rest anything too heavy on the surface of the table. It might just break, and I really don't want to face this process again.
Tuesday, April 23, 2013
Tuesday, April 16, 2013
We Are God's Cats
I've never directly asked them, but I'm reasonably sure my cats don't understand me.
They don't get why I only feed them one scoop per day, or why I don't let them roam freely outside. They don't comprehend the idea that household furniture has other uses besides being their scratching posts. They can't understand why they only get rich, tasty human food on special occasions.
They can't fathom why I seem leave them for hours a day, why I yell at them when they eat each other's food, or why I hurt them by brushing the knots out of their matted fur.
In their little cat brains, the ideas of rules, vet visits and treats withheld must all seem like senseless punishment.
My cats love me because I love them and provide for them, but they often don't have a clue as to how I operate.
Sometimes I try to reason with them, but they can't speak my language. Every now and then a word like "no" or "come" gets through, but they can't discern the nuance of complicated messages.
They try to communicate back to me, but they just make the same noise over and over again. Of course, I usually know what they really want, but it would be nice if to hear something new from them every now and then.
I can tell by their voices and posture when they are scared. I try to comfort them. I tell them that things will be ok, and that I have everything under control.
I tell them that moving to a new place might be scary, but they'll love it when we get there. I tell them that their cat carriers might not be comfortable, but that their confinement will just last a little while. I try to explain that the vet visit might hurt a little bit, but the pain is worth it in the long term.
I say all these things, even though they can't understand.
Sometimes they seem glad to know that I am there with them, even when they can't grasp what is happening or why. I wish they could understand me. I hate to see them suffering.
One cat hisses at me sometimes when I enforce a rule she doesn't like. I'm not threatened by her; I just find her ridiculous. We both know her life is much better with me in than without, and that she wouldn't last very long in the wilderness.
One time my cat--aptly named Trouble--broke the rules. She left the porch and wandered away. It was only a few minutes before she was pawing at the door desperately begging to get back inside.
Another time she hopped into my neighbor's bushes--the ones she always finds so enticing--and she came back with fleas. She didn't like that experience. Or the ensuing flea treatment. But she's still prone to wandering back to those same bushes if she goes too long without hearing my voice calling her back home.
Our other cat, Sebastian, is a better cat citizen than is his sister. He's prone to eating things that make him sick, but he's generally more obedient and less likely to steal food, start a fight or wander away. I don't love him more than his sister, though. While I want my cats to be nice to each other, my love for them isn't based on some kind of merit system.
I love my cats because they, at some level they can't totally understand, want to live in my house and be my cats. When they sit in my lap and purr, I forgive their numerous misadventures. I clean their messes and remove their crap because their companionship is worth it. And sometimes, I like to just sit back and watch them do cat things, like chase bugs around or stretch out in the sun.
When my cats can't understand what I'm doing, sometimes I just have to ask them to trust me. When they seem unsure, I hope that they'll somehow remember that I've never steered them wrong.
I'll never be able to explain to them how I'm different than they are, how they were created, or intricacies of the world beyond our house.
I can't give them everything they want, and they ultimately won't like it if I did. But if they stay in my house and take what I do give, they'll ultimately have what they need. There will be good times and bad, but we'll go through it all together, and we'll comfort each other until the end.
I don't claim to understand God. God is at least as far above my understanding as I am above the comprehension of my cats.
But when Heaven looks down on us, I can't help but think that we must look an awful lot like God's cats.
They don't get why I only feed them one scoop per day, or why I don't let them roam freely outside. They don't comprehend the idea that household furniture has other uses besides being their scratching posts. They can't understand why they only get rich, tasty human food on special occasions.
They can't fathom why I seem leave them for hours a day, why I yell at them when they eat each other's food, or why I hurt them by brushing the knots out of their matted fur.
In their little cat brains, the ideas of rules, vet visits and treats withheld must all seem like senseless punishment.
My cats love me because I love them and provide for them, but they often don't have a clue as to how I operate.
Sometimes I try to reason with them, but they can't speak my language. Every now and then a word like "no" or "come" gets through, but they can't discern the nuance of complicated messages.
They try to communicate back to me, but they just make the same noise over and over again. Of course, I usually know what they really want, but it would be nice if to hear something new from them every now and then.
I can tell by their voices and posture when they are scared. I try to comfort them. I tell them that things will be ok, and that I have everything under control.
I tell them that moving to a new place might be scary, but they'll love it when we get there. I tell them that their cat carriers might not be comfortable, but that their confinement will just last a little while. I try to explain that the vet visit might hurt a little bit, but the pain is worth it in the long term.
I say all these things, even though they can't understand.
Sometimes they seem glad to know that I am there with them, even when they can't grasp what is happening or why. I wish they could understand me. I hate to see them suffering.
One cat hisses at me sometimes when I enforce a rule she doesn't like. I'm not threatened by her; I just find her ridiculous. We both know her life is much better with me in than without, and that she wouldn't last very long in the wilderness.
One time my cat--aptly named Trouble--broke the rules. She left the porch and wandered away. It was only a few minutes before she was pawing at the door desperately begging to get back inside.
Another time she hopped into my neighbor's bushes--the ones she always finds so enticing--and she came back with fleas. She didn't like that experience. Or the ensuing flea treatment. But she's still prone to wandering back to those same bushes if she goes too long without hearing my voice calling her back home.
Our other cat, Sebastian, is a better cat citizen than is his sister. He's prone to eating things that make him sick, but he's generally more obedient and less likely to steal food, start a fight or wander away. I don't love him more than his sister, though. While I want my cats to be nice to each other, my love for them isn't based on some kind of merit system.
I love my cats because they, at some level they can't totally understand, want to live in my house and be my cats. When they sit in my lap and purr, I forgive their numerous misadventures. I clean their messes and remove their crap because their companionship is worth it. And sometimes, I like to just sit back and watch them do cat things, like chase bugs around or stretch out in the sun.
When my cats can't understand what I'm doing, sometimes I just have to ask them to trust me. When they seem unsure, I hope that they'll somehow remember that I've never steered them wrong.
I'll never be able to explain to them how I'm different than they are, how they were created, or intricacies of the world beyond our house.
I can't give them everything they want, and they ultimately won't like it if I did. But if they stay in my house and take what I do give, they'll ultimately have what they need. There will be good times and bad, but we'll go through it all together, and we'll comfort each other until the end.
I don't claim to understand God. God is at least as far above my understanding as I am above the comprehension of my cats.
But when Heaven looks down on us, I can't help but think that we must look an awful lot like God's cats.
Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Bad Interview Stories
My wife had a series of job interviews recently. She had to endure four interviews for a position for which only three candidates were being considered, but she was thrilled to eventually get the job. Still, the whole episode reminded me of some of the most traumatic moments of my life: job interviews.
The job interview process combines all the worst parts of life into one ball of misery: its where humiliation, desperation, intimidation and frustration combine into one self-esteem bursting heap.
I've had more than my share of bad interviews.
All of these things actually happened to me:
An elderly attorney asked me four times during a 15-minute interview whether I wanted a peppermint. I'm still not sure if my breath was bad or he was senile. Or possibly both. But I still didn't get the job.
While interviewing with a local firm when I was in law school, I wanted to prove that I planned to stay in town long-term. I mentioned to the interviewer that I owned my condo and intended to stay there. He argued with me, for at least five minutes, that I couldn't possibly have obtained the financing.
In the same interview, I noticed the interviewer doodling on my resume while I answered one of his questions. When he saw he was busted, he tried to turn his doodle into a large arrow, but it wasn't really pointing at anything. I didn't get the job.
An interviewer at a large firm in Birmingham firm told me: "If you don't like racism, you shouldn't live in Birmingham." And I don't.
At the end of a promising interview with a small firm in New Orleans, the hiring partner told me that she had one more interview scheduled, but the remaining candidate wasn't strong and that she'd be calling me to tell me the job was officially mine next week. When I hadn't heard back from her in two weeks, I called back. The hiring partner had left the firm, and no one remaining there even knew who I was. Needless to say, I didn't get hired.
At an interview in Pensacola, I was introduced to a sheepish, overwhelmed-looking attorney with his wrist wrapped tightly in a compression bandage. When I asked him what happened, he replied, "working here." Later, he offered me what he termed as "survival tips."
During the same interview, my car slipped out of gear and slid into the middle of the parking lot, blocking traffic completely. The firm was so starved for help they offered me the job regardless. But I turned it down.
An interviewer at a firm in Mobile noted that my resume mentioned I had been a sports writer for my college newspaper. He refused to continue the interview until I named 10 Boston Red Sox players. And I could only think of 4 or 5 off the top of my head.
In the same interview, the interviewer noted that the "activities" section of my resume listed I was part of a newly started swing dance club that one of my law school friends had started. He put on music and made me show him the basic steps. But I still didn't get the job.
A firm in Cincinnati flew me into town the night before my interview and took me to a nice dinner. All was going perfectly until I spilled the remnants of my second glass of red wine onto my only dress shirt as we got up to leave. The fancy hotel I was staying at somehow managed to get rid of the stain and have the shirt back to me--perfectly pressed--by 8 the next morning. I didn't get the job, but I still stay at that hotel every time I'm in Cincinnati.
In St. Louis, a firm asked me if I could come in for a job interview on a Saturday morning. I did. I ultimately even got the job. But it wasn't long before I wished I hadn't. That Saturday morning thing wasn't a fluke--those turned out to be normal working hours. The only consolation was that weekends were the only days I got to wear jeans.
I had aced a preliminary interview with a firm in Nashville and was feeling good heading into a meeting with the hiring partner. He saw I was from Alabama and asked if I followed the state's politics. I had a poly sci minor from the state's flagship university and considered my reasonably well versed, so I responded affirmatively. He then proceeded to ask me my thoughts on some ridiculously obscure ethics scandal involving a little-known state judge I'd only vaguely even heard of. The only response I could think of was, "that whole thing is just a mess."
I didn't get the job, but I managed to accidentally sum up the job interview process rather well, I'd say.
Got your own bad interview stories? Feel free to share them in the comments section, below.
The job interview process combines all the worst parts of life into one ball of misery: its where humiliation, desperation, intimidation and frustration combine into one self-esteem bursting heap.
I've had more than my share of bad interviews.
All of these things actually happened to me:
An elderly attorney asked me four times during a 15-minute interview whether I wanted a peppermint. I'm still not sure if my breath was bad or he was senile. Or possibly both. But I still didn't get the job.
While interviewing with a local firm when I was in law school, I wanted to prove that I planned to stay in town long-term. I mentioned to the interviewer that I owned my condo and intended to stay there. He argued with me, for at least five minutes, that I couldn't possibly have obtained the financing.
In the same interview, I noticed the interviewer doodling on my resume while I answered one of his questions. When he saw he was busted, he tried to turn his doodle into a large arrow, but it wasn't really pointing at anything. I didn't get the job.
An interviewer at a large firm in Birmingham firm told me: "If you don't like racism, you shouldn't live in Birmingham." And I don't.
At the end of a promising interview with a small firm in New Orleans, the hiring partner told me that she had one more interview scheduled, but the remaining candidate wasn't strong and that she'd be calling me to tell me the job was officially mine next week. When I hadn't heard back from her in two weeks, I called back. The hiring partner had left the firm, and no one remaining there even knew who I was. Needless to say, I didn't get hired.
At an interview in Pensacola, I was introduced to a sheepish, overwhelmed-looking attorney with his wrist wrapped tightly in a compression bandage. When I asked him what happened, he replied, "working here." Later, he offered me what he termed as "survival tips."
During the same interview, my car slipped out of gear and slid into the middle of the parking lot, blocking traffic completely. The firm was so starved for help they offered me the job regardless. But I turned it down.
An interviewer at a firm in Mobile noted that my resume mentioned I had been a sports writer for my college newspaper. He refused to continue the interview until I named 10 Boston Red Sox players. And I could only think of 4 or 5 off the top of my head.
In the same interview, the interviewer noted that the "activities" section of my resume listed I was part of a newly started swing dance club that one of my law school friends had started. He put on music and made me show him the basic steps. But I still didn't get the job.
A firm in Cincinnati flew me into town the night before my interview and took me to a nice dinner. All was going perfectly until I spilled the remnants of my second glass of red wine onto my only dress shirt as we got up to leave. The fancy hotel I was staying at somehow managed to get rid of the stain and have the shirt back to me--perfectly pressed--by 8 the next morning. I didn't get the job, but I still stay at that hotel every time I'm in Cincinnati.
In St. Louis, a firm asked me if I could come in for a job interview on a Saturday morning. I did. I ultimately even got the job. But it wasn't long before I wished I hadn't. That Saturday morning thing wasn't a fluke--those turned out to be normal working hours. The only consolation was that weekends were the only days I got to wear jeans.
I had aced a preliminary interview with a firm in Nashville and was feeling good heading into a meeting with the hiring partner. He saw I was from Alabama and asked if I followed the state's politics. I had a poly sci minor from the state's flagship university and considered my reasonably well versed, so I responded affirmatively. He then proceeded to ask me my thoughts on some ridiculously obscure ethics scandal involving a little-known state judge I'd only vaguely even heard of. The only response I could think of was, "that whole thing is just a mess."
I didn't get the job, but I managed to accidentally sum up the job interview process rather well, I'd say.
Got your own bad interview stories? Feel free to share them in the comments section, below.
Tuesday, March 26, 2013
Why I'm running a half marathon
It's not that I want to run a half marathon; it's that I'm powerless to resist it.
Its gravitational pull has left me helpless. It's so obvious that I have to do this that it's never even occurred to me whether I want to or not.
I had toyed with the idea of running this thing ever since I moved to Nashville six years ago. The whole city shuts down the last weekend of April for this race, and it felt weird not to be part of it, even though I had never been that into long distance running.
But I just couldn't pull the trigger.
I kept coming up with reasons not to do it: It requires a whole lot of training, and I don't have much spare time. The registration fee is high, and I don't win anything for my effort, so what's the point? April is an unpredictable weather month, and the conditions might be miserable. The race might conflict with my training for the Jamaican bobsled team.
I made that last one up, but you get the point.
This year, though, was different.
I had started running last year, when I couldn't process the stuff life was throwing at me through any other means. I guess Forrest Gump and I have that in common, along with being from Alabama.
I found that while I couldn't run escape the cancer in my family, the financial problems in my household or the deteriorating relationships in my life, I could still run away, if only for an hour, and that counted for something.
My weekly runs started out as a simple diversion, but before long finishing the route before me became a metaphor for making it through whatever else I was struggling with in my life.
As I began to associate running with overcoming the things that had stolen my joy, it was only natural that it started to feel like the only way I could ever reclaim my peace of mind was to finish the biggest race my city has to offer.
In the meantime, I've found that I like running. Or at least, I like running until I get really tired, my legs hurt and I feel nauseous.
I've still never reached a state of enlightenment or felt a "runner's high," but I like having an hour or so to be alone with my thoughts and where my mind can roam aimlessly, at least until my body hurts so badly that I can't think of anything but finishing.
Even then, when I'm done, there's something rewarding about winning the struggle between my own limitations and the distance to my destination.
It's that feeling that is pushing me forward into the 13.1 club. I have to do this so that I can prove to myself I can.
It's a symbol for overcoming every other overwhelming obstacle in life. It will be a reminder that through hard work and progressive steps I can accomplish so much more than what seems possible, and that I'll be able to accomplish still more in the future than I can right now.
It's a starting point for crossing off those lingering life projects I've put on the backburner for too long, and becoming the person I know somewhere deep inside that I could be.
It's to be a final triumph to signal closure, hopefully, to at least a segment of a difficult period of life. It's to reaffirm that hard times don't endure forever, and that there can be joy if we continue running until we reach the other side,even if it isn't always in sight.
I realize that my other problems won't magically disappear once I cross the finish line, nor will an instruction manual pop into my hands to tell me how to fix them.
I'll still have too much debt, unfinished dreams, and imperfect relationships whether I run a half marathon or not. But somehow, it seems like those issues will feel just a little less daunting if I know that the person facing them is the type of person who can persevere to finish a half marathon.
I just need to prove to myself that I'm that kind of person.
Its gravitational pull has left me helpless. It's so obvious that I have to do this that it's never even occurred to me whether I want to or not.
I had toyed with the idea of running this thing ever since I moved to Nashville six years ago. The whole city shuts down the last weekend of April for this race, and it felt weird not to be part of it, even though I had never been that into long distance running.
But I just couldn't pull the trigger.
I kept coming up with reasons not to do it: It requires a whole lot of training, and I don't have much spare time. The registration fee is high, and I don't win anything for my effort, so what's the point? April is an unpredictable weather month, and the conditions might be miserable. The race might conflict with my training for the Jamaican bobsled team.
I made that last one up, but you get the point.
This year, though, was different.
I had started running last year, when I couldn't process the stuff life was throwing at me through any other means. I guess Forrest Gump and I have that in common, along with being from Alabama.
I found that while I couldn't run escape the cancer in my family, the financial problems in my household or the deteriorating relationships in my life, I could still run away, if only for an hour, and that counted for something.
My weekly runs started out as a simple diversion, but before long finishing the route before me became a metaphor for making it through whatever else I was struggling with in my life.
As I began to associate running with overcoming the things that had stolen my joy, it was only natural that it started to feel like the only way I could ever reclaim my peace of mind was to finish the biggest race my city has to offer.
In the meantime, I've found that I like running. Or at least, I like running until I get really tired, my legs hurt and I feel nauseous.
I've still never reached a state of enlightenment or felt a "runner's high," but I like having an hour or so to be alone with my thoughts and where my mind can roam aimlessly, at least until my body hurts so badly that I can't think of anything but finishing.
Even then, when I'm done, there's something rewarding about winning the struggle between my own limitations and the distance to my destination.
It's that feeling that is pushing me forward into the 13.1 club. I have to do this so that I can prove to myself I can.
It's a symbol for overcoming every other overwhelming obstacle in life. It will be a reminder that through hard work and progressive steps I can accomplish so much more than what seems possible, and that I'll be able to accomplish still more in the future than I can right now.
It's a starting point for crossing off those lingering life projects I've put on the backburner for too long, and becoming the person I know somewhere deep inside that I could be.
It's to be a final triumph to signal closure, hopefully, to at least a segment of a difficult period of life. It's to reaffirm that hard times don't endure forever, and that there can be joy if we continue running until we reach the other side,even if it isn't always in sight.
I realize that my other problems won't magically disappear once I cross the finish line, nor will an instruction manual pop into my hands to tell me how to fix them.
I'll still have too much debt, unfinished dreams, and imperfect relationships whether I run a half marathon or not. But somehow, it seems like those issues will feel just a little less daunting if I know that the person facing them is the type of person who can persevere to finish a half marathon.
I just need to prove to myself that I'm that kind of person.
Tuesday, March 19, 2013
Backhanded Compliments
"You're a really good writer. I mean, I don't actually read your blog or anything, but your stuff is pretty good."
"You've really come a long way."
"You're pretty good at basketball, for a white guy."
"Your idea is interesting. It's heretical, but it's interesting."
"I was hoping (that other couple) would want to come out too, so our night might be fun."
"You've gotten much better looking since the last time I saw you."
"I used to think you had dumpy hair. You've improved it 100 percent."
"This brief is not the best you can do."
"You're not as big of a know-it-all jerk as I thought when I first met you."
"I'm sorry I don't feel the same way about you. But I really respect who you are as a person."
"It's not that I don't like your girlfriend. It's that I believe in you so much that I think you can do better."
"You don't look like you're old enough to be my lawyer."
"God gave you the potential to do so much with your life. If only you had the faith to trust him."
"Congratulations on achieving a measure of success."
"You don't sound like you're from Alabama."
"You're not as dumb as you look."
What do all of these phrases have in common?
With the exception of the last one (which is just a personal favorite), I've heard each of them at some point in my life.
Nothing sends a mixed message quite like the backhanded compliment. It's the message that you are either better than the useless idiot you used to be, or perhaps, that you are ok but not as good as you could be, if you actually applied yourself.
It's the art of telling someone that they are good, but only up to a point. It's sharing in someone else's success, but with an implicit message that they not get too carried away, lest they suddenly think that they are more important than you.
It's telling someone to stand and accept recognition, but stay in their place.
Why do people say these kinds of things? If you want someone to feel appreciated, what's the point of attaching strings to the positivity?
I seem to attract a lot of these for some reason, maybe I really did use to be an uptight weenie, and maybe because I constantly feel like I fall short of my potential. But I suppose people usually mean well when they say these things but just don't know how to express themselves.
The people with selfish motives for saying these type of things usually have low esteem, and their backhandedness comes out of their own feelings of inferiority, so I try not to take it personally. Other people are just socially clueless and not worthy of our frustration--by the way, these are the same people who post pointlessly argumentative things on facebook.
I sometimes marvel at how anyone could think their mixed blessings could be interpreted as anything other than an insult, but I try to just shake my head and file them away for a future blog post.
And what about this post?
Well, maybe it wasn't very good. But it's better than most of the ones I've done lately.
You don't have to tell me.
Tuesday, March 12, 2013
Whoever Heard of Catfish in a Swimming Pool?
When I rank the numerous bizarre stories from my childhood, number one on the list is probably the time my dad stocked our swimming pool with catfish.
While I'm tempted to just leave the details story to your imagination, I suppose it's only fair to share it.
You see, my dad has come up with a number of bad ideas over the years, generally with the goal of either making or saving a few dollars. So when someone told him that he could save money on chlorine and electricity during the wintertime by stocking the swimming pool with catfish, he was open to hearing the details.
The premise was that catfish were bottom feeders and would naturally eat the algae and bacteria that cause unattended pools to turn green. Someone (and perhaps it was a catfish salesman) managed to convince my dad that the upfront costs of buying a bunch of catfish would pay for more than even out from the savings on electricity and chlorine (not to mention the effort of cleaning the pool) in just one winter, and when it was warm enough to swim again, the catfish could easily be scooped out of the clear water and provide a number of tasty meals.
As my dad loves catfish, saving money, and the saving effort, it seemed to him a brilliant plan.
And what could go wrong?
Well, everything.
Catfish might eat bacteria and algae, but they don't eat their own poop, so the pool quickly turned some shade of brownish-green. The fins cut holes in the pool lining, which meant that not only did my dad waste a whole lot of money on catfish, he had to drop over a thousand dollars for a new pool liner.
But before we could do that, he had to remove the catfish from the pool. For some reason, my dad didn't want to chlorinate the pool until the fish were gone. Maybe he thought it would be a lost cause, as the catfish's natural pollution would undo whatever benefit the chlorine might offer.
More likely, he thought the catfish's ingestion of chlorine would render them inedible and thus destroy the last potential minuscule return on his investment.
Why he didn't just drain the pool is an open question, but my only guess is that he wanted to catch the fish slowly so as to allow the catfish to reproduce all winter, thus maximizing the proceeds of his investment over time.
But even using this incremental strategy, the whisker-filled bottom feeders proved surprisingly difficult to fish out of the murky water. The catfish remained in the pool long after the experiment had proven itself a complete disaster.
To make matters worse, my dad had his real estate office behind the house, directly beside the pool. On more than one occasion, a client arrived to close on a real estate transaction only to be greeted by the sight of a green swimming pool, and one of my then-skinny brothers casting a fishing line inside of it, apparently in hopes of a small miracle.
If my dad sold any property at all during this period, it was a small miracle in and of itself.
The pool was eventually drained, and I don't remember whether we ate the catfish immediately or just threw them in the pond that was further behind the house.
That pond, by the way, was full of brown, murky water, despite the presence of numerous catfish inside it.
Perhaps that should have been a sign.
While I'm tempted to just leave the details story to your imagination, I suppose it's only fair to share it.
You see, my dad has come up with a number of bad ideas over the years, generally with the goal of either making or saving a few dollars. So when someone told him that he could save money on chlorine and electricity during the wintertime by stocking the swimming pool with catfish, he was open to hearing the details.
The premise was that catfish were bottom feeders and would naturally eat the algae and bacteria that cause unattended pools to turn green. Someone (and perhaps it was a catfish salesman) managed to convince my dad that the upfront costs of buying a bunch of catfish would pay for more than even out from the savings on electricity and chlorine (not to mention the effort of cleaning the pool) in just one winter, and when it was warm enough to swim again, the catfish could easily be scooped out of the clear water and provide a number of tasty meals.
As my dad loves catfish, saving money, and the saving effort, it seemed to him a brilliant plan.
And what could go wrong?
Well, everything.
Catfish might eat bacteria and algae, but they don't eat their own poop, so the pool quickly turned some shade of brownish-green. The fins cut holes in the pool lining, which meant that not only did my dad waste a whole lot of money on catfish, he had to drop over a thousand dollars for a new pool liner.
But before we could do that, he had to remove the catfish from the pool. For some reason, my dad didn't want to chlorinate the pool until the fish were gone. Maybe he thought it would be a lost cause, as the catfish's natural pollution would undo whatever benefit the chlorine might offer.
More likely, he thought the catfish's ingestion of chlorine would render them inedible and thus destroy the last potential minuscule return on his investment.
Why he didn't just drain the pool is an open question, but my only guess is that he wanted to catch the fish slowly so as to allow the catfish to reproduce all winter, thus maximizing the proceeds of his investment over time.
But even using this incremental strategy, the whisker-filled bottom feeders proved surprisingly difficult to fish out of the murky water. The catfish remained in the pool long after the experiment had proven itself a complete disaster.
To make matters worse, my dad had his real estate office behind the house, directly beside the pool. On more than one occasion, a client arrived to close on a real estate transaction only to be greeted by the sight of a green swimming pool, and one of my then-skinny brothers casting a fishing line inside of it, apparently in hopes of a small miracle.
If my dad sold any property at all during this period, it was a small miracle in and of itself.
The pool was eventually drained, and I don't remember whether we ate the catfish immediately or just threw them in the pond that was further behind the house.
That pond, by the way, was full of brown, murky water, despite the presence of numerous catfish inside it.
Perhaps that should have been a sign.
Tuesday, March 5, 2013
Just Hoping: One Year Later
It's hard to believe it's been a year since I wrote this:
http://andrewsmithsthoughts.blogspot.com/2012/02/this-is-blog-about-hope.html
But it's true. My brother's surgery to remove a fist-sized mass and 18 inches from his colon was a year ago today.
Since then, he's endured 12 sessions of chemotherapy, a triathlon and a whole lot of life uncertainty, starting with an initial post-bioposy prognosis on the Ides of March that didn't sound so optimistic.
But he's kept moving forward (as much as circumstances allowed) one day at a time, and all the news lately has been good. His is an inspiring story of what we can overcome if we refuse to accept defeat.
But as for my story, it has been better.
I've been in the dumps lately, and I can't seem to find my way out.
Sometimes it seems, after life has been calm for awhile, a million little things conspire (with a couple of big things) to try to drag you down. Of course, I have way too many friends who are going through worse things than I am, but I don't know whether their suffering should make me feel thankful that my life seems peaceful by comparison, or whether I should just feel heartbroken on their behalf. I compromise by feeling a little bit of both.
I want to believe there's beauty and meaning in our struggles, but sometimes, it seems like tragedies are a hot potato that gets tossed around freely from one person to the next.
My pastor says that God "prunes" us sometimes, which hurts in the beginning but leads to greater, more focused growth over the long term. In the meantime, though, it just hurts.
I've found myself in similar places before, and worked my way out. I've found that if we just focus on finding the strength to live the day in front of us, it always seems that eventually we'll suddenly realize that life's uphill climb has finally evened out, or maybe even started just the slightest slope downward.
Until then, all we can do is try to find the strength, hope and courage to keep going, believing that better things, things that we can't even fathom, are around that blind corner.
I've lived this story enough times to know that hope is true.
But wouldn't it be nice if that corner got here soon?
http://andrewsmithsthoughts.blogspot.com/2012/02/this-is-blog-about-hope.html
But it's true. My brother's surgery to remove a fist-sized mass and 18 inches from his colon was a year ago today.
Since then, he's endured 12 sessions of chemotherapy, a triathlon and a whole lot of life uncertainty, starting with an initial post-bioposy prognosis on the Ides of March that didn't sound so optimistic.
But he's kept moving forward (as much as circumstances allowed) one day at a time, and all the news lately has been good. His is an inspiring story of what we can overcome if we refuse to accept defeat.
But as for my story, it has been better.
I've been in the dumps lately, and I can't seem to find my way out.
Sometimes it seems, after life has been calm for awhile, a million little things conspire (with a couple of big things) to try to drag you down. Of course, I have way too many friends who are going through worse things than I am, but I don't know whether their suffering should make me feel thankful that my life seems peaceful by comparison, or whether I should just feel heartbroken on their behalf. I compromise by feeling a little bit of both.
I want to believe there's beauty and meaning in our struggles, but sometimes, it seems like tragedies are a hot potato that gets tossed around freely from one person to the next.
My pastor says that God "prunes" us sometimes, which hurts in the beginning but leads to greater, more focused growth over the long term. In the meantime, though, it just hurts.
I've found myself in similar places before, and worked my way out. I've found that if we just focus on finding the strength to live the day in front of us, it always seems that eventually we'll suddenly realize that life's uphill climb has finally evened out, or maybe even started just the slightest slope downward.
Until then, all we can do is try to find the strength, hope and courage to keep going, believing that better things, things that we can't even fathom, are around that blind corner.
I've lived this story enough times to know that hope is true.
But wouldn't it be nice if that corner got here soon?
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