OK... now that I have chased that rabbit down a morbid hole, let me follow up by saying I was not at all thrilled about being "put out" and having a camera stuck down by throat! My friend, Judie shuttled me to the surgical center... not only because they told me I couldn't drive afterward, but my boss thought I might back out of it and spend the day at the beach. Judie is almost as ornery as I am and he knew she'd make me follow through! We arrived early... too early because we both got a bad case of the sillies! We would watch good people being called back, but no one was coming out! I became quite convinced that they were piling up bodies in the back room and advised Judie to take a look at the map posted on the desk (not quite sure why it was there) and come grab me if she heard screaming! She would hit me every time the nurse called a name and I followed with a "Run Don Run" or "Tom is still standing at the door... do you think he's gonna make a run for it"? There was a gentleman wandering around the parking lot when we arrived who came in who later entered the waiting room and asked a man for a bottle of water. When I looked at her in the eyes and said... "See what I mean, look what they did to him, that boy just ain't right," it was more than she could take and had to go outside for a smoke!
When she came back, she giggled and told me to behave myself and think of something serious. So... I did! The night before I couldn't sleep and about midnight found an interesting program on the Science Channel (yeah I know I'm a nerd!) According to this program, the Japanese are contemplating building a huge pyramid. (the size of 55 Luxor hotels) in the ocean. This open-air mega-pyramid would contain a number of skyscrapers and a series of pods which would contain a mass transit system so people could more quickly from place to place. They are now consulting with environmentalists and engineers from all over the globe to work out the bugs in the project. The reason for the feat of architecture is to alleviate the population explosion which has occurred in Tokyo and excessive pollution that goes along with the dense population.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shimizu_Mega-City_Pyramid
I watched in awe of how the Japanese were looking to the future of their country much like our grandparents did following the Great Depression. The single generational focus was "How can we make our nation a better place for our kids and their future." As a student of sociology, I am afraid that our country has lost that vision! I remember when I was in the classroom, being frustrated watching kids who I knew could perform much better, being quite content with their "C."
One day during a lecture on intrinsic motivation, I asked my psych students, "How many of you would like to ride with a pilot that lands a plane safely 70% of the time"? Or "How many of you would like to be operated by a surgeon who has a success rate of 70%."? They all laughed and said "No way," but that is exactly what we are perpetuating within our society. It seems the new American dream is to do the very least to make the most money for recreation. It grieves my heart that we are not fostering the work ethic of our grandparents. With the exception of a few scholars at MIT is there anyone seriously thinking about the America of the future?
I declared to Judie... "We are raising a generation of clones"! In the near future will our kids be building pyramids for the Japanese because they lack the intrinsic motivation to better their own society? After all someone will surely come along and bail us all out, won't they? With China being forced to dump billions of dollars in the American economy, is this our wake up call? Is it time to teach our children the value of hard work rather than hoping for the lottery?
As we enter into the most dreaded of weeks with thousands of teachers getting pink slips in our state, I have to stop and reflect... how did we get here? And do we have the ability to crawl out of this black hole which was created by our own hands? The future is in the hands of our children...
