a practical thinker……

I remember when I decided I was going to go to the University of Wisconsin.  I was going to be a writer, a journalist, Dan Rather, William Sapphire.  I was going to be a lawyer, a regular Efram Zimbalist Junior.  I know he wasn’t a lawyer, but what a cool name if we was….

So, I did something called Integrated Liberal Studies, a two year program for really smart people in the humanities, smart beyond my belief.  I never felt I belonged, but I loved it, and I grew.

But, there were all of these smart people, from great places all over the world.  I’d never been on an airplane.  How did I belong to this group?  People always said they were impressed with me, but I never saw it.

While I was in school, I worked.  I worked in a nursing home in recreational therapy.  I worked mostly with old people, getting them out into to community, normalizing their lives.  To me, it was a practical thing.  These people had lives before they got into the home.  Wouldn’t they want to do the things before they got themselves into that situation?

So, I took them to things they did, not things we thought they should do.  I took people into bars, shot pool.  We played cards, went to community festivals.   People had actual conversations with “regular” people.  We went to games.  We went to church.  I felt like my job was to extend their real lives while they were in the nursing home.  And, it worked.

But, back to school.  I transferred to the University of Wisconsin, Whitewater, not because I didn’t love Madison.  But, Whitewater had a good journalism school with this great class in advertising.  So, I went.  And, I did well and…..

While I was in Whitewater, and Madison, for that matter, I was in contact with a company regarding a job.  I contacted them once a month for three years.  I was offered a job after my junior year (less than 10 credits short of graduation, and all major work completed)  for $42,000 a year (this was 1979, in the middle of our great malaise).  I took it.

I took it for a lot of reasons.  It secured my future when futures didn’t look so great.  I took it because I grew up on a farm and really never had a lot.  I took it because it validated me.

Do I regret it?   Sometimes.

I’ve had a great career, and I’m a lifelong learner.  Learning doesn’t stop because you’re not in a classroom.   I decided I could learn.  I could use my curiosity to my advantage, and I have.

But, I still have those feelings of inadequacy, especially when I’ve been around accomplished people, thinking maybe I could be accomplished, too. 

And then it comes to me.  I am accomplished. 

I guess those feelings never completely go away. 

This is a completely different blog than I intended to write.