Met a man on a flight. Small flight, all of forty-five minutes and we managed to discuss the herculean work-pressures of aircraft-controllers at Atlanta airport, and insidious ways of wiring the phone so that callers are met with an engaged tone, within those forty-five minutes. Make no mistake, most of it was led by him.
He was one of those old men, who travel the world, picking up languages (he knew fifteen!), acquaintances, and a way of chatting up strangers.
At one point, he said -
A lizard stuck on the ceiling probably thinks it is holding the roof up. You young mbas have the same weird notion of yourselves. You'll think the company would go kaput were you to take an off-day. So, stop being a lizard.
The moral of this story is that old men have character, confidence. Young men? Are like investments. A man at twenty-five has just started to be what he really will be. A man at fifty has lived and even his scars have stories to tell.
I am 25, going on 50.
ReplyDeletelove the last sentence! absolutely! :-)
ReplyDeleteThe Lizards! :) :)
ReplyDeleteGood one!
I wonder how much the two years of MBA classroom teaching contributed to the transformation into a 'lizard'. My take - a lot! Most of the time, we teach so many concepts in the classes as if they completely capture reality and even more dangerous, we do it with a notion that its the only truth!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteand you prove that women typically like older mature men if they are not demi moore :)
ReplyDelete@GUP - Sure you are. There's no other way
ReplyDelete@GPS - I really think so and you must too, coz u havent reached the stage where you have to pretend to ;)
@Kavity - Yea, all of us! The lizard brigade!
@Mani - The 'truth' that we are the cat's whiskers and the cat's tail and the world is just lucky to have us :) The flipside of this notion is that - the world would not be able to function without us.
@SFS - Sigh. I admit that I am slightly Moore-ish ;)