Living the Dream

I’m listening to the CORE FM, a Rutgers University radio station as I write this from Franklin Tennessee. Yes, the Web has opened a world to us that was completely unknown to our parents, not to mention our grandparents. The DJ I’m listening to is Mike Wollman, a 61 year old friend of mine from our days at Rutgers in Newark. And that is perhaps the larger miracle of the age in which we live.
Mike has had a very successful career as a teacher in secondary schools. While we were in college he held down a DJ slot on the campus radio station. Now here he is enjoying a passion of his, still in fine voice and as much on top of today’s music as he was in the 1960s.
We live in an age when dreams need not be lost because of time wasted, obligations undertaken or narrowly missed opportunities. Long held dreams are not trampled by the fates the way they were in generations past. Thanks to the Web, a plethora of educational opportunities and demand publishing to name a few, there are more avenues for self expression than ever before in history. Mike told me he did in fact dream of being on the radio again for almost 30 years. When the opportunity presented itself he studied, took some tests and made it happen. And in the nicest of touches, his daughter Becca, who was active at the station, gave him an assist.
Our dreams can stay alive for years, even if fed only by the tiniest morsel of hope. The beauty of our world is this: Dreams can come to fruition at any time. One reason is there is less discrimination now. When women and minorities secured the right to chase their dreams, they helped to break down lots of barriers and conventional wisdom including the silly idea that one should act his age.
Certainly a mature individual is capable of discerning the difference between what is truly a young person’s activity and what is open to anyone willing to try. So it is that former President Bush jumped from an airplane to celebrate his 75th, 80th and 85th birthdays. Conventional wisdom surely would suggest that the former President act his age. Fortunately he didn’t and anyone still chasing a dream should take heart.
At a recent Toastmasters meeting the Toastmaster of the day chose fearlessness as the theme of the day which led to some discussion about why people fear chasing their dreams. Some said it’s the fear of ridicule. Others suggested a fear of failure. It’s hard to disagree with those explanations but I suspect there is another fundamental reason why people don’t actually chase their dreams. Most of us have secret dreams that we hold dear for many years. We tell ourselves that one day we will do the thing we really want to do. Maybe it’s something grand like climbing Mt Everest or perhaps a bit more modest like learning to speak French. We would do these things if only we had the time.
So what derails us from chasing our dreams as we crawl, walk and sometimes run through life? I think the underlying fear is that if we fail, the question then is what will happen to our dreams? What in the world will we replace them with if we fail? Lord knows even an unrealized dream can serve a critical purpose in our lives. A dream can be mental comfort food, something we pull out when our lives are completely at odds with the world.
“No I didn’t get that promotion but some day I’m going to get my MBA and I’ll be a huge success.”
“Another broken relationship and it hurts but one day I’ll write a best seller and then…”
Thoughts like that can get us through some difficult moments but it seems like a high price to pay for succor. I think Mike figured out that the beauty of chasing his dream was in the doing. He didn’t become a celebrity DJ talking to millions from a Manhattan studio. But that isn’t how he defined success. He realized that accepting the challenge and doing what he loved was true success. Think about times when you have been really successful. What part of the experience gives you the most satisfaction, the recognition or the actual work you completed?
Life will always have its disappointments. Don’t let one of yours be that you never reached for your secret stars. Remember living the dream is in the doing.

Copyright 2011 Len Serafino. All rights reserved.

Generic Birthday Greetings are Driving Me Crazy

On the first day of every month a very good friend of mine emails a birthday list to all of the guys from our college fraternity. This month seven brothers of Kappa Phi will celebrate their birthdays. While the Rutgers University based fraternity didn’t survive the turbulent years that followed the sixties, a lot of friendships have endured and many are very strong.
Now I think it’s nice for Mike that he sends this list around but I am not enamored by the way some of the brothers use it. Let me explain. Since our frat days, my friend Paul and I have called each other on our birthdays. While Paul stayed put, building a business in Manhattan, I moved around a bit. Still, whether I was living in tiny Palmyra, New Jersey, Webster, New York (where life is worth living according to the natives) or my current home in Franklin, Tennessee, Paul always called. Paul is one of the July birthdays so when his day comes I will no doubt give him a call. Our conversations are lively, personal, and great fun. We catch up on what is happening in our lives now and indulge ourselves by retelling a story or two from the days when we were carefree college students. (If you’re reading this Paul, I did not steal the delicious London broil sandwich your mother made.) Over the years I added to the list of people I called as did Paul. And a funny thing happened after about 25 years of calling these guys. They started remembering my birthday and calling me: More terrific conversations to enjoy. If you can’t be sipping a tall one in the same pub together, hearing a good friend’s voice is the next best thing. Reading a Times New Roman font size 12 greeting is a pale comparison.
Enter the Internet age and email. I’m afraid some people are overcome with the easiness of typing out a few words and letting it go at that. Sadly, as far as I know, Microsoft has yet to figure out how to deliver the nuance that each person’s unique pitch and voice tone can deliver. And until they do we will keep calling. I hope it never stops.
Since Mike started sending his monthly blast email birthday list, my inbox has been choked by messages from a growing number of well wishers. Some recipients of Mike’s message reply to all with alacrity. Since my birthday is in January none of these guys are wishing me anything. They are just letting me know they are wishing someone else a Happy Birthday. How nice. Couldn’t they at least send an e-card to the birthday boys?
I am at a loss to understand how a generic “Happy Birthday to all the guys that have a birthday this month” is meaningful. If it makes sense to do that, why not send birthday greetings on January1st every year? “Happy Birthday to everyone I ever met” should do the trick.
The guys I went to school with always seemed bright to me. They did go to Rutgers after all, a great school that in those days was often thought to be an Ivy League university. Admittedly it wasn’t because of the academic standards, but we did play some of the Ivy’s in football every year. People seeing me in my Rutgers sweatshirt would ask, “Rutgers! Is that an Ivy League school? My answer never varied. “Almost,” I said.
But I digress. I’m annoyed by these unwanted email intrusions. Is it possible that the guys who send these vapid greetings want credit for acknowledging birthdays? Why else would Rollo, Tony and Al, not to mention Mark, feel the need to copy me and 50 other guys? These guys have been successful in life by any measurement you can name. It can’t be that they are lazy. It might be Mike’s fault for sending out the list but I hesitate to blame him. He might delete me from the group.
Listen, I do hope that every brother in the fraternity has a very happy birthday and many more of them too. But if I feel the need to tell them that I’ll call each one personally and say so. What I want more than anything for my birthday next year is this: Stop clicking “Reply to All” and send something meaningful to each birthday brother individually on the anniversary of his actual date of birth. Better yet call them. I’m sure every brother has the roster Mike sends with changes every three or four days.

Copyright Len Serafino, 2010. All rights reserved.