英语书籍：Bowling Across America（3）ZT
=====TODAY'S BOOK=====================
BOWLING ACROSS AMERICA
50 States in Rented Shoes
by Mike Walsh (nonfiction)
Published by St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 9780312366193
Text Copyright (c) 2008 by Mike Walsh
BOWLING (Part 3 of 5)
======================================
(continued from Tuesday)
The previous summer, for the first time in years, he had gathered us
all for a family reunion. We spent a hot, humid Labor Day weekend at
a state park in Illinois, not too far from where his grandfather
first settled after coming from Ireland. At that event Dad shared
with us the results of research he'd been doing on the Walsh
family's ancestry, which he had made into laminated printouts for
each of us. The description of his grandfather's journey to the
United States reads: "One of the photos herewith shows the house
from which Grandpa walked, when he left home for the port of
Cork...probably a 40 or 50 mile walk or ride, if able to hitch one.
His farewell 'party' would have been like an Irish wake...lots of
crying, story telling, speculation of what would be or could have
been, and lots of booze." A road map we'd subconsciously followed
for Dad's immigration to the afterlife.
His last note to me was a thank-you card for the gift I'd given him
for Christmas. Recounting the culmination of their holiday season,
he wrote that after forty-two years of marriage he and my mother
"finally got New Year's Eve right" with a quiet evening of gin rummy
at home.
During a couples' weekend they attended four years earlier, he and
my mother had been assigned the task of writing each other a letter
about their fears. His read, in part: "I fear a prolonged death and
you and the kids having to take care of me. I want to die playing
handball."
In every aspect of his life, it seemed, he'd set things right.
Nothing was left undone, unsaid, or undecided. If not for the
suddenness of his death, one could be forgiven for thinking he'd
known it was coming and prepared expressly for it. This was
comforting to believe.
Of course it was also completely untrue. He'd left countless things
undone, like spending another 20 years with his wife and growing old
with her. Like walking his two unmarried daughters down the aisle at
their weddings. Like meeting his grandchildren who were not yet born
but were no doubt forthcoming. These things only God could bring
about now, and only spiritually.
And then there was that one other earthly task Dad left undone.
It had glared at me from his office on East Fifth Avenue, hanging
crooked on the wall behind his desk, two nights after his death when
Peter, Pat, and I went there to try to absorb Dad's presence. Of
course, all going there did was depress us more, being surrounded by
his life's work while his life's last breath was being recirculated
throughout an athletic club's HVAC system. But the thing that
haunted me most, that captured my gaze and locked my stare upon it,
was the map on the wall.
It was a rudimentary map of the United States, measuring 20" x 30"
and colored in blue, green, and varying shades of purple and pink,
each state a single color and the shades carefully chosen so no
state bordered another of the same color. The states' names were
written in all caps, and major cities and midsized towns were noted
along-side black dots. Alaska and Hawaii were tucked in the lower
right-hand corner, doing no justice to Alaska's size or Hawaii's
distance from the mainland. According to a copyright notice beneath
the legend, the map had been made by a company in Texas. It was
mounted on cheap white foam board; taped to its upper edge were a
photo of Dad with my sister Molly, and my sister Regan's college
business card from when she was president of her sorority.
Only after looking at it for the third or fourth time would one
notice the small circular stickers, about a quarter inch in
diameter, in either green or yellow, each with a number on it. The
numbers were pre-printed, and their placement appeared arbitrary.
There was no discernible pattern, no apparent reason that Boise,
Idaho, had a green "135" while Huntington, West Virginia, had a
yellow "5." Cryptographers would go mad trying to figure our why
twenty-eight states had stickers and others had none. But the answer
was simple to anyone who knew Leo B. Walsh. And it was obvious that
someone had to finish what he'd started.
Though it would take over a year to materialize, there was a journey
of epic, if somewhat absurd, proportions in my future.
CHAPTER ONE
Reserving the Lanes
Scrawled in the margins of a yellow legal pad on which I am
ostensibly taking notes is a list of states, and next to each the
name of someone who lives there and might have a guest room or couch
where I could spend the night. "VT--Owen. CA--Josh, Val, Erica.
MN--Orths." And so on. Some states have blank spaces next to them;
others I just can't remember. I'm having an embarrassingly hard time
naming all 50; I never learned that song that children are taught as
a mnemonic device to remember them.
Around me people are debating which word, "whiter" or "brighter,"
would be most effective at getting consumers to pay 30 cents more
for their laundry soap, or a similar topic of such monumental
importance. I have long since tuned out. I've been doing that a lot
lately.
I am one of those advertising executives they portray in the movies
gathered around a conference table saying important-sounding things
about sketches mounted on black presentation boards. "I think the
logo should be bigger" and whatnot. Movie portrayals
notwithstanding, what once seemed an exciting world of expense
accounts, photo shoots, and high-powered meetings has become a bleak
reality of rushed airport dining, prima donna egotists, and
windowless conference rooms on beautiful spring days. My interest is
waning, has waned, and I've become desperate for something more
fulfilling.
Now, I'm self-aware enough to realize I'm being somewhat immature
and impatient in this. Who does love their job? There's nothing
special about my situation. In fact, I should be happy to have a job
that pays me well and involves little more than writing e-mails and
talking to people all day. Kids making Nikes would kill for work
like this if they didn't die from the shock of learning that people
are paid tens of thousands of dollars to do it. And here I am
griping that it isn't fulfilling enough.
I take some comfort that these feelings are, if not universal,
perhaps genetic. My dad loved his job, running the business he
founded, but he'd once had a yellow legal pad of his own.
He was thirty-seven--a decade older than I am. He had a wife, four
children, and a lucrative, secure job as a salesman for Honeywell.
In those days, employment at a company such as Honeywell was a
lifetime engagement if one so desired. But despite that security and
decent pay, he was frustrated, bored, and feeling more ambitious
than that corporate culture would allow. He spent his weekends and
evenings scribbling his legal pad ragged, showing it to his friend
Mike Petrie, talking it over with my mother, and finally getting up
the courage to enact its contents: the business plan for Columbus
Temperature Control, the company he would leave in Peter's hands
upon his death. In 1972 he quit Honeywell, rented a warehouse, and
became a wholesale distributor of heating and air-conditioning
parts. Aside from a meager amount of inventory, all he had was a lot
of confidence and an inventive sales pitch: "Buy something.
Anything."
(continued on Thursday)
=====TODAY'S BOOK=====================
BOWLING ACROSS AMERICA
50 States in Rented Shoes
by Mike Walsh (nonfiction)
Published by St. Martin's Press
ISBN: 9780312366193
Text Copyright (c) 2008 by Mike Walsh
BOWLING (Part 3 of 5)
======================================
(continued from Tuesday)
The previous summer, for the first time in years, he had gathered us
all for a family reunion. We spent a hot, humid Labor Day weekend at
a state park in Illinois, not too far from where his grandfather
first settled after coming from Ireland. At that event Dad shared
with us the results of research he'd been doing on the Walsh
family's ancestry, which he had made into laminated printouts for
each of us. The description of his grandfather's journey to the
United States reads: "One of the photos herewith shows the house
from which Grandpa walked, when he left home for the port of
Cork...probably a 40 or 50 mile walk or ride, if able to hitch one.
His farewell 'party' would have been like an Irish wake...lots of
crying, story telling, speculation of what would be or could have
been, and lots of booze." A road map we'd subconsciously followed
for Dad's immigration to the afterlife.
His last note to me was a thank-you card for the gift I'd given him
for Christmas. Recounting the culmination of their holiday season,
he wrote that after forty-two years of marriage he and my mother
"finally got New Year's Eve right" with a quiet evening of gin rummy
at home.
During a couples' weekend they attended four years earlier, he and
my mother had been assigned the task of writing each other a letter
about their fears. His read, in part: "I fear a prolonged death and
you and the kids having to take care of me. I want to die playing
handball."
In every aspect of his life, it seemed, he'd set things right.
Nothing was left undone, unsaid, or undecided. If not for the
suddenness of his death, one could be forgiven for thinking he'd
known it was coming and prepared expressly for it. This was
comforting to believe.
Of course it was also completely untrue. He'd left countless things
undone, like spending another 20 years with his wife and growing old
with her. Like walking his two unmarried daughters down the aisle at
their weddings. Like meeting his grandchildren who were not yet born
but were no doubt forthcoming. These things only God could bring
about now, and only spiritually.
And then there was that one other earthly task Dad left undone.
It had glared at me from his office on East Fifth Avenue, hanging
crooked on the wall behind his desk, two nights after his death when
Peter, Pat, and I went there to try to absorb Dad's presence. Of
course, all going there did was depress us more, being surrounded by
his life's work while his life's last breath was being recirculated
throughout an athletic club's HVAC system. But the thing that
haunted me most, that captured my gaze and locked my stare upon it,
was the map on the wall.
It was a rudimentary map of the United States, measuring 20" x 30"
and colored in blue, green, and varying shades of purple and pink,
each state a single color and the shades carefully chosen so no
state bordered another of the same color. The states' names were
written in all caps, and major cities and midsized towns were noted
along-side black dots. Alaska and Hawaii were tucked in the lower
right-hand corner, doing no justice to Alaska's size or Hawaii's
distance from the mainland. According to a copyright notice beneath
the legend, the map had been made by a company in Texas. It was
mounted on cheap white foam board; taped to its upper edge were a
photo of Dad with my sister Molly, and my sister Regan's college
business card from when she was president of her sorority.
Only after looking at it for the third or fourth time would one
notice the small circular stickers, about a quarter inch in
diameter, in either green or yellow, each with a number on it. The
numbers were pre-printed, and their placement appeared arbitrary.
There was no discernible pattern, no apparent reason that Boise,
Idaho, had a green "135" while Huntington, West Virginia, had a
yellow "5." Cryptographers would go mad trying to figure our why
twenty-eight states had stickers and others had none. But the answer
was simple to anyone who knew Leo B. Walsh. And it was obvious that
someone had to finish what he'd started.
Though it would take over a year to materialize, there was a journey
of epic, if somewhat absurd, proportions in my future.
CHAPTER ONE
Reserving the Lanes
Scrawled in the margins of a yellow legal pad on which I am
ostensibly taking notes is a list of states, and next to each the
name of someone who lives there and might have a guest room or couch
where I could spend the night. "VT--Owen. CA--Josh, Val, Erica.
MN--Orths." And so on. Some states have blank spaces next to them;
others I just can't remember. I'm having an embarrassingly hard time
naming all 50; I never learned that song that children are taught as
a mnemonic device to remember them.
Around me people are debating which word, "whiter" or "brighter,"
would be most effective at getting consumers to pay 30 cents more
for their laundry soap, or a similar topic of such monumental
importance. I have long since tuned out. I've been doing that a lot
lately.
I am one of those advertising executives they portray in the movies
gathered around a conference table saying important-sounding things
about sketches mounted on black presentation boards. "I think the
logo should be bigger" and whatnot. Movie portrayals
notwithstanding, what once seemed an exciting world of expense
accounts, photo shoots, and high-powered meetings has become a bleak
reality of rushed airport dining, prima donna egotists, and
windowless conference rooms on beautiful spring days. My interest is
waning, has waned, and I've become desperate for something more
fulfilling.
Now, I'm self-aware enough to realize I'm being somewhat immature
and impatient in this. Who does love their job? There's nothing
special about my situation. In fact, I should be happy to have a job
that pays me well and involves little more than writing e-mails and
talking to people all day. Kids making Nikes would kill for work
like this if they didn't die from the shock of learning that people
are paid tens of thousands of dollars to do it. And here I am
griping that it isn't fulfilling enough.
I take some comfort that these feelings are, if not universal,
perhaps genetic. My dad loved his job, running the business he
founded, but he'd once had a yellow legal pad of his own.
He was thirty-seven--a decade older than I am. He had a wife, four
children, and a lucrative, secure job as a salesman for Honeywell.
In those days, employment at a company such as Honeywell was a
lifetime engagement if one so desired. But despite that security and
decent pay, he was frustrated, bored, and feeling more ambitious
than that corporate culture would allow. He spent his weekends and
evenings scribbling his legal pad ragged, showing it to his friend
Mike Petrie, talking it over with my mother, and finally getting up
the courage to enact its contents: the business plan for Columbus
Temperature Control, the company he would leave in Peter's hands
upon his death. In 1972 he quit Honeywell, rented a warehouse, and
became a wholesale distributor of heating and air-conditioning
parts. Aside from a meager amount of inventory, all he had was a lot
of confidence and an inventive sales pitch: "Buy something.
Anything."
(continued on Thursday)
选择“Disable on www.wenxuecity.com”
选择“don't run on pages on this domain”
