“56% of U.S. survey respondents would prefer to receive tickets to a live experience rather than more stuff. Women in particular prefer experiences over physical gifts. So, wrap up those tickets, and give the gift of making memories.”
—according to Eventbrite (a ticketing venue)
I left my first job at Taco Bell on Aurora Avenue North in 1970 because my boss said the people shot at Kent State got what they deserved. My second job was at DJ’s Sound City at Northgate in Seattle but my boss had an eye for another employee and when the business began to fail, she was the only one not laid off. In 1972, the University of Washington’s University Book Store hired me for the Music Department, a job for which I was eminently unqualified. Think bins of LPs and a scattering of cassettes tapes—that long ago. I would work there for most of the next four years while completing two studio art degrees. Despite having abandoned guitar, I learned a lot about music during those years.
And I met an old woman named Florence.
On my run this morning I thought about how, as a teenager, I used to plan my life. Alone or partnered? With or without children? Horses? Goats? I was still dreaming of five acres and independence in college when I completed a sustainable living plan for a Botany class using a book by that title as a reference. [Five Acres and Independence by Maurice Grenville Kains, 1935]
I was younger than the young woman pictured below, but she must also have dreams of where her life might take her. Life will probably surprise her.
IMPERFECT PATIENCE 