Random Thoughts from a Restless Mind

Sunday musings…

1) Time. “Keep the rally going and you defeat time.” Roger Angell.

2) Travel. Once again I was blown away by the generosity of the Crossfit community and Crossfit Affiliate owners. “The Heir”, Lil’bingo, and I were the guests of Mark and Crossfit Cape Cod for a vacation WOD on Thursday. As always we identified ourselves as experienced Crossfitters, but as the call was made by “The Heir”, we were NOT identified as Clan bingo. We were welcomed as old friends and without asking given a discount on the drop-in rate. Classy and classic.

I travel a bit, and I like to visit Crossfit gyms when I do. I always ask to pay, and I always ask if I will make a class too crowded. Even before identifying myself I am always welcomed and rarely asked for the drop-in fee. Talking with other Crossfitters this seems to be the norm.

We are a generous, tightly knit lot, we Crossfitters. We assume goodwill on the part of our CF brethren. In general Crossfit brings out more of our good qualities than our less than good. Heartfelt thanks once again to Mark, his bride, and the good people of Crossfit Cape Cod for another great CF experience!

3) First up. Where are you on the birth order in your family? Mrs. bingo and I are both first born. If you have children where do they lie in the birth order of the grandchildren? Again, our first two are the first of 10. It’s almost a cartoon, a caricature, how similar our experience is probably to any of yours who share this seemingly trivial trait.

Your parents got you fully assembled without an owner’s manual. Your were their grand experiment. It was a “Goldilocks” process for them, too. You know, too strict, too loose, just right. They got all kinds of “help” raising you, too. Lots of folks are pretty darned sure of how you should do this kid raising thing until they find themselves drowning in the process themselves.

Here’s the deal: “I told you so” is possibly the cruelest blow you could ever rain down on all of your “advisors” when they find themselves awash in the ebb and flow of their own parenting chores. It’s just as hard for them as it was for you, of that you can be sure. If you’ve done a pretty good job with your progeny simply hope all of those helpful color commentators were paying attention.

Be kind.

4) Want/need. Again. Up and down the fortunes go. Some stay inexorably above the “want” threshold, while for others there are dips into the realm of need. Me? Flip-flopping like a fish on the deck, up and down across the divide. How’s that going? Pretty well, actually.

It’s instructive to watch others as they struggle with this. Instructive, but also sometimes quite painful. A series of mishaps or setbacks can leave the heretofore comfortable in a ragged state of shock, so close to the “need” level that it feels as if “need” isn’t being met. The reality is that almost all of us are actually quite far removed from the real “need” threshold, but that doesn’t make the vector of the movement any less traumatic.

Some of this is reflective of expectations, what our folks would have called “counting your chickens before they’re hatched.” The bonus or raise or promotion didn’t come. That 100 member milestone is still out there on the horizon, too many months after the proforma said it would make landfall. It’s the “lottery syndrome”: we spend today as if it were already the tomorrow we are hoping to live.

Be clear-eyed in evaluating your status. Only kid yourself for fun. Want what you have. Enjoy what you have. Mrs. bingo has beaten this into me, on the way up, and also on the way down, and she’s always been right.

I’ve always had enough.

I’ll see you next week…

Posted by bingo at August 7, 2011 8:25 AM

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