words of wisdom

If you scoot your eyes over to the right hand side of this blog, you might see a link to Catherine Newman's blog. Prepare to have your mind blown: She has two. The other is on Wondertime.

I love her kids, and mostly I love Ben. Ben is funny, kind, and the kind of quirky you can only be when you are 8. This week's blog on Wondertime has Ben talking about asperations and kids around the world, and it hit especially close to home for me:

We still read Children Just Like Me all the time — that awesome DK book that profiles kids around the world in a really beautiful, non-intrusive way — and Ben is newly amazed by it. Maybe it's because most of the kids are 8 or 9 ("Those children are just like me!" he always cries, comically), and Ben is identifying with them anew. "Wow," he says, "the kids always want to grow up and go into politics, to make the world a better place. They're so amazing. I always picture the page about me in the book, and it would be like, One day Ben wants to own a sandwich shop where he can only serve lunch so he won't have to work too hard." Self-ironizing is a past-time that seems to come early in my house. "I want to want to be president," Ben sighs. "But it just seems so tiring. And like I should probably leave it for someone who really wants it." I like how he makes presidential candidacy sound like it's the last waffle on a plate.

And it's true, at least for me. I want to be the guy that owns a sandwich shop open only for lunch. I like to have lofty goals because they sound so impressive, but in the end I just want to enjoy my life and my family. I feel like hard, demanding work (like the presidency) can really be a drag on my ultimate goal of doing nothing, like Peter in Office Space.

I just re-read that, and it appears that I am a blob who grunts at the slightest thing I need to do, like shower.

And I just re-read that, and I realized that I have said on numerous occasions that I would shower everyday if it didn't take so long.

So please scratch all you just read, and understand that I am 100% on board with Ben's sentiments, and that being who you are is a good thing, even if people have the mistaken impression you are a lazy SOB.