I want I want. There aren’t enough hours in the day to satisfy my endless list of wants. And it’s not getting any easier as I go through mid-life. Fortunately, the list doesn’t include much in the way of material things. Instead, I suffer from a bad case of too many interests which results in a daily tug-of-war over how I should spend my time.
Wikipedia defines “Jack of all trades, master of none” as “a figure of speech used in reference to a person who is competent with many skills but is not outstanding in anyone.” That would be me. On the plus side, I consider myself to be a well rounded, versatile sort, conversant on a variety of subjects. On the downside, I meander through life unfocused, never rising above mediocrity. Alas, the value of the multi-tasking Ninja is suspect. It’s an illusion. True accomplishment and fulfillment remain a big tease. I learn to play the signature riff but never finish the whole song. I add the book to my shelf, but never master the subject. I wear the fashionable jacket with the letter, but remain hopelessly stranded on J.V. I torture myself in a long buffet line of great smelling food while holding a small salad plate and no idea where the forks are.
Oh, how I envy those who figure out their life’s purpose at an early age. How nice it must be to employ the talents each of us has been given, engaging in fulfilling endeavors with no regrets about how the time was spent.
In an ideal world, parents would expose kids to a wide variety of experiences; let them see for themselves which ones they are good at, and sit back and watch nature take its course while they narrow the list down. Hopefully, by the time they reach college age, they will see a good fit between their natural talents and a major field of study and a hobby or two they really enjoy. My problem is, I gained a wide variety of experiences in spades, but nothing ever dropped off the list. It’s a cruel form of nature that prunes my list, only because I’ve learned the hard way that I don’t function very well on less than 8 hours of sleep.
I want to play guitar like Carlos Santana, the piano like Billy Joel, write op-ed pieces for the NY Times and be the local movie buff with instant recall of movie trivia. I want to run a marathon, hit the slopes on weekends, do Cycle Oregon and hike around the Mt. Hood trail. I want to collect Beatles memorabilia, do amazing stunts on water skis, and go sailing every year in the San Juan’s. I want to trade stocks and make people wonder if I’m clairvoyant.
I want to start a side business, coach youth soccer, build furniture and travel to Italy. I want to get my handicap down to 5, fly fish in southern Oregon, read all the important novels and volunteer down at the Oregon Foodbank. I want season tickets to Oregon football and to visit all of the Pac 10 stadiums with my sons. I want to be considered an expert level Perl programmer, a UNIX guru, and tech whiz. I want to be a great Dad, Granddad, and all-around family guy, with kids who are independent, self-sufficient, thoughtful and considerate adults.
It’s frustrating because I now require a large house, a three-car garage, and a storage unit to store all of this stuff that I use maybe once a year (not to mention the cost of purchasing it all). The worst part is, I’ve spread my time so thinly across these activities that I’m not really very good at any of them. I’m just thankful that I wasn’t exposed to scuba diving because that gear looks really expensive.
This year, instead of recycling my list of New Year’s resolutions, I’m determined to simplify down to a single want: an ah-ha moment. An awakening. An epiphany. A vision that clues me in as to which of these minuscule talents to focus on. Surely this knowledge will lead me down the path to enlightenment. Then I promise to let go of all the other forms of mediocrity that I engage in, have a huge garage sale and focus on whatever it is until someone says “Hey, you’re really good at that.”
View from my PDX Window 