Greetings!
Quarantined life during COVID-19 is the opposite of FOMO. I feel this weird but cool solidarity that literally everyone in the country is going through this thing together.
No one is going to the beach or going out to their favorite restaurant or visiting their grandkids. We’re all home. We’re all washing our hands. We’re all doing our best to adjust to social distancing.
I call my best friend, Kylie, and ask what she’s doing. “Oh, I’m just having a little alone time.”
It’s not that funny but I can’t stop laughing. Because it is that funny. Or maybe I’m starting to lose my mind a little bit.
After 45 minutes when I’d usually have something that I actually have to do, I tell Kylie, “Welp, I’m gonna get back to it then,” because I don’t have a real reason to get off the phone with her.
Later that night, there’s a frog in my toilet. It catches me quite by surprise, like when I recently discovered a container of leftover asparagus in the cabinet instead of the fridge where it belonged (pregnancy brain?).
It was late - Sam was asleep - and I didn’t know what to do. I Googled it. Apparently, frogs can sometimes find their way up your pipes and into your toilet bowl. The little green guy was sitting partially in the water, looking perfectly content. I tried to flush him. Twice. I figured if he came up that way he could go down that way, but his little suctioned feet weren’t budging.
I closed the toilet lid and went back to the couch, resigned. Texted Kylie and first she replied, “Don’t flush him!!” to which I felt immediately guilty, then relieved that I wasn’t able to flush him. Then she wrote, “Get a cup and put him outside.”
Why didn’t I think of that? I grabbed two Solo cups and entered the bathroom, sweating.
As soon as I gently touched Mr. Frog with the side of the cup, he jumped out of the toilet and hopped all over the bathroom floor. Even though I promised myself I’d be quiet, I screamed for two minutes, then eventually caught him.
Fortunately, Sam took sleeping medicine and was completely zonked out. I freed the little guy outside. When I came back in the house, I couldn’t stop laughing. The kind of laughing that is so loud that you sound like you’re sobbing and only gets worse because you’re trying to be quiet. I had to cover my mouth.
It’s easily the most eventful thing that has happened in the last month, so I wanted to share.
I hope that you are all finding moments of eventfulness, surprise, and laughter. Especially laughter. I might be losing my mind a little bit, but it’s comforting to know that we all are.
Investing in Love
I knew nothing about finance until I met Sam. My metric for success was meeting the minimum monthly payment on my Victoria’s Secret credit card.
Over time I realized that I was most engaged in what he was saying when I could relate an investing term to my own life, namely my romantic life.
So I wrote a guide to investing terms as they relate to my relationship experiences. By using romantic analogies, it will be easy for the novice to truly understand, and amusing for the seasoned investor to see it from a new perspective.
The Last Dance
The first two episodes of the Michael Jordan documentary aired Sunday. Sam and I were stoked for different reasons. Sam grew up watching NBA basketball when Jordan was king and everything about it was very nostalgic for him. For me, it took me back to when I played.
I loved basketball so much. For a long time, I wanted to be the best. I practiced dribbling on the batch of cement in front of my house. I practiced my shot in the backyard. I attended every single optional practice that was available.
My high school coach was a dictator. She was very passionate in a way that I had never seen before. I had the utmost respect for her. I wanted her approval more than anything.
Coaches treat individual players differently. There were players on the team who she was delicate with, but with me, she was harsher than ever because, “I could handle it.” She broke me down to a point where I thought I wanted to quit, but instead, something burned inside of me and all I wanted to do for the rest of my two years on the team was prove her wrong.
I was struck when Jordan’s Dad said the following:
“If you want to bring out the best in Michael, tell him he can’t do something or he can’t do it as good as someone else. I think he takes it as a personal challenge to go out and do it just to prove you wrong.”
Jordan’s Dad was hard on him. He wasn’t encouraging. He pinned his sons against each other.
This leaves me very conflicted. I used to think it was good how my coach pushed me and put me down with negative reinforcement all the time. I’m very mentally tough because of it. But what if she was more encouraging? What if I had felt like she believed in me?
What if Jordan felt nurtured and encouraged in his own game? Maybe he wouldn’t be the greatest basketball player of all time. Or maybe he would be the greatest basketball player of all time WITHOUT a chip on his shoulder.
I don’t know. But I do know that when it comes to my son, I don’t want him to ever feel like it’s him against the world.
What do you think? How do you foster mental toughness and grit while also being encouraging and supportive?
What’s with all the screaming?
We had a Zoom call with Sam’s two nephews, ages 6 and 8. The conversation eerily resembled this tweet:
How am I supposed to react to this behavior? Currently, I do my best to ignore it, but I would honestly like some advice if there’s a way to encourage a real conversation with these kids.
The boys’ dad will either scold them and tell them to “Settle down,” or he’ll say, “They’re just being shy.”
I’m sorry but I do not equate screaming to shyness. It feels more like a plea for attention.
I want my son to feel like he can be playful and be a kid, but I also want him to be a good communicator and be able to socialize with people of all ages.
Am I living in a dream world or is this totally reasonable??
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See you next week!
Charlie