The door is answered by a young, pretty, very undressed girl who tells you that your married friend is in the shower. He comes out looking sheepish, reaching out for the food as you have the sensation of your jaw dropping to the floor. There are things you want to say, a million sarcastic remarks you can wag at him, but the situation has become very uncomfortable and you want to make a hurried exit. It is one thing to see another female in the house and assume she was a relative or even a mutual friend who was staying over, with the wife’s knowledge, but as the girl appears undressed, you know it is more than ‘friends’. When you see him a few days later, there isn’t an ounce of guilt. He barely acknowledges the incident and when he does, he tells you with confidence that because you were friends with him first, you will not tell his wife. Now, how much stickier can a situation like this get, Dad?
His wife comes back, all is well and some months later she again, goes off on a business trip. This time, he brings home two girls. Weeks later, he describes the situation, telling you how the girls fought between themselves about who should go first with him, and no, I do not think he was talking about food, shower or a trip to the mall. He openly admits that he hires prostitutes because they make him feel “naughty” and he is able to perform better having sex with a prostitute than with his wife. At one point, you will feign ignorance and tell him you do not want to be an accomplice to anymore details and that he should sort the issue out with his wife. Instead, he will laugh and answer you with a complete arrogance, “she loves me, so of course she will stay, no matter what”. He goes on to say that because they had so many adjustment problems in the beginning, she has become very tolerant of his habits and will forgive him in a heartbeat? Seriously?
Moving on from the less popular version of Hefner, there is the devoted wife who will proudly boast about her weekend sex-capades with her lover in some fancy hotel or another while her husband stays home with her two boys. Now, I say “her two boys” because she openly admits that she is not at all sure if her husband is the father. When you do bump into this ‘happily married’ couple, you want to hug him and let it all out but at the same time, you wonder if he is really that clueless about what is happening, or is she actually that good at covering it up? She will describe her lover to you, this dashing dive instructor who has a magnificent bike and makes wads of cash. The description she provides, will give you the dreamy sensation of a George Clooney lookalike and then when you do meet him, the only thought that runs through your head is, “could a beer belly actually be that big”?
There is also the travelling husband who takes every opportunity to tell you that he wants nothing more than to divorce his wife. She does not meet his sexual needs, never around to clean the house or keep order for him. Every time you see him, it is almost like a broken record. It gets to the point where you are so sick of hearing it. So much talk to you, but nothing to his wife and no action is taken. When you ask him to go ahead and do it, he stares at you like you have gone mad and goes on a rant about his public image and how his position at work will be ruined. Like, wow, talk about love. I completely understand, Dad, to each his own. Truth be told, I am sure there are choices I have made that have had people going, “now look at that crazy” but how does marriage, trust and a third party or several additional parties all go hand in hand and work out fine? Is it even possible? Or is that what they tell themselves to hide the guilt of their indiscretions while their children receive the worst lesson of trust?
GENERATIONAL ELDERS
These are people who are all around us Dad, and I am sure you also know a few of them. Even as we try to grow up and live our own lives, they are adamant that you have to listen to them and only them because their ways are the best. They govern their families and try to govern society by how things were done thirty years ago. They seem incapable of coping with change and expect red carpets everywhere they go. When they do not receive this, it is not because of their delusional expectations, it is because people are rude and do not understand the contributions they made to society, fifteen years ago. I think, because they are much older, I am sometimes able to eat my words and swallow them like a bitter pill. Nobody wants a scene and when you tell off a much older person, what does that say about the younger one, irrelevant of what was said or done.
However, what really gets to me is the way they pass on this mentality of “we are great” to their children and grandchildren, who eventually think they are perfect and far above everyone else. On the ladder of the social elite, they place themselves on the highest rung, knowing they are able to get away with almost anything because of their family name. A visible fault on your end automatically converts you into the village pariah. You are isolated and set apart from everyone else because they refuse to understand you. Any argument presented against the notion that you are stupid, weak and worthless means you are insolent, even ungrateful for all the numerous ways they have tried to help you. How dare you speak against their perfection? Which makes me wonder, when was the last time they even looked in a mirror? They have either dreamt their perfection or they have lost their senses.
Their own family is besotted with numerous problems in the form of the son-in-law who enjoys groping other females, cousins and nieces. Or the son who goes around beating up homeless people believing they should get jobs instead of being parasites to society. Who can look past the daughter who has an affair with a married man, awaits his divorce so she can marry him; and in all this, openly flaunts their relationship driving the man’s wife to a nervous breakdown? And as much as they sugarcoat the truth in so many different ways, you know there is so much more to the real story that you are not getting. They claim that their daughter’s husband got a five year transfer to a mysterious faraway city to which she never visits, but he never visits her either, let alone their two young children. What is it about these people and not being able to see things for what they are?
These are the people who continually preach love, kindness and tolerance to all, when apparently they cannot practice any of it in their own homes. Oh yes, they will set themselves on some grand missions so that the world can see them perform, “Save the Children”, “Save the Whales”, “Save the World” and then they forget to save their own homes. How so many people can be so adamant in thinking the world has to change before they do, is beyond me. These are also the people who come with family names so polished, gold could not shine as much, or so they think. They would rather live in the same small town for the rest of their lives, without traveling, without seeing the world or meeting people who only come to them just so their polished family name stays intact. If anyone were so bold as to make a mistake that can possibly taint this legacy, then banished they must be, or at least be treated to feel like nothing good can ever come from them.
Never mind all that talk about love and acceptance. It is the family name that matters. What could possibly be more precious than this? All those years of gold, chipped away, to be picked at by those unknown to the family. It makes me wonder Dad, why stand by a family name when you risk the chance of losing your family? For some, taking what a majority of strangers are saying about your family name is far more important, as long as this majority is in favour of the “oh so great family name”. I get it that a reputation is important Dad and that is a good thing, but I would prefer to be the home that my children can return to irrelevant of season, time, loss, mistake or misdirection. I think it means so much more to say “just come home and we will take you through” than to get all bungled up in the politics of what other people are gossiping about us. I would rather have them know that family is with them even if the world is against them. What say you, Dad?
BUT I HAVE TO ...
December 4, 2010
You know Dad, if I had a dime for every time I heard, “but I have to do this and I have to do that”, I would be so rich, I could probably be Richard Branson’s neighbour on that island of his. When we simmer it down to the hard cold facts, the truth is, none of us “
have to” do anything. We do not have to get out of bed in the morning because our children or spouse needs breakfast, we choose to do it. We do not have to go slog at a job we sometimes hate, we choose to do that also. Yes, it is a choice. Do not get out of bed, do not go to work, can you live with the results of what happens? Essentially that’s the issue. Most of us are so caught up with what other people think, we lose sight of what we want to do and what needs to be done.
For instance, two Stanford students did not have to put any extra effort on their research project but Larry Page and Sergey Brin did, and we got Google. A man fired from the company he started, who went on to create an animation company did not have to face the world again, yet he did. Steve Jobs rejoined Apple after starting Pixar and so we have the iPhone, not to mention Toy Story, Finding Nemo and the rest of that troop. No adult had to create a cartoon character but Walt Disney did after losing the rights to Oswald The Lucky Rabbit. Since 18th November 1928, Mickey Mouse has been a cherished icon to children all around the world. All of these people and more are given the same number of hours as you and I, what makes them different?
There is no time. Here is a laugh. Ideally, we need eight hours of sleep and three main meals a day. All in, this would give us a balance of say, fourteen hours a day. So, say there is work for another eight hours so that gives us a balance of six hours. In addition commuting, traffic and over time, we may end up with three hours. What can we do in three hours? It takes about two minutes to say, “I am thinking of you” or “I love you”, it takes say ten minutes even with the slowest of Internet connections to send out a birthday or greeting card for loved ones and it takes even less, to pick up the phone and just say, “hello”. Should we be supporting a charity or working at a cause, this will maybe take another hour to get more support, to do a bit more reaching out so that still gives us another hour, brimming with sixty minutes. What then?
Let us do it tomorrow. Procrastination is the foundation of all disasters. We are always telling ourselves we want to be ahead, we want to be ready for what comes our way. But come a favourite television show or a gossip filled phone call from a friend, all urges to forge ahead go flying out the window. Very dramatic I know, but unfortunately that is just how it is for most people. We are all guilty of it at some point. But the more you put off something the more it will roll itself into a ball and appear as an avalanche heading straight for you, and by then, there is no escaping the disastrous effects it will bring. We chide ourselves by saying the diversions we entertained were what we “had to” do. But in truth, why does anyone “have to” spend twenty minutes talking about what the neighbour’s friend’s daughter wore to a dinner?
It is polite. For most of the mistakes I have made in life, this is probably my biggest and most repeated. I have made myself accustomed to being the “yes” person, to being split and ready to help all five or more people who come to me seeking assistance. Until, I realized in the end, the person I was helping the least was myself. Saying “yes” every single time is not being polite, it is being overly accommodating and allowing them to take advantage. There is no rule book that says you “have to” help or “have to say yes” to everyone that comes your way. You do this because you want to, even if you do not admit it to yourself. Be it from a cultural perspective, social outlook or traditional upbringing, you do this because you think you want to be on the right side of things. But if you cannot please yourself, you will never please anyone.
The money is good. Given half a choice, I would love to be outside working in an office with people to meet and deadlines to keep, but I have had the biggest surgery of my life and I do not have to stay at home and look for work online, but I want to. Why? Well, I could risk it all and put my nose to the grindstone, I was after all recently offered a job I wanted, but then what if it is too soon, and I have rushed into it, my shunt malfunctions and I need to get another? We work to earn money, we need money for food and other necessities. How much food and the quality of our necessities depends on what you want to do for work and not what you have to do for a job. Some get lucky, ending up happy with their choices, while others realize those choices are not what was expected, that does not make the decision any less of a choice.
One day, I will use it. Some people use memories as an excuse for the way they clutter their lives. “I have to keep this because it belonged to ...” What if the item is a big, moldy cupboard which is susceptible to termites? Would you keep it then? Keep what you need. Use what you keep. Yes, I know Dad, I am not one to preach, I am a sentimentalist as well, but I think there is a big difference between keeping a piece of your history and cluttering your house with things you do not even know exist in the first place. To look at it from a different viewpoint, if you really are that noble, think of the people you can help by giving them the things you do not need or even better, think of how much you can raise for yourself by selling these items?
So, I think, every time we each keep telling ourselves we “have to” do something, we are not coaching ourselves to do better, we are just weighing ourselves down with choices that we can change or improve. Better still, I would remember these three things for a very long time to come:
Apple, Google and Mickey Mouse. There. Three things that did not have to be.
GOSSIP QUEEN
We have all gossiped at one point or another. Whether it is about that cute girl you saw your friend’s husband with or that gorgeous newly refurbished neighbour’s house, we have all done it. To say otherwise would be an even bigger lie. But, and this is a very big B-U-T, there are some people who can wear a crown for how they do it. Meet gossip queen. You will see her at every festival, every funeral, every church event and if possible every other weekend in someone else’s house. She will know the daily routines of people around you, right up to those who live in Timbuktu. When you bump into her at the grocer’s, she will ask you how you are and then tell you news about yourself that even you did not know. Ah yes, this is the person who does not need Facebook, Twitter and Stumble Upon. She is a whole social media network all by herself. What is her goal you ask?
Well, she will tell you that it is her concern. That she is looking out for your best interest. Right, so does every other politician. See, it is one thing to pass on accurate information, true and objective, oh wait, that is what journalism is supposed to be, and that’s a whole different story as you already know, Dad. It is a completely different thing to pass on inaccuracies and assumptions. This is the person who even when fully aware that she has offered an inaccuracy, will not in any way offer a retraction or apology. She will simply shrug her shoulders and move on to the next juicy bit of gossip. A gossip queen thrives on the inconvenience of other people. Difficulties that you are going through are an ideal opportunity for her to pick at other situations in your life, not to help you with the rough patch you are going through.
This is not the person who asks how you are and waits for your answer because she cares, she asks the question so she can fire at you her next query which would probably be something like, “so, I heard, you have got a new job, how much are you getting paid?” She will want to know what you have cooked for lunch and what you will be preparing for dinner, while at the same time, letting you know that one of your neighbours will be celebrating their child’s birthday next week at the restaurant down the road. She will marry off people who do not even know each other and transfer the local councilman who in reality has no clue, plan or thought of being moved. This is also the person who will take one step into your house and question your decision about that lovely earth toned rug you have, because it looks ugly, expensive or cheap and goes on to tell you about the rug in yet another friend’s house.
She will keep track of every birthday, every wedding anniversary and function that takes place in your house so not only can she source out an invitation for herself, she can also poke at you about who else is being invited. The polite words she offers to you are just a means of getting those biting rumours sh
e will soon be passing on. Sometimes, I wonder, when a person strives at being this well-informed, what must their phone bill be like, Dad? Does it mean they actually sit by their phone waiting for phone calls from various parties or do they spend that much time calling and seeking out information? Or maybe, they have more emails in their inbox than a Fortune 500 CEO? Which brings me to another thought, if this person is known for their information spreading capabilities, do you think they would have many friends? As in, if I knew my friend is such a gossip, would I actually want to tell her things in confidence, knowing full well it would not stay that way?
A gossip queen would like to think she is everyone’s friend.Do you think she knows that people actually loathe the sight of her and if it wasn’t downright rude, they would prefer to shut the door and lock themselves in when they see her approaching the driveway of their home? Sigh. I am taking a slow, deep breath. Unfortunately, there is one or more of this type everywhere you go, there is no hiding but there is avoiding. When you avoid, be prepared to have even wilder stories passed around about you but think about it, real friends would not care and the ones who do aren’t real friends. And if you ever come across the opportunity to share in gossip think of this, when you ass-u-me, oh never mind, you know what they say about assumptions. What do you think, Dad? As childish and impolite as it seems, why do I have to feed that person stories about others and myself when quite literally, it is none of her business?
Excuse Me, My Brains Have Stepped Out Page 12