Sticking with my exploration of saved posts and links from Facebook, a more recent save was from The Atlantic magazine, titled, "An Ode to Low Expectations."
It's brief and mostly about a moment from 30 years ago when the writer was feeling a bit down about things and about not meeting his own expectations, but mostly I time-traveled to long before the 1990s, and my father sharing this nugget: "Keep your expectations low and you will never be disappointed."
That's a very Midwestern thing to say, based on a mythology that life sucks, and then you die... but there ARE moments of joy and satisfaction, so hang in there.
Any kid raised in Iowa in the 1950s knows this about life: Don't get too full of yourself and don't start thinking the victory is won. Life will soon remind you of reality.
I'm still a Hawkeye fan -- looking forward to watching both the Iowa men and women play Michigan later today, back-to-back, on TV -- but here's how I go into games like this, with Michigan being the favored team in both contests: We will likely give it a good go but we won't win.
I will likely blame a combination of the referees and fate, along with the relatively small population that Iowa can draw on for athletes, and, for the women, the lack of fans screaming support and pulling the team through tough moments. It's nice to know how it is most likely to go. My low expectations won't keep me from watching and occasionally shouting at the screen. Hey, those young athletes need my help.
And if either (both? hush my mouth) team manages a win, the experience will be so much sweeter.
I know this in my heart (and the heck with whether it is true or backed by science): as soon as I find myself expecting success or victory or a top mark or even a thank you, the precise opposite is going to happen.
Interestingly, this does not make me depressed or pessimistic. I am open to the win.
I just think of the good results as gifts and the bad results as life's baseline.
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