POPT

The trick is in what one emphasizes. We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves happy. The amount of work is the same.” Carlos Castaneda

by FireCrow

Yup, in a nutshell, the above quote is The Power of Positive Thinking. Now, this often seems simplistic. Contrived. Trite. But, it also works. Back in high school I naively wrote POPT on just about everything. Partly to help get myself through the rigors of high school, and partly to irritate a Gloom and Doom friend 🙂 I would scribble POPT on his textbook during our shared Human Physiology class (taught by a woman who truly looked like a witch and was known to be a tad tipsy), and he would write “Death!” Ah yes, good times.  Given that he is now working for Oxfam, I guess you could say that he is spreading a lot more POPT than he thought he would back then! And yet, there is an even more well known friend of mine from high school who is going to be honored this weekend. We shared our senior yearbook page together. We kept in touch after graduation for about 7 years. I had MusicMan. She married and had a son while in medical school. Then she moved to L.A. and we lost touch. She was always a little scattered though, so I was not surprised. OK, check that. I am surprised! Look what she has done with her life!

I’m going on Saturday night for this alumni event and I cannot wait to see her again. I wonder, of course, if she will be the same to me. Or is there really a “Hollywood” attitude? We will see. I hope not. In fact, I choose to think *positively* that the friend I knew is still there even though she drifted away to the land of the stars. Smart as a whip, yet charmingly goofy and with a heart of gold and a very quick laugh.  Clearly the intelligence and heart are still there – that is why she is being honored.

Meanwhile, as a reaction to the recent ‘issues’ going on around me, I decided to undertake a fall cleaning project in my house and at work. Figure I gotta control *something* and make it better!! POPT. Or, something like that.