Slaving Away While I am no archeologist or anthropologist, I think it’s agreed that man as we know him (homo sapiens) has existed for some 300,000 years. If we conservatively consider a generation as lasting an average of thirty years, that means there have been 10,000 generations of humans. If I stretch Malcolm Gladwell’s concept of expertise using the 10,000 Hour Rule, one might suggest that the human species should have learned a thing…
The Master of My Fate It is sometimes difficult to say what is ordinary and what is extraordinary. I was watching the movie Invictus, which is the story of the South African Rugby World Cup Championship in 1995 as inspired by Nelson Mandela, the then new president of South Africa. Besides the obvious and extraordinary performance by the South African Springboks, the real understory is about the perseverance of Nelson Mandela and the black…
Of Family and Friendships There is an old expression which technically comes our way from Harper Lee in To Kill a Mockingbird, when Atticus Finch says, “You can choose your friends but you sho’ can’t choose your family.” I have said for a long time that I don’t find that expression 100% accurate. It is correct in its reference to family, but it is only half-correct when it comes to friends. Friends are perhaps…
I’ll Be Back While I’m not a big Action Movie fan for the most part, I do have fond memories of some, including the Terminator series. And like everyone else on the planet, I remember Linda Hamilton’s original role as the tough-as-nails mother of John Connor as too good not to admire. Any actor who can show themselves as all muscle and sinew and still look and act tough gets lots of respect from…
Three Calls and Six Texts I don’t do business dinners much any more. There was a time when it felt like I had one every night. I’m not sure I remember which job had the most of that, but I’ll bet it was during my private banking days. That was between 1994 and 1999 when I was 40-45 years-old and my children ranged between young and younger. I mention the children because what you mostly…
Untamed Heart I believe the best movie ever made by Christian Slater and Marisa Tomei may be the obscure 1993 Untamed Heart. He was 24 and she 29 when it was made. He played a quiet, questionably intelligent young dishwasher who was an orphan with a severely damaged congenital heart problem. She is a working-class young woman who works as a diner waitress, trying to better her position and who has her share of boy-problems…
I Think I’m Going to Cry Again Kim and I enjoy watching Michael Douglas and Akan Arkin in The Kominsky Method on Netflix. They are Hollywood friends of a certain age even though Arkin is 85 and Douglas is ten years younger. I am ten years younger again than Douglas, but I find this show hilarious. Maybe that’s because it’s written by Chuck Lorre, creator of The Big Bang Theory, and a man of…
On My Sleeve It is said by Shakespeare that Iago, Othello’s less-than-faithful servant, wears his feelings on his sleeve. We all know what a crafty fellow Iago was, so it seems somewhat like a head-fake to think that he would be so obvious. And long before that, the Roman army, which strongly discouraged its legionnaires from marrying (presumably for fear that they would go less than all-out if they had something to lose), allowed…
One Fine Day Again I am staring out across New York Harbor at the Verrazano Bridge from my dining room table. It is the last week of October and we are an hour from sunset, so its that loveliest time of day. I wandered home, walking the entire half block along State Street with a pleasant breeze blowing. There is not a cloud in the sky and the water is just mildly choppy, just enough…
Taking a Day I am something in between a workaholic and a lazy bastard. I truly do not know which of the extremes is more prevalent. I know I have worked for forty-three years mostly non-stop. I had several instances when I could have and perhaps should have reasonably taken a break from work of something like six months. There was always something that drove me to keep working or, most often, jump into my…