An old Yiddish proverb goes, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.” Maybe I took that a little too seriously.

So I’ve always figured, to add my own aside to the wisdom of the sages, sometimes the best recipe for peace of mind is just to wear a good set of blinders and to live your life in ignorant bliss.

There was a windstorm in Ottawa a few weeks ago. It had been widely forecast.

But the weather didn’t look too menacing as I pedaled my ass down Bank Street a little before 4 p.m. that afternoon on my way to the GoodLife gym. The gym is located on the same level as the underground parking lot so there’s really only one large side window in the whole place. I don’t look out the window too much as I workout (and no, it’s not because I’m constantly checking myself out in the mirror.)

When I finished up an hour and a half later things were much the same exiting the building as they were when I entered. Nothing happening here, Sergeant.

That evening, having a couple of beers with neighbours, I made the innocent remark that the predicted raging storm had been highly exaggerated. My neighbours looked at me, somewhat strangely I thought, and commented that actually trees had been blown over just a street away and that there were power outages all over … everywhere.

As the British rock group entitled one of my favourite albums in the 1970s (also the heyday of my life)… “Crisis ? What Crisis?”

And along these lines, it’s funny what stands out in our minds. Back in the 1980s one of my brothers was describing my general persona to someone who didn’t know my every foible the way he did. “If David had a child just like him they could be watching t.v. and the roof could fall in. David would say, “Did you just hear something?” And his child, if he were anything like his old man would say. “No. I didn’t hear a thing.” Then the subject which was closest to their hearts would be brought up. David would say, “Aren’t you supposed to be making supper?’

And his kid would say. “I thought you were!”

But it’s funny how a fictional? good story sometimes foreshadows the future. A few months ago one of my now-grownup kids who, uh, took a few years to get a career on track (but now seems to be well on his way) said to me, “I wrote down some goals. I never realized that you were supposed to have goals.”

Goals ? I knew that there had been something I had overlooked !

Those goals might have been worthwhile if ever organization had been my trump card. I remember my last place of employment, Nepean High School, where the disorganized piles of paper on my desk were a standing joke among my fellow department members, if not the whole staff. I probably retired before the whole mess collapsed on me, taking me out for good.

Another old aphorism goes that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree. Of course it’s describing how children’s behaviour so often mirrors that of their parents.

I was in a Parent-Teacher meeting a number of years ago when my son Adam was still in high school. His math teacher, which incidentally was a subject in which he excelled, asked him to produce his notebook. Adam reached into a chaotically -stuffed backpack and produced one crumpled piece of paper.

I should have been shocked and aghast, but all I could do was nod in total understanding.