Dearest Rachel –
It’s another day of music that was never ours, and of which some you’ve never heard. Like I said, I’m trying to listen to different stuff, so that it doesn’t bring back painful memories. On the other hand, some of it is painful enough as it is, by sheer dint of content.
It all goes into the fact that (without going into too much detail on either case, so this is going to be a particularly short read today, I’m afraid), today is not one that I’m looking forward to, because I’m going to have to both deliver and receive some unpleasant truths. And both of these songs, while more geared toward the latter scenario, basically sum up the natural human attitude towards such things; “tell me a lie,” or “don’t speak” at all.
But why do we fear the truth so? You would think that understanding and accepting the truth would allow us to move forward; to trim the unnecessary from our lives, and focus on the things that will work. We can become better businessmen, better people, if we just heed the bad news as it stands, and work to improve on it. Why is this so hard?
I think you would probably understand; we as humans want what we want, and don’t really like to be told ‘no,’ even for the most trivial of reasons. It’s that old “sunk cost” fallacy; we have our minds set on the things we’ve already invested in, in part because we’ve invested in them. We don’t want to think of that time and money as having been wasted, even if it quite clearly is. And sometimes, there’s the galling fact that what we’re pursuing is a worthy thing; noble, even, but impossible – at least for us.
Of course, that doesn’t stop all of us…
Now, with regard to the news I’m delivering this evening, it pertains to my profession, which has something of a rock-ribbed relationship with the truth, all jokes aside (there is, for instance, the story of a fellow being interviewed for an accounting job who, when asked what two and two add up to, looks around, closes the blinds, check that the door is locked, leans in toward his interviewer, and asks, sotto voce, “What would you like it to be?”). At the end of the day, the balance sheet must do what it says, and balance; the profit must flow from the income statement into that balance sheet; and there must be a way to tie the cash as reported to what the bank says you have, and I can certainly do all that. It’s when comparing to the budget, or the past year, that there can be concerns.
I still remember how, when I first started the job you let me leave behind, how we were regular making profit margins in the neighborhood of 25% every year, which was incredible for that time and industry. But eventually, we began adding lines that weren’t so profitable, and questions came up as to why the overall margin was slipping. And for whatever reason, referencing the drag these new divisions had on us was an unacceptable line of defense; we had to offer a different explanation as to why we weren’t showing the level of profit we had been in the past. Needless to say, this was frustrating.
There’s some of that going on here; the numbers are okay, but not what they were last year. Some of that may be due to a lack of information, and may be resolved as it comes in. Others are just because of a drying up of revenue streams. It’s not crippling, and we have plenty of time (and resources on hand) to turn things around, but things have looked better. It probably doesn’t help that, from a fiscal standpoint, our main goal is to maximize something – human souls brought into eternity – that can’t be measured. How much is a soul worth on an income statement, especially since it doesn’t belong to us (despite our spending money and resources to win it over)?
Likewise, there are matters of the heart and emotions that we wrestle with the truth on. It’s not quite like, pace Colonel Jessup, that we “can’t handle the truth”…
…so much as we can’t always grasp the truth, especially with regards to other people’s perspectives. There was a time, throughout high school and college, when I expected I would end up living my life on my own, alone. I wasn’t happy about it, by any means, but I assumed it would be my fate, and accepted that it would happen. It didn’t, of course, and thank you for that…
…until it did. And at this point, I couldn’t (and still can’t) imagine why someone would want to live like this; when dealing with someone who has this perspective, I literally can’t comprehend their mindset (and, now that I think about it, I suppose they would be equally hard-pressed to understand mine). Why would you want to live your life alone? Why would you not want a partner who’s willing to share their life with you and vice versa? And while they can’t explain their position to me in a way that I can understand, it’s entirely possible that I’m not able to do so to them, either, and my whole line of inquiry becomes an affront to the life they’ve chosen to live.
I’m going to end with one more song, but at least it’s one you might remember, since it was popular about a decade or so ago. It would never have been one of “ours” – not only was it well after “our” time, but it fell into that second category of pop songs that we had no use for; most such music is about love or breakups, and since we never broke up, well… yeah, that was an entire roster that we found pointless. But while breakup songs do convey a certain sense of loss, most of them still don’t work for my situation.
Then again, what situation does this work for?
Honestly (although is that a word the singer even considers?), what’s the point in covering up what happened? The fact is, you’re gone; how it happened is irrelevant after a certain point. Either way, you still have to pick yourself up and move on. Or is it a disgrace to have been broken up with? I guarantee you, there are a lot more songs about that topic than having lost someone the way you left me, honey.
Well, this turned out to be longer than I expected it was going to be; I hope I didn’t go into too many details I shouldn’t have about the events I expect to be dealing with. In any event, more that usual, I could stand to have you keeping an eye on me, and wishing me luck. Lord knows, I’ll need it.
Letters to Rachel 