Some might call it serendipity. Other’s might call it cause and effect. But isn’t wonderful how one choice, one decision can ripple through your entire life?

About fifty years ago I decided on a whim, to judge at the California State High School Speech Tournament finals. I had been involved in speech and debate in both high school and college and I thought it might be fun.

As one of the three judges for the final round of oratory, I helped select the winner. But then, I made another choice. I wrote the winner a check so he could afford to attend to the national finals in Washington, D. C.

Word of monetary gifts travel fast. Two months later his friend Jim showed up in my office. He was finishing his great novel, and needed money to live on, so I hired him to be a “secret shopper” for our apartment buildings in the San Fernando Valley. (I learned that more than one of our apartment managers wore their hair in curlers on Sunday morning).

But the point of this story (which I’ve shared before) is that my one decision, to judge a speech contest, led to chain of events that has drastically impacted my life for the better.  Jim in turn, introduced me to rare book collecting. It was through rare book collecting that I first saw Daveen, who was working at Heritage Book Shop on La Cienega.

And through Daveen I met … well, three of my daughters, for one thing.

Once choice. A lifetime of happy consequences. Each day in our lives we follow along a path, making many decisions. Inevitably, those decisions impact our lives in unforeseeable ways. If I take the path that forks off the one I’m on, that could change everything. The folks we meet in our journey might be a random lot. But if we have the sagacity to notice these chance meetings as opportunities, we can have a hand in creating our own good fortune. Our task is not to find the best possible partner or friends, but to recognize them when, through happy accident, we meet along the path.

The life I have today is as good as it gets. And I can thank a few well-made choices, and a few happy accidents for that.

So, share your joy. I wish you many happy accidents.

Alan

Though she really did exist, her name was not Josephine, and she was extremely smart, except in one important area — interactions with people.

Over the years I’ve told my children, as well as anyone else who would listen, that if you can have only a single skill in life it should be getting along well with others. I think that Josephine missed that lecture.

She first saw me for counseling when I was an apprentice in the Counselor Ed program at the USC School of Education.  She continued seeing me, sporadically and at no cost, for many years after.

I remember one of Josephine’s many problems. On the second day of a new job she gave her employer a list of everything she thought they needed to correct in their business.

How much longer do you think she held that job?  (Hint: think Minutes rather than Years.)

I have absolutely no idea whether Josephine’s suggestions had value. In any event, her ideas might have been eagerly implemented if their source had been a paid consultant rather than a know-it-all high school student. (Consider the source?) But she was hired as a file clerk, not as a Consultant .

If she had been driving, I might have bluntly suggested that she stay in her own lane. But she was just an intrusive busybody with no common sense. (There’s nothing so uncommon as common sense?)

So what should I say?

Wait a minute. You think I’m going to just give you the answer?

No no no. You’re going to have to work for this one.

Actually, I’m going to have to work for this one. I did learn in the USC Professional Wiriting program that a self-help author is expected to be an expert. No hemming and hawing. Just perfection. Now.

Interestingly enough, research in Counseling at the time clearly indicated that talking to a friend could have the same value as talking to a professional counselor. I don’t think the Counseling industry publicized this finding to any major extent.

So here we are. Pretty much as we were before.

But now we realize that maybe finishing the GRE quickly, and even with a perfect score, does not necessarily guarantee success in life.

It’s the personal touch that really counts. 

Alan

In many of the childhood memories I’ve held onto, I’m just having fun. Like the times I used to play at the beach — that is, until a large wave slammed my small body onto the sand. Ouch.

One particularly happy memory from days gone by is of the Good Humor Man. Every summer afternoon of my childhood, sure as sprinkles, I waited to hear the tinkly tune from the Good Humor truck. For those of you who may have come of age after me, this was an ice cream vendor who drove his truck around the neighborhood selling ice cream bars. I remember half and half bars, vanilla ice cream coated in chocolate, for only five cents.

Though cash was chronically short (even thrift can be costly), my mom always seemed to have an extra dime to spare for two ice cream bars — one for me, and one for my little brother. (I always thought of David as my “little” brother, even when he grew up to be taller than me.)

Come to think of it, I haven’t seen a dime in circulation for years. And now, the U S treasury has announced that it will no longer mint any more pennies because they cost 3.7 cents each to manufacture.  (I guess that they finally figured that they weren’t going to make a profit with increased production.)

While dimes and pennies and nickels seem to be following the same course as the dinosaurs, Daveen and I still carry around quarters for — see if you can guess?

That’s right!  For parking meters. Because it is easier to drop in four quarters than it is to deal with the vagaries of using a credit card to buy time on a meter, which it seems, are often broken. (Parking tip: I frequently find available parking in a space with a broken meter. It seems other people don’t know you can park for free if the meter is broken – up to the maximum posted time limit.)

The Good Humor Man is long gone from the neighborhood I grew up in, as am I, but the sweet memories linger, of licking a cold ice cream bar on a hot summer afternoon.

In my world, back in those days, a nickel was all I needed to be happy.

Well, maybe a dime to buy a kite, from time to time.

Alan