From my earliest memories, we seem to have had a family tradition of 'Sunday Driving'; that is, we would set out to travel without having any destination.
I suspect that the practice goes back in our family into times long before the automobile, and in my sense of the phrase, I include all modes of wandering, including horse, foot, armchair, 'netsurfing' & most of my design work.
To plan in detail in advance is to invite frustration. The beauty of Sunday Driving is that without a pre-determined destination, you can never fail to get there, and the journey is one of discovery.
With a fully worked-out plan, every unforseen occurrence becomes an obstacle, while for the Sunday Driver such encounters are opportunities to develop the experience.
A passing trailer hit a pothole, dumping part of its load of dung on two friends who had stopped to chat. While the one exclaimed
"I was afraid something like this would happen,"
his friend crossed the road to try and borrow a wheelbarrow.
Experience has a tendency to reflect one's outlook. Neither pessimists nor optimists need look far to find evidence to support their views.
The only gratification available to a pessimist is expressed in the form "I knew this would happen," or if there is a spouse involved, "I told you it would go wrong!"
It has been my continued good fortune to be part of a family of optimists.
visitors since Jan 8th 1999