The baseball deflected off the bat, soaring high and out of play. It reached the roof over the grandstand above us, but I suspected it might roll back. It did. I watched as gravity reversed the ball's course and it fell back into the crowd. Hitting the aisle about twenty feet away, it ricocheted wildly off the concrete, and raced through a forest of arms, right toward me. I kept my eye on the ball and relied on the instincts and reflexes honed in my days as a second baseman. I alertly shifted my hands to my left and the ball stuck. I had just caught a foul ball at Wrigley Field on …
You & Improved
You Are Better than Einstein
Believe it or not, you’re actually better than Einstein. I read once that Albert Einstein didn’t know how to swim. And he was a terrible sailor, capsizing his boat so often that locals regularly had to tow him back to shore. It made me feel good to read that. I have never sailed, but I do know how to swim. It’s nice to know that I can do something Einstein couldn’t, and that he stunk at things. Because I spend too much time worrying that I’m not enough. I’m not outgoing enough, smart enough, creative enough, disciplined enough, thin enough, or faithful enough to …
A Moonrise to Remember
I pulled out a notebook and pushed aside the bowl of creamers and the container of jellies. My family was at one of our favorite breakfast spots, our go-to place for celebrating big milestones. This day was decidedly less joyful, however; more of an escape from a nightmare we recently experienced. A few miles away, our house was an island in an apocalyptic landscape. A week before, a hurricane force straight-line wind mutilated an idyllic stand of 150 pine trees into an ugly riot of splintered, uprooted sticks, violently strewn about. Amidst the aftermath, it was hard to imagine …
The Two Zoo Truths
I have an odd experiment I'd love to try someday. I thought of it during a family visit to the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago, after going through a number of exhibits in a row in which the animals were either hidden or off exhibit. (It's hard to tell if the jaguar is sleeping in a corner out of view or at the vet for a check-up.) After a few minutes of fruitless searching, we just shrug our shoulders and head to the next one. So I thought it would be interesting to remove all the animals from every exhibit at a particular zoo. How long would it take for the average visitor to realize that …
Stacking Your Way to Success
Sometimes people look at successes I've had and say, "Must be nice," as if they happened by magic. What they don't often see is the framework that helped enable that success. Fortunately, it's a framework anyone can develop. We often assume that in order to be successful, we need to be great at one thing. That can work—see LeBron James, for example—but that path is extremely difficult and unlikely. The truth is you only need to be pretty good at a handful of ordinary skills. You just need to build a talent stack. Scott Adams, the creator of the comic strip Dilbert, popularized …
The Artful Balance of Dreaming and Doing
When I was a teenager, my mom called me a dreamer. She didn’t mean it as a compliment, but she wasn’t wrong. I've always been idealistic, my head regularly inhabiting the clouds. I’d sing along with John Lennon’s Imagine and revel in the fact that we were soul mates. You’re NOT the only one, John. We’re in this together! I took pride in that side of myself. But when my mom labeled me a dreamer, and I knew it wasn’t a compliment, it got my attention. Of course, my idiot teenage response was, "What does she know?" Eventually, I would relate to Mark Twain, who said, …
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Because You Said So
We recently renovated the rec room in our basement. The transformation mostly consisted of several gallons of paint and some key new decor purchases. In the past, I would have been tasked with the paint job, but this time, we decided to make it a family affair. It was a great idea, mostly because I'd still be working on it — the bead board required four coats alone — but also because it gave us a shared sense of accomplishment and excitement for the finished product. The kids weren't token helpers, either. I managed the trim, but they were involved in everything else. Lucy is fourteen …
Your Life as a Goonie
My family watched The Goonies recently. I've probably seen it a dozen times, as it was a favorite from my childhood. If you haven't seen it, Wikipedia offers this summary: "The Goonies is a 1985 American adventure comedy film co-produced and directed by Richard Donner from a screenplay by Chris Columbus, and based on a story by Steven Spielberg. In the film, a group of kids who live in the 'Goon Docks' neighborhood of Astoria, Oregon, attempt to save their homes from foreclosure and, in doing so, they discover an old treasure map that takes them on an adventure to unearth the long-lost …
A Ridiculously Easy Way to Rekindle a Friendship
"I Just Called to Say I Love You" is a famous Stevie Wonder song. It's also the title of this painting. One word in that title might be more important than all the others. We'll get to that in a sec. When my wife Kim and I were dating, we'd spend hours and hours on the phone, talking late into the night, racking up phone bills that if bound together, would make the longest Harry Potter book look like a pamphlet. This was in the days when phones were attached to walls and the "call waiting" feature was a source of civil war for any siblings also angling for phone rights. My personal …
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The Downside of Doing Things the Regular Way
How do I eat my cereal? The regular way. I pour cereal into a bowl. Then I pour milk over the cereal. Then I eat the cereal, savoring the first bites before said cereal is ruined with sogginess. My wife does it differently. She pours cereal into a bowl. Then she adds the milk. Then she goes on a two-week vacation. Then she eats the cereal. Somehow, we've been married for almost twenty-three years. I recently learned of yet another way to approach this breakfast staple that might be even weirder. I actually met a person who pours the milk in first, before the cereal. She …
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