In Praise of Rabbit Trails...

I had coffee with Kleman last week. It was great to spend time together. She has such a singular presence and voice in the world. So focused, so curious, so unpretentious, so brilliant.

So anyway.

She told me about this term that scholars are using to talk about conversational rabbit trails. "Off Target Verbosity" is the name. Isn't that great? And in case you don't get the connection....I (and my blog) am the king of "off target verbosity"...or rabbit trails or whatever.

....

Ann wrote me an email with a good idea yesterday that seemed slightly disconnected to any conversation that we had had in the last two days, and explained her off-target-emailosity this way:

Just an idea because I am procrastinating thinking about what I should be thinking about.

and i wrote back:

Procrastination is one of the most productive ways of doing life, I think.

...

And speaking of procrastination:

I was blogsurfing the other day (I know, I know, I don't have time to blogsurf -- I have memos to write, meetings to go to, friends to email, kids to play with)...and I read this blog who was mourning what his procrastination had cost him:

  I could probably tell you a lot about alien fighting and looking through plate glass windows.  I could explain in detail how a person might will himself to fly without moving a muscle, just like I could speak volumes about the politics behind the battle of good versus evil.

There are a lot of things I could do if I weren’t such a procrastinator.  Knowing more about my dreams would be just one of them.

...

i live in a world (most of you do too) where "mission statements", "being intentional", "strategic planning", (dot, dot,dot)

are the words that frame the story that we like to tell ourselves about our path.

There IS a path. There IS a direction. LOOK! Where We're Going!

......

David Foster Wallace has a new book -- _oblivion_ -- a collection of short stories. (and while i loved his first collection of short stories, i became, ironically (?) bored by _infinite jest_, the novel. perhaps some rabbit trails are just too long to invite anyone along?) and the paste reviewer refers (kindly) to his "wistful misdirection"....

sorry, phillip, the reviewer, i got lost on that rabbit trail...

it's a nice label....

possibly a good one for my life...

definitely a bestselling antidote to the PURPOSE DRIVEN life...

and actually, if my procrastination ends up not affording me enough time to write an autobiography named:

Wistful Misdirection...

than it would definitely make a handsome epitaph...

and there's something TRUE about engraving words like that in marble...

don't you think...?