Inigo: Hello there! Slow going?
Dread Pirate Roberts: Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but this is not as easy as it looks, so I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t distract me.
Inigo: Sorry.
Dread Pirate Roberts: Thank you.
Inigo: I do not suppose you could a-speed things up?
Dread Pirate Roberts: If you’re in such a hurry, you could lower a rope or a tree branch or find something useful to do.
Inigo: I could do that. I still got some rope up here, but I do not think you would accept my help, since I am only waiting around to kill you.
Dread Pirate Roberts: That does put a damper on our relationship.
Inigo: But, I promise I will not kill you until you reach the top.
Dread Pirate Roberts: That’s very comforting, but I’m afraid you’ll just have to wait.
Inigo: I hate waiting.
I once wanted to sell a car. I had a friend who was a car salesman. I gave him the details, and he offered to list it for me. I think he listed it at $5,000.
My problem was I needed the money quickly. I went to talk to him about the timing.
Just be patient Rodney. It will sell.
Is there any way to make it sell faster?
Sure.
Okay, how?
Just lower the price. It would sell today for $4,000.
And that’s how I lost $1,000 selling my car.
I understood what I was doing. I really needed the money and sad as it is to say, it was worth the extra money to get the cash sooner. My friend was happy to help. He was going to sell the car for me for free. As it was, he made an extra thousand dollars. (I presume. I didn’t actually ask him what he got for the car.)
Long time readers of this site know that I used to have a car named Ironman, or as the license plate said IRONMN.Unfortunately, IRONMN had to go. But, I kept the custom wheels I purchased for him. They don’t fit my current car. I finally decided to sell them. Of course, they are no where near what I paid for them. I think they were about $1000.
I recently listed them on Facebook Marketplace for $120. That was for all four of them. . .plus the tires. It’s okay. The tires have wear on them and the rims served me well and have some minor scrapes and fading. It’s a fair price.
Fair, but not lowball. Fair but also not too high. I’ve had the wheels listed for several weeks. If you list something on Marketplace, interested buyers can ping you with a message,
Is this still available?
It’s encouraging, right? It’s like fishing when the line giggles a little. It’s not a bite, it’s a nibble. It’s tempting when you feel that slight tug on the line to immediately start to pull on line. If you do, you’ll lose the fish.
No, you have to be patient. . .a lot of patient.
Good things come to those who wait. Only those things left by those who hurry.
The early bird gets the worm. But, the second mouse gets the cheese.
Patience is hard to learn. Sometimes it’s impossible. But, typically the amount you are willing to wait translates into better bargining positions.
It’s been weeks. And while I would like the $120 for the wheels, they’ve been sitting in my backyard for quite over a year. I can wait.
Tomorrow I am meeting a guy. He wants the rims. . .probably. If not, I can afford to be patient.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
Rodney, I noticed you typically take off around 3:00. Why is that?
Well, I generally start at 7:00.
Yeah, I know. Kind of early isn’t it?
Depends on where you’re at.
Global business, global economy, yesterday I talked about global virus.
The world is getting smaller and getting bigger. When does the day start? Dolly Parton did a song called “9-5.” It was about a typical work day. Those times have even permeated our culture. Alan Jackson has a song called, “It’s 5 o’clock Somewhere.”
But, does the day really start at 9? Does it end at 5?
Dr. Bob Niedorf : Answer as quickly as you can… how old is a man born in 1928?
George Malley : Still alive?
Dr. Bob Niedorf : If a man is born in 1928, and he’s still alive, how old is he?
George Malley : What month?
Dr. Bob Niedorf : If a man was born October 3rd, 1928, and he’s still alive, how old is he?
George Malley : What time?
Dr. Bob Niedorf : 10 o’clock… PM!
George Malley : Where?
Dr. Bob Niedorf : Anywhere!
George Malley : Well, let’s get specific, Bob! I mean, if the guy’s still alive, born in California, October 3rd, 1928, 10 PM, he’s 67 years, 9 months, 22 days, 14 hours, and…
[takes Bob’s hand to see his wristwatch]
… and 12 minutes. If he was born in New York, he’s 3 hours older, now isn’t he?
– Touchstone Pictures “Phenomenon”
And even if the day does start at nine, 9:00 where? Your time zone? New York time? California? Toyko? Sydney?
Most middle and senior IT managers are salaried employees. That means that we get paid by the day. Work 5 minutes and you get paid for the whole day. Work 12 hours and you get paid for the whole day. So, if you are working with teams all across teh US or all across the globe, your day might “start” with a conference call from Manila at 4:00 AM and “end” with a conference call with London at 8:00 PM.
And since you are salary, you get paid for the entire day. All 16 hours of it.
What do you do about it? One option is to insist that “I put in my 8 hours and everything else will have to wait until tomorrow.” I don’t think I’ve ever heard an IT person, salaried or not, make that statement. If someone had that attitude, they’d go into a different line of work. I’ve seen desktop engineers that literally worked themselves to the point of exhaustion. I do not recommend it. In fact, it’s often one of the things managers have to guard against their teams doing.
How do you do it? How do you figure out when to start and end your day? Often it’s governed by the job. You put in the time that is needed. But, you also figure out when to not put in the time.
You have to deliberately choose to step away at times. Sometimes that means sleeping in the middle of the day because you were up all night on an outage. Sometimes it means taking time in the middle of the day to attend a kid’s soccer game. And sometimes, it just means hanging up your apron at 5:00 pm.
After all, it’s five o’clock somewhere.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
Kerry, do you think anyone will object to our training being scheduled the same time as the CEO broadcast?
I don’t think so.
Okay, by me.
You realize that a worldwide CEO broadcast is the most expensive meeting you will ever be part of?
What do you mean?
Well, if you look at how many thousands of people will be attending and then you figure the cost of all those people, the hour long broadcast is the most expensive meeting you will ever be part of.
Never thought of it that way.
Ultimately, the people who were scheduled to attend the training, didn’t join. None of us were actually in the same room. Many of us were even in different countries. Most of us were dialing in from home.
Since the training was rescheduled, I joined the CEO broadcast. We are a worldwide company. I have no idea where the CEO was broadcasting from. I’m not even sure aht country he was broadcasting from.
And yet, I was as comfortable in the meeting if he were sitting in an office in Salt Lake City. Even if he’d been in Salt Lake City, I would have been dialing in from my office on the other side of town from our management office building.
But, instead I was logging in from home. I was completely connected to all the tools I needed, email, Microsoft Teams, the Zoom software that was hosting the conference.
The CEO holds regularly scheduled broadcasts. It’s something I like about my company. While it’s a worldwide organization, the company works very hard to promote a family atmosphere. And that starts with the CEO.
So I settled into a PowerPoint slideshow about success, challenges, competitive market forces. The presentations are always informative, enjoyable and occasionally funny as the CEO who is not a native English speaker will use his sharp whit to keep the mood light.
As his presentation was wrapping up he addressed the Coronavirus. As I said, we are a worldwide company. We are a telecommunications company. We have call centers, all over the world. From a few hundred to over a thousand agents in each center. Obviously, the health of our employees is a great concern.
The CEO talked about the efforts we are making as a company to keep our employees safe while also keeping our business running.
And I realized as I looked around my office, that what I had seen as a convenience I now saw as a part of a larger corporate effort that could help our company.
The virus is affecting businesses all around the world. I realized how fortunate I was to have a job that I could do completely from home.
Wherever you are working, I hope that you stay safe from the virus and that the scientists and the World Health Organization can find a vaccine or cure quickly.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
Today’s post is just a picture. The thing is, the picture, as near as I can tell, only exists in my head. It exists somewhere or at least it did. I saw it long enough ago that I can’t remember when I saw it, but recently enough that I can remember the image.
The image centers around a deer. He’s obviously an old buck. He has a nice rack of antlers. He’s standing on a hill. Down below him, are two young fawns playing in the middle of a moutain road. Off in the distance, visible to the buck, but hidden from the fawns, a car is headed their way.
The caption reads “How can he warn them?”
The message, of course, is the idea that the buck, oh, let’s call him the dad just because I’m a dad, understands the danger. He’s seen it before. Maybe he’s even had kids hit by cars in the past. If he could only convince the fawns to leave the road, he can save their lives.
But, the fawns, probably teenagers, don’t need him to warn them about anything. They are convinced that they have it all figured out. And they don’t see the danger. In fact, they don’t have a word to describe the danger.
What is this thing called “car?” Or “truck?” Or “Stopping distance?” Or “reaction time?”
Okay, maybe the dad deer might not understand those terms either, but many dad’s understand those terms and others as well.
The problem with the poster is that it asks the question, but it doesn’t provide any answer.
And having been a dad for years, I can tell you that after all these years, I still don’t know how to warn them.
That’s why I decided today I wasn’t going to write anything. Just post that picture, or meme if will.
Sorry to not offer any context around the picture, but it’s just that kind of a day.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
Conan O’Brien, the talk show host, will someday be forgotten. That was the point of an article I recently read. And since he’s going to be forgotten anyway, he shouldn’t worry about leaving a legacy. In fact, Conan himself has suggested he won’t have a “grand finale” show when his time is done. Again, no lasting legacy, so no point.
With all due respect to the funnyman, he’s wrong.
It’s true that very few of us will have an impact that will be remembered beyond our own lives. There were hundreds of musicians in the 18th century. A quick view of wikipedia shows dozens from multiple countries. And yet, how many do you know?
Mozart? Sure. Beethovan? Of course. Vivaldi? Yes. Salieri? Ah. . .he was in that movie, right? Anyone else? Umm. . .
We could do the same thing with painters, or sculptors, or storytellers. Do you think Homer was the only writer in ancient Greece? Or that Shakespeare and Ben Johnson were the only playwrights in 16th century England?
Each of these men (and, of course, there were famous women through history) left a legacy. They created art that will last through the ages. And the same continues today. American presidents will be remembered as long as there is an America.
The Beatles will be remembered as long as there is music.
So, we should each attempt to rise to the level of Beatles, or Mozart or Van Gogh or Shakespeare? No.
(Yes, I know Van Gogh was never famous during his lifetime. That’s the point.)
Van Gogh wasn’t worried about a legacy. Neither were the Beatles. In fact, one of the issues that John Lennon had with Paul McCartney, was Lennon’s feeling that the Beatle’s music was not transcendental of other genres.
But, each of these artists was trying to create their very best work. They were not focused on legacy, they were focused on their art.
What does that have to do with you? After all, you may not be a painter, or a writer, or a musician. You might not think you have any artistic ability. And you don’t need to.
But, you are a father, or a brother, or a project manager, or a bus driver or a fisherman, or a talk show host. You can attempt to do your best in whatever role you choose.
Many years ago, I worked for WordPerfect corporation, I needed some dentist work done. I needed a lot of dental work done. I decided to wear a suit to the dentist. There was no specific reason. I just wanted to make my dentist appointments unique.
It was unusual to wear a suit to work at WordPerfect. Typicaly you only did it when you had a job interview. No matter how much I insisted to people that I only had a dentist appointment, they were convinced that I was interviewing for another job.
Years later, I was working for a non-profit in Utah. One of our coworkers showed up in a suit one day. Again, it was not a place that many wore suits. Another coworker said, “So, got a dentist appointment?”
They had no idea where the phrase came from. And they had no idea that I was the origin of that story. In fact, they didn’t even know there was a story at all. Just the reference to a dentist appointment.
I was not attempting to leave a legacy when I was dressing up for those dentist appointments.
I will admit that this was a somewhat silly and very inconsequential legacy. And it is by no means the only legacy I hope I leave.
Do you know if you had relatives living in the 18th century? Or the 15th?
It’s a silly question. Of course you had relatives who lived througout every century. Will you be forgotten years from now? Most likely. Will your works live on? Absolutely. The Internet is forever. A story you write will remain. A stupid youtube video you create will remain.
And if you are fortunate enough to have children, they, and their children and their children will always have you to look back on. Not on the life you try to make for eternity, but on the life you make today.
So, I don’t think we should be obsessed wiht our legacy. But, we should certainly understand that we are making one. We make it everyday by the choices we make, the things we do and the places we go. . .even if it’s just to the dentist.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
We’ve all seen them, right? The car pulled off to the side of the freeway. Maybe the hood is up. Maybe the flashers are on. Maybe there’s someone sitting on the ground, or in the car if it’s rainy or dark. Sometimes the cars are abandoned.
Perhaps you drive past them without a thought. Maybe you glance to make sure that no one is injured and then continue on. I’ve started to see those cars in a whole different light. A personal light.
My word of the year this year is Grateful. I’ve been exploring what that meant. Yesterday I talked about the things about my job that make me grateful.
But, we can find gratitude, like the hand of God, in everything if we look for it. I find gratitude when I see a car broken down on the side of the road.
This was me in April 2015.
My car died on the side of the road. I didn’t know how serious it was at the time. Turns out it was pretty serious. We, my neighbor and I, ended up rebuilding nearly the entire engine. It was a weeks long job that taught me a lot about cars.
One of the thigns I learned about cars is that I enjoy working on my cars, but I don’t really trust my mechanic. Maybe it’s like watching the sausage being made.
Maybe you know that there are shocks that connect your axles to the rest of the car. There’s four of course. And the entire weight of the car is resting on those four shocks. I once had to replace the shocks on my car. Turns out those shocks, that are holding up your entire car are secured by three bolts. That’s it. And not great big lug nut type bolts. No, three fairly medium sized bolts, and gravity hold it together.
I drove very timidly during in the weeks after I swapped out my shocks. I mean, three bolts!
So, when I’m driving down the freeway, and I feel my car “lurch” I get a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. Is it just a bad spot on the road? Or is it the engine going out? Or is it one of those three bolts failing? (The last one is not really an worry. More of an irrational fear.)
And I drive old cars, so the chances that some critical part of the car will fail while on the freeway at 70 MPH is not outside the realm of possibility.
So, why am I grateful when I see a car broken down on the side of the road?
This might sound insensitive, but I’m glad it’s not me. In fact, I will often say,
There’s someone who’s having a worse day than me.
And that’s something to be grateful for.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
My brother, Richard Bliss, is a social media expert. His job is to help others, especially senior managers, to effectively use social media to build their brands and craft effective messages. He works independently, for himself.
My friend, Howard Tayler, is an award winning Cartoonist. Twenty years ago, he left corporate life to become a fulltime artist. He works independently, for himself.
I have another friend, David Wolverton. He’s a New York Times bestselling author. Thirty years ago, Dave started writing books. He’s a teacher and a mentor to many. He works independently, for himself.
Each man crafted a job for himself. He built the job he wanted. You would think that having created their jobs themselves, that their job would perfect.
I know that each man enjoys his job and his career. But, I also know that none of them have “perfect” jobs.
There is no perfect job. Jobs are jobs. Sometimes (hopefully most times) they are enjoyable. Sometimes, it’s enough that they are endurable. Sometimes, they are unbearable.
My friend Howard, started “doodling” as he called it, when he was working for Novell. In the year 2000 he became a fulltime cartoonist. You would think that Howad had it wonderful now. His advocation had become his vocation.
Find a job you love and you’ll never work another day in your life.
– Mark Twain
Mr Twain was wrong. Work is work. A funny thing happened after Howard took to cartooning fulltime. He found he needed a hobby. His hobby had become his job and now “fun” was no longer fun. He opted for painting miniature figures. And he’s still drawing comics, twenty years later.
My brother, has been independent for the past year. He used to write a lot on social media. Now it’s his job. And he doesn’t write for enjoyment much any more. (I suggested he get a hobby.)
So, what makes a great job? I’ve been thinking a lot about gratitude this year. And a great job is one that you can certainly be grateful for. My job is one that I’ve done for years. And I’m really good at it. I’m grateful to have a job I’m good at.
My job let’s me work from home at times. With some health challenges, that’s something I’m certainly grateful for.
I got involved with computers at an early age. Early in the life of the PC and early in my life. One of the advantages of working with PCs is the fact that it’s “inside” work. This is a blessing to be grateful for during Utah’s winters.
I work with people from all across the United States and the Philippines. And yet, I can do nearly everything I need to do from my home office, or my office at work. That’s a blessing I’m grateful for.
And I also travel occasionally. Our centers are located in some historic and often beautiful places. I get to spend time in these places. That’s also something I am grateful for.
Is my job perfect? Not at all.
Is it a great job, one I can be grateful for? Absolutely.
Hopefully, yours is too.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
I remember reading a story as a young man. It involved an overweight, out of shape kid who for some reason joined the track team. In his first practice, he lined up with the rest of the runners. At the command to run, he sprinted with all of his might. The race was close, but at the 100 yard mark, amazingly he was the winner.
As he collapsed on the ground, he was surprised to see the other runners continuing around the track. They were running the mile race. The coach had used him to pace them for the first hundred yards.
Sisyphus, was cursed by the Greek god Zeus with constantly pushing a boulder up a hill in Hades only to have it roll back down again. He had to do this forever. (Never a good idea to make an enemy of Zeus.)
James Woods plays Hades in the Disney cartoon Hercules. Woods also plays a character named Gabriel Caine in the movie Diggs Town. The key conflict of the movie is that a boxer, played by Lou Gossett JR, has to fight ten boxers back to back. One of the boxers never enters the ring. As the tenth boxer is carried from the ring, Lou Gossett JR is completely spent. The opposing manager asks when he is ready to face the tenth fighter. Confused, his opponent reminds him that the one who failed to enter the ring doesn’t count. And now Lou Gossett JR must face another fresh fighter after he thought he was done.
Just watching it made me exhausted.
In the classic movie, The Hustler, staring Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason, Newman battles Gleason’s Minnasota Fats character all night long in a back and forth battle playing games of pool. Finally, in the morning, as both men are exhausted, they take a break. Newman collapses in his chair. Gleason leaves and then comes back in a freshly pressed shirt and clean-shaven ready to go again. Newman’s character was already beat at that point.
Each of these stories explores the psychology of constant stress. Of thinking you are done, only to find that you are at the beginning.
I don’t have any impressive business lesson tie-ins. I was just thinking this week that I’m really tired of pushing that rock. The next fighter stepping into the ring looks like a monster. I’m never going to catch those runners and I don’t want to shoot another game of pool.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
My lovely wife’s favorite painter is Thomas Kincaid. To some people that’s like saying your favorite chef is Chef Boyardee. Or your favorite band is The Monkees. Or your favorite super hero is anyone except The Batman.
If you are unfamiliar with Kincaid’s work, he’s known as “The Painter of Light.” Of course, he gave himself that name. He was great at self promotion. He was known for paintings of buildings with bright lights coming out of the windows. His critics say they all look like they are on fire.
Anyway, my lovely wife very much likes his work. She has a framed galley print, a clock, several ceramic tiles with is pictures on them, and most recently got some puzzles of his work.
The box she got had three puzzles. A 100 piece puzzle, a 550 piece puzzle and a 700 piece puzzle. The box came from a second hand store, so she was concerned there might be some pieces missing.
First we put together the 100 piece puzzle. It was of a sailboat. All 100 pieces were there. She very carefully put the pieces into a ziplock bag. She then immediately added the pieces from the 700 piece puzzle on top of them.
Yes, it was a mistake. Fortunately it was not my mistake.
We started putting together the 550 piece puzzle. It’s a picture of a cabin in the woods. There’s a nearby campfire and magestic blue mountains soar in the background. The cabin looks like it’s on fire inside.
It takes a while to put together a 550 piece puzzle. Especially when it’s a painting all full of greys and browns and I-don’t-know-maybe-it’s-really-greens.
The picture was on our living room table for several days. My lovely wife, my daughter and I each contributed to getting it put together.
When it was about 3/4 of the way done, I looked at the remaining pieces. It didn’t seem like there was enough room to fit all the remaining pieces into the space that was remaining.
Puzzles are like that, of course. Every piece has a place and no two pieces can be exchanged. You must get them exactly right. And the most efficient form to store the pieces is to fit them all together. If you don’t have it exactly together correctly, the pieces not only take more space, they are messy.
If you read the title of this piece, you know that this is the point at which I try to use the pizzle as a metaphor. You could think of it as,
When you finally get your life together it will come together as perfectly as a puzzle.
Or maybe,
Every single piece of your life is important and without any aspect, you will be incomplete.
I’m not actually going to try to make that point. No. Instead, I’m going with,
Life is messy. And we are never as efficient as we can be.
In business we strive for efficiency. There are entire disciplines devoted to it. Six Sigma, for example, is practice devoted to studying processes and removing inefficencies.
In my current role, my goal is 100% system availability every month. If our systems are less than 100% efficient, we risk paying penalties. When we originally wrote the contract with our client we built in a budget for a certain amount of penalties in a given year. The idea is that no matter how efficient we become, there were going to be setbacks. There were going to be times where either because of human error, or systems failing, we would be less than 100%.
And that’s the lesson of the puzzles. We might stive to get all the pieces in place, to get everything to fit inside the edge pieces (because, of course we put those together first.) But, real life isn’t like that. Any active system, be it computers, or our lives is messy.
I’ve been a speaker at two funerals over the past few years. I spoke at my father’s funeral and I spoke at my uncles funeral. When my dad passed, there were pieces of his story that no one knew. Apparently he ran away and joined the circus. He’d never talked about it. None of us knew any of the details. His puzzle, while complete, had some holes in it.
My uncle died while out riding his Harley for “the last ride of the season.” He died of a heart attack after pulling over to call his sister. We knew a lot of his story. His puzzle was nearly 100% complete.
But, in both cases, the puzzle was done. The pieces that weren’t put together were lost forever.
But, for us, the living, the pieces keep moving around. For computers, we are constantly updating systems. Daily we increase and decrease the load on the system. Only when the system is comletely offline are the puzzle pieces static.
That’s the real lesson of the puzzles. It’s not an attempt to make life perfect, every piece in its place. Instead it’s about creating the picture of what we want our life to be.
It will be static and “done” soon enough.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
Tell your friends about this!
This is my valentine.
This picture is many years ago. This is what my lovely wife looked like just a couple years after I met her. It’s my favorite picture of her. It pulls my mind back almost 40 years. But, my trip back to our youth isn’t accomplished all at once.
Instead I travel back slowly. I start just a few weeks back, making shelves to hold her picture and that of our kids.
I slip back a little further to children’s graduations. A daughter from University of Utah surrounded by her own children and friends. A daughter from Pleasant Grove high school. Back a few months more. Eagle Scout projects. (The mother’s pin isn’t nearly big enough.)
Travel to hospitals to welcome grandchildren. One little girl so ill that she was life-flighted to Primary Childrens Hospital in Salt Lake City. She spent months in the Neonatal ICU. He’s home, healthy and happy.
Before that, travel to foreign lands to welcome home children.
There were sad moments too. The premature death of our oldest grandson, and a heartbreaking tiny casket carried lovingly in his father’s arms.
Times spent in courtrooms. Adoptions? Sure. But, some less happy times. Trying to help children make good decisions and correct from bad ones.
Travelling back further, there’s the birth of three or our children. How small our family seemed then. Large at the time, of course. Our children outnumbered us!
And back even more. To when it was just the two of us. Two crazy kids trying starting out in life. But, being together.
And before that? Fear. Fear that this wonderful woman, barely more than a girl, won’t say yes.
And that brings me all the way back to this picture. First meeting. Teenagers. Saying and doing teenager things.
Yes, I love this picture. Because I love the story. The long winding story that has been told and retold over the years and decades.
Happy Valentines day. Today and every day.
Rodney M Bliss is an author, columnist and IT Consultant. His blog updates every weekday. He lives in Pleasant Grove, UT with his lovely wife, thirteen children and grandchildren.
Follow him on
Twitter (@rodneymbliss)
Facebook (www.facebook.com/rbliss)
LinkedIn (www.LinkedIn.com/in/rbliss)
or email him at rbliss at msn dot com(c) 2020 Rodney M Bliss, all rights reserved
