Enhancing your personal brand through friendships and quality people

I’m self-admittedly too big of a fan of motivational Youtube videos. Every morning on my way to class or work I listen to an assortment of speakers – Les Brown, Eric Thomas, Tony Robbins – who touch on a variety of self-development techniques. I’ve always been interested in public speaking, and enjoy the way these people articulate ideas. I make it a mission  every day to improve myself in some area, whether that be socially, intellectually, or physically. I harken back to sophomore year when my roommate Dan, one of the most motivational figures in my life, mentioned his disdain towards complacency. It was somewhere around that point that I started making an explicit effort every day to improve myself in some measurable area, and so it became that these videos started playing a measurably minor, albeit consistent and rather important part of my life.

One of the themes intertwined between all of these videos focuses on reaching your full potential, and how an integral component of being able to do that is through surrounding yourself with “only quality people”, or as Les Brown calls it, OQP.

When I started watching these videos, though, I was making a critical mistake: I was visualizing myself and my friends, or people, as two separate entities. I fell into the trap of vanity, of convincing myself that I am a self-sustainable and self-capable human being who can, when necessary, rely on the abilities of myself to get where I want to be in life.

In hindsight, this mistake was dangerous, and incredibly, incredibly stupid. Without realizing it, this form of thinking affected the way I built my social circle. It gave me leeway that I didn’t really have. It instilled within me a false sense of confidence that I can surround myself with any kind of people, regardless of their absolute values, and not be affected by them. This mindset was wrong.

One of the concepts I learned in one of my marketing classes is that for a brand, Positioning = Differentiation + Relevance + Credibility.

How you position yourself in life is everything. If you want to be a doctor, you go to medical school to learn the necessary material to position yourself as an educated candidate for a hospital.

Hopefully by the end of the medical school you learned more than your classmates, and therefore, are a better doctor than them. That’s differentiation.

Hopefully the skills you learned are useful in today’s society and your entire wealth of knowledge isn’t based on curing lupus. That’s relevancy.

The truth of the matter is that you are a brand, and you have to position yourself successfully if you want to be successful in life. You have complete control over how willing you are to differentiate yourself from your peers, and how relevant you are within society. Credibility, though, is where “only quality people” get involved.

One of the speakers I listen to, Eric Thomas, says the following: “if you hang out with gang bangers, drug dealers, and bums, you become them. If you were actually better than them, you wouldn’t be fuckin’ around with them.”

A little harsh, I agree. But it’s true. Your friends affect your credibility, and therefore, your positioning in life. Plenty of college sport’s stars have fallen in drafts because scouting reports site that they hang out with a bad crowd – i.e. Johnny Football. If your friends are negative and constantly complaining, chances are you are a negative person who also complains. If your friends are doing drugs, chances are you’re doing drugs. It’s nearly unavoidable, according to Kurt Lewin, who created the formula, Behavior is a function of the individual and the environment. Your friends are your environment, and therefore alter your behavior.

I encourage you to take a look at your friends, at your environment, and see how these elements are affecting your behavior. Another one of my favorite speakers said: “Do you really expect your life and career to be any different from messing with the same things and people and situations. You are the reason you’re not winning. You keep messing with negative, evil, and dysfunctional people and expect positive results.” I seek people that already have the positive results I want to achieve.

MIT did a study, and the study indicated that you earn within $2,000 of your five closest friends. The average household income in America is $50,233. While I don’t believe money dictates happiness nor one’s quality of life, I believe it does a good job of quantifying these more abstract concepts. Really rich people hang out with other really rich people. Kevin Hart and Leonardo DiCaprio don’t wait in line in Allston on a Friday night and try to get into a frat party. Elon Musk isn’t walking around Germantown, Philadelphia in the middle of the night spray painting public property. Leonardo DiCaprio and Kevin Hart are hanging out with Rihanna and Chris Rock. Elon Musk is probably having a nice night with Peter Thiel. Leonardo DiCaprio, Kevin Hart, Peter Thiel – they can be anywhere in the world, hanging out with anyone they choose. They choose to hang out with successful people. You are what you do, and more importantly, you are who you hang out with.

I think it’s also important to note: When I say surround yourself, “quality” people, I do not mean surround yourself with the smartest, wealthiest, most connected people. I mean surround yourself with people that enhance the quality of your life, encourage you to “run faster, reach further”, and take a genuine interest in your well being.

Before writing this I took a close look at everyone I would consider a true friend. I reached two conclusions:

1. All my friends are smarter than me.

2. All my friends disagree with me a lot.

My friends influence my behavior in a way that makes me strive to become smarter. They also don’t create an echo chamber that continually encourages negative behavior. If I’m screwing up a lot, they tell me. If I’m succeeding, they challenge me to succeed more. If I come to them with ideas they question the legitimacy of those ideas, forcing me to think critically.

The question, then, becomes: why don’t people practice this? Why do great people let themselves get anchored down by negative people.

My best guess is that when you start putting stock into your friendships, you need to hold those people accountable, which is difficult and at times even uncomfortable. Once you start articulating to your friends that you are investing in their success and that they help build your credibility, continuing that friendship becomes a more substantial decision. It’s easy to hang around with losers. Being a loser and staying on the bottom or in the middle of pack takes absolutely no effort. If you surround yourself with people who are happy with being on the bottom or in the middle, that is where you are going to end up. When you implement standards, though, that your friends have to meet in terms of quality, you have to hold them accountable.

Unfortunately, though, it is difficult to change people’s behavior. So when your friends don’t meet these standards, instead of changing them, you have to make the decision of continuing that friendship or not.

My close friends help enhance the Robert Bethell brand. When employers look at who I surround myself, I am confident that they will be impressed. When I go out for the night I don’t need to worry about my friends embarrassing me in any way, shape, or form, or causing a scene. My credibility as a person is enhanced because of my friends, and I’d like to think the relationship is reciprocal.

(Without sounding egotistical) Becoming restrictive regarding who I become friends with has been one of the greatest things I’ve ever done. It sounds cheesy and silly but everyday I wake up and remind myself that I have value, that I can find new ways to enhance that value, and that I can share that value with people who recognize it and take it seriously.

Part of the reason I love the Great Gatsby so much is that it’s as much a story about personal branding as it is anything else. Gatsby, for all his tragic flaws, without exception strived for a better life. He was relentless in his pursuit for realizing the dreams he had as a boy, and built the ultimate brand name. In life you are either moving forward or backward. Moving forward to the green light is what fuels me every day, and I truly could not do it without the people I consider close friends.

I urge you to look critically at your friendships, and question whether you practice “OQP”. I assure you: your personal brand will have a lot more equity if it is built on the foundation of quality friendships.

 

“Disruptors” in society, and the consequences visionaries face trying to change the world

Elon Musk, my perpetual man of the year, man of the century, and man of eternity, just topped Vanity Fair’s “Disruptors” list for advancements in electricity, space, and sustainability.

I’ve always liked the concept of disruption. To be labeled as a disruptor is powerful. The title has a positive connotation attached to it that is rarely associated with its synonyms. Go to a thesaurus and type in the word “disruption” and it will spit the words “interruption”, “break”, “separation”, and “splitting” to you.

Not exactly the most positive sounding words.

Disruption has a certain sexiness to it, a certain implication of tact and strategy that follows in its footsteps that we often associate with the mad, offbeat geniuses of our time, like Elon Musk.

However, I’m not interested in the idea of disruption – and the idea of being a disruptor for that matter – because of its subtle sexiness. I’m interested in these two concepts because of how incredibly difficult they are to achieve in real life, and how high the consequences are for anyone trying to achieve them.

These are abstract ideas, and given that I am no F. Scott Fitzgerald, it will perhaps be slightly difficult for me to articulate myself clearly. I would like to examine what it truly means to be a disruptor, what the distinction between being a disruptor and causing disruption is, and how fine the line is between being labeled a disruptor, and being labeled crazy.

The easiest way for me to tackle these questions is to start with a case study. On one end of the spectrum let’s put Elon Musk, the modern god of electricity and sustainability.

So what makes Elon Musk a disruptor? What does Elon Musk do that makes him a disruptor compared to a Tim Cook – arguably an equally as powerful man – who most wouldn’t consider a disruptor. I would even go as far as saying Steve Jobs couldn’t really be categorized as a quote on quote, “disruptor”.

First off, I think it’s important for me to clarify that I don’t find being innovative, and being disruptive synonymous. Tim Cook is innovative. Tim Cook is not a disruptor. Elon Musk is innovative. Elon Musk is also a disruptor. So, while innovation seems to be a character trait of disruptors, it definitely is not safe to say that being innovative is the same thing as being disruptive.

The Webster definition of disruptor is “to cause disorder”. Now, while that has a naturally negative implication, I believe it is valuable in our analysis to define what a disruptor truly is. While disorder is often associated with negative ideas, like chaos and turmoil, I believe in Elon Musk’s case, it refers to his ability to take a bunch of assumptions the world holds for one reason or another, and either A) break down those assumptions, subsequently breaking new barriers in world possibilities, or B) reorders or reconstructs them.

So, going back to innovation, I believe being innovative is the biggest qualifier in what makes someone disruptive. But it is not being innovative that makes someone a disrupter, but rather, how the innovation is done.

Elon Musk’s innovation is quicker, more radical, more ideological, and more controversial than Tim Cook’s innovation. For example, when Elon Musk was working on one of the earlier SpaceX’s rockets, he actually called up Russia’s military managers, and requested a meeting to purchase the country’s equipment. And he got a meeting. With top ranking Russian military officials. Regarding uber expensive, top secret military equipment.

That’s crazy. It’s crazy because it goes against the key assumption that in the world there is the government and then there are citizens, and there is a big divide between the two parties. Elon Musk is a citizen. Yes, a very smart citizen, but he is not part of the US government. However, he personally called up high ranking Russian officials, and basically demanded a meeting.

Yes, it was for an innovative product. But more importantly, it’s disruptive. It’s disruptive in that it breaks down a major assumption – that there is the government, and then there is us – and goes against it to extend the capabilities of the world.

Now, on to the other end of the spectrum. One of my favorite movie characters of all time is Revolutionary Road’s John Givings.

For those haven’t seen the movie, it takes place in the 1950s when America is essentially living in a white picket fence society. During this time conformity was popular; a man and a woman were supposed to get married, move to the suburbs, get a white picket fence, have two children, and live a nice, upper middle class life with the latest and greatest consumer products. Anyone who went against that notion was deemed as “crazy”. In Revolutionary Road, the Wheelers are couple who are bored of this type of living and want to move to Paris to escape the conformity.

John Givings plays the role of the “crazy” person. He is an educated, mathematically advanced man, and absolutely hates the conformist lifestyle everyone is living. He calls people out for the boring lives they live, and really gets under the skin of the main characters.

I like John Givings because he is right in his assertions and out-lashes towards society. Nothing he says or rants about is ever incorrect. However, because he does it in a rather manic, insulting way, he is deemed by many as crazy. In addition – and the more important fact – he doesn’t do anything about his awareness and observations towards the crippling mundanity of the world. Instead, he just goes from household to household insulting anyone who lives the white picket fence life.

He is particularly interesting and relevant to the conversation of disrupters because he shows what is at stake for anyone in society who strives to reach the Elon Musk archetype. Essentially, John Givings possesses everything Elon Musk does – he’s brilliant, educated, aware of the flaws in society, and most importantly, willing to bring them to the surface. However, the key distinction between the two, Musk and Givings, is that Givings never causes any disruption.

Givings is a disruptor, but he doesn’t cause any disruption. That is why people call him crazy. Givings is able to identify what is wrong with the world, and has an awareness well above any other character in the story/movie, but doesn’t do anything with it.

On a smaller scale, we all know a John Givings. They are the people that want to cause change, want to advance society, and like the idea of being significant, but are just too lazy, or too damn cowardly to do anything about. So, instead of actually doing anything significant, like Elon Musk, these people just sit back and talk about how valuable their opinions are without actually ever manifesting them in real life.

Talking about changing the world and actually changing the world are two different things.

The truth of the matter is that while someone may possess the awareness to see what is wrong with the world, and understand how innovation can fix that, he may not possess the ability to actually execute that change.  That’s a scary thought, the fact that we are limited by our own intellectual, financial, and resource-driven capabilities.

And that’s why a lot of people shy away from ever actually trying to be a disruptor: because if you fail (AKA if you’re not Elon Musk), it’s a very real possibility that society will view you as John Givings.

Elon Musk is a disruptor in that he sees things that needs to be fixed or improved, and uses innovation to fix them in a way that society has never seen before. On a lower level, people like Tim Cook are individuals who sees things that need to be fixed or improved, and use innovation to fix them, just in a much less radical way. Below that are the people that are fine with the way things are, which isn’t bad at all. There’s no reason for everyone to feel the need to be a disruptor.

And unfortunately, below that is where we put the people who are like John Givings, who may have the awareness the Elon Musks of the world have, but for one reason or another, just don’t ever use that awareness to do anything significant.

The stakes are high for people who want to cause disruption.

The structure of society today with all of its diversity and innovation really serves as a bottleneck for disruptors. There are only one or two people who are actually going to slip through that bottleneck and execute that vision. The rest of the people are either going to be okay with the status quo, innovative and slightly revolutionary (Tim Cook), or unable to execute that disruptive vision, risking the label of a John Givings.

So what’s my assertion with all this? I don’t know. It’s a pretty damn abstract concept. I guess it’s to realize why some people don’t have the balls to execute the change they talk about.

No one wants to be called a John Givings.

Tender is the Night and the perception of genius in society

What a lot of people do not know about F. Scott Fitzgerald is that he was viewed as a rather mediocre writer at the time when most of his works were published. When the Great Gatsby first surfaced in 1925, it only sold 21,000 copies, less than half the amount of sales of his previous work, “This Side of Paradise.” Gatsby wasn’t even officially considered a classic until the late 1950s, more than 30 years after it was published.

What I find more interesting regarding Fitzgerald’s writing career though, is that Gatsby was never intended to be his most famous work. What even less people know about F. Scott is that he planned the much lengthier “Tender is the Night” to serve as his greatest success. He manically slaved away for 9 years working on the piece, and his mind, regarded it as the greatest thing he had ever written.

However, the novel unfortunately opened up to lukewarm reviews, and throughout the course of history, has been scattered all over the literary spectrum regarding how great it is. From a pure popularity standpoint, Gatsby is unarguably a more successful book than “Tender is the Night”. From a literary standpoint, the general consensus among scholarly critics is that while “Tender is the Night” is still very good, Gatsby is a much more well written book, and holds the crown on literature’s throne.

Strictly from a literary perspective, Gatsby and Tender is the Night couldn’t be more different; where Gatsby is simple, airy, and astonishingly short in length, “Tender is the Night” is dense, overpowered by strong language, and a towering read for readers of all levels.

And that’s what makes the comparison between the two works so interesting, both from a literal standpoint and from a societal standpoint: “Tender is the Night” was carefully, exhaustingly constructed by Fitzgerald to be his lasting stroke of genius, while Gatsby, his true golden piece, was written much more organically, barely tops 120 pages, and was intended to be merely another quality piece of work in his backpack of novels.

This opens the door for several conversations: Was Gatsby truly a better piece of work? What does this say about greatness from a personal standpoint? What does this say about greatness from a societal standpoint?

To answer the first question, my opinion is that Gatsby is a better piece of work. I loved “Tender is the Night”, but from a personal standpoint, I will take Gatsby as the better novel any day of the week and twice on Sunday. But that’s not to slight “Tender is the Night”. Many literary critics actually believe and have written on why it is a better novel that Gatsby, and I see the merit in these analyses. The truth of the matter is that there is more genius in “Tender is the Night” than there is in Gatsby. But the book is towering; sentences run on for seemingly forever, and sometimes the ranting gets so bad you have to reread a page just to know where the paragraphs are heading. Gatsby comes together much better. Everything moves whimsically from word to word, and by the end of the novel everything seemed to happen so quickly and organically you have to go back and reread parts just to recognize the complexity of it all.

Pound for pound, there is more genius and greatness in “Tender is the Night”, but when we look strictly at how the pieces of genius come together as a whole, Gatsby is more…great.

So what does this say about greatness within a personal context? First and foremost, I believe it demonstrates that effort does not always equate to greatness.

That’s a difficult concept for people to grasp, especially given how much rhetoric we are fed at a young age; that in life we have to work hard, and if we work hard, we are guaranteed success or some spot on the top of Mount Rushmore. And unfortunately, it doesn’t work that way. Every piece of research points to how much effort was poured into “Tender is the Night”. Fitzgerald – perhaps the most obsessive writer in American history – slaved away at every word. Tales have surfaced about how many times Fitzgerald reworked sentences in “Tender is the Night”, moving a comma here, changing a word there, all relying on the premise that more effort will unequivocally lead to more success. Unfortunately, when the novel was published, many thought that the book insisted too much upon itself, and Fitzgerald was devastated with its reception.

It’s a scary realization to make that we can try our absolute hardest and still fail. It goes against a lot of principles in life that we are taught as children. Unfortunately, that realization is true. While effort is necessary, it does not make people entitled to success or greatness. Some people just do not have the capacity to obtain greatness or exhibit genius in whatever field they are in. While this idea manifested itself in Fitzgerald’s life through a novel that is still considered by nearly every literary standard very good, it manifests in everyone’s life in a variety of ways: perhaps the realization that no matter how many times you work on your shot, you’re not making the NBA, or regardless of the amount of pages you read in a textbook, you’re not going to become  a doctor.

What “Tender is the Night” also represents is that personal greatness and genius often results from things that come natural to us. Gatsby came to Fitzgerald much more naturally than did “Tender is the Night”. It’s difficult to chisel away at the idea, especially because the two works are both written by the same author, but it more or less equates to the idea that Michael Jordan is better at basketball than I ever will be, regardless of how many more hours I spend practicing my game more than Jordan does. It’s important in life to find not only what you think you should be, but what you truly excel at, what comes natural to you, and how you can capitalize on that. Forcing something – like Fitzgerald forced “Tender is the Night” – will result in some hardships down the road.

Finally, I want to examine what this all means in terms of how society perceives and appreciates greatness. Like I said before, many literary critics will go to the grave testifying that “Tender is the Night” is a better novel than Gatsby from an objective standpoint. And they may be right. But what we must realize is that greatness and genius are often validated by how it is perceived by the audience, and how applicable it is to reality.

To be less abstract: “Tender is the Night” may in fact be the better written book, but unfortunately, because we do not operate at the same level of genius that Fitzgerald does, we may not be able to appreciate that literary greatness the way he, along with a select number of critics do. People don’t like to feel inadequate, but another harsh reality may be that perhaps not everyone is intelligent enough to appreciate someone’s genius. Perhaps I am not smart enough, not advanced enough within the world of literature, to truly appreciate just how great “Tender is the Night” is. And that sucks for Fitzgerald, that it may be very possible that the world just isn’t smart enough to truly understand “Tender is The Night” and all its greatness.

But what that says is that for greatness and perfection and genius to be truly considered great and perfection and genius, they need to be sculpted in a way that society can appreciate them. Gatsby is considered great largely because people can relate to it and understand it. It’s short, easy to read, and the complexity manifests in a way that is recognizable by nearly anyone.

A perfect analogy for this concept is comparing Lebron James to Michael Jordan. Bill Simmons said it best: Five Lebron James could beat five of any other guy, even five Jordans. What many sports analysts are realizing is that Lebron’s genius in basketball extends much further than Jordan’s genius ever did, but because not every player in the league operates on the same level as Lebron, his genius is limited by perception. Jordan was able to sculpt his greatness and genius – a lesser greatness and genius than Lebrons – in a more applicable way than Lebron has been able to.

Just as Fitzgerald was able to sculpt the greatness of Gatsby in a much more applicable way than he was able to sculpt the greatness of “Tender is the Night”. The lump sum of greatness, however that is defined or measured, is perhaps larger in “Tender is the Night”, but because the rest of society is not able to recognize and appreciate that upper extremity where the most advanced greatness lies, where only a select few literary minds can operate, we point towards Gatsby as being the better piece of literature.

So the ultimate question is: As a society, are we missing out on appreciating greatness and genius simply because we are not advanced enough to understand it?

Happy father’s day to my perfect father

The death of my dad has always been something that I have grappled with, both internally and externally. Most people who know me understand that I am very open with this particular (unfortunate) part of my life; more so than a lot of people who have dealt with similar circumstances. I’ve always wondered why that is, because for the most part, I like to think of myself as a private person. There is a persona that I like and feel is necessary to put on for the public, then there is the person that I go to bed with at night and show to only my closest friends. The beauty about grief is that there isn’t a right or wrong way to do it, no time table that needs to be followed. And anyone that tells you otherwise, or uses the proverbial “well, you need to get over it and move on eventually”, is absolutely full of shit.

As I have gotten older and matured I think I am starting to finally understand why I am so eager to express the story of both myself and my father. Being an adult (well, close to it) with a job, and a real life now, I finally understand the phrase that “life is hard.” It’s an adage that most are familiar with, and eventually, father time delivers that adage in tangible form to everyone in one way or another.

And that is why I am so willing to celebrate my father’s life and share everything that he taught me and all of his values to anyone who is willing to listen. Looking back as an older, more intelligent Robert Bethell, I realize that my dad reached such an acute level of excellence as a father and human being, that his character and value set bordered on the line of perfection.

Being a perfect father is not easy. And as a writer, I understand the importance of word precision. I mean perfect. Not perfect in the sense that he would make sure that I always had fun, or always got my way, or was the cool dad when my friends were around. He was perfect in the sense that the effort he put forth towards being a role model was unfaltering, and so incredibly absurd, that it can only be appreciated in hindsight.  Through actions and words, he molded me with such precision and tact into becoming a genuinely good person, drawing from a value set more fit for a nun than a grocery store manager.

My dad worked as the manager of a food store in Philadelphia for the entirety of his career. He didn’t go to college, was self-proclaimed “not the best at english or science, but pretty good at math”, and one time completely broke my computer trying to browse the internet. Rather than speaking in cryptic and anecdotes, I’ll just say it: my dad was not a glitzy or fancy man financially or intellectually. He was intelligent, but not the school book intelligent. You wouldn’t know it though; his dress style of choice was business formal, and many times got angry with me for wanting to wear athletic clothes to a Flyers’ game. He also sent me to a basketball game back in my athletic days wearing dress socks. Needless to say, I was the only kid on the court wearing socks fit for an interview with basketball shoes.

He grew up in Juniata, Philadelphia, a not so great area in a dangerous city. I wasn’t there, and of course there’s the urge among the family to romanticize and sugar coat his childhood, but it’s accurate to assume that he didn’t grow up with the best crowd, and probably partook in activities that sometimes “got him into trouble.” My dad fit the part, too. He was a hulking giant of a man, intimidating in every way possible. His skin was tough, his arms and legs were like tree trunks, and his hair was jet black and slicked back most of the time. He stood well above six feet tall, and weighed around 240 pounds. What happened to me, I don’t know, but too put it bluntly: he wasn’t somebody that you wanted to fuck with.

My dad loved three things in life: his friends, his family, and the beach. His friends will tell me that he was perfect. My family will make him the centerpiece topic of conversation at every family gathering, and when I go to the beach – a beautiful shore in Cape May – everyone knows who I am because of him. That was what made my dad perfect: he defined three aspects of life and dominated them so clearly and completely.

Regarding family, it was difficult as a child to realize the sacrifices my dad made on a daily basis to ensure that he was always there for his family.

A few days before he went to the hospital because of his cancer, while sick with god knows what going on in his body, he drove an hour and a half to pick up Penguins versus Flyers tickets for me for my birthday, after placing in the order as a special favor from a buddy of his weeks in advance. That was after I got into a huge fight with him because he told me that he couldn’t get tickets to the game just a few hours prior. On the way to the game he backed our car into a fire hydrant because the tumor in his brain effected his motor skills. When we were finally at the game, he stayed upstairs in our suite all night, away from our seats, sick as a dog because of the cancer. Of course I didn’t care at the time because I was at the game, and I wanted to be at the game, so all was good and my dad was “the best dad in the world.”

Looking back, I realize that I don’t go to class when I have a cold. To this day, I still can not imagine how difficult it was for my dad to sit at a hockey game for three hours with a brain tumor in his head, after recovering from esophageal cancer just a month before.

It wasn’t only these acts of selflessness that led me to the conclusion that my dad was a rare exception as a human being. It’s easy to be great when the spotlight is on you, or when you are expected to perform, like your child’s birthday. That’s a constant in life, whether it be in sports, school, at work, or in a relationship. In my opinion, people are defined by how they act when there is nothing at stake, and nobody is watching.

My father visited his mother and other elderly relatives nearly every day, and forced me to come along. I absolutely hated it. I hated sitting in a house with who I called at the time “old people”, including my grandmother, and my uncle Barney for hours at a time, with nothing to do. Truth be told, I don’t even know if my dad enjoyed it. I’m sure there were times he was too tired to go, after working fifty hours a week or just didn’t feel up to it. But he went and kept them company. Most of the time, he was their only company. It wasn’t when they were sick, or needed something that my dad would go for a visit. It was all the time, when nothing was expected. My father instilled in me the true value of family, the idea that there is a group of people who are obligated to love me unconditionally, and that I need to protect that and show them that I care just as much about them.

When my dad would come home from work late at night he would wake me up and bring me downstairs to have a bowl of ice cream with him, or crackers and cheese. He would then take me over to our couch, prop me up on top of his massive body, and we would watch whatever movie was on television. We both knew I had school the next day, but he never minded if I went in an hour late because of “headaches”, if it meant he could spend some time with me after work. I’m not saying one form of parenting – strict regarding school or not – is better than the other. All I can say is that from a personal standpoint, I remember the movies we watched – the Mighty Ducks, Invincible, In the Line of Fire – much more than whatever I learned in art class the next morning.

Regarding his friends, they describe him to me as literally perfect. He would call each of them at 8 in the morning on Saturdays and Sundays to see how they were doing. Who I surrounded myself with was important to him. He didn’t want me to hang out with “assholes” or “troublemakers.” He wanted me to surround myself with people that genuinely cared about me, much like his friends genuinely cared about him. His coworkers, who were also his friends, would share stories about how they would hate coming into the store until they saw him, who would brighten up their day with exaggerated stories about mundane things, like crab legs and the beach, topped off with enthusiastic hand gestures. My dad was a person of the people, and looked out for his friends, who all have their own personal “I remember when Dennis” story. Yeah, my dad changed his ways from a street kid in Juniata to a responsible adult, but I would be lying if I said he wouldn’t take a bat to someones head if his friends asked. He helped me realize the importance of friendship, and how it is absolutely crucial to do everything in your power to protect and care for those friends who mean the most to you.

Regarding work, my father took more pride in arranging food on a grocery store shelf than I have anything in my entire life. My father didn’t have the most spectacular of jobs, but he clocked in every day, and demanded the best of his employees. He wasn’t the CEO of a financial firm, and made around 50,000 dollars a year, if that, after working for thirty years. But he took pride in that store, in stocking shelves, in placing orders, in checking expiration dates. Those were the cards that life had dealt him career wise, and between 9 and 5 that was what kept him going. “You don’t do things in life you care about half-ass.” There is something to be said about a man who can give everything to something so mundane, and handle his responsibilities regarding something that mundane with such urgency and tact.

As I grow up, it’s clear that the paths that me and my dad have taken to adulthood are different. I didn’t grow up with the circumstances that he had to deal with. I grew up in the suburbs of New Jersey, am going to a world class university, and will likely rely on my intellect to lead me to success. And while this gap between paths to adulthood widens as the years pass on, the destination – because of how successful my dad was – remains true for me: friends, family, and the beach.

My own “I remember when Dennis” stories are the tools that have helped me get through life.

I remember when he brought me to our 40 year old dump of a beach house in the early days of a freezing February, without any heat, just for the experience. We got under a heaping pile of covers and watched the Steve Nash led Phoenix Suns play the Mavericks. It was awesome.

I remember when he brought me to the Flyers’ game to meet Keith Primeau for my birthday when he was sick with cancer so I could meet “a true leader”. Little did I know at the time that the true leader was my dad.

I remember when he told me to go bed one night at around midnight while I was frustrated because I couldn’t finish a 5th grade school project for Ms. Cohen’s class. “Fuck the project”, he said. “Tell the teacher to call me if this isn’t good enough. You need sleep”

I remember when he would leave two dollar bills and silver dollars next to my bed side before leaving for work every day, so I had something to look forward to when waking up.

I remember when he would bring me in for take your child to work day, and told me to go remove all the expired food off of the shelves. When I asked him why he cared so much about managing a food store, he said “if you don’t take pride in your work or what you do, you’re a loser.”

I remember when I was upset after a basketball game because I didn’t get enough playing time and I thought my coach didn’t think I was good. My dad, on his hospital bed, dying by that time, told me “Don’t worry about what people think of you. You’re good, and people are going to know you’re good.”

I remember laying on my dad, on a big maroon chair in my house, several days before he went to the hospital for the final time. I told him, in the only moment of vulnerability and weakness for both of us during it all, “I don’t want you to die.” He told me, confident as ever, even though we both knew he was, “I’m not dying. Ever.”

My dad was the perfect person. Not because he had flaws, such as growing up in a rough area, not going to college, not being the most intelligent of people, experimenting with drugs, and smoking cigarettes, and then “making it.” But because he fixed those flaws when it was necessary, and changed his lifestyle to ensure that he was still able to dominate those three aspects of life: friends, family, and the beach. No sacrifice was too big, too demanding, or too selfless for him if it meant being there for his friends and family. Many successful and good people fail at being there for the people that they love because their job is too demanding, their life is too strenuous, or their vices are too difficult to handle. As I get older it becomes more and more evident that adults, really, are not that different than teenagers and college kids. Adults put on a show to their children just as much as children put on a show to them. My dad was genuine, and a good person, and upheld my belief that adults are a magical form or human beings who are fundamentally perfect in values and actions.

A lot of people wonder if giving up everything for your friends and family is worth it. Unfortunately, it is only after we die that we’ll ever know the answer. Over a thousand people showed up to my dad’s viewing and funeral.  That was before social media, before the cyber boom when people could know you without ever meeting you face to face. That means my dad touched over a thousand people personally, as a grocery store manager from a rough neighborhood in Philadelphia who didn’t go to college. The line at his viewing went out the door and down the road, and the funeral home had to extend an already three hour viewing by an extra hour just so everyone in line could pay their respects. People showed up the next day for the required additional viewing to fit everyone in. If a quarter of the amount of people show up to my funeral after I die, I will consider that a successful life.

That to me, is the epitome of the perfection. And that, in my opinion, needs to be shared with all the dads out there, and future dads who think it’s important to become a financial big shot, or the cool guy. None of that stuff matters when you’re in the ground.

Happy father’s day to my dad, Dennis Bethell, and all the dads out there.

Why the Chainsmokers’ Selfie is similar to F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby

Today I was in the car with my mother and the song “Selfie” came on, which queued her to say “this song is so funny”, and she then proceeded to dance to it in the car.

1. My mother is too cool to be doing that. 2. My mother’s car is way too cool for that song to be playing in it.

Anyway, that led to some thinking by me.

As a fan of the Great Gatsby, I’m naturally attracted to a stories that serve as cautionary tales. And despite the playfulness and humor embedded within the Chainsmoker’s massive hit, “Selfie”, the song itself largely does serve as a cautionary depiction of the digital society we live in. While it’s difficult to compare the Great Gatsby – considered by many, including myself – to be the greatest novel in the history of literature, to a pop/EDM song targeted towards teenagers on a level playing field, the similarities are nonetheless interesting, and in most cases, in my opinion, valid to discuss.

First and foremost, for those have never read the Great Gatsby, and therefore have no taste in literature or entertainment, the central message of the book is that society during the Jazz Age was too excessive, and because of that excess, a societal and economic crash were evident. This is ultimately represented through the death of our main protagonist, Mr. Gatsby, who mainly serves as a symbol for commercialism and the materialistic way of life for many during the roaring twenties.

Fitzgerald’s story turned out to be more than prophetic, given that the Great Depression occurred just a few years after the publication of the Great Gatsby, and both the economic and social bubble popped, raining down misfortune on essentially everyone.

So how does this compare to the song you’ll often see me dancing too foolishly, “Selfie”?

Well, I think for the most part that people – specifically teenagers and young adults – know that the song is meant to be a parody of how girls (and guys) act when they go out; worrying more about Snapchat, Instagram, Vine, Facebook, and Twitter the entire night, rather than having fun. However, despite the fact the lyrics are mostly fun and humorous, I do believe that the Chainsmokers do have a deeper message buried somewhere within.

I’ve said it to my roommate before: “Selfie” could not be more accurate in depicting how girls (again, and guys) act when they go out. If any of you have ever watched the Social Network (one of my favorite movies, despite the fact that it insults my beloved Terrier world in the first 15 minutes), one of Mark Zuckerberg’s main point was that social media (specifically Facebook), then a concept that was still very new, was to serve as an accessory to going out and partying. However, due to the rapid progression of social media, especially its prevalence in college and high school life, services like Facebook, Snapchat, Vine, and Instagram are now taking the forefront of the “going out” experience.

No longer is going out simply something you do to have fun with your friends. Because we are able to share every minute of our night with our friends and acquaintances, going out is an activity now used to show off social status and increase someone’s personal brand. People now feel the added pressure of documenting every minute of their night, whether it’s at a club, a frat party, a sporting event, etc, to prove to their peers that they are 1) social people who have friends and 2) objectively attractive, given the capabilities of “selfies”.

And that’s where I believe the song really has some cautionary societal value, much like the Great Gatsby did, and in some cases, still does. Social media is ruining the natural ideology of what it means to “go out”. And honestly, I’m not a fan. That’s why I don’t like frat parties, and that’s why I don’t like sororities. Everything is focused on taking pictures, rather than actually having fun. People feel the need to take pictures of themselves at every stage of the night, with various groups of people, doing various poses, holding various kinds of alcohol, to prove to their friends that they have reached some level of social crust that they desire. They also feel the need to post them on Facebook, or Twitter, or Instagram, or all three plus Pinterest, and if they don’t get X amount of likes in Y amount of minutes, the picture is taken down, the uploader feels like he or she isn’t attractive or socially cool enough, and the entire process is repeated in the hopes of a better result.

And that really sucks. Because I go out to have fun and enjoy myself. And approximately 45 minutes into the night I look like absolute crap. I’m sweating, I’m in a heavily populated area, going wild, and in general, just look terrible. Chances are you would not recognize me if you saw me on the street the day after a night of going out. But because society is so concerned with displaying how much fun we have, or look like we can have when we go out, we have to make sure that we look flawless all night long. Because the biggest crime in the world is taking an ugly selfie and having it uploaded for all of your friends, acquaintances, and love interests to see. When I go out, pictures of me are often in really bad lighting, when I’m sweating bullets, my face is red, and the picture is often from a really unflattering angle.

The fact that people feel the need to make social media, specifically selfies, such a big part of going out, makes doing anything much more tiring, unenjoyable, and socially strenuous than it should be. My roommate, Dan “muy bars” Sutterman, has some good anecdotal evidence regarding my complaint. He likes to go to raves to go absolutely crazy and act like an idiot. Unfortunately, he often complains that he sees far too many people going to the same shows, and spend the entire night snapchatting, taking pictures, or making fun of people who are actually having fun rather than enjoying themselves.

And that’s my main complaint regarding the whole issue. Look, if you are a group of people and want to take a bunch of pictures pretending like you’re in your natural environment having a great time, go ahead, no one is going to stop you. Like the Godfather said, “it’s no business of mine how somebody lives their life”. But if you’re going out to genuinely have fun, I honestly can not see how in the world taking hundreds of pictures, including thousands of retakes, compounded into trillions of different poses and angles, can possibly fun.

Our society is heading towards, and some may argue has already reached, an image focused lifestyle. For the most part, that’s because images are a great way to remember a moment. But now, as social media becomes more and more relevant, images are not used as so much to remember a moment, but to represent how impressive you are as a human being aesthetically and socially. Pictures, especially the Selfie, through likes, favorites, and retweets, are used to reconfirm to yourself that you…are okay, and you’re beautiful, and you have friends, and you are enjoying yourself in the company of others who are also as beautiful and enjoyable. If I had a dollar for every person that “Snapchatted” or “Instagrammed” an exotic car that they do not own, but want people to believe that they own, I would be able to buy my own sport’s team.

The song “Selfie” perfectly captures this. Lyrically the song is tiring and overwhelming, which parallels how meticulous it is to go out with a group of friends who are more concerned with Facebook and Instagram pictures than they are enjoying themselves. “Selfie” is a cautionary song in that it shows how society is starting to care more about making sure it looks like it is having fun, rather than actually having fun. It’s a song that fully and completely captures the level of excess regarding how much social media has become integrated into our daily lives, and how even if you’re at the worst party or club ever, it is absolutely critical that you make sure all of your friends think it’s the best place ever, and of course, that you look phenomenal that night.

Now, it’s also important to be a little self-aware, and understand why most people don’t see “Selfie” in this way, or comparable to the Great Gatsby at all. The comparisons that can be drawn between Selfie and The Great Gatsby shed light on the idea that the medium of which you send your message really matters. For example, people take the Great Gatsby seriously because it is a complex book, written by an author with an incredible amount of ethos, with messages embedded into deep and complex sentences and metaphors.

Selfie, on the other hand, is a lighthearted, dance move inducing, club song that is much more explicit in its depiction of society. And because the song is not serious in nature, the message it gives is also not taken seriously. Instead, girls and guys actually use the song as an excuse to continue their ways of prioritizing social media while going out, and view it as their anthem. Just know, that even if you’re engaging in the activity that Selfie makes fun of, you’re still participating in the activity.

Finally, I have to say that in the end, it’s obviously important to put the behavior this soliloquy discusses into perspective. At the end of the day (or night), uploading a bunch of pictures to social media sites isn’t a big deal. No one is losing any sleep over it, and therefore, warrants me saying, do whatever you want to do. But I still think everything I said at least warrants consideration. Because as I’ve discussed with my friends before, it’s unfortunate to see people feel so much pressure to make it look like they live exciting and socially acceptable lives on social media. The act of using social media as a way to filter your life so it appears to everyone that you are always beautiful and are always doing exciting things is a little concerning, and I believe Selfie perfectly captures that. And I think there will be some societal consequences of this behavior and social media excess. Perhaps not to the magnitude of an economic breakdown, but…first let me take a selfie.

Notes

– Today on my flight the guy sitting next to me drank 4 coke and rums in 45 minutes. I guess that’s really taking advantage of the first class “free drink” policy. I got orange juice.

– I still look terrible in light blue pants

– My mother dresses way cooler than me.

Remembering: Upenn hospital, nostalgia, and the power of the human brain.

I’m currently waiting in the lobby of the University of Pennsylvania hospital for my cousin to go to the Eagle’s playoff game versus the Saints. It’s actually my first time here since my dad’s passing.

It’s a very eerie, almost surreal experience, considering there was a point in my life when this hospital was virtually my entire life. And now I’m just a visitor, without someone there to visit. My time spent at that hospital was very mechanical; whenever I describe my visits to people, the entire thing comes out like it was an after school job I had at a factory, slaving away at the same process every day. First my mother and I would drop off the car with the valet service, then we would slide through the revolving door, then up the escalators, and finally through a series of intricate hallways, elevator rides and passage ways until we finally reached my father’s room.

My daily life revolved around that hospital. I ate dinner there; did my homework there; watched television and went on the computer there. I knew the hospital inside and out; which floors were for what types of patients, what the optimal time to visit the cafeteria was, and even where they kept snacks for the patients in little closets. I can still find my way to each of the rooms my dad stayed in; not through directions or intuitively, but mechanically. The walkways are engraved in my head, sort of like riding a bike. It’s like my brain will always be programmed to go the same exact way, step for step, the second I pass through the revolving doors.I couldn’t tell you how to get there, but I can do it flawlessly. Roads was the building my dad stayed in before he passed; to this day I refuse to ever step foot in there – it’s too creepy.

All of the nurses knew me; at that time I had a very distinct blonde head of hair, and I was there so often I was on a first name basis with a lot of the workers.

I didn’t explore the hospital at all, but I still remember the layout. If you wanted to go to the cafeteria you would walk up the escalator, go to the second set of elevators, take it to the correct floor; you would then get out, and take a right. After that you would take a left, and pass a series of very odd painting for sale. About halfway down the hall there’s a small chapel, for the religious I suppose. Finally you would get to the cafeteria.

I remember the first time my dad went in for surgery for his esophagus. I checked my fantasy football team on the waiting room’s computer; I drafted Steven Jackson with the second overall pick that year, and had Matt Schaub as my quarterback. When my dad went in for his surgery on his brain, I remember the feeling of overwhelming joy I had when Dr. O’ Rourke came out and told my family the surgery was successful.

I remember buying nba live 2008 for the Nintendo wii one afternoon before visiting him. I remember watching the very first game played by the celtics big three in the room.

I remember exactly where I was, and how i felt the first time my mother told me my dad wasn’t going to get better. I was sitting outside the room, waiting for her to get back from talking to the doctor. I already knew that my dad wasn’t going to make it by then. Exactly a week earlier I told my mom in the elevator, the “first week daddy gets out I’m going to take him to the phillies game.” That was when I knew; that’s how I denied the inevitable. I remember that I tried French vanilla coffee from wawa for the first time that afternoon, the day I was told, after school, which I left early from while my enriched science class was watching osmosis jones. I remember the exit sign that hung above his room, with the letter “E” blacked out. I remember who the first person I texted was when I received the bad news, and the exact text they sent back. I also remember being on the computer, talking on AIM just before my dad took his final breath. I’m not a religious person, but something – at that very moment – told me to get off the computer and go see my dad. To this day I don’t know what that feeling was, but if am grateful for it every day. If I didn’t go back at that exact moment, I would have missed my dad’s death for being on the computer. I remember the face of the young blonde nurse – probably her first year there – asking me if I wanted any water to calm down.

The point of this post isn’t too harp on any negatives. It’s too acknowledge how powerful, and incredibly mysterious the brain is. For a very long time I forgot about all these things; they didn’t even pass through my mind. But sitting here, in the lobby, brings back probably the most significant, time consuming part of my entire life like it never left my memory. All of those memories rushed back, like a ghost rising from a grave of memories that my brain subconsciously suppressed. The human brain is absolutely amazing, and shapes the world how you would like to see it, suppressing realities and tragic memories. I just had to write something down, because the feeling, like I said, is surreal. Looking back, my personality was developed in that hospital.

The saying goes that “you’re a product of your environment”. And in this case, it’s true.The truth is, that when you’re a child in a hospital with a parent suffering from a terminal illness, you get told a lot of bullshit. The euphemisms, the deceiving overly positive attitudes: I grew up with that. And I was a smart kid. I owe my overly aware, constantly questioning, and no tolerance for bullshit personality to this. And being back there just sort of reminded me of this.

On a side note: seeing people – mothers, children, fathers, brothers, sisters, and friends – walk up the escalator to visit loved ones, some of whom that are also dying, makes you reevaluate your ability to assess people’s lives on first glance.

Why Jay Gatsby is straight edge

I have not written a post in forever.

For some of you, that’s good news. For the others who actually enjoy reading what I write, I’m sorry. The end of the semester was incredibly busy with long projects for my electives, and a lot of finals to study for, which basically involved learning a semester’s worth of material in a few weeks. Now that the semester is over, and I’m on winter break – which largely consists of sleeping, eating, and catching up on movies – I can finally get back to churning out posts consistently. Before I start though, I need to give a shout out to my main Jewish man Moshe Hagigi for undoubtedly rounding my final accounting grade up about 45 points: Mazel Tov my brotha.

Regarding this post, I’d like to focus a bit on the characterization of Jay Gatsby: specifically how his behavior juxtaposes with his lavish environments, and what that really means.

As a reader (or a movie watcher for that matter) I’m a big fan of character development; I’m extremely interested in the behavior of people in general, and how people’s behavior alters given different environments. From an entertainment perspective, I enjoy books, tv shows, and movies that primarily focus on character, rather than plot, which explains why I like the Great Gatsby so much, and am not really a fan of Inception.

Given that preface, I’d like to dive into Gatsby’s behavior throughout various social settings throughout the novel. One of the first things I ever picked up on while reading the Great Gatsby is that Gatsby never partakes in this festivities at his own parties, and more importantly, never drinks. Analyzing the fact that Gatsby doesn’t “party” at his parties is rather amateur, given that most readers of the novel know that that this behavior merely represents the fact that he throws the party not to enjoy himself, but simply to attract Daisy. What I believe is the important element of this discovery, and what I would like to analyze more critically in this, post is the fact that Gatsby drink, and how that relates to the morality, motives, and personality of his character.

Throughout the novel, Fitzgerald continually touches on the significance of alcohol: Nick states  how rare it is for him to drink, noting that he only had gotten drunk one or twice in his life.  Gatsby talks about how Dan Cody, his mentor, was an alcoholic, which I believe is extremely interesting. On the surface, there really is no purpose of Fitzgerald labeling Cody as an alcoholic; yes Gatsby saves Cody’s life while old Dan was on in his boat one time, but given that there was a storm, the boat was bound to be on course to crash whether Cody was drunk or not. Most importantly,  the most prevalent way Fitzgerald incorporates alcohol in the novel is through Gatsby’s source of money; Gatsby’s main source of income was from bootlegging. Ultimately, I find it incredibly interesting, and a little humorous/ironic that Gatsby made his bones as a bootlegger, and throws lavish parties where people go to get drunk and forget reality for a while, yet he doesn’t drink himself – not even casually/socially. Given these facts, there is no doubt that alcohol is indeed an element that Fitzgerald purposely implemented into the novel, and as readers, we should attempt to analyze what it adds to our understanding of the novel as a whole.

(He is shown holding a drink here. I don’t think he ever actually drinks it)

The fact that Gatsby was a bootlegger, but never drank says a lot about him. Most explicitly it shows the absolute obsession Gatsby had for Daisy; Gatsby was willing to adapt a lifestyle he was obviously against to make money to hopefully impress Daisy and win her back from Tom. This contributes to my theory that Gatsby’s love for Daisy is built on incredibly shallow elements, and ultimately is more about fulfilling a neurotic need, rather than building a relationship with someone he truly loves. Essentially, Fitzgerald could have picked any arbitrary illegal activity for Gatsby to be involved in as a source of money; the fact that he chose bootlegging – compounded with the other focus on alcohol throughout the novel – shows how alcohol truly is an important element that should be considered by anyone analyzing the story. Analyzing Gatsby through a more exterior lens, and taking into consideration the time period the book was published and the societal themes of the Jazz age, it becomes more obvious why Fitzgerald chose to make alcohol one of the themes in his novel; the book was written during the prohibition era, and bootlegging was a very common activity for society’s citizens.

“The bar is in full swing, and floating rounds of cocktails permeate the garden outside, until the air is alive with chatter and laughter, and casual innuendo and introductions forgotten on the spot, and enthusiastic meetings between women who never knew each other’s names.”

Diving deeper, I think Gatsby’s refusal to drink alcohol adds a lot to what his character ultimately represents. The main reason why the Great Gatsby is such a popular book is because of the enigma that Jay Gatsby is; he’s so polarizing, mysterious, and paradoxical that the literary world can not reach a definitive characterization of him. Alcohol, at least in my opinion, largely contributes to his enigma. At the core of the Gatsby characterization debate is whether or not he is a good guy; is he a symbol of hope or corruption? The fact that he made his money as a bootlegger, but does not drink the alcohol further blurs the line; he’s neither entirely good (or hopeful), nor entirely bad. His bootlegging proves that on one hand, Jay Gatsby is a symbol of the corruption and excess that plagued 1920’s America. On the other hand, the fact that he doesn’t drink the alcohol shows that he is also a symbol of hope.

The significance of this point is that it shows how Gatsby operates as a person: internally, at his core, Gatsby is indeed a symbol of hope, and I believe a genuinely good person. However, externally, his obsession with Daisy forced him to bootleg and become this symbol for corruption and excess. Essentially, the entire story is a constant personal battle for Gatsby: the bootlegging Gatsby – the one who is obsessed with Daisy and impressing others – and the non drinking Gatsby – the one who has late night chats with Nick – constantly clash with each other, fogging the image he portrays to the reader. Gatsby’s corruption stems from Daisy, and I believe that is extremely valuable to the reader’s characterization of both Daisy and Tom Buchanan. Gatsby’s hope stems from within, showing that perhaps the true Gatsby is really a good guy.

A quote that Nick says that I believe also pertains to Gatsby is as followed:

“I was within and without, simultaneously enchanted and repelled by the inexhaustible variety of life”

Like Nick, Gatsby was within and without the corruption of the 1920s. He was within the world of corruption by becoming a bootlegger to make money to ultimately impress Daisy, but he was without by refusing to drink. This speaks volumes about how the characters are interrelated to each other, and how the characterization of each major player in the Great Gatsby largely plays off of his/her surrounding characters and environment.

Ultimately, we can conclude from Gatsby’s fairly straight edge life regarding alcohol is that at his core, Gatsby is a good person, and a symbol of hope. But his external needs are so overwhelming that he’s willing to suppress his true self and become something he’s not; all adding to the enigma that he is, and the great debate surrounding how truly great Gatsby the character is.

However, if Gatsby were to drink, his drink of choice would obviously be:

One note I would like to add is from the movie. In this scene Gatsby is depicted as drinking, and ultimately loses his cool, almost punches Tom, and scares away Daisy. While it’s not clear if he is drinking during the similar corresponding scene in the novel, it does represent how alcohol, and the corruption that alcohol is associated with, largely pertains to Daisy and Tom. You can also see how the pink suit that I own looks on Gatsby, which I assure you is a bit more dapper than how it looks on me.

 

 

 

http://robertbethell.brandyourself.com/

A poem (it’s about Jay Gatsby)

Glenn McCarty

So one of the cool things about being a high school teacher is I get to assign creative writing pieces, which I then get to complete along with my students. I know, tricky, right? A couple weeks back, I asked my juniors to write a poem inspired by The Great Gatsby. Theirs turned out great, but the poem I wrote turned out pretty good, too, so I thought I’d share. Feel free to comment!

“Akeldama”

I sold my name for this silver dream,
in the dim belief
that the golden girl,
who moves like music,
her voice quivering like water
reflected in a golden bowl,
would slake her restless thirst
in the fountain I constructed
from the wealth I would squander
in an instant for her warm hand
pressed into my damp palm.

But now, our future spills forth
like blood from a chest wound,
hemorrhaging in thick crimson…

View original post 16 more words

“I’m sorry about the clock”: The significance of time in the Great Gatsby

This weekend was exciting for me, as I was reminded why I have developed such a strong passion for the Great Gatsby: somewhere in the radiant, masterfully concocted world that Fitzgerald built, there is some metaphor that I have not recognized yet; and it is this type of artistry, this suffocating stranglehold Fitzgerald has on his prose that keeps me coming back to the novel. I view the Great Gatsby as the definitive masterpiece of American literature, and like Gatsby’s smile, it is the type of work that I may “only come across four or five times in life”.

With that said, I’d like to share my newest revelation regarding a specific scene in the novel: when Gatsby is first reunited with Daisy and breaks Nick’s clock. As a disclaimer, I can not call this a self-revelation, as the idea was sparked by a book that I recently read on the Great Gatsby: Chronology, Composition, and Narrative Technique in the Great Gatsby, by Thomas A. Pendleton.

Also, for those who are unfamiliar with the scene, you can watch the movie version of it here (starts at 2:30):

When I first read the novel I thought very little of Gatsby’s blunder; I viewed it as sort of comic relief, and thought it was implemented to show how Gatsby’s cool, collective persona fades away when he is with Daisy. I thought it juxtaposed Gatsby’s character when he dealt with Daisy (clumsy and flustered) and Gatsby’s character when he dealt with every other character (cool, calm, collective) expertly, but I really didn’t see any other significance, which – looking back – was extremely naive of myself. As I wrote in an earlier blog post, themes that Fitzgerald touch on frequently is the permanence of the past and the significant of moving on in life. How I didn’t make the connection between Gatsby knocking over a clock, which is the physical representation of time, and these two themes absolutely bewilders me.

A major internal struggle that Gatsby faces throughout the novel is the inability to move on in life; Gatsby is convinced that he can erase the last five years of Daisy and Tom’s marriage, and continue his relationship with Daisy as if time hadn’t skipped a second since his last encounter with her five years ago. The quote that most perfectly elicits this struggle of Gatsby is as followed:

“Can’t repeat the past?” He cried incredulously. “Why of course you can!”

So back to the clock scene.

Gatsby drops the clock when he is first reunited with Daisy. Given that fact, I believe it is accurate to infer that in that moment, for Jay Gatsby, time stopped; life as he knew it without Daisy suddenly ceased to exist, and it was time to start a new life, built on rekindled love and the ability to be with Daisy. As readers we know for Gatsby, it was not enough for Daisy to simply leave Tom and start a life with him: it was necessary for Daisy to dismiss her marriage with Tom and act as if the last 5 years never happened. Gatsby wanted to vaporize the idea that at any point of time in Daisy’s life, she actually loved Tom; and given other evidence from the text, it is logical to assume that Gatsby’s breaking of the clock represents this.

“I’m going to fix everything just the way it was before,” he said, nodding determinedly. “She’ll see.”

However, what makes this scene so exciting is that I think it represents something completely different for the reader. For Gatsby I believe it represents his unrelenting obsession to recreate the past and dismiss the last five years as ever happening. For the reader, however, I believe the scene is meant to foreshadow the temporariness of Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship. One certainty of life is that it goes on. No matter what we do, or how hard we try, it is physically impossible to stop time from moving on. The clock continues to tick.

Gatsby drops the clock right before he and Daisy restart their relationship. The clock breaking is meant to signify this temporary relationship that is about to ensue. However, as I just stated, even when the clock breaks, time continues to drag on. Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship throughout the book is a short, non-permanent break from reality; a relationship that as readers we know will ultimately end, with life continuing on like nothing happened. Even when the clock is temporarily broken, we know that time is still ticking, life is still going on. Having the clock fall and break is Fitzgerald’s way of telling the reader, Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship is simply the clock breaking for a while. We can pretend it’s going to last, but eventually the reality of life is going to come crashing down. 

Sort of like a vacation to Disney World: you go with your family to a magical fantasy land where everything is perfect for a few days, but even when you’re there, real life is happening beyond those walls, and eventually you have to come back to it

Gatsby and Daisy’s relationship is like your trip to Disney Word; it’s amazing and magic; but in the end it’s just fantasy.

Time is still ticking, even if the clock is broken for a while.

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Notes

• I’m thoroughly enjoying Trimalchio, Fitzgerald’s first complete draft of the Great Gatsby
• GTFO registrar if I want to take Chaotic Dynamical Systems. BU schedule registration absolutely sucks and I’m going to write a strongly worded letter expressing my dissatisfaction
• I don’t look good in light blue pants

“It’s a favor Jay. Just a favor”

When Nick tells Gatsby he’s going to invite Daisy over for tea, and Gatsby offers a sideline job as an expression of gratitude, Mr. Carraway says my favorite quote in the entire movie:

“It’s a favor Jay. Just a favor”

The best part is that Gatsby is absolutely floored at the idea that Nick would do something for him simply out of kindness, without expecting anything in return. It’s so sad, that someone lives in such an artificial world that he simply can not believe that someone would come along and perform an act of kindness for no reason but good intention. And unfortunately, its a theme that is still very prevalent in the real world. 

Life today is often compared to life during the jazz age. We live in a world plagued by commercialism, where the dollar rules all, and as a result, members of society often believe success is merely a function of material wealth and societal status. Another glaring similarity between Fitzgerald’s 1920s and life today is the interaction of people.

Everyone has heard the quote, “It’s not what you know, it’s who you know”, as if the main goal to meet and interact with people is to use them to progress in life later on. Just like the characters in the Great Gatsby, many people today use others for parties, money, and job opportunities. And unfortunately, as a society we sort of just accept this foundation for relationships: that it is our duty to provide our closest friends with some quantifiable or tangible benefit, as if friendship alone isn’t enough.

As a result, when people come along and genuinely enjoy doing good things for others, like Nick Carraway, we begin to question their motives. Like Gatsby, we can’t fathom that certain people would want to do something nice for us simply out of the kindness of their heart. And that’s really, really, really, god damn unfortunate. 

Everyone has value. Our job is not to exploit it, but to care for it and appreciate it, letting that person know they matter.

There are special people out there – people that enjoy helping others simply out of the kindness of their heart, and because it makes them feel good. Not everyone is a Daisy and mooches off of others, performing good deeds with only self interest in mine. Unfortunately, because there are so many Daisies, and not enough Nicks, that society has begun to view this act of doing good deeds for ultimate personal gain as just a natural part of moving up in life. We see it everywhere in life: people do community service to put it on a college application, do their bosses extraordinary favors to get a promotion.

The reality is: Doing good things does not make you a good person.

Motivation matters. Why are you doing the things you’re doing? Is it to put on a resume, or is it because you genuinely enjoy helping others. For the only time in your life, be a Nick Carraway; do good things as a favor. Be special. Be extraordinary. Volunteer at a place because it will make others smile.

Exemplified by Gatsby’s and Nick’s close friendship, doing good things because you genuinely care about the happiness of others is what will help build your closest and most special relationships. Not only that, but it will genuinely change society. Society has grown so accustomed to the artificiality of today’s world, that people are absolutely bewildered when someone does something good for no reason but to help others. These people are special, and don’t come along too often.

Change that.

So today, volunteer at a soup kitchen, visit a senior home and spend time with the residents, give some spare change to a homeless person, or simply hold a door open. Make someone’s day for absolute no reason. We can only realize the value of each other and ourselves when we begin to truly value the well-being of society as a whole.

Be Nick Carraway. Do something good.