Two Men and a Window

Two men, both seriously ill, occupied the same hospital room. One man was allowed to sit up in his bed for an hour each afternoon to help drain the fluid from his lungs. His bed was next to the only window in the room.

The other man had to spend all his time flat on his back.

The two men talked for hours on end. They spoke of their wives and families, their homes, their jobs, their involvement in the military service, where they had been on vacation…

Every afternoon, when the man in the bed by the window could sit up, he would pass the time by describing to his roommate all the things he could see outside the window. The man in the other bed began to live for those one-hour periods where his world would be broadened and enlivened by all the activity and color of the world outside. 

The window overlooked a park with a lovely lake. Ducks and swans played on the water while children sailed their model boats. Young lovers walked arm in arm among flowers of every color, and a fine view of the city skyline could be seen in the distance. 

As the man by the window described all this in exquisite detail, the man on the other side of the room would close his eyes and imagine this picturesque scene. One warm afternoon, the man by the window described a parade passing by. Although the other man could not hear the band, he could see it in his mind's eye as the gentleman by the window portrayed it with descriptive words.

Days, weeks, and months passed.

One morning, the day nurse arrived to bring water for their baths only to find the lifeless body of the man by the window, who had died peacefully in his sleep. She was saddened and called the hospital attendants to take the body away.

As soon as it seemed appropriate, the other man asked if he could be moved next to the window. The nurse was happy to make the switch, and after making sure the man was comfortable, she left him alone. 

Slowly, painfully, he propped himself up on one elbow to take his first look at the real world outside. He strained to slowly turn and look out the window beside the bed.

It faced a blank wall.

The man asked the nurse what could have compelled his deceased roommate to describe such wonderful things outside this window.  The nurse responded that the man was blind and could not even see the wall.

She said, “Perhaps he just wanted to encourage you.” 

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Can you write a moral to this story?

Can Dreams Come True?

 

“Throw your dreams into space like a kite, and you do not know what it will bring back...a new life, a new friend, a new love, a new country."
- Anaïs Nin, The Diaries of Anaïs Nin

I love this quote because I did just this. I threw my dreams into space and found all of the above, but not everyone has this experience when traveling to a new land or taking the risk of trying to realize their dreams.

How about you? What dreams have you made come true? And which ones didn't turn out the way you had hoped?

Words of Wisdom

The famous anthropologist Margaret Mead (1901-1978) was also known for her poignant observations of human nature and society. Below are some of her quotes.

*Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone else.

*Every time we liberate a woman, we liberate a man.

*Having two bathrooms ruined the capacity to cooperate.

*I was wise enough to never grow up while fooling most people into believing I had.

*Instead of being presented with stereotypes by age, sex, color, class, or religion, children must have the opportunity to learn that, within each range, some people are loathsome and some are delightful.

*It is utterly false and cruelly arbitrary to put all the play and learning into childhood, all the work into middle age, and all the regrets into old age.

*One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don't come home at night.

*“Sister” is probably the most competitive relationship within the family, but once the sisters are grown, it becomes the strongest relationship.

Which is your favorite, and why?

The Mayonnaise Jar

(*I am reprinting this post from an anonymous e-mail I received)

When things in your life seem almost too much to handle and when 24 hours in a day is not enough, remember the mayonnaise jar and 2 cups of coffee.

A professor stood before his philosophy class and had some items in front of him. When the class began, he picked up a very large and empty mayonnaise jar and started to fill it with golf balls. He then asked the students if the jar was full. They agreed that it was.

The professor then picked up a box of pebbles and poured it into the jar. He shook the jar lightly. The pebbles rolled into the open areas between the golf balls. He asked the students again if the jar was full. They agreed it was.

The professor next picked up a box of sand and poured it into the jar. Of course, the sand filled up everything else. He asked once more if the jar was full. The students responded with a unanimous “yes”.

The professor then produced two cups of coffee from under the table and poured the entire contents into the jar, effectively filling the empty space between the sand. The students laughed.

“Now,” said the professor as the laughter subsided. “I want you to recognize that this jar represents your life. The golf balls are the important things – family, children, health, friends, and favorite passions – things that if everything else was lost and only they remained, your life would still be full. The pebbles are the things that matter like your job, house, and car. The sand is everything else – the small stuff.

“If you put the sand into the jar first,” he continued, “there is no room for the pebbles or the golf balls. The same goes for life. If you spend all your time and energy on the small stuff, you will never have room for the things that are important to you.

“So...pay attention to the things that are critical to your happiness. Play with your children. Take time to get medical checkups. Take your partner out to dinner. There will always be time to clean the house and fix the dripping tap. Take care of the golf balls first – the things that really matter. Set your priorities. The rest is just sand.”

One of the students raised her hand and inquired what the coffee represented.

The professor smiled. “I'm glad you asked. It just goes to show you that no matter how full your life may seem, there's always room for a couple of cups of coffee with a friend.”

What about you? What are your “golf balls”? Which things are most important to you? And what is your “sand”?

Are You Lost?

This week's post comes borrowed from my blog friend, Jenny, an out-of-state college English professor who manages to find humor in English grammar. (Yes, it can actually be funny.)

Please click on this link, Missed Periods and Other Grammar Scares, and read some useful tips on capitalization. You might also save yourself from getting lost some day :-)

After reading Jenny's blog, please tell me which part of your country you come from...and use proper capitalization.

The Art of Listening

As a writer, I am forever honing the craft of writing. As a professor, I am eternally mired in papers, thereby helping me perfect the art of reading (and editing!). But what about that elusive skill...the one we start to practice first as infants when words have not yet formed...the art of listening? It's the ability we've technically practiced the most, yet it is sometimes a dastardly task to accomplish even with two perfectly functioning ears.

As a fiction writer, I practice listening by imagining the voices of my characters. What do they sound like? What kind of vocabulary do they use? How formally or colloquially do they speak? As I come to hear these characters, I get to know them better, and that familiarity hopefully transfers to the written page so the readers can hear these characters as well as I can.


The real world is a different story (pun intended). When we think we are listening to our friends, our professors, our colleagues, our family, we are often only hearing their words instead of listening to the message. Our minds are full of distractions, and often the biggest distraction is the argument we are already formulating in response to something spoken moments before. We focus on what our hearts have to say and stop listening to the other person. When we do this, we are effectively saying, "My ideas or feelings are more important than yours." (Even if we believe this, it is bad form to admit it.)


So what can we do? (I've given this a lot of thought as I've recently been frustrated by many around me who say they hear me but don't actually do it unless I accidentally burp at the dinner table.)


Like we must sometimes do with our addiction to electronic devices, we can make the effort to temporarily shut down...our minds, that is. When listening to someone, we need to turn off our own thoughts and say to ourselves, For this moment, I am listening to someone else. Quite honestly, I think the brain would appreciate a respite. I tried this the other night with my daughter, and it actually helped me relax even though her message was one of sadness. By ignoring my own frustration with her behavior and choosing to listen to her, I heard what was in her heart.


What about you? Do you have any suggestions for how we can all learn to listen better?

It Must Be True

Today I heard a 14-year-old girl make the following statement:

"If it's on the Internet, it's not necessarily true. But if you read it in a book, then you know it has to be true because books don't lie."

There was another woman with us, who looked at me and rolled her eyes in response to the naivety of the girl. So this got me thinking...

In general, people tend to believe things they read in print. If they are educated people, they check the source before deciding if the information is valid or not. But with the Internet now being the first place most people get their "facts", how much can we believe when we don't always know the source?

The innocent girl who made that remark has certainly been misled since not all books publish the truth, or because the truth is sometimes relative. However, I understand her thinking. Since all books identify their publisher and author, books have credibility. The Internet, on the other hand, holds information by both identifiable and unidentifiable sources. Anyone in the world (literally) can post information and present it as fact. I believe that this is what the girl was trying to say.

As students, it is your responsibility to identify the sources of your research when you write a paper, but if you are relying only on the Internet, this can be a big challenge. And if you are trying to read the news online, you have so many sources to go to. This, too, can be frustrating as you try to decide whose information to believe.

I ask you this question: Which Internet news source is your favorite, and why?

Attacks in the Workplace

Unfortunately, nowadays there are new things to worry about at work and school. We can't just think about meeting deadlines or passing tests; we also have to think about what craziness might be going on outside our office or classroom.

Please watch this 6-minute video and then answer the question below.

Is there any other advice you can offer in a situation like this?

Bar Jokes

A standard scenario in American jokes is when three related characters, such as three different religious leaders or three different professionals, walk into a bar, and the punch line is based on situational or linguistic humor. The following "bar" joke came across my desk recently, and it seems wonderfully appropriate for my English classes.

The past, present, and future walked into a bar. It was tense.

I invite you to tell me your own joke. You may translate it from your language if you think it will still be funny in English.

The Book

We think technology is always about improvement, but what if the archaic invention is still the best? Watch the video below. Although it is in Spanish, there are English subtitles, so I apologize in advance to non-Spanish-speaking students. (It doesn't exist in English.)

Which do you prefer? Then, or now?