Nice stuff June 24, 2009
500 Days of Summer
I wanna watch this show!
The Nicest Thing:)
We get on
Sentimental Heart
You could be happy
COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS TO GRADUATING CLASS OF THE BUCKLEY SCHOOL June 20, 2009
Now, there are two types of failure you will experience in
life. The first type is what I just described and comes from things
you can control. That is the worst kind. But there is another form
of failure that will be equally devastating to you, and that is the
kind beyond your control. This happened to me in 1982. I had met
a very lovely young Harvard student from Connecticut, dated her
for two years then asked her to marry me right after she graduated
from college. We set a date; we sent out the invitations; and all
was fantastic until one month before the wedding when her father
called me. He said, “Paul, my daughter sat me down this
afternoon, and she doesn’t know how to tell you this, but she is
really unhappy and thinks it’s time for you two to take a break.”
At first I thought he was joking because he was a very funny guy.
Then he said, “No, she is serious about this.” I thought to myself,
“Oh, my God, I am being dumped at the altar.” I’m from
Tennessee. Getting dumped at the altar was the supreme social
embarrassment of that time. It was a big deal. When all my family
and friends found out, they were ready to re-start the Civil War on
the spot. I had to remind them that the last Civil War didn’t go so
well for our side, and I didn’t like our chances in a rematch. The
reality was that I was a 26-year old knucklehead, and since all my
friends were getting married, I kind of felt it was time for me to do
the same thing. And that was the worst reason in the world to get
married. I actually think she understood that and to a certain
extent spared me what would have been a very tough marriage.
Instead, I’ve had an incredible marriage for twenty years to a
wonderful wife, and we have four kids that I love more than
anything on Earth. Some things happen to you that at the time will
make you feel like the world is coming to an end, but in actuality,
there is a very good reason for it. You just can’t see it and don’t
know it. When one door closes, another will open, but standing in
that hallway can be hell. You just have to persevere. Quite often
that dragon of failure is really chasing you off the wrong road and
on to the right one.
… by Paul Tudor
