Sometimes we can get caught up in minutia.. narrowing our focus too much and miss something special. We all do it. Perhaps we see what someone has “liked” and “like” it too without really looking at it.
That happened to a item I posted on Pinterest. The picture was a roll of the multi-flavored fruit lifesavers and under it was a story about a classroom of young students and a creative teacher. It went like this: “The children began to identify the flavors by their color. Red…Cherry. Yellow…Lemon. Green…Lime. Orange…Orange. Finally the teacher gave them all Honey lifesavers. None of the children could identify the taste. The teacher said, ‘I will give you all a clue. It’s what your mother may sometime call your father.’ One little girl looked up in horror, spit her lifesaver out and yelled, “Oh my God! They’re A**-holes!”
I still chuckle every time I read it. I pinned it to my “Makes Me Think/Humor” board. Well it caught on. I started getting notifications that people were pinning it…to DESIGN. Really? Design? I thought this was an anomaly but within four days over 3100 people pinned it to boards for Design. I’m pleased they liked the design of the photo but I can’t help but wonder if they missed something.
Recently I had someone read one of my books. Apparently the small land mass and corresponding population bothered them. They focused on it to such an extent that it seemed a bigger deal than the story. I couldn’t help but think that they were missing a sun kissed rainbow by staring at the water streaked window. Oh and by the way..it is fiction. I can always grow more land mass. LOL
I sometimes find myself engaged in this sort of myopia during editing or when reading reviews and need to refocus on the big picture. Whether it is looking at my work, the political process or social networking it is useful to step back and get the broader view. Perspective is achieved when you can see the whole view out the window.
Do you have some not-seeing-the-forest-through-the-trees stories? Share them. I would love to hear your anecdotes.
1 Comment
Thank you for sharing the cute Lifesavers story. I may have a story where a company—which I will not name just yet—failed to see the forest for the trees.
Six months ago I decided not to pay an 80 cents interest charge on a bill that I had paid, though the check had cleared a day late. The charge came as a surprise as I make a point to pay punctually, and I assumed the company’s own lethargy in mailings or processing time had caused the debt. Given that the amount was so low, I decided it was not worth my stamp nor their manpower to process the bill, so in a glow of foolish naivete which dooms me to ever expect decency in others, I assumed the matter would be dropped, forgiven, and forgot.
About three months ago, I received a plague of calls demanding payment. I first assumed them scams, but after a google search I identified the company as a subsidiary of the one I had supposedly owed 80 cents. I called and left a message, explaining the pittance of money involved and that since the check had been processed a bare day late, it was just as likely their fault as mine. After that, the calls ended. Once again, I assumed sanity and a sense of humanity had prevailed.
How wrong I was. This week I received a letter from a collection agency who had been sold the rights to my debt. They threatened to attack my credit rating should I fail to submit to paying them in full. The original 80 cent charge had transmogrified through some demonic math to $16.04.
So, I paid it. Meaning, this story ends a tragedy. And the name of the company? No, not Bank of America. Not a cutthroat bookie or a pre-payday loan shark. It was the local hospital.