Be Like BESSIE!

Be Like Bessie!

“Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience.”―Ralph Waldo Emerson

A few days each week during the winter I work in a giant laboratory studying the behavior of vast numbers of people. My specific areas of interest are the characteristics of patience and kindness while in pursuit of happiness and outdoor adventure. More specifically, I am a greeter at a New England ski area. From this vantage point I have face-to-face contact with hundreds of men, women and children of all ages. The stories my colleagues and I collect could fill a book. (Hey, that’s an idea!)

One of a Greeter’s responsibilities, beyond welcoming guests and answering basic questions, is to be sure each visitor’s wait in the line to purchase lift tickets is as short as possible, hopefully no more that 7-15 minutes on the most crowded days. This is no mean feat in the age of data collection required for the issuance of a re-usable RFID card that can be detected by a scanner in the pocket of even the most high tech parka. We also draw the short straw sometimes and have to facilitate traffic flow in the “drop off” area. If the entire ski area is the laboratory, then this particular area is the active Petri dish. . Maybe we should put up a sign that says, “Remember! Children are watching and listening.”

If I was looking to hire people to build a team for a task that required intense, cooperative effort in a stressful situation, I’d insist on seeing videos of how these job candidates handled their cars, friends, family and Greeters in the “drop off” area. Surely I’d learn more than any resume or interview could reveal.

Since we Greeters spend most of our time managing ticket lines, that’s where the best stories come from. Just the other day a person was in such a hurry to get his ticket that instead of walking through the short, simple, ten-foot, back and forth maze to the ticket window, this “gentleman” ducked under the ropes to take a more direct route, knocking over several stanchions, which he did not fix. He may have saved a full three seconds getting to the ticket window. I just smiled at him sympathetically. You know, one of those smiles that says, “I hope you get better soon.”

We greeters pick up a wonderful assortment of sound bites or snippets from the hundreds of conversations that swirl around us. My all-time favorite came from two brothers, strolling past with their arms on each other’s shoulders. The older brother looked at his younger sibling and said, “Hey, your wife’s happy and your girlfriend’s happy. I think everything is going to be fine.” Then they disappeared into the crowd leaving me with a number of questions that will forever go unanswered.

I’ve been thinking of asking management to position a large video screen in the ticket line waiting area showing highlights of good and bad behavior of guests collected over the course of the winter season. We would obscure the faces to prevent law suits, but the instructional value would be powerful…and highly entertaining.

Most people waiting in line to purchase tickets fall into one of three categories:

Group A. “I am too important to have to wait in line with all of these other people. Can’t you do something?”

Group B. “It’s too bad the wait is so long. Have you considered ways that might make things move more efficiently?”

Group C. “I’m not at work, I’m in a beautiful place and eventually we are going to have a great day on the slopes.”

The hybrid of groups B and C is my personal favorite. By the way, guests can purchase their tickets online at a reduced price and eliminate or greatly shorten their wait in line. It’s a reward for those thoughtful people who plan ahead. Let’s call this Group S for smart.

So how does this all tie in with BESSIE’S STORY? It’s simple. Bessie is the model of patience. She’ll stand with her nose to a door calmly and peacefully if she wants to go outside. When it’s time for breakfast or dinner Bessie sits like an angel without barking, whining or grumbling. In her dark, fragrant world she somehow just knows that we’re going to do the best we can to take care of her needs. When we are going somewhere in the car she’ll hop in and sit calmly as long as necessary. Very few people can follow her example of poise and good manners. The only time Bessie ever acts or behaves as if she is the most important piece of the puzzle is when someone is playing retrieving games with her. She can be a little antsy during these times, but we understand.

I’ve said it before. The best way to make friends and influence people is to BE LIKE BESSIE. It’s not as easy as it sounds.

“Your face is marked with lines of life, put there by love and laughter, suffering and tears. It's beautiful.”― Lynsay Sands

There are moments in each person’s life that seem simple in retrospect yet are monumental as signals of change. On the front end, for example, we have potty training, riding a two-wheeler, or sleeping outside in a tent with just your friends and no parents for the first time. As adolescence and young adulthood arrive the list of turning points becomes more complicated and harder to share. Secrets creep in like ants at a picnic. Then there is this vast, open meadow between the ages of 30 and 50 when the view out of the window is fairly predictable; the changes are subtle, often seen through a consistent lens. Life moves forward at a steady pace with predictable ups and down.

One day, the engine stalls or sputters. Perhaps it’s the findings at your annual physical; your doctor’s questions remind you of stories your parents or grandparents shared. But wait, this is about YOU. It can’t be! Perhaps you walk upstairs one day and for the life of you, cannot remember what brought you there. My advice at these moments: don’t swear, chuckle. You’ll remember your mission eventually, and the experience will bond you with every member of your family and longtime friend who lived past the age of sixty. There is a corollary between acquiring wisdom and losing your short-term memory. One goes up as the other goes down.

Bessie is at that age now. Her habits are so ironclad as to prevent her from making big mistakes, but she can’t fool me; though the jubilant puppy is alive and well in her soul, the beautiful old lady is front and center. She gets stuck in a corner now and then, but will prance like a show horse on her way to fetch her toy from the lake. We spend so much time together we can read each other’s minds, and her actions tell me we are reaching the promised land of “later in life” together, in step with each other. She is leading the dance.

We have two cars, a Toyota Rav4 and a Subaru Forester. Both are small SUVs well designed for the endless winters of New Hampshire. When we go on long drives Bessie takes over the back seat, stretched out comfortably like an airline passenger in business class. She LOVES it. On shorter journeys Bess rides in the cargo area, which she accesses by jumping in the open hatchback. Just recently I’ve noticed a change in her behavior. She still gets excited when we get ready to head out, but an adjustment has been made. The back deck of the Subaru is about four inches higher than the RAV4. She hops into the RAV like a puppy, but with the Subaru…not anymore. Somehow, she is aware the heights are different. With the Subaru Bess puts her two front feet up on the deck and with her blind eyes says, “How ‘bout a little help here?”, imploring us to lift her the rest of the way in.

There is no embarrassment or regret on her part. Her expression and body language are crystal clear: “I simply can’t do this on my own anymore.” I love her for this. She knows in her core it’s a sign of strength to ask for help and accept help when it’s offered. Her self-awareness and poise in relation to this adjustment are inspiring. Bessie understands she has nothing to prove, nothing at all, and her willingness to acknowledge the need for a little boost in her charming old age provides a wonderful model we can learn from.

Bessie is aging gracefully. There are few things in life that are more difficult to do than that. If she were a person there would likely be excuses, denials, regrets, perhaps some plastic surgery and futile attempts to camouflage the inevitable. But she is a dog, and so her reaction to getting older is pure. Her beautiful brown fur is turning white, she has weird growths on her body that were not there a year ago, she can’t see anything, and she sleeps most of the time. But her endless love for adventure is vivid, and she will continue to swim, retrieve, trot, explore and bark loudly until she just can’t anymore. One day she’ll simply turn in her keys and check out from the hotel of life. Until then, there will be no complaints, ever, just an endless joy that another new day is waiting for her when she closes her eyes at night, snoring louder and louder as the years pile up. And Bessie will ask for help when she needs it and accept it with grace and poise. That’s called wisdom.