Alexandersmap

    Author: nhcarmichael

    • Poems and Cat Puke

      The clouds have left the sky,
      The wind hath left the sea,
      The half-moon up on high
      Shrinketh her face of dree

      She lightens on the comb
      Of leaden waves, that roar
      And thrust their hurried foam
      Up on the dusky shore.

      Behind the western bars
      The shrouded day retreats,
      And unperceived the stars
      Steal to their sovran seats.

      And whiter grows the foam,
      The small moon lightens more;
      And as I turn me home,
      My shadow walks before.
      – Robert Bridges, Dusky Shore

      There’s a moment when expectations meet reality. Certainly we all expected more out of 2020 than we got, and I can say the same about this morning’s blog. It started with a poem – Dusky Shore, as you see. It became cleanup in aisle 5.

      I’ve toyed with Bridges’ famous poem for some time, undecided about whether to dance with the classic romantic lines, or leave well enough alone. It has all the ingredients sprinkled together just so – the moon and the sea, post sunset dusky bliss and a turn towards home… but it still misses the mark for me. And I’m not sure why.

      I believe it’s in the way the words are stacked just so. It feels like he’s playing to the audience a bit to me, instead of mining his soul. But still the words are lovely in the way that a Thomas Kinkade painting is. Pretty, I suppose, but not really my style.

      As I walked down the stairs contemplating this poem and whether to go there, I came across the apocalyptic mounds of yellowish cat puke on the area rug that announced my quaint dalliance with Dusky Shore was going to take a back seat for the moment. As the designated early bird in a house full of night owls, I’m faced with such moments more than I care to remember. You either pretend not to see it or grab the paper towels and deal with it. I’ve learned it’s best to tackle the demons head-on and get on with your life. There’s nothing more demonic than cat puke on an area rug.

      I wonder about Robert Bridges, turning from the white foamy sea towards home, shadow walking before. As he opened the door to his humble home, what greeted him? For all the beauty of the prose, every now and then a little cat puke intrudes upon your Rosebud Cottage. It may be unwelcome, but it teaches you a bit about who you are when the moment of bliss is interrupted.

    • Worthy of Good

      “Isn’t it more appropriate for us humans to endure and be strong? We understand, after all, that we suffer for the sake of something good, either to help our friends, to aid our city, to fight on behalf of women or children, or for the most important and weighty reason of all, to be good and just and self-controlled. No one achieves this without pain. And so I conclude that because we humans acquire all good things by pain, the person who is himself unwilling to endure pain all but condemns himself to being worthy of nothing good.” – Musonius Rufus

      Looking back on the last year I wonder at the person I was a year ago, optimistic yet unsure about the pandemic. Working from home all the time was new; different and unfamiliar. A year later, the work is once again taking over. But we’re different, aren’t we? And so is the nature of the work.

      Ultimately, we either do the work or become masters at hiding from it. In general, and over time, this becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy for us. Do the work that matters, harden the softness that threatens your effectiveness and eventually good things will come your way.

      The days fly by when you’re deep in productive and rewarding work. Over the last year there were plenty of days that felt both unproductive and unrewarding. Sometimes you feel that things will never get back to normal. But the rewards are there for those who push through the pain and frustration and loss. Which makes me wonder, have I done enough to be worthy of those rewards? Are we doing enough now?

      If we know we can do more, shouldn’t we?

    • There’s a Tool for That

      Tool collections speak to me. You know what someone has done when they’ve got shelves full of well-used tools. If you’re observant, you can tell when they picked up a certain skill along the way too. I walked into the basement of an older gentleman I know who doesn’t get around much now to change out his dehumidifier. His tool collection was accumulated in the 1950’s through the 1970’s. And it could still do the job today.

      My own collection of tools grows with every to-do list. It took off when I began working construction jobs during college breaks. And then started rigging boats, maintained a temperamental F-150, pulled network cable and finally as a homeowner a few times over. I added an angle grinder last weekend because it’s the only good way to cut vinyl siding. How I’d gone so long without one is a mystery to me, but now it’s handy for the next odd project that requires that certain tool.

      There are some tools you buy in case you need it later. Those tend to grow lonely and still look new years later. Tools shouldn’t be bought on speculation. A tool is best acquired when you’re in need of it. The immediacy of the task demands a quick learning curve, and a lifetime of working towards mastery. Tools patiently wait for you to develop the skills to use it to its potential.

      I don’t ever worry about working, because I could leave my dress clothes behind today and start a small construction business. Or simply work for someone else. There’s always work in the trades, and never enough people willing to roll up their sleeves, grab their tools and get to it. What’s more permanent, the forecast I’m contemplating or the brick patio I laid down in 2006?

      A guy I worked for a long time ago once told me that there was nothing to any profession but learning the tricks of the trade. Every trick is now easily found on YouTube. Mastery is a different story, but you can make that up with time and patience (and a few do-overs). Those projects just need a willing apprentice to tackle them. And, of course, the right tool.

    • Present

      “No one imagines that a symphony is supposed to improve as it goes along, or that the whole object of playing is to reach the finale. The point of music is discovered in every moment of playing and listening to it. It is the same, I feel, with the greater part of our lives, and if we are unduly absorbed in improving them, we may forget altogether to live them.” – Alan Watts

      “For there is never anything but the present, and if one cannot live there, one cannot live anywhere.” – Alan Watts

      There’s no moment to reflect on the present quite like a Monday morning. It informs where you are in meeting the expectations you have for yourself. Looking ahead at the work that must be done, and looking back at where you’ve just been. So how does that symphony sound?

      The last two days flew right by as I worked on my garage doors. If spending your entire weekend in your garage sounds off-putting, I understand. It’s not Paris or a beach in the Caribbean, but mix the focused work of crafting something of lasting value with a greatest hits playlist and suddenly the garage wasn’t such a bad place to linger after all.

      A weekend of accomplishment meets the quiet reset of another week. When you come off the glow of building something of substance, what do you do the next morning? Hidden in that Monday morning to-do list is our purpose and direction (sometimes its really well-hidden).

      Weekends are great, but 72% of our lives is lived between Monday morning and Friday night. Life presents us with a succession of Monday mornings, all asking the same question: How do you like me now? Love the tune or not, it’s your move.

    • The Parking Lot Pop-Up Exhibit

      The impact of the pandemic goes well beyond the health crisis. You can see it in the price and availability in a growing number of items in the store. You can see it in the awkwardness of once commonplace routines like whether to shake hands or have an actual face-to-face meeting with someone. And yesterday, you could see it scattered throughout the parking lot of an orange home improvement store.

      Committed as I was to spending the stack of gift cards on the latest project on the house, I’d foolishly arrived at the store on a Saturday morning thinking I might just get a lumber cart. It seems there is a distinct lack of lumber carts at this location, for as carts are damaged they aren’t repaired but retired permanently. And replacements are apparently hard to come by. So that left people wandering the parking lot like zombies in an apocalypse movie, looking in vain for the one or two lumber carts that might still be available.

      Stubbornly creative in such moments, after two laps of the parking lot and one through the inside of the store, I decided to grab an orange shopping cart and use it instead. I wasn’t getting heavy lumber, I was getting PVC trim boards, I figured. Since weight wasn’t an issue, it was all about balance. And who’s more balanced than me?

      Stacking eight foot PVC trim boards is a simple matter. Adding ten foot trim boards on top of those is also simple. I even positioned the boards in such a manner that the stickers were ready for easy scanning. Fitting them into a car was completely secondary, I’d achieved proper balance on the cart and glided effortlessly through the store. Lost souls still searching for lumber carts nodded in understanding. The laws of the jungle apply in adversity.

      As you might have guessed, this masterpiece worked perfectly on the poured concrete floor of the big box store but didn’t pass muster when I started rolling across the parking lot. Vibration became the primary factor, creating instability, and the entire pile slid gently but uncontrollably forward and right off the cart. I’ve learned not to catch the sliding stack, for there is where injuries occur. I simply waited for the sculpture to speak to me. Luckily a father and son quietly joined me in putting the masterpiece back together again (quiet, but I knew what they were thinking – Wow, this guy is a genius!).

      And then I got the stack to the small SUV and began the process of fitting all of this in. I enjoy a good puzzle now and then. But here is where I missed having a truck. I might get creative with a shopping cart in a store, but the public roads are a different story. Soon I was back in the store purchasing a saw to make it fit just so. You do what you must in this apocalyptic world.

    • Two Sides of the Coin

      The last year highlighted the value of a good home, with a good yard, with good Internet. Having all three was the trifecta. But the last year also reminded us of what we were missing, out there, waiting for quarantines to end.

      For all the bold claims of travel, I keep investing in new projects to fortify the homestead. In a time of amplified real estate frenzy, you either double down or cash out. I keep doubling down with new projects. You invest where you focus most. But always with an eye towards the future. Travel will have its time.

      Many of us are fully vaccinated now and waiting for the world to pivot towards open borders, silently listing the destinations and the vehicles with which to get there. For 2021 I’m contemplating drives across the country instead of flights to the international bucket list. Local mountain peaks and waterfalls remain a priority, with more overnight hiking sprinkled in. Hopefully more time exploring the world from the water. And perhaps, this year, under it.

      In the void, the projects continue. New garage doors sparkle! And point out the requirement for new trim. And of course now something must be done with that front door. The fence project of last year was a beautiful addition! And highlighted where it should have gone to, demanding extension. The garden, the pool, the appliances… everything calls for attention.

      Always time and money. Travel and home each demand the same currencies. And this is the two sides of the coin that I find myself flipping. The coin keeps landing on home at the moment. But things have a way of leveling out… Right?

    • Memories, Like Sunsets

      “You may fancy yourself safe and think yourself strong. But a chance tone of color in a room or a morning sky, a particular perfume that you had once loved and that brings subtle memories with it, a line from a forgotten poem that you had come across again, a cadence from a piece of music that you had ceased to play. I tell you Dorian, that it is on things like these that our lives depend.” – Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

      The subtleties of memory drawn out from the senses alerting us to moments linked forever to that certain smell or that certain song lies dormant in all of us, awaiting the awakening. We never know when something might trigger an old memory. I was listening to a podcast while driving yesterday and the person being interviewed mentioned one moment from his life that triggered a memory of a similar moment in my own life, and the rest of the drive was down memory lane.

      I try to live in the present, with an eye towards the future. Living in the past does us no good. Lingering memories draw you into a different version of yourself, seen through the lens of who you are now. There are parts of the old me that I’m not particularly fond of, and other parts I reflect back on fondly. All of those parts built who I am today, and the me I might be tomorrow.

      Memories aren’t such a bad thing. They keep alive the people and places from our past that might not be with us anymore. They draw a smile out of us in quiet moments of reflection, or poke at us for the foolish behavior we don’t ever want to try again. Memories serve.

      “Loss brings pain. Yes. But pain triggers memory. And memory is a kind of new birth, within each of us. And it is that new birth after long pain, that resurrection – in memory – that, to our surprise, perhaps, comforts us.” – Sue Miller

      So I guess the answer is to live in the present, but embrace the memories when they’re triggered awake by the senses. Memories can be like the lingering glow after the sun sets. Sometimes the afterglow is better than the event itself, but sometimes it’s a continuation of something pretty spectacular. Memories, like sunsets, ought to be celebrated. Even as we look ahead to a new and different future.

    • Making Antibodies

      It turns out the second Pfizer shot beat me up a bit. Between the 20th hour and the 36th hour seems to have been my scheduled antibody manufacturing time. It began with chills, moved to aches, then lightheadedness. And then it sort of went away for a time. It turns out the vaccine was resting up to double down on the wave of suck. Suddenly I couldn’t get warm, then couldn’t stay cool. My body started aching down my right side (where I got the shot) to my lower back.

      And I’d have done it all over again in a second. If the vaccine beat me up like this I have no doubt the virus would have been 10x worse. Which is an admission this tough guy isn’t comfortable making.

      The takeaway is to get your vaccine whenever you’re on deck. Because I’d love to have you stick around for awhile. Because we have celebrations and travel and some version of normal waiting for us.

      So make some antibodies. It might not be as fun as making pizza or love, but it’s a good way to help get us back to where we all want to be. We’re almost there.

    • Reach

      Momentum is about rate of iteration and persistence, not brilliance.

      Luck is a function of surface area.

      In the early days, effective people increase their luck by exposing themselves to more opportunities and more people.

      There’s a reason why successful people tend to be proactive: they’re expanding their reach.

      Reach is a serendipity engine.
      – @Julian

      Anyone who sells anything has stumbled upon the truth of what Julian Shapiro is saying here. It’s profoundly obvious that the more people you reach out to the more you’ll expose yourself to opportunities. The trick has always been finding the right people, and the right opportunities, at the right time. And until you’ve built a network up around yourself and located the 20% of people who will help you the most in life, the more you’ve got to just get out there and play the numbers game.

      Momentum through our rate of iteration and persistence applies to everything we do in life.

      Want to be fit? Do the work, push yourself to do more, be consistent. Repeat.

      Want to speak a different language? Learn the basics and then push your limits. Immerse yourself in a culture where you must stretch yourself to be understood.

      Want to be a great writer? Read more to know what great writing is. Live more to have something to say. Write more to get good at it. Publish more to gain a following. Connect with more people to find the 20% who will help you the most in your career.

      Do more. Expand your reach. Reach is a serendipity engine. Simple. And simply true.

      For people starting their careers, I’d point to these simple @Julian tweets as the core lesson. No need to buy the books, attend the success summits, or watch hours of video. Just do the work, intelligently and persistently, that moves you towards your goal.

      Reach involves a level of discomfort. The very act of reaching implies going beyond your current place. Going beyond your comfort zone. To places of uncertainty and rejection and the unfamiliar. We’ve all felt that when walking into a room where we don’t know anyone. What we forget is that most of the people in that room feel the same way.

      Reach leads to connection.

      So go out on a limb.

      When you continue reaching, the uncomfortable becomes comfortable. Opportunities come up. Friendships and alliances are formed. And you grow in new and unexpected directions.

      So by all means, reach.

    • The Glories of the Journey

      “We must go beyond textbooks, go out into the bypaths and untrodden depths of the wilderness and travel and explore and tell the world the glories of our journey.” – John Hope Franklin

      “On a personal level, [the pandemic is] reminding me that, “Boy, life is short.” Life is precious. And, if you’re dreaming about doing something, there’s no better time than right now, if you can pull it off.” – Rick Steves

      The world is slowly opening up, even as COVID is declaring it’s not quite done with us yet. So where do we go when the world and we are ready? In the United States, the National Parks are already almost fully booked. Everyone is thinking the same way; we must get out there! The next few years are going to be the flood of the masses making up for lost time. Knowing that, where do you find your quiet little corner of Paradise?

      Personally, my vote is the most remote and obscure of destinations. Places where the RV’s can’t reach. Places where exercise and inconvenience are a toll many refuse to pay. The glories of the journey aren’t found elbow to elbow at the railing of the South Rim. They’re found when you hike deep down into the canyon to the silent reverence. When you wake up early and watch the sunlight dance on the canyon walls.

      Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that there are folks jamming into National Parks in record numbers. The more people who see and experience the wonders of the world, the more people will care enough to protect it for future generations. Pack ’em in. Buy the magnets and stickers and t-shirts. When I visit those places I do it too. Just try to peel back the onion a layer or two deeper while you’re there. Find the secret places hiding just around the corner.

      The world has stories to tell us. It’s waiting for the change it will bring to you in that moment of connection between the ancient truth and your current state. Those moments that you’ll bring back to the rest of the world in stories of your own. For we travel out to reach within.