Thought du Jour by Brad Dale
Experience of a lifetime
“Don’t screw this up.” I think this every time I need to defrost a freezer. I’m not quite sure what age I was when I first attempted this task. I’m guessing low-teens. For some strange reason – perhaps boredom or the feeling that I needed to contribute more to the...
Hey, Brother, can you carry a grudge?
I recently ran into a former co-worker. We don’t live in the same city anymore, but I was in his for a meeting. I was stopping at my favourite butcher shop before heading home, and I saw he and his wife coming toward the door. “Oh boy,” thought I, resolved to just go...
On Ninjas and Eggs-istential Crises
“Some Ninja you are.” The words popped into my head as the grocery bag containing two dozen eggs lay on the sidewalk. I had just come out of the store, cart full, eggs on top. As I navigated the cart down the sidewalk ramp, the bag slipped off. I knew immediately...
Grocery Ninja
Everyone is good at certain things and lousy at others. That’s the way society works. We don’t expect our doctors to also be chefs. The best mechanic in your town likely doesn’t also do gymnastics. Maybe your local florist isn’t a competitive lumberjack. But all...
Still waiting …
“My name is Brad, and I’ll be your waiter.” No, I’m not bringing you coffee and pie. That’s your server. I’m the guy waiting patiently. I’ve been waiting for years. Two marriages, three kids, now one grandchild. He’s gonna make me wait at some point. He can’t help it....
Voices that level with me
I was thinking today of a man I knew far too briefly. I met him in Galway Ireland two years ago, shared drinks and visited him at his home the next day. A few short weeks later he was gone, felled in his mid 50s by a sudden heart attack. This was not a random meeting....
Split decisions
I’ve got a thing for firewood. My wife knows it. When we’re driving through the country, and she sees a long row of firewood, she looks at me and says, “You’re thinking about that firewood, aren’t you?” She knows me too well. I’ve got a load of wood in the back yard...
Exercising my right to speak
“When I talk to the cat, we don’t have long conversations.” My wife: “We??” “Sometimes I can’t get a word in edgewise.” She thinks I might be losing it, and that’s a distinct possibility, given that I’ve worked from my dining table for most of the past year or was it...
Waste knot, want knot …
I am not a hoarder. I want to make that perfectly clear, before anyone gets an image of stacks of old newspapers piled high in the basement, or a room full of dollar store impulse buys that I may someday be forced to part with after my kids get a court order. But I do...
Triggered by something in your pasta
I sometimes make my wife cry. Something wells up inside her and I see the lower lip quiver, the eyes beginning to moisten. She fans her face as the tears threaten to flow. “Sorry. I’m emotional about spaghetti.” “I assumed it was the garlic,” I replied. It was the...