Let's take the way-back machine to a winter where Brad had just bought a $50k new wake-boarding boat. Let's just say he had high expectations. Very high. One night while in Ted's basement watching a sporting event, Brad made a rather funny joke about the odd's of Will actually finding a woman like Monaca in the world. Next thing we knew, Will had lovingly tossed Brad to the ground as we all heard an nasty popping noise. That popping noise was Brad's shoulder coming out of the socket and the noise of Brad's dreams of being able to wake-board that summer being crushed.
My friend Brad is old. Very old. With that super-oldness comes the occasional great nugget of wisdom. One of the things he taught me about ten years ago was this simple saying, "Expectations are resentments waiting to happen". I ran across this mathematical representation of Brad's wisdom. He told me this after I returned from my first vacation with two small kids. To date, my expectations of vacation were kicking back in a chair on the beach, enjoying a cold beer or two and having fun. My first family vacation with kids was NOTHING like that. Any time I've got a big event coming up, Brad will chime in with the phrase, "Sounds like you have some pretty high expectations." To which I'll try and try and reset things and make sure that I'm good with whatever comes my way.
I say this because Cathie and I are heading to Key West on Thursday night, along with Jon and Beth. It should be a great week, great weather, great company. I'm trying to lower my expectations and make sure that I can enjoy the moment.
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Brad would be fine today if I had only thrown him to the ground. Unfortunately for Brad, I decided to jump on him as well. I heard a sound like a chicken bone breaking as all of my body weight came to bear on his upper body.
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