Optimism - Part II

There are several stories that have inspired me over the years and buoyed my optimism. One of them is the story about a man we’ll call Bill, who tried and tried to find work. He finally got a job as a garbage man. On his first day on the job, the boss gave him a written list of the addresses he had to go to pick up garbage.

Bill looked at the list despondently. “ I can’t read,” he confessed to his boss. “Well,” said the boss, “if you can’t read then you can’t be a garbage man.” He felt sorry for Bill so he handed him some bananas and wished him good luck.

Bill went to the park to sit and think about his life. He set the bananas on the bench beside him. A man came along and asked Bill if he would sell him a banana for five cents. Bill sold him a banana. Thinking about what happened, Bill placed the rest of the bananas on the bench in a more noticeable position. Before an hour had passed, he sold all of his bananas. In fact, the demand was so high he figured he could raise the price to 10 cents for the last two bananas. Sure enough, they sold. At that price.

“Wow, what a day!” Bill thought. He decided to go down to the grocery store and buy as many bananas as he could with the money from his sales. Back to the park bench he went. Every day throughout the summer, he went to the park and sold bananas. Then he started to sell different fruits, and soon he found a place for himself at the gate of the park.

Things just got better and better for Bill. A few decades later, he found himself in the boardroom of a major company to which he was selling his business, which had now grown to be one of the biggest food distribution companies in the US. The company sold for hundreds of millions of dollars. Finally, the documents were ready to sign. The lawyers put them in front of Bill for him to read over.

“I can’t read,” Bill said, and he slid the documents over to his lawyer. The purchaser couldn’t believe his ears. “This is unbelievable,” he said to Bill. “Here you are so successful without being able to read. Just imagine what you could have been if you could read.”

Bill thought about that for a minute. “Yes, I know what I could have been,” he replied. “I could have been a garbage man.”

Excerpt from 'LifeManual' by Peter H. Thomas. www.lifemanual.com. Copyright 2005, 2006. All rights reserved.

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