How did we name Jim?

     Our vet asked us that same question a few months ago and I said we named him after James Joyce, and the vet raised his eyebrows and started talking about Ulysses and Molly Bloom, which surprised me as I was only joking, trying to cover up the fact that he was named after James T. Kirk of Star Trek. A movie we had just seen.

     We had kicked around way too many names for him. In fact, he had a name already when we got him as a puppy. His name was Latte. We couldn't handle that name. My daughter Mar, who managed a coffee house, gave him that name.

     It was cute, but too cute for a rugged little Jack Russell blend with a fantastic vertical leap. So we searched for names and I thought of the star ship Enterprise, and thought of Scotty, Spock and Mr. Sulu and those were also too cute. I wasn't telling Kathy that I was mentally doing this, but from the kitchen I suddenly said to her, because I was totally inspired, "Jim." The captain of the starship!

     She then said, "Jimmy!" And the dog looked up at her and began wagging his tail. "Jimmy!" she said again and again. And so it was.

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     Flying into New York one time I read from Esquire magazine a little piece called "What I've Learned," an interview with William Shatner. Shatner said, "You have to create your life. You have to carve it, like a sculpture." And he also said (and I underlined this one with my pen as the bumpy landing was happening,) "We meet aliens every day who have something to give us. They come in the form of people with different opinions."

     William Shatner realized that he had become kind of a joke in the public eye after his time as Captain Kirk on Star Trek had ended. He didn't have a lot of acting talent, and his public personality was awkward and clumsy. He didn't know how to go on talk shows and sound smart.

     But he decided, after a long while, to stop reacting to that situation. He looked at the situation, and crafted a brilliant response. He would just go with it.  If the public thought he was kind of a buffoon and a has-been, then that was fine with him, he would be that for them. He was soon playing a buffoon and a has-been called Denny Crane in Boston Legal. He was brilliant at it. He was funny. He won Emmys! He was no longer a has been! Esquire magazine sought him out for interviews. And look! In his interview he was smart!

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"I am actually a paranoid in reverse.
I suspect that people are secretly plotting
to make me happy."

~J. D. Salinger

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     At CLUB FEARLESS we are secretly plotting to make club members happy by sending them (soon) my new book Time Warrior and my best audio program ever: CHOOSING.

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     I am falling asleep while Jim is plotting to make me happy.