Tomorrow, February 23, is my wife's birthday. One of the first of the real Baby Boomer generation, she was born in 1944 in Orlando, Florida, the first child of a WWII soldier and a lovely Minnesota maiden. Jacqueline White, a professional singer for forty years, was among many other notables born that year who made something of their lives:
1944: Angela Davis, Martin Jay, Al Kooper, Alice Walker, Kim Deitch,
Stockard Channing, Bill Griffith, Jonathan Demme, Johnny Winter, Bobby
Womack, Sly Stone, Sirhan Sirhan, Richard Ford, Diana Ross, Sherry
Lansing, Jack Casady, Rob Tyner, George Lucas, Patti LaBelle, Rudy
Giuliani, Leonard Peltier, Paul Wellstone, Michael Douglas, Gene Clark,
Danny DeVito, Wesley Clark. Elsewhere: Jimmy Page, Lorne Michaels, Frank
Oz, Dave Mason, Pete Townshend, Rem Koolhaas.
Happy Birthday, Jackie!
Actress Drew Barrymore was born on February 22, 1975. She started using alcohol and cocaine at age nine, posed nude for Playboy, and flashed her boobs on the David Letterman Show, in 1995.
Fictional Character Pebbles Flintstone was born on February 22, 10,000 BC. By the age of fifteen, she was eating seven pound Brontasaurus steaks and slamming a gallon of Snorkasaurus milk at every meal. As a preteen, she became an excellent baseball player, developing extraordinary pitching skills and outfielding abilities. She later pursued a career in advertising, then married her childhood sweetheart, Bam-Bam Rubble.
I feel like such an underachiever when I read biographical snippets like that. Obviously, these three people, two real and one fiction, knew what they wanted in life and although they met obstacles along the way, they dealt with them accordingly. I just never had the right start. It may sound like I’m feeling sorry for myself, but I know exactly when things went wrong for me, and there’s nothing I can do, now, to change it.
You see, I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up, the choices seemed so vast that when my 7th grade guidance counselor asked me that question. I stammered out the first thing that came into my head, “A professional archer,” I said. Had I been offered to write my answer, I’m sure I would’ve set my goals higher and maybe wrote, “A grinding disk sales representative,” or, “A quantum physics explainer.”
That’s the way it is for me as someone better off writing his answers than verbalizing them. The last time I verbally offered my condolences at a funeral, I grasped the hand of the grieving son at his mother’s grave site, and said “Congratulations.” Had I just handed him a homemade sympathy card with thoughtful words and phrases written inside it, I’m sure it would’ve been more profound. Live and learn.
The Baby Boomers, 1944-53
Happy Birthday, Jackie!
Actress Drew Barrymore was born on February 22, 1975. She started using alcohol and cocaine at age nine, posed nude for Playboy, and flashed her boobs on the David Letterman Show, in 1995.
Fictional Character Pebbles Flintstone was born on February 22, 10,000 BC. By the age of fifteen, she was eating seven pound Brontasaurus steaks and slamming a gallon of Snorkasaurus milk at every meal. As a preteen, she became an excellent baseball player, developing extraordinary pitching skills and outfielding abilities. She later pursued a career in advertising, then married her childhood sweetheart, Bam-Bam Rubble.
I feel like such an underachiever when I read biographical snippets like that. Obviously, these three people, two real and one fiction, knew what they wanted in life and although they met obstacles along the way, they dealt with them accordingly. I just never had the right start. It may sound like I’m feeling sorry for myself, but I know exactly when things went wrong for me, and there’s nothing I can do, now, to change it.
You see, I never knew what I wanted to be when I grew up, the choices seemed so vast that when my 7th grade guidance counselor asked me that question. I stammered out the first thing that came into my head, “A professional archer,” I said. Had I been offered to write my answer, I’m sure I would’ve set my goals higher and maybe wrote, “A grinding disk sales representative,” or, “A quantum physics explainer.”
That’s the way it is for me as someone better off writing his answers than verbalizing them. The last time I verbally offered my condolences at a funeral, I grasped the hand of the grieving son at his mother’s grave site, and said “Congratulations.” Had I just handed him a homemade sympathy card with thoughtful words and phrases written inside it, I’m sure it would’ve been more profound. Live and learn.
I reviewed Kim's list of CliftonStrengths, and here's what I value in Thor - and in Thor's writing:
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Deliberative
Empathy
Includer
Positivity
Relator
Restorative
Woo [big-time Woo]
Thor would not be Thor if he was an Achiever, Analytical, Command, Competition, Strategy sort of writer or person, and it would be highly unlikely that I would value him as a friend. If you want a Woo-less, unconnected, uncommitted, negative, scheming demigod, you can have Loki or 45. I'll stick with Thor.
Dearest Thor -- You underestimate your skills and talents. First and foremost of these is your thorough grasp of the writing process, and your ability to create massively (Woe, word choice?) compelling writings. You go every time you write! ("You go" in the sense of great work, keep up the excellent production, etc. vs. a trip to the loo.). Woe is correct: Thor may bemoan who and what he believes is important, but he must be blind to his blown-away strengths. So there. Head for Beltrami Forest when you need a dose of reality and a shot in the old ego, and/or a writer's loft at your disposal.
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