Archive for April, 2008

“If you can’t say something nice, don’t say nothing at all.” –Thumper

“Mens regnum bona possidet” (”An honest heart is a kingdom in itself”) –Seneca

“Am I my brother’s keeper?” –Cain

To hold back out of kindness, even perhaps mercy, is a time-honored tradition often associated with polite society. It expedites, it smooths over, it lets us not butt heads over every disagreement. But every time we withhold the truth, we also lie a little bit.

Honesty frees us from the fences every lie puts up. When one has to lie in the first place, it’s usually because the true answer would have undesirable consequences, and so to avoid the compounded consequences, one often chooses to lie to cover the lie.  I’m sure everyone has heard something like this from one’s mother.

Recently I have been finding that when the admonition to be honest collides with the admonition to say only nice things, I side with honesty.  I’ve been feeling rather blunt, and perhaps a bit simple, because for whatever reason, the ability to dissimulate carries with it an air of sophistication.  And so I have injured my pride by being straightforward, and others’ feeling by being honest, and my reputation by being less than nice.

I wonder (out loud, apparently) if there were two right ways to handle those situations, and if so, why I seem to have consistently chosen the more innocent?  In many ways this is a trap of my own doing; if I didn’t care about the consequences of my words (or lack thereof), this wouldn’t be a problem; many of these recent confrontations were borne out of a feeling of responsibility; the idea that, through my honesty, I might open up someone’s eyes to something that they really should know but weren’t about to find out for themselves.

And so I am either my brother’s keeper, honest in my loving criticism, shouldering the burden of speaking the cruel truth because I have the sad gift of seeing it; or else I am a meddler, interfering in other’s lives, choosing to belittle them for some unknown reason.  Or more probably, a little of each.  In any case, I wish I had been able to say more nice things lately.

How much money is there in bumper stickers?

A friend of mine had a pretty awesome bumper sticker idea last weekend; I could see it going over well.  And then it turns out that he’s had this idea for a while.  I wonder where it could go if he would follow through.  Ideas are pretty valuable things – I would rather have a good idea than a good thing.  The guy who first put water in a bottle is a lot cooler than a guy who just has water in a bottle.  Or perhaps that’s a bad example; I mean, water and things to hold it have been around for a long time.  Maybe it would be better to say that the guy who thought up the helicopter (I’m looking at you, DaVinci) is a lot cooler than a guy who just has a helicopter.  You get the point.

So is there any money/glamour/future in the idea of a bumper sticker?  One could sell the idea to somebody who is already in the business of making stickers (deal with nothing but the idea), or make some stickers and sell those.  How much money do you think a good bumper sticker makes?  I wonder if the guy who made the “Endless—-this war” sticker (the most popular one I see) has retired off of the profits.

Okay, probably not.  But I wonder how many of these other ideas I can find if I start looking around for them – ideas that are good, and could be marketable with a little work.  Of course there are people who do make their living by providing the drive and perspiration for other’s inspiration – people like editors or agents, for instance.  I’m probably terrible at it – after all, I can’t usually turn my own ideas into reality – what are the odds I’ll have the follow through to work on someone else’s?

I’m off to see if I can turn somebody else’s inspiration into money.  Chances are I will give up and it’ll have just been an interesting exercise.  But if not… today, a bumper sticker.  Tomorrow – who knows?