Be Good at Things that Happen A Lot
The sign on the side of the highway said, “HITCHHIKERS MAY BE INMATES.” It’s a serious sign-- not the kind made of cardboard and magic marker constructed on a whim in somebody’s backyard. It’s metal, painted bright yellow with professional black lettering, and it is welded to steel pipes permanently secured in the dirt.
Some thought has gone into this.
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And it sort of makes some sense. A state correctional facility is located about a mile on down the road, just over a hill or two, right on the side of the highway not very close to anything but yet not far away from much. It’s a maximum-security prison, the kind with silver barbed wire rolled up like a slightly stretched out slinky on top of the fence surrounding the grounds. Suffice to say, it’s not a place that appears to be easy to enter, much less to escape from, were one so inclined.
So what’s up with that sign?
I can only guess that an incident (or two or more maybe?) occurred—probably years and years ago-- instigating the good citizen warning. But it’s hard for me to imagine that it ever happened much. It’s even harder to imagine a prison escapee walking along the side of the road with his thumb up just a mile from prison grounds. And if one did, it’s almost impossible for me to imagine someone stopping to pick him up. Especially on this two lane “highway” that simply serves as a connector for a handful of small towns. People in these parts are kind, but they’re not unaware.
So how did that simple sentiment make it so far as to merit a sign? It’s odd the things we fixate on, the problems we pour into that rarely, if ever, even come to pass.
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We get so concerned about what might happen or what could happen that we sometimes fail to focus our attention on what happens all the time. Pete Carril, the late, great Princeton basketball coach, used to tell his guys to “get good at things that happen a lot.” As logical as that sounds, it’s a mark we often miss.
Basketball players are the worst about doing things that have limited real time impact. They spin balls on their fingers, dribble them with their knees, and they’re enamored with last second, long range shots. Give them a rack of balls and an unsupervised gym and within minutes shots are raining from half court. They don’t lace up their shoes and practice lay-ups. They lace their shoes, bounce the ball a couple of times, and start heaving it from deep. And even though it is almost never called upon, there’s not a player on the planet that hasn’t practiced a half-court shot.
Ball players aren’t the only ones who get caught up in the glitz, though. Leaders, too, are prone to fixate on moments that only happen now and then. They spend massive amounts of time on an annual address and next to no time on daily interaction with the people they lead. They pour themselves into the development of a project, dotting all the i’s and crossing all the t’s and yet don’t take the time to write a thank you note or rinse their coffee cup or change a basic practice that would save their people in the trenches tons of time. It’s easy to become enamored with the things that feel great big. Unfortunately, sometimes in doing so we sacrifice the things that matter most.
We do it in our relationships, too. We think birthday celebrations and extravagant anniversary gifts are the deal breakers. We get fixated on date nights and sharing our feelings—both of which are really good ideas—but if you want to make it 40 years, you’d best get good at picking up each other’s socks. Interpersonal kindness, the sort we often save for strangers, practiced day after day after day turns out to be way more important than bucket lists. If you can listen again to a story you’ve heard a hundred times (with a face that makes it seem as if you haven’t), you can stay married for a really long time.
As parents, we get things out of order, too. We spend a lot of time preparing for the pivotal moments--those fork in the road opportunities that we think a lot about when our children are becoming. How will we handle the questions about sex and God and what should they do with the rest of their lives? But the most influential conversations are usually not those. They’re the ones we don’t know are important when they’re happening. The stuff that makes or breaks a life rarely comes after, “Hey, buddy, we want to talk to you about something.” The words that actually sink in and put down roots usually come from the chit-chat in the car on the way to school and in the back yard while playing catch. What happens a lot when your kids are growing up? They win, they lose, they pass, they fail, but mostly their days are a hodge podge of middle of the road randomness that won’t really have a place of prominence on the shelf of the great scheme of things. Most days are “meh.” So it’s probably a good idea to figure out what to do with those.
Things that happen a lot don’t tend to be covered in glitter. Maybe that’s why we so often miss them--their external polish gets rubbed off by daily use. But the funny thing is, if we can learn to get good at the everydays, the every-once-in-a-blue-moons have a way of taking care of themselves.