The first part of the headline is a tag line for a self-promotional series of PSA’s I’m developing from an idea that came from Mercedes Rose. ‘It’s not this economy, it’s the new economy. Get creative.’ The tag encompasses the upbeat and optimistic outlook that keeps me going. Make it happen. Move, shake. Meet, greet. Hustle. I embrace this philosophy. It keeps me up at night my mind alive and working, and it gets me up early. It pushes me to come up with new ideas, and to do the legwork to get them off the ground.
There’s something else that keeps me up at nights as well. And I don’t think I’m alone. If you listen to the Planet Money podcast too often it starts to weigh on you. You get way under bid on a job. That frustrated feeling of defeat sticks around a little longer than usual. Your buddy who’s a builder is sweating bullets. Houses in your neighborhood (or the nicer neighborhood around the corner) are for sale, and sitting empty. The numbers are reported, the look is on the faces around you. Things really are bad.
Two nights ago the Dodgers started a game against the Giants in self-defeating fashion. Right fielder Andre Ethier and center fielder Matt Kemp collided in the outfield, causing Kemp to drop a routine fly ball. On the next play Kemp misjudged a line drive, starting in and then heading out as the ball sailed an inch or two past his outstretched glove. Those two plays led to three runs in an eventual 5-4 loss. It was a sloppy start and a frustrating loss. After the game we learned that due to high wind conditions Ethier couldn’t hear Kemp calling for the fly ball on the collision. Wind that also played a factor in the ball sailing over Kemp’s head. Neither one was interested in making excuses:
Both players called for the ball as it sliced from right to center, but neither heard the other.
“Because of the wind,” said Kemp. “It was pretty crazy tonight with the wind and the noise, but the ball should have been caught by one of us.” (From Ken Gurnick, mlb.com)
We all live in ambivalence. Positive and negative. Action and inaction. Progress and stagnation. The layers on top of this are what make it really tricky. Generally speaking, it’s not appropriate to ask people how their how things are going financially with their business. But now the recession is such a topic of international discussion that it’s all any of us can think about. Somehow it’s ok to talk about. We ask, and we answer. I hear myself saying things like, “Things are going fine.” Then describing how the slowdown has allowed me to do the necessary preparation for projects I normally wouldn’t be able to do. We hedge our disclosures, paint a pretty picture. And why shouldn’t we? I don’t want to complain to people about my problems any more than they want to hear about them… Not that I have any problems to complain about. Should we just keep our mouths shut about this stuff, suffer or succeed in silence? Or is it therapeutic to talk about it? There’s the ambivalence tugging at me again.
Last night the boys in blue played another tough one against the Giants. Weather conditions were bad, the game was tight. With one out and runners on second and third in the sixth, the Giants were threatening to break a 2-2 tie. Emmanuel Burris smoked a line drive, just nailed it. But tonight the breaks were falling for the Dodgers. He hit it right at first baseman James Loney, who doubled up Travis Ishikawa at third. In the ninth inning Ethier doubled in the go ahead run on a ten pitch at bat, then Kemp tripled him home to pad the lead. Dodgers win. Up and down, good and bad. No excuses. Take the lumps as they come, and be ready for the opportunity when it arrives.