One way to cope: Have you ever stood in a line when you weren't sure what the line was for?
I was in Chicago for work in October, 1987. I head downtown because there is a Tom Waits show that night. I get my ticket, which turns out to be in the second row. Wow! Someone from the media isn't showing up. But, now I have time to kill. I walk a few blocks and find a line for a movie I haven't seen. It turns out to be the first run of Fatal Attraction. The crowd was more into the movie than any show I have been to, short of Rocky Horror Picture Show. I take that back. The reaction to Fatal Attraction, screams and all, right at Halloween, is sincere. This isn't contrived. This movie is getting to people. I go to see Tom Waits. It's a cool show, too. Midway in the performance, Tom opens a refrigerator which has been on the stage the entire set. He takes out and drinks a beer, the only item in the fridge. Classic.
In May, 1989, I wander back into the Chicago air and find another long line. I get into it. What's going on? Mayor Bill Daley waves at the crowd as he approaches a theater in a limo. He taunts those of us waiting in line. "I'm getting in. You're not!" By the time I reach the front of the line, I actually have a ticket. Evidently, tickets were free, though admission to Letterman is not guaranteed. I have a view of the doors as they close, leaving me in the overflow outside. I wander off for a sandwich. I return to the back side of the theater. Larry "Bud" Melman" is by a stage entrance saying hello to everyone while people (and animals) who had been onstage reenact "stupid pet tricks" that worked, or didn't. Would being inside the theater have been any better?*
I always kept myself entertained when I visited Chicago for work. Sometimes, it was merely by finding a line to stand in when I was out of town on business with nothing more to do.
What I have written is the attention-seeking introduction. The advice per the above is that you could do worse than to wait in a line long and see what happens. You can certainly fill time that way. Depending on your interests, you could easily find that time to be wasted and meaningless, but likely not. Dale Carnegie advised to keep busy.
A senior VP at my company advised us all to take whatever role was assigned, then eventually we will be put in charge, because he said, "That's what I did." Don't think. Wait in line.
My advice is different, though.
The coping mechanism I fall back on is to write. That is how I coped when Grandma Focht died during Thanksgiving break of college.
When my father's wife and step-daughter were murdered by the son-in-law leaving behind four young children, I did lots of writing that month.
When I left my engineering career a year later, I even joined a Writer's Group.
What with political upheaval, a novel coronavirus, police racism and brutality, and the burned down buildings blocks away, there is plenty to write about now. There is plenty to think about, plenty to process.
When I write, somehow a dose of raw emotion leaves and this bullet of irrationality is replaced by a dose of unemotional thought. What I write I have to believe. What I believe, I have to support with evidence. What I can't support with evidence just needs to leave my mind. I think Kurt Vonnegut might have written Slaughterhouse-Five for similar reasons. Though Vonnegut wrote mostly fiction, personal experiences were at the heart of it. What's left over in my mind might be mundane. At least, it is supportable truth.
Babies cry. Adults rant and rave. But, somehow when I write, I can tell when I am crying or ranting or raving and then I need to re-edit to a reality that I can justify to myself is honest truth.
That is my advice for those hoping to always be regarded as sane. That is my go-to coping mechanism.
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* I actually had tickets a Letterman show mailed to me in Iowa during the month I moved to Woodbury in April, 1988. I ended up Fed Ex'ing those tickets to my step-sister in Brooklyn Hts. since I had no time to arrange the travel due to the delay of the mail. I never saw Letterman, though it was almost twice. Nonetheless, what I did see live in New York, a 1990 SNL episode is hard to top.
I was in Chicago for work in October, 1987. I head downtown because there is a Tom Waits show that night. I get my ticket, which turns out to be in the second row. Wow! Someone from the media isn't showing up. But, now I have time to kill. I walk a few blocks and find a line for a movie I haven't seen. It turns out to be the first run of Fatal Attraction. The crowd was more into the movie than any show I have been to, short of Rocky Horror Picture Show. I take that back. The reaction to Fatal Attraction, screams and all, right at Halloween, is sincere. This isn't contrived. This movie is getting to people. I go to see Tom Waits. It's a cool show, too. Midway in the performance, Tom opens a refrigerator which has been on the stage the entire set. He takes out and drinks a beer, the only item in the fridge. Classic.
In May, 1989, I wander back into the Chicago air and find another long line. I get into it. What's going on? Mayor Bill Daley waves at the crowd as he approaches a theater in a limo. He taunts those of us waiting in line. "I'm getting in. You're not!" By the time I reach the front of the line, I actually have a ticket. Evidently, tickets were free, though admission to Letterman is not guaranteed. I have a view of the doors as they close, leaving me in the overflow outside. I wander off for a sandwich. I return to the back side of the theater. Larry "Bud" Melman" is by a stage entrance saying hello to everyone while people (and animals) who had been onstage reenact "stupid pet tricks" that worked, or didn't. Would being inside the theater have been any better?*
I always kept myself entertained when I visited Chicago for work. Sometimes, it was merely by finding a line to stand in when I was out of town on business with nothing more to do.
What I have written is the attention-seeking introduction. The advice per the above is that you could do worse than to wait in a line long and see what happens. You can certainly fill time that way. Depending on your interests, you could easily find that time to be wasted and meaningless, but likely not. Dale Carnegie advised to keep busy.
A senior VP at my company advised us all to take whatever role was assigned, then eventually we will be put in charge, because he said, "That's what I did." Don't think. Wait in line.
My advice is different, though.
The coping mechanism I fall back on is to write. That is how I coped when Grandma Focht died during Thanksgiving break of college.
When my father's wife and step-daughter were murdered by the son-in-law leaving behind four young children, I did lots of writing that month.
When I left my engineering career a year later, I even joined a Writer's Group.
What with political upheaval, a novel coronavirus, police racism and brutality, and the burned down buildings blocks away, there is plenty to write about now. There is plenty to think about, plenty to process.
When I write, somehow a dose of raw emotion leaves and this bullet of irrationality is replaced by a dose of unemotional thought. What I write I have to believe. What I believe, I have to support with evidence. What I can't support with evidence just needs to leave my mind. I think Kurt Vonnegut might have written Slaughterhouse-Five for similar reasons. Though Vonnegut wrote mostly fiction, personal experiences were at the heart of it. What's left over in my mind might be mundane. At least, it is supportable truth.
Babies cry. Adults rant and rave. But, somehow when I write, I can tell when I am crying or ranting or raving and then I need to re-edit to a reality that I can justify to myself is honest truth.
That is my advice for those hoping to always be regarded as sane. That is my go-to coping mechanism.
------------------------------------------------------
* I actually had tickets a Letterman show mailed to me in Iowa during the month I moved to Woodbury in April, 1988. I ended up Fed Ex'ing those tickets to my step-sister in Brooklyn Hts. since I had no time to arrange the travel due to the delay of the mail. I never saw Letterman, though it was almost twice. Nonetheless, what I did see live in New York, a 1990 SNL episode is hard to top.
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