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Note: During his podcast interviews, (link) Derek referred to his blog essay about how, instead of idealistically busting a gut, he could “Relax for the same Result.” (li
Dear Derek,
Greetings from the province of Alberta.
Isn’t the world full of wonder? You mentioned in passing that the leader of Singapore caused a burst of laughter among mystified foreigners after he said one of the very best things for Singapore was the “invention of air conditioning.”
True, very true. Meanwhile, as a native North American, Derek, you may know it was “Air Con” that opened up the U.S. southern states, including (“But not limited to,” my lawyer hastens to add) Florida and Arizona.
Every April I would leave Phoenix to return to Canada, along with my snowbird buddies, when the hotels were about to reduce, not raise, their rates for the summer. Backwards, eh? There’s more: In Arizona, before you drive somewhere, you first rush out to start up your car for a while. Not to warm it up, to cool it down!
I have a brother in Nevada. Down there, he tells me, you can’t use a Volkswagen beetle or a motorcycle: Because air cooled engines won’t work. (As a northerner, I keep wondering if he is pulling my leg) In Fort Lauderdale, a local told me that if a transit bus AC fails, everyone abandons the bus. Opening the bus windows won’t suffice.
You Derek, being a former resident of the city-state of Singapore, may know it used to be part of Malaysia. Here in Alberta, in the middle of the-continent, far from the moderating oceans, on the freeze-dried prairie, one morning I trudged over snowy fields to my university wearing a thick parka. That afternoon, a few of us were quizzing a young classmate from Malaysia. Finally someone asked, “Would you go back to live there again?”
“No! Too hot!” Suddenly, my parka was not so heavy.
… …
Derek, in your “relax your effort,” essay you realized something, saying: “…(effort was) just unnecessary stress that made me feel like I was doing my best.” I get it. Sometimes, in my easy air conditioned room on a nice chair, bent over a table doing arithmetic with a pencil, I may feel I am working harder if I narrow my eyes and stick out my tongue.
One day, when she wasn’t even doing any sums, my young pretty bank teller had a furrowed brow. I said, “I’m old enough to be your father, so I’m telling you: Don’t tense your forehead. Otherwise when you’re my age you will be wearing a brow patch to bed.” Turns out her mother was already doing so… Strange how children “copy” parents: It’s genetics I think, like in twin studies, so let’s not blame dear old mom.
My bank teller thought she had no choice. Maybe so, I agreed, but then I remembered: There’s a well paid, motivated young actress who learned to keep her face perfectly smooth even when doing fight scenes and throwing people around. That was Summer Glau, playing the part of a robot, fighting terminators on The Sarah Connor Chronicles. Also, from reading Derek’s essay-blog commenters, I could have mentioned the fellow who learned to play tennis with a smooth face, finding it threw off his opponent, and the fellow who learned to walk in the pouring rain keeping a straight face, not grimacing, finding it made no difference to the amount of rain that got into his eyes.
… … In Alberta in mid-winter, so far away from the hot Malaysian sun, as with some effort I am trudging across snowy fields with the air blowing ice crystals—spat, spat, spat against my parka—I am so grateful to be present in this wonderful world… and I’m not grimacing.
Sean Crawford
