Across the Divide

I asked my six-year-old granddaughter what she wants to be when she grows up.

There was no hesitation: "An artist."

"Why do you want to be an artist?"

"Because I like to draw."

"Do you like people to see your drawings?"

"Only some of them. Others I don't want anyone to see."

***

My father used to love to draw. He'd let me see his drawings but he told me that they were not very good. Maybe they were or maybe they weren't, but he kept drawing nonetheless.

He'd keep his drawings in an old dresser that I think was called a "filboy." From the limited research I've done, this may have been an example of the Waterfall Art Deco style of furniture from *circa* 1930.

When I was young, we lived on the outskirts of Detroit, and he was a milk salesman who went store to store selling his company's brand of milk.

Sometimes he took me along. He knew every shopkeeper's name, asked about their families, and handed out tchotchkes from his company folder. He'd also often tell them a story, simple tales about the store down the way, that kind of thing.

Years later, when I was raising money for various non-profit organizations, I found myself using some of the same techniques, almost unconsciously. My emphasis was always on the story-telling, which usually revolved around the impacts of our work.

Years after that, I read that story-telling had become the norm in marketing. During a down period in my journalism career, I applied for a few marketing jobs. "You don't have enough marketing experience," I was told.

Selling, of course, is selling -- a process where the product almost is incidental. Part of the sales job is creating a founder's myth, a story about how your company or its founder got started.

Take the light bulb. Thomas Edison is often given credit for tis invention but he was only one of many people who contributed to the development of this important item. According to *LiveScience*:

"The story of the light bulb begins long before Edison patented the first commercially successful bulb in 1879. In 1800, Italian inventor Alessandro Volta developed the first practical method of generating electricity, the voltaic pile. Made of alternating discs of zinc and copper — interspersed with layers of cardboards soaked in salt water — the pile conducted electricity when a copper wire was connected at either end. While actually a predecessor of the modern battery, Volta's glowing copper wire is also considered to be one of the earliest manifestations of incandescent lighting."

Edison was no fool. He started a company to exploit his founder's myth for commercial purposes. His company set truth aside in that pursuit.

When it comes to marketing campaign, they come and go, as do the companies. But the story, true or false, survives. 

***

This is a period of scams and fraud. Someone stole my credit card number and ran up over $1,000 in charges this month, which. came to my attention yesterday as I went to pay the bill.

"What is this?" I muttered, "And this and this and that?"

The fraudulent purchases were all for delivery. When I called the bank, they acknowledged the fraud and said they would remove the charges from my account.

I know many people who read my essays are elderly. Please be aware that these are times that criminals prey upon the unsuspecting. Be alert.

Most people are honest most of the time. We might shave the yellow-to-red light thing a little close sometimes as we glide through an intersection, but we feel guilty about that. Here's where effective law enforcement can prove helpful.

If you get stopped for that kind of infraction, a warning will usually suffice. The rule is that you should not enter an intersection when the light is yellow and you must exit it before it turns red.

A couple months back, I was taking a Lyft ride from San Francisco down the peninsula when I noticed that the driver would never turn right after stopping at a red light, even though that is legal in California. The driver was a recent arrival in the U.S. and I asked him if he understood the rule.

He said that he did but that most of his pickups were in the city, where drivers have perfected rolling through red lights when executing right turns, never quite coming to the required complete stop. City cops tend to overlook this practice; in fact they do it themselves all the time.

The driver told me he'd been ticketed recently on the peninsula for doing just that. Maybe cops down here were stricter?

In any event, he'd decided it was far better to come to a complete stop and wait for the green light than to risk another ticket, which would wipe out an entire shift's earnings. I understood, but being in a hurry, I was irritated by his caution.

In his case, a warning from the cop may have been more effective than the ticket. As it happened, after he was stopped, he had to work an entire second shift to make up the difference. So one of the peninsula's cities got some ticket revenue while those using Lyft got a very tired driver working much longer than he should have been doing.

And I got a slower trip home than I wanted.

***

As I watch people navigating the whole social distance maneuver when they encounter one another, I notice that the children, in particular, are mastering this dance. When they see a friend, they prance to about the six-foot line, then move backward as their friend moves forward. Back and forth they go, never touching or breathing each other's emissions of respiratory particles, virus-laden or not.

I'm wondering whether this ritual will evolve into a new mating dance for the human animal, dancing back and forth, six feet apart, until enough trust is established to convince them to encroach upon the safety zone and embrace.

After all, love requires risk. Everyone knows that.

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