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mg

sing with me, sing for the years sing for the laughter and sing for the tears

by mg at 11:45 PM on January 16, 2006

I have a dream. Or at least I recently heard someone else talking about their dream.

And though today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, I�m not talking about the good doctor, or his dream. The King, now he had a good dream what with all the races getting together and all. Curing polio or whooping cough would be a pretty good dream too. Winning the lottery wouldn�t be a half bad dream either. Even something selfish like being the meat in a three-way sandwich getting Brad and Jennifer back together would be a dream I could get behind (or in the middle of).

But this person�s dream was to become the assistant manager of the store where she worked.

Now, I don�t want to squash anyone�s hopes or dreams, but assistant manager? You don�t have to equalize the races, cure a disease, or participate in deviant sexual acts with celebrities, but if your dream includes the words �assistant� anything you should be shooting a little higher.

I�m reminded of the old American folk song, Big Rock Candy Mountain. The song is written from the perspective of a hobo talking about their ideal of a perfect world. In this perfect world, the Big Rock Candy Mountain, all the cops have wooden legs, the boxcars are all empty, and the barns are full of hay.

Not, in the Big Rock Candy Mountain I wouldn�t have to done anything illegal, like steal, loiter, or be publicly drunk, so the cops would leave me alone. Not, in the Big Rock Candy Mountain I�d have my own car or better yet, jet pack, so I don�t have to ride the rails. Not, in the Big Rock Candy Mountain I�d have a home with a nice bed so that I didn�t have to sleep in barns.

In the Big Rock Candy Mountain you are still going to be homeless, jobless, and an alcoholic, but at least there's a lake of stew and of whiskey that can sate your hunger and further your liver problems.

It is a certain kind of mentality that says �I don�t want to be great.� And I just don�t understand that. I�ll not try to insinuate that I am great (which is a totally different kind of mentality), but how can you not try to be not just be better, but to be the best? Not just the assistant manager, or the night manager, but the gall darn manager.

As I�m nearing 30 years old it is with the added introspection that comes with reaching another milestone that makes me take a closer look at what I�ve accomplished in my life. I can�t think any of the plans I�d made while younger would have dropped me off here.

I have a great job and a great family. Things are very good, but I never thought I�d end up here, and I�m not sure exactly where I want to go anymore. And as satisfied as I am with everything in my life, I know I won�t just settle for what I have now. I know I can�t just settle for assistant manager.

I don�t have one right now, but its time to go to sleep, so maybe tonight, I�ll have a dream.

comments (8)

It's the same reason I wonder why there are people who'd be the offensive linemen on a football team. Why not slim down a little and be the tailback?

by anna at January 17, 2006 7:52 AM


Funny, my post on Monday(the second one from the current top post) was along the sames lines... maybe it was the cold weather... the bare trees...

I dunno MG, I'll be about your linear age again soon too...

www.tradinganddrugs.blogspot.com

by LOCKHEED at January 17, 2006 12:53 PM


I wanted to be a RAF fighter pilot but an optician put a torch to my dreams and declared me colour blind. Leaving the opticians afterwards I had a sense of: "Well, whatever I'm gonna end up doing... it's gonna 'suck'!"

Kinda been drifting since. Yeah, from being fourteen. Whatever pays well and doesn't demand much by way of work, s'usually what I end up doing. I've never wanted to be an assistant anything... unless it's an assistant hand for a masturbating super model? Keh heh. You're an assistant parent MG, we all know mothers are head honcho in the parenting lark.

Lessee... a dream. Beyond getting rich, I got nothing. Huh. Not even a between dreams dream which'll let me in on how I'm supposed to do it. Maybe I'm supposed to become an assistant manager of... uh... a Disney store or something... and be relatively comfortable but mistake it for being rich when I'm old, and grey, and have worked the better part of my life for... comfortable... just 'comfortable'.

Screw that. }:-|

by Ex Crimson Guard NCO at January 20, 2006 10:41 AM


I didn't know Disney had Disney Stores overseas. It makes sense. Are they like crack for little kids in Britain also?

by jean at January 20, 2006 7:48 PM


All your bases are belong to us.

Disney is everywhere. They are going to be our new overlords.

by Long Time Lurker at January 21, 2006 3:02 PM


All your base!... not all your bases's'. No pluralai's in Japanese translation of ancient video game.

LTL jus got pwnt! n00b! im teh 1337357 yeah!!!!!!!!111

by Ex Crimson Guard NCO at January 22, 2006 1:54 PM


ill bet your idea of the big rock candy mountain is a nice home with 2.5 children in conneticut, with a volvo station wagon that never breaks down and a country club that never makes you pay the membership fees, and where your wife stays 31 years old her whole life.
Or just stop whining, grow up, and come hang out with me at the big rock candy mountain

by krk at February 6, 2006 9:38 PM


Who is wining, Mr. Can't Afford a Vowel? And seriously, if my dream were a station wagon, Conneticut, and a country club, isn't that better than a fucking cop with a wooden leg? I'm not saying every body has to have the same dream, but that you should have a dream, something to strive for, not just a fall-back plan.

by mg at February 7, 2006 12:17 AM