The Perfect Friday Post.

My wife, L, believes there is something called "the perfect Friday post" and that I have it in me to write such a post.

Though L has never fully-articulated its particular construction, I think that perfect Friday post could be regarded as something of a reward for having made it through the week. It would combine sound advice--wisdom, even--sprinkled with generous portions of humor and poignancy. And lest we forget, love.

If you've ever heard me coach my daughters through a dark moment--you'd get the idea. 

Nothing saccharine, Hallmarky or malarky.

Just love, listening, more love and life experience. With the strong recommendation of applying more than a soupçon of elbow grease.

Not too many minutes ago, Sandy Greenberg, my friend and fellow JCrew member, and founder of the eponymous Terri and Sandy agency, sent those of us in the JCrew this video.

Before I received it, I had been out for my long morning walk. It's simply gorgeous up here on the Gingham Coast and I added a mile to my usual four. 

During my steps, I was a bit lugubrious. Maybe more so than my usual setting of eleven.

Worth a listen.

I was experiencing what Duke Ellington eloquently and poetically dubbed "Mood Indigo."

I felt for probably the first time in my life that I am severely mentor-less. Mentor-bereft.

I lost my best, and wisest friend--a friend of half-a-century--just about four years ago. Steve Hayden left us about a year ago. I have Owen, my therapist of forty years, and Rob S., another JCrew member, and they're both wise and inordinately helpful. But, and this is my fault, they aren't "backstops" the way the aforementioned mentors have been. 

I say this is my fault because it takes me literally decades to trust. I don't even put people's names in my phone until I've had one-hundred conversations with them. I abjure the transitory--there's too much of it. And it takes a lot for me to commit. I think if I were in the Mafia, I'd bring a 9mm to bed every night lest my wife of 42 years turn on me. Trust does not come naturally to me.

All that aside, I think the point in the Dolly/Johnny video is to remind yourself to think about the magical people who recognized you and gave you a boost somewhere along the way.

I've probably been shitty at this.

Not believing my eyes even when I saw it with my own eyes.

Boosts are never "vaudeville" theatrical. A stagehand doesn't strut out carrying a step-stool and hold out his hand to elevate you. Boosts are, very often, subtle little things. You can't collect them like coins in an old glass applesauce jar. Yet, if you're watching, breathing, recognizing and appreciating, those boosts are accumulating all the same.

What I love about the Dolly/Johnny clip is the overt acknowledgement of a boost and the rocket-fuel that boost supplied. Once-in-a-while people show faith in you and take a risk that leads to a chance you wouldn't have otherwise had.

That's what Johnny did for Dolly.

My Fridayness is simple.

Be on the look-out for those boosts. 

They matter.

And the people who propel them matter, too.

You might not even know them.

You might even recognize the boost you got.

You might not realize it when it happens.

I have, too often, that malady.

That Mood Indigo.

Your boost might be second-hand like second-hand smoke. A boost motivated by something said by someone you do know to someone you hardly know. 

But when those boosts do happen treat them like a ballplayer would treat a hanging curve, or a halfback would treat a missed tackle. 

Go.

Go and say thank you.

Go and say thank you again.

Go and say thank you and grab that boost like it may be the last one you ever get and it may make all the difference.

Go and fulfill for the booster as if she is the best client you've ever had. Come through for the booster even if you've never met the booster.

Run through hell in a gasoline suit to prove the boost astute.

Go and as soon as you can, pass on a boost to someone else. 

That's your job.

As a human.

Be fruitful and boostify.

Thank you.