Erlebnisgesellschaft

ON MY BUSINESS CARD, my title is listed as “Chief of Creative Strategies and Corporate Culture”. Yes, it is meant to be taken with a grain or two of salt and an eye roll, but it sounds much more noble than “Head Huckster in an Industry With Questionable Moral Redeeming Value”.

In ninth grade English class, we were given an assignment: write a paper on what you would like to be when you grow up. I remember some of my classmates struggling with the assignment. When you’re 14 or so, and filled with bright hope and other stuff, it can be hard to narrow the possibilities for a life calling down to one job. 

For me it was easy. At that moment in time I had vocational clarity. I was to be a radio disk jockey. Even then I was certain I could stack the order of current hits to create a playlist that would not only wow and entertain but prove to be the soundtrack for young lovers everywhere.

Of course, my commitment to being a great DJ would wax and wane, and my vocational vision would wander over the next few years, but never, ever would I have written an essay about being the marketing guy for a bank. But that all changed with my discovery of erlebnisgesellschaft.

In the early 90s, a German sociologist named Gerhard Schulze wrote a book called "Erlebnisgesellschaft", or "The Experience Society". Then in 1999, a couple of guys named Pine and Gilmore wrote an article explaining what they called “The Experience Economy”. They used the example of a birthday party and the requisite birthday cake to explain the various economies and how the experience economy fits. It goes something like this:

Agaraian economy: To make the cake, the mom gathers the necessary commodities and makes the cake from scratch.

Goods-Based economy: Life gets a little easier. Now some lady named Betty Crocker has put a bunch of the key ingredients in a box called a cake mix.

Service economy: Now you don’t even have to turn on an oven. You go to Wal Mart, point at a cake in a glass case, they squirt the kid’s name on it, and voilà! you have yourself a party. (Well, you still have to get the pointy hats, napkins, punch, balloons, magician, corn dogs, and clean the house when it’s all over.)

And last, but not least, the Experience Economy: Now you just outsource the whole thing to Chuck E. Cheese.

Erlebnisgesellschaft, in theory, changed my perspective on marketing a bank—a part of an industry that has managed to turn even “service” into a commodity. Somehow it made the vocation seem more like a calling than a job. I thought we had made some strides toward this idea, until I visited the pinnacle of the Experience Economy model: The American Girl Doll Store.

Our oldest Grand-Girl will be eight soon. (The recommended age for the AGD experience.) I had heard they stage quite the experience and I strive to earn the right to continue to drink from my “#1 Pops” coffee mug. So, let’s do this right.

A Google search provided these tips: 1.) Make your bistro reservations before you arrive. 2.) Stay the night before your visit in a partner hotel. 3.) Arrive early and make your reservation at the spa first thing. Check, check & check!

As we arrived at the “partner hotel”, the young lady at the desk looked right past me to Karlee, who was holding her American Girl doll. “This must be yours!” she says enthusiastically, as she hands Karlee a large AGD bag.

As soon as we walked into our room, we noticed cookies and milk awaiting her arrival. She dug in to her bag to find a tiny little bed, satin sheets, a pillow, a robe and slippers all for her doll and hers to keep. There was also a $25 AGD gift card in the bag, to prime the pump so to speak.

The next morning we were at the AGD queendom as they doors opened. Karlee made an appointment at the spa to have her doll’s ears pierced, then we were off to Brunch at the AGD Bistro and shopping. Several hours and dollars later, we started for home. As I looked in the rearview mirror to find Karlee and her doll sound asleep, I thought, “Erlebnisgesellschaft indeed!”

Tea time at the Bistro

Selecting a new pair of shoes takes a committee

Done

About Babies

LET ME INTRODUCE YOU! This is Brooke and Kyle's little baby and our sixth Grand. It is no secret if you read this blog at all, that we have five beautiful, gifted GrandGirls. Will this little one be another girl or maybe a boy? We won't know until it makes its grand entrance sometime in May. One thing is certain, as you can tell from it's picture here that it is a lovely and loved child.

So, it's Christmastime, that wonderful time when many of us celebrate the birth of Jesus, our hope and peace. What if, and I'm just imagining here, ultrasound technology had been available to Mary and Joseph? I hope it's not impious to picture the young teenage parents at the clinic. The technician says, "It's a boy!" and Mary says to Joseph, "The angel was right!?"

I'm guessing that only a young, expectant mother can begin to understand the emotion of that moment, when it all first becomes real, when a human sort of advent begins. In my over-imaginative mind, I picture Mary laying her hand gently on her belly and saying, "I hope he has his Father's eyes."

As it turns out, not only does he have his father's eyes, but he said, "If you've seen me, you've seen my father."

If you'll allow me, an old man, to use that masculine reference "Father", I would only hope this season that I too could have my Father's eyes--that I will somehow be able to see people as He sees them. To see His creation as He sees it. To somehow see beyond the hate, the division, the bleakness; and to see the beauty of it all.

Last year about this time I posted here on the old About POPS blog some thoughts about Beauty and Pain. I invite you to check it out by clicking this sentence.

Merry Christmas Ya'll.

Question Like A Kid

CURIOUS GEORGE is nearly 80 years old. How has this storyline endured? I’m curious.

It’s like that grocery store tabloid, National Enquirer says, “Enquiring minds want to know.”

Why “enquire” instead of “inquire”? Curious, huh?

Do you think inquiry is frowned upon? Maybe life would have been less complicated if I had heeded the warning that “curiousity killed the cat”. Maybe the authorities that said, “Don’t question authority,” were wise. Maybe I should have been one of those who accepts rules, regulations, conventional wisdom, dogma as matters of fact; without questioning.

I love that the first sentence a child learns is “Why?!”

THE INQUISITIVE HARPER

Could it be that there’s a better answer than, “Because I said so. That’s WHY.”

Friday night, we were at Cracker Barrel® with our Grand-Girls. It was our first time there since Nora, the youngest, at 16 months began running at a pace best described as a blur, with hands just as fast. Karlee, the oldest at 6, grabbed my hand as we were walking in, and asked in a voice so her parents couldn’t hear, “Pops, could we maybe do a little shopping after we eat?” Of course we can. That’s Cracker Barrel’s business model!

During the meal, as Karlee was slathering apple butter on her biscut, she said, “Pops turn around and look at all the stuff on that wall.” If you never been to Cracker Barrel, they have excellent apple butter and a LOT of stuff on their walls. “See that NO SMOKIN’ sign,” she asked. (She’s reading really well these days.) I confirmed that I did see it. Then she asked a question that could be important for Cracker Barrel designers, “Do you think they’re serious about that, or is it just part of the decoration?”

Why did she ask that? It’s not like she was thinking about lighting up. I’m no psycologist, but it seems like maybe, it could be, that for kids, there’s a beautiful curiousity for the sake of understanding, for knowledge, and maybe for curiousity in itself.

For many, many years, I sought to have a part in the spiritual development of some teenagers. To the casual observer it may have looked like I was just playing volleyball, snow skiing, and eating enough pizza to bring on coronary disease. I listened for hours to the woes of early adolescent drama, and had more fun than anyone deserved to have.

What I hope I did NOT do was squelch their inquisitiveness about spiritual things, just giving pat answers. I hope I never gave them the impression that to have questions means you don’t have faith. In fact, I hope I helped them understand that as your faith grows, so does the importance of asking more questions, deeper questions.

I’m going to say this outloud, here in virtual ink. I’ve said it before and gotten in trouble for it, probably because I don’t explain it well, or whomever I’m trying to explain it to doesn’t have ears to hear. When it comes to faith, to a spiritual quest, don’t ever stop asking questions. But, know this: sometimes you won’t find an answer. It’s not necessarily because there isn’t an answer, it’s just that us humans don’t have the ability to fully understand.

Take PEACE for example. It is worthy to inquire about what peace is and how we find it, and while we can experience a degree of it, and sometimes in sufficient quantity, we will never know it fully, because this we know for sure, the peace of God, transcends all understanding. (Philippians 4:7)

I’m not saying there is not absolute Truth. I am saying we can not know it fully; here. We get glimpses of it, and there is always more to learn. When we reduce it all to black and white, inquiry stops. And, when we want to ask questions, we’re told to “accept by faith.” It seems to me that nothing suffocates the journey of faith quite like that attitude: “Don’t question, accept by faith.”

I have a dear friend who is on a quest. She is asking very hard questions which has led me to ask questions, which has awakened something in me, and I am grateful. Perhaps I can tell you more about this in another post.

“All human beings by nature desire to know.”

— Aristotle

CHECK OUT this tune by Jars of Clay. Good music to ask questions by.

Grand-Fathering

PICTURE WITH ME an idyllic, mythic tableau of grandparenting. You know the ones that look like the “after” picture of prescription medication ads, not the ones where he’s plagued with those pesky side effects like: constipation, diarrhea, rash, swelling of hands, feet and face, wheezing, irratibility, increased appetite, night sweats and visions of Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton in the Whitehouse.

In the first frames of these ads, gramps is relegated to the porch with an elephant sitting on his chest while the rest of the family is frolicking in the yard. But, then he takes his meds for HBP, COPD, ED, ADD, RA and XYZ. Now he’s splitting wood, and throwing another log on the campfire, where the kids are roasting marshmallows for s’mores. He gives grandma a knowing wink and a nuzzle, and thinks how much better the whole scene would be if he could light up a pipe and have a scotch. Then he notices something at the edge of the campfire’s glow: it’s Norman Rockwell and Thomas Kinkade painting the whole scene. “I’m so glad I put on my clean cardigan and remembered to zip up!” he thinks to himself.

When you are of a generation that grew up with programs like Father Knows Best, Ozzie & Harriett, Leave It To Beaver, etc., you think of things like this.

Perhaps you’re aware that I am the grandfather to three grands; all girls. AKA, Pops and the Grand-Girls. It is a role I cherish. But, I will admit that sometimes I don’t feel adequate to this high calling. It has to do with gender roles. Don’t panic! This isn’t veering off to some weird place.

I know it’s old fashioned, but my culture has created in me some expectations and understandings—right or wrong. For example, when I think about rites-of-passage, the connections between a grandfather and grandson seem really obvious. A grandfather can teach the boy to shine shoes, oil his ball glove, bait a hook. He can buy his grandson his first pocket knife and teach him how to play mumbley peg or “dissect” a frog.

But who are we kidding here? There is nothing a granddad could pull out of his bag of tricks that will break the trance-like spell an iPad or video game has on a wee lad.

The fact is, I wouldn’t trade my three Grand-Girls for all the boys in the tri-state area. Turns out I love going to the ballet with them. We all love to read. And even though I don’t know an Elsa from an Anna, I’m still invited to sit in the floor and “play” Frozen. We go to museums together and weirdly enough we all like Chick-fil-a and dark chocolate. Who knew?

Sometimes, when spending quality time with the girls, I will suggest an activity, a game, or maybe a plot line and characters for an evolving make-believe story.

Sometimes, my ideas are met with enthusiasm.

Sometimes, not so much.

Sometimes, the creative juices are running way ahead of me.

Often times, our best times together are where memories are made.

the grand-girls at uncle kyle's graduation