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Barking up the wrong tree

With Fletcher at my feet I spent Wednesday night thinking about expectations. The thing that spurred me to this abstract topic was the completely black and white manner in which a four-year-old Labrador puppy lives its life.

Fletcher, from what I can gather because he has yet to talk, is fairly simple. I don’t mean short-bus simple (although he is a bit lacking in the noggin power), but simple in his wants and needs.

He’s pretty much a three-trick pony. Eating, sleeping, evacuating—then doing it all over again. There is certainly a little bit of snuffling about thrown in for good measure as well as a healthy amount of dashing this way and that and attacking sticks.

But for the most part Fletcher is simple. We’re not like that.

Take the holidays for instance. During which we pretty much let our expectations rule our perceptions of people, their actions and our lot in life.

If we get a gift we don’t like, we seldom look inward for the reason.

Nope. We suddenly and critically look at the person who let us down by giving us a gift. We project upon them a sense of evil motivation. One that has caused them to maniacally wrest control from our superior life and dash our hopes and dreams.

That might seem a bit severe, but try and follow this twisted scenario. I’ll give you the end first and then build in the backstory.

I got too many teapots for Christmas and therefore thought that nobody cared about me.

“Well, that’s logical� you’re probably thinking. Teapots are a thoughtless and shoddy gift. In fact, you’re probably saying aloud right now, “I wonder how you wronged these people to such a degree that they foisted teapot after teapot on you!�

Now here’s the filler. A quality tea kettle was on my list – remember the jeffcutler.com/wishlist site?

And instead of being proactive and taking the kettle off the list the moment I found out that Mrs. Claus had gotten me a kettle, I let the list languish and trusted the others to read my mind.

I’m the same way about other occasions too. My birthday, Valentine’s Day, Talk Like A Pirate Day, and even the first day of sweeps week.

While things would be so much better if people could read minds, I don’t think it would help me too much in the way of gifts and special treatment.

People might see that I sometimes project my feelings onto situations and that I can be prone to self focus on various occasions.

Maybe I better keep my hopes for a clairvoyant society a secret before this whole situation turns ugly.

For if word got out that I really like presents, but I don’t always appreciate them as much as I should…I’d definitely be in the dog house.

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If you're listening to the podcast instead of reading this online, you are acutely aware that I sound like crap. This cold in my throat and brain arrived after Thanksgiving and has decided to stay through the holidays. I've set out clean towels and am just waiting for it to leave.

In the meantime, I've been focusing on my trip to France in July which has necessitated a little tightening of the purse strings. Instead of eating lunch out every day I've been occasionally bringing leftovers. And instead of eating each breakfast out - and this is my FAVORITE meal of the day - I have started to cook again.

Today I had my famous spicy eggs. I can't give you the recipe because they were created by mistake while I was distracted by DirecTv TITANIUM.

Titanium is a package for people who don't have enough going on in their lives to leave the couch. For a mere $7500 a year, you can get EVERY SINGLE CHANNEL AND MOVIE that DirecTv delivers. That includes NFL Sunday Ticket, PayPerView (all you can eat), every movie channel, all the adult selections (oooooooohh, still not worth it), and hundreds of regular channels.

In my weakened condition I tried to do the math. I'm paying about $50 per month for a pretty good package. I don't get movies or sex channels, but I also choose to fill a good portion of my day with something other than embossing my couch with my body.

For this package to be worth it, I would have to watch television and movies 31 hours a day. $7500 is more than ten times more expensive than my current bill and I rarely break the 2-hour per day mark, much less the vaunted 3.1 hour barrier.

Well, I have been known to plunk myself down once in a while when there's a Scrubs marathon or NFL Football on the tube. And we're not including July when I regularly watch 5+ hours a day of the Tour de France.

So, my shocked state I put too much pepper in my eggs and realized once again that if television - or any activity - is interfering in your life, it might be a sign. I'm taking this to mean that titanium is too heavy a metal for me to handle.

Keep thinking!

I finally got my act together the other day and re-compiled my wish list for the holidays. I’ve been doing this for more than 30 years, so it wasn’t a new endeavor, but it took more effort this time.

And it’s precisely this effort that concerns me. Instead of being rabid to compose a string of expensive, extravagant and interesting items on a list that is posted for all the world to see – by the way, you can find it at jeffcutler.com/wishlist (the wishlist part is all one word) – instead of this rabidity, I was pretty nonchalant this year. And that frightens me.

My modus operandi is one that is best described as Jeff to the world. Not in a inwardly focused style, but in a ‘the holidays are so taxing on everyone’s nerves that you should be able to smile’ way.

So I frequently try to be as creative in my list making as I am in my advertising brainstorming, my blog entries and my emails to long-lost friends. I sometimes put things like circus tickets, licorice laces and even home renovations to the tune of $260,000 on the list. But I think I’ve either grown up or lost the enthusiasm for things.

Don’t think this is all crazy talk, I still have some fun stuff there, but most things on the list are more slanted toward gift cards and practical items than in years past.

Maybe it’s a new era – or the semblance of a period that we all approach as we get older – but I’m not sure I’m too fond of the list apathy that has gripped my soul.

I want to want. The urge to bask in excess is something I miss, and thankfully it’s something I can’t grasp hold of by purchasing gadgets from Brookstone, sushi from Porter Square or bike parts from SpeedGoat.com. Well, maybe the sushi would make me smile a little.
But what comes next? The inexorable trip to being altruistic? A path that has me standing in soup kitchens with a ladle? Or divesting myself of all 280 of my baseball caps to kids who need them more than I.

In retrospect I think this sense of wonder is a safety valve to my sanity and it gives me hope that I’m not that far gone from the present-hoarder of days gone by.

Similar to those smart people you know who don’t focus on their brains and are slightly insecure in their brilliance, I think that I’m safe from gift burnout.

You see, by leaning toward the irrational and talking hypothetically about no presents, I’ve awoken a greedy little monster inside me. And this monster is already gurgling and whimpering about gift cards, home and travel electronics and a lengthy list of fun things to sate its appetite.

Phew, that was close! Wishion accomplished!