The Golden-Plated Rule
I’ve been trying to think of a name for this for a couple hours now, on and off (between fits of debugging on Maven). I’m trying to capture the feeling I get when driving around Gainesville, FL…if you’ve ever been out on a Friday afternoon around the mall, you’ll know what I’m talking about. This is somewhere near the opposite of the golden rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. The golden rule doesn’t really apply in the impersonal aspects of life in Gainesville. I suspect that’s true of impersonal interactions all over, but this is the place where I really notice it. Driving in rush hour in Kansas City gives you a hint of this flavor, but here it’s liberally applied. The rule in effect here is the cynic’s version of the golden rule, and it reads something closer to this: Do unto others as those bastards would do unto you (if they had the chance). Honestly. I actually saw something I didn’t know was possible ...
Posted on March 21, 2008 4:57:35 PM EDT
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Living a More Intentional Life
Last night and again this morning, I snapped out of the preoccupations of my day to discover that I was brushing my teeth. Here’s a little insight into my personality: it’s a good thing I always do things like brush my teeth in the same way every time, or I probably would have started over again with parts I’d already brushed, and become preoccupied again. I might still be there now, were it not for the extreme ritualistic approach I take to these things. Later this morning, over breakfast, Emily mentioned a blog she’d discovered where the author and her family were trying to live for a year without making any unnecessary purchases. Apparently, she talked at length about the things they’d taken to Goodwill that had been sitting in boxes for 15 years, and how it had made her realize the junk quality of the items in many of the stores we flock to. This is all paraphrasing, of course. That conversation, in turn, reminded me of the book I’m just finishing: Big Box Swindle. In ...
Posted on March 21, 2008 11:22:49 AM EDT
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