From our trip to the Outer Banks, this person was just sitting in the grass on top of the dunes reading. She began to turn her head as I started taking pics, I don’t think she was aware I was shooting her. The other two shots have her looking up into the sky with the back of her head towards me. But this…
I am the last person to tell you that my photos are worth a damn, but I love this shot.
As long as there is an older generation hanging on to what they know, there will always be a conflict with a younger generation that sees a new path clearly.
Even my generation is not immune. We were quite aware of what we were going through, but we need to know that the new children are the ones we’ll be spitting on and as much as we might like to break that cycle, it seems like this is just a circle of life kind of thing.
The best we can do is Our Thing ™, and let them do Their Thing ™.
And so it goes.
There are times when I wonder whether or not the whole economy hangs on by a thread, that thread being ‘the way we’ve always done it’. Uncertainty and unpredictability throws the status quo for a loop.
I’m not sure that’s the way a global system should work. I am sure that’s the way it’s designed.
If anything, the Work From Home movement proves that we don’t need to look a certain way to perform. But of course, that causes another problem. I’ve talked about this before. If we’re not in the office, then not only is the company wasting money for office space they’re not utilizing, then all the other things around that office suffer. The gas station, the coffee shop, the fast food restaurants, the bars. The folks that are supposed to be making the money at the worker’s expense are taking a beating.
You’re not doing as you’re told. You’re a slow learner.
“You must try harder. It’s not easy to become sane.” — O’Brien
Standards could also mean professionalism. That’s how the Boomers and older try to dress it up.
If you want to be considered a professional, then be professional. A colorful swath of fabric around the neck is irrelevant.
There’s been a lot of talk about ‘standards’ lately. Many people of a certain age are lamenting the loss of standards. They are also crying about kids on their lawn, I suppose.
They’re not mad about standards. They’re mad that a new generation of people aren’t listening to them when they stamp their feet and yell that it’s always been done a certain way, and opt instead to come up with a new way to do it.
I hate to be dark about it, but eventually the annoyance will cease. Luckily, it will never have stopped us from the work.
I don’t think I’m telling you any tall tales when I say that a lot of us have trouble putting a little something away. I remember seeing a story on more than one occasion that a good chunk of us in here in America would be in some real trouble if we got sick, or if we had a car break down with something major, or a major appliance breaks down and need replacing. I’ve certainly been in this place, I feel like a lot of us have. On a related note, no matter how much our young folks save, it seems like simple housing—even a studio apartment—appears to be out of reach of the younger generations. I have three kids, my youngest is gonna be 24 in October. They all still live here at home, because they can’t afford to live anywhere else. It’s at the point where I feel like the best course of action is to pay off this house and give it to them with the understanding that you keep a room handy for Kim and I, and we go traveling in our later years. That’s the goal.
For those of us who have children, we are now entering nervous season. For me, Fall has meant the anxiety of thinking about Christmas. Putting stuff under the tree. Now, I have long since passed the age where Christmas has thrown up all over my Living Room. I still get gifts for everyone, but nowhere near the tonnage I used to. The anxiety of putting that money away has lessened a great deal, but I still get pangs as we get closer to Christmas. But I have found a solution that works for me and mine, and I want to share it with you. I call it my Christmas Club account. If you don’t know what that is, I’ll explain. I don’t know if this is a thing anymore, but you used to be able to go to your bank and set up an automatic deposit into a savings account to have that money there when it’s time to go Holiday Shopping.
But let’s say you manage to put some money away for Christmas. I have a wad of money that needs something to do, but I generally have no idea what the kids are into at this moment in time. If you’ve bought toy horses for the daughter because she told you she liked horses in May, but has moved on to Anime in September and never mentioned it, you might know what I’m talking about. So, I’ve devised a solution that makes everyone happy, and I get to take care of Christmas with as little anxiety as possible. The only thing I have to deal with is the usual Holiday Gloom that I get every year, but that’s another story for another time.
The main ingredient you need for this recipe is Amazon. If you object to Amazon for whatever reason, that’s fine. I understand, and there’s no hate from me. Vaya con Dios, compadres. It’s simple. First, everyone in the house has a wish list that they’ve shared with me. Over the year, they can put whatever they want on it. Second, you have a gift card account with your Amazon account, and it’s reloadable. I use it as a savings account. Every paycheck I put a minimum of 25 dollars on that gift balance. Just using the minimum if you’re paid twice a month, you have 500 bucks in that account by the end of October. Of course, you need to make sure that you don’t use that gift card if you buy something on Amazon in the interim, so make sure you check how you’re paying for something before you place that order.
You must do this first. Don’t think about it, just do it. If you sit there and think about it, you’ll find another reason for that 25 bucks. If you do it and don’t think about it, you may find that you don’t miss that 25 bucks, and it’s residing in a place where it can do some good in the long term. Of course, you may find that you can contribute more, but I would say this. If you can find you can contribute more, then your brain has made the jump into knowing you can put money away. Take that extra money that you’re thinking about putting in the Amazon account and put it in a savings account for when you’ve got to replace that refrigerator. Like you do. I hope this helps, and if you have other ways to handle this, I’d love to hear about them.
Right across the parking lot from the Graveyard of the Atlantic Museum is a BEAUTIFUL beach, that has had less than ten people on it every Saturday Morning I’ve been there.
One surfer totally made me as I was taking photos. I wanted to call him Ken, but he had a surfboard, his job is more than beach.
However, I thought you might like to see these since this is one part of my trip to OBX that didn’t flame out.
I guess there’s a broader lesson from my little OBX misadventure. I had a vision for what I wanted, which turned out to be beyond my knowledge of the tech I had in front of me, my imagination always appears to be beyond what is possible at my skillset.
The lesson is that If you’re going to do it, then start with what you have and what you can do. Then work your way up.
Now all I need is a plan.
Famous last words, right?
Recently, the wife and I drove to the Outer Banks. I love the Banks, I’ve been going there off and on since I was 17 years old. I’ve watched it grow, and I’ve watched some places decay. The water park where I worked got destroyed in 2003 and never rebuilt. Still, I would put up the drive through the Pea Island Refuge as one of the best drives in the country.
On this occasion, I used my iPhone to capture a POV, the intent was to drive al the way to the Hatteras Ferry to Ocracoke. Then, on the way back, stop at the various places of interest like Hatteras Light, the decaying Waterfall Park in Rodanthe, Bodie Island Light, and various places in between and vlog using my Akaso GO Action Camera. Great plan, or so I thought.
Everything started to go off the rails at 8 AM, when my alarm went off and stopped my POV recording as we were leaving Rodanthe, then every ten minutes after as I refuse to believe I pressed Stop and continued the snooze function. Then, none of the shots I took on the Action Camera were all wrong, I failed to take into account the fact that it is a wide angle lens by design. So, returning home and licking my wounds, I decided to produce the POV video from Nags Head to Rodanthe, and decided to eject on the vlog.
Lessons learned: Turn off the damn alarm, and try using the Cam to get a better Idea of framing before moving to production in bright sunlight.