It’s Deja Vu All Over Again
This title is a quote attributed to the New York Yankees all-star catcher Yogi Berra. I used to follow major league baseball, and I remember how ubiquitous that phrase became. It was repeated mostly when something happened in the game that was (unintentionally) funny and could be attributed to Yogi.
I’m quite familiar with stories being repeated. My father had fifteen or twenty favorites that he told and retold throughout the last fifty years of his life. But since I would remind him when he’d already told me the story, he learned to ask, “Have I told you the story about…” My answer was always the same.
“YES, Dad.”
Now the shoe is firmly on the other foot as I find myself facing a similar problem. Over the past ten years, my friend Nancy has edited my blog. Whenever I ask her if I’ve already written on a specific topic her answer is almost always, “YES. Several times.”
Based on my history with my dad, I try to never tell the same story twice. That means that within my family my stories have a shelf life of no more than two weeks (or a single blog). By then everyone has either heard the story directly from me, or indirectly from someone else. Fortunately, or not, Nancy has a better memory when it comes to what I’ve previously written than I do. But I don’t remember writing about Déjà Vu All Over Again. Do you, Nancy? (If you’re reading this then you can assume she didn’t).
One author says that if he likes a book he’ll read it again. He always finds something interesting that he’d missed the first time around. I seldom read a book twice, and I’ve seen very few movies more than once. One was Westside Story, although the second time was the remake, not the original. I’ve seen the Musical Les Misérables more than five times – because it’s great. Sad and funny, and I like both.
I’m reminded of the graduate student who confronted his economics professor before the final exam.
“It’s well known,” the student said, “that you’ve used the same exact final exam for the past twenty years.”
“That’s true,” the economics professor responded. “The questions are the same. But I always change the answers.”
In life the big problems seem to always be the same. Let’s hope we all come up with our own “win-win” answers.
In my case, I may start with, “have I told you the story about…”
Alan