It may be both the most sincere and also the most ruthless thing I do.
Each year, I invite my nearest and dearest over to decorate our Christmas tree.
It is a delightful gathering where I serve only gingerbread.
At the same time, it’s also an incredible time saver.
It’s perhaps a nod to Amish barn-raising or even Tom Sawyer’s drafting his friends into white-washing a picket fence.
Although too may cooks may spoil the broth, it’s equally true that many hands make light work.
Frankly, it’s the best of all worlds: a chance to celebrate together and a brilliant time-saving strategy, worthy of any efficiency expert.
Speaking of strategy…
I’ve found I’m most effective by defining my life goals in quarters.
While a year flies by in an instant, so much happens that it seems impossible to think in those terms.
Planning through a season, however, I can more or less handle.
And––as a true ambivert––while I’m content to spend the vast majority of my time discussing politics and religion with Vlad (along with having a few close friends over on a weekly basis), I also have more or less committed to having one larger gathering each quarter.
That pace feels right, allowing me to open my doors for Vlad’s birthday or his Gotcha Day or a Tree Trimming, and gently shut them afterward.
There is, in fact, only one downside.
Namely, that four times a year I have to deal with one of my pet peeves, one which causes me to scratch my head, but also gives me very little real angst.
The source of my dismay?
That a significant portion of the population––including people I like and love––are absolutely terrible at RSVPing to an invitation.
And that’s why Honor the Invitation is the theme of this December’s meditation HERE.
I’ve noticed this phenomenon even before the age of Evite and Paperless Post.
(aka pre-historic times).
A lifetime ago, I was friends with the owner of a landmark West Village restaurant
We bonded over his lament that, with each passing year, his no-shows for reservations had gotten worse and worse.
Although a restaurant reservation isn’t the same level of commitment as agreeing to donate a kidney, it nonetheless makes planning quite difficult for the management.
His belief––which I don’t think applies to my invitees that much––was that everyone was holding out for the last minute, waiting to see all their options before really committing.
I, however, have a different theory.
I think there’s an odd humility (with a dash of sloth) to some people’s not responding.
It’s a reasoning akin to why people often don’t vote in elections or report emergencies.
It’s all too easy to self-efface one’s impact, to embrace a diffusion of responsibility.
There are all those classic studies showing that in a crowd scene no one reports an incident because they assume that someone else probably has or will.
By the way, Diffusion of Responsibility has even been used as a defense in trials for War Crimes––which even I admit is galaxies beyond my pet peeves about modern social etiquette.
Basically, it’s all too easy to posit that in the Grand Scheme of Things one’s individual Yay or Nay doesn’t matter.
Yet we live in a world where elections are often won and lost by astonishingly slim margins.
And we also live in a world where, even in a crowded room, someone actually wants YOU––a very specific individual––to be there, to share and celebrate a carefully curated moment of their life.
Sidebar:
As good as I am at the online R.S.V.P., I’m also keenly aware of all the less formal invitations I’ve missed and inadvertently ignored.
Sadly, I have an embarrassing number of anecdotes where people have expressed their frustration about my not reading the signs they were giving me.
Way too many times, I’ve been blind to the invitation in front of me, one I’d often been secretly and shyly coveting.
(For a recovering arch-romantic, I’m often astonishingly clueless.)
And those are just the invitations that became clear to me via Monday-Morning Quarterbacking conversations.
Who know how many opportunities for all sorts of adventures on all levels I’ve inadvertently missed.
Perhaps you can relate…?
Since I’m only serving Gingerbread for my Tree Trimming party, there’s actually very little at stake in terms of fluctuating attendance.
I have enough mix prepared to cover most contingencies (plus the batter for some gluten free pumpkin bread + a chocolate mint loaf as well.)
Thus, I’ve even issued some spontaneous last-minute invites.
In fact, this morning the rain was drizzling on and off, and only three dogs were in the baseball field, those most passionate about Fetch.
Vlad, of course, as well as Miku the Weimaraner and Moon, like Vlad, a handsome mutt.
Although we see each other practically every single morning for an hour or so of exercising our sporting dogs, I confess that I don’t actually know either owner’s name.
I’ve always loved the line my friend SARK wrote in How To Be An Artist:
“Invite Someone Dangerous to Tea.”
I feel I’m experiencing my own version of that with:
“Invite someone whose name
you don’t really know to a party
…See What Happens When They Show Up!“
Please note that I am not, in any way, suggesting that one exuberantly say “Yes” to every invitation.
(And as a mentor of mine says, “No” is indeed a complete sentence.)
Every now and then via social media, I see an acquaintance post something like “This is the Year I’m Saying ‘Yes'” and I just want to shake them.
Certainly, if you feel you’ve held yourself back, then by all means go for it (whatever that means).
My point is NOT that you compulsively say YES.
It’s that you simply become more aware of invitations and respond––whether that’s by paperless post or a carrier pigeon or raising your confidence and flirting back with a stranger––however you see fit.
Last week, I wrote about how Vlad and his best friend Malibu make a beeline for each other’s apartment whenever they’re given the chance.
He didn’t know I was writing about it, but this week Malibu’s dad Bobby captured the moment on camera HERE.
I find it incredibly heart-warming to watch how Malibu responds to the simplest of invitations: “Let’s go see Vlad.”
Looking back only once, Malibu bolts through the hallway, heading straight to our door.
He knows what he wants and he joyously races towards it.
Responding to life’s invitations––even coveted ones––with such unconflicted clarity is remarkably rare.
This month and always, I want more of that freedom, that self-given permission to run full-gallop towards our heart’s desires for all of us.
Namaste for Now,
