David & the Gold Medal GOLIATH!

This is an old post I found in my drafts box that somehow never made it to the blog.  It was originally dated Jan.10, 2010.  I have since ended up as the demo-dummy on a couple other occasions, one of which I will dedicate another post to another day.  

Wednesday night I wrestled Rulon Gardner. Chest to chest, shoulder to shoulder, forehead to forehead, sweaty shirt to sweaty shirt, groping for writst control. Okay, so really I was the biggest guy on the mat next to Rulon who's got to be 400+ pounds, and he just rag dolled me as his demo-dummy, but still, I wrestled Rulon Gardner.

I'll never forget his Gold Medal win against Aleksandr Karelin at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games. "Karelin broke his grip..." Rulon's huge smile and the biggest cartwheel in Olympic history are as vivid in my mind's eye as the day they were first planted there. 

The lesson of the day was "drop your ass"  to find your power.  In the last move of the day I ended up pressed into the cage with Rulon's shoulder in the middle of my chest and his stubbly head grinding into my chin (the position he had achieved by dropping his ass).  Once grounded in place and with all his weight on my sternum he commanded, "Now move!"  I more or less flailed and tried to refill my lungs with air each time I was lucky enough to get him to shift his weight.

Such a remarkable thing to be on the receiving end of that kind of power.  His strength and speed, despite his girth is other-worldly.  

"Writing will take you from where you are to anyplace you want to go..." Jeffrey Gitomer, The Little Red Book on Selling

Just finished listening to Jeffrey Gitomer's Little Red Book of Selling while driving around for my Opera By Children visits.  He's a brilliant and fun author and authority on selling.  In a sort of inspired-to-continue-even-though-the-book-is-over afterward he somewhat randomly flows into a discussion of the importance of writing.  If nothing else, he was inspired for me.  The following are exceprts:

If someone were to ask me for one thing I could pinpoint to my success, without a nanosecond of thought I would answer writing...

Success is a low level word when I describe what the discipline of writing has done for my career, my success, my fulfilment and my legacy...

If you only choose to believe one thing that I tell you, believe that writing will take you from where you are to any place you want to go...

I wish there was a way that I could explain the power of the written word. The only thing I can say is to reinforce my earlier statement that every piece of my business good fortune for the past fifteen years has in some way or another come from my writing.

For more on Jeffrey Gitomer, go to  www.gitomer.com.  

 

A Letter to Theo Regarding Cell Phones, Persuasion, and Where Babies Come From

Yesterday my son Theo brought home a persuasive paper he had written in his seventh grade English class. His assignment was to convince his parents to do something; he argued we should get him a cell phone. My assignment from his teacher was to respond and seal my reply in an envelope for him to open at school today.  The assignment continues with him reading and responding to my reply.  This means, at last for one hour of English class, I have his attention.  What an opportunity!

Regarding Cell Phones, Persuasion, 

and Where Babies Come From

My boy my beautiful boy,

First, let me congratulate you on what wonderful son you are. I do recognize the lists of goodness that you include in your letter. Master violist, the Prince of Polo, the brother of brothers, the friend of friends. My gosh, if I had to trade my position in life for any other, I'd choose to be your brother and your friend. You are one of the most positively contagious people I have ever met. You keep life rolling with your wild, off-beat, obscure passions: Italian opera, Speedos, gourmet crab sauces, vinyl records, just the two of us on long Sunday drives (okay, the last one is creepy)... I see your level of commitment to your loves: the work you put into water polo, your dedication to making sure you don't miss mid-meals, the hours you spend with the viola stuck to your chin... I also see the good nature with which you approach the mundane and by no means rewarding work of life like Saturday jobs and kitchen nights; you really do whistle while you work – which really only happens in movies with dwarfs (maybe this isn't the time to tell you, but you are adopted. Mom fell in love with you at Disneyland and had to bring you home. She said, “Snow White has seven of them, surely she won't miss one...” anyhow, long story for another day – maybe a long Sunday drive, just the two of us). My point is that you have a great attitude and have no problem shouldering your fair share of work (even if it is only a wee little dwarf shoulder's worth). I think if only I had half your drive when I was a punk kid, what might I have become? But then one of the beauties of being a father is the joy of watching your children surpass you in life. I'm thrilled by thoughts of who you will become someday. My life is magnificent because as your father I get to share and celebrate your life. So, first and much more important than when you get a cell phone (because I'm sure, regardless of my response, you will get a cell phone someday), thanks for making being your dad such a pleasurable privilege. All cell phones aside, I give you my most sincere love and thanks for being such a wonderful son.

Next, sometimes in our youth (i.e. sometime shortly after puberty and before your first minivan and male patter baldness) we make the mistake of connecting money and love. But, fathers that love their kids the most aren't necessarily the fathers that put the most presents under the Christmas tree. In fact, I don't think Jesus ever even got a Christmas tree, never mind the presents (and rumor has it he had a pretty good dad). What his dad did give him was life, confidence, tools (which is a fair extrapolation considering he was a carpenter), and work to do. Incidentally, I have read his book a couple of times and I don't recall any mention of whether or not his dad ever gave him a cell phone, though it would have been handy on those construction sites far from home and considering there was no OSHA and the working conditions were likely not only harsh, but also dangerous. My point is this, my decision, because I do love you, is less about a cell phone than it is about what is best for you in the grand scale of life.

Now to the practical business of a phone. Your points are well taken and your arguments well made. Tracing the art of persuasion back to Aristotle's Rhetoric and virtually every study that has been conducted since, it all boils down to ethos, pathos and logos, and you connect well on each level. Ethos is establishing your credibility: good brother, dedicated student, honorable musician and dedicated athlete – can't argue with that. Logos is the logic of your appeal: a phone is a tool that helps you connect with your friends, allows you to report your every move to us, and in the event of an emergency you can reach us and/or we can reach you. Pathos is the emotional appeal and the story of Kade is the perfect touch. You and Alec saved his life; two boy heroes with a cell phone save their brother and friend.  That's absolutely perfect persuasive technique.  The flaw in all of this, dear Theo, is not with  your arguments, but with you position in the equation.  You are essentially a pauper before the king, and as the king I can simply argue back, “All is well in my kingdom without a phone. Next.”

But alas my lad, there is a nugget of persuasion that speaks to all, kings and paupers alike. Two words that make the world go round and these are they: revenue enhancement. Let me speak them again in less ostentatious terms: more gold! Another key to persuasion is knowing your foe and answering his needs. With all other elements in place you have my attention. Now, with proof that your proposal somehow means for me less work and more money, you have my blessing. All the other persuasions up until this point are important in preparing me to rule in your behalf; with them you have opened a window of opportunity. Now I send you back to do your work, and if you do it well, the phone is yours. From here on out, it's all about the bottom line. If in fact, you can save me money by canceling our home phone and somehow adding another phone on our plan, or if there is another plan out there that makes financial sense, show me the deal and you get a phone.

Incidentally, I do hate reducing your request to the bottom line, because all the factors you bring into your argument are much more important to me and in the grand scale of life, but part of my job as your dad is to teach you, which is mostly why this response is as long as it is, but it is also this long because right now in my life I have more words and love and maybe even wisdom than I have money.

Finally (which really is a place-holder of a word for a concept I don't believe in), if the bottom line doesn't add up in your favor, come back again. Whatever it is you really want in life is worth asking for more than once. You may not get the answer you want, but in the process you may well discover a way to get what you want. If a phone really is what you want, I'm sure we can find a way. It will likely involve work, but as you established early in your arguments, you're a strong smart worker. The fun might be that we can work together to make it happen. In the mean time, all the other family phones are at your disposal – just watch your minutes.

My boy my beautiful boy, congratulations on being the wonderful son you are. I'm so lucky to be your dad. And if I ever do seem to forget, please call me and I'm sure at the sound of your voice I'll remember.

Too life,

Dad

p.s. On the subject of black bears not really being black: I once saw a cinnamon black bear on the Salmon River and it wasn't really cinnamon or black, so stop throwing red herrings into your arguments, because red herrings aren't black bears either, except in this case they actually are, but since black bears aren't black it's impossible to be certain what color the red herrings are and they only confuse your arguments.

p.s.s. That whole part about adoption... that's where some babies come from, but not all of them. We need to go for a drive. What are you doing Sunday afternoon?

2011 Green With Hope

Goodbye to 2010... though a wonderful ground-breaking year it was.  Allen Ashelman, one of my dad's best friends and a great friend of mine as well, used to talk about his favorite day of farming.  It would come one morning every spring; it was the day he'd wake up and look out across his fields and sprouts had finally broken through the soil and turned his world from muddy brown to spring green.  2010 was a long spring of sorts and  December 2010 was the metaphoric spring day at the start of a new season in my life.  And now 2011 is taking off as that still fragile but ever so beautiful spring crop is greening my world with hope.  

"I love Buddha. He was a wise man." Piper, 8

"Why do you think people in China pray to statues?"
"What kind of statues?"
"Of Buddha?"
"People pray to statues of Buddha?  I love Buddha.  He was a wise man.  Besides that he's made out of gold and he has a fat wobbly belly that makes you want to rub it and his name sounds like 'booty'.  What more do you want than that?"

Piper, age 8, in Primary discussing graven images during a lesson on the 10 commandments.

The Birth of a Genre on the Birth of the Bard

I came in to school early this morning to scratch the life out of my freshmen class’ Romeo and Juliet essays, but neither the muse nor the bard would have any of that today. Instead a continuation of a song I had begun scribbling a few weeks ago started pouring out the end of one of my dull art pencils because the words were coming and the sharpener was out of reach.

She’s the Calliope of Coffee,
The Queen of Caffeine
Who wakes every morning
Her Orphian son
Who in jitters and spurts
Scribbles poems and puns
And songs and odes,
Who with shimmery words
Give shapes to dreams
That wisp and swirl
Like coffee that steams
Into thin air…

It was there that my racing mind stopped racing and something urged me from my musings. I came to with my head crooked sideways staring down into a blur of faded book spines at the 4 For A Dollar book sale table in our school library. With stacks of papers to grade I didn’t belong there. And it truth I don’t know how I ended up there, except that I was led. In retrospect I'm fairly certain Calliope, Will and Ray walked me down; I'm not certain if Homer was with them, but whatever the case against my will I was pondering buying books I have no time to read. My eyes raced across the rows and out of the doomed titles lept the Illustrated Man.
The irony, a Bradburian masterpiece on its way to be burned.
And then revelation:
COPYRIGHT, 1951, BY RAY BRADBURY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
This book is for
Father, Mother, and Skip,
with love.
A first edition of Ray Bradbury’s Illustrated Man. Ray, the greatest living American writer. In 1988 I heard him speak and he changed my life – another story for another day. I have written him over the years. One of my greatest possessions – a handwritten letter:
Dear Dave,
Just back from a summer in France.
Prometheus sounds grand. Keep me posted.
I send you love.
Ray
Really there could have been no more hallowed sign that the muses were calling and that literary lightning was about to strike.
As I tucked the book under my arm and looked back at the table of titles it was as if the titles were tumblers of an ancient and magnificent code and as they started to whirl and spin the poetry began to pour out. An hour later the bell rang, and just as it did I rearranged the last two titles and as far as I can tell, today, April 23rd on William Shakespeare’s birthday, at 8:30 am, Dave’s Song, the first ever Book Table Poem was brought to life. Dedicated to Calliope, William, Ray and most importantly to the love of my life, my muse my immortal wife and partner in creation –Suzi.
Today's photo is the 34 books whose titles are my poem.
Incidentally today I have birthed a couple of blogs as well:
www.booktablepoetry.blogspot.com and www.booktablepoetry.wordpress.com