A favorite Kansas saying, that.  You can’t push on a rope my dad used to tell me.  Case closed, it was obvious, he meant to say.  You pulled on that rope.

Born in 1915, he came of age during The Depression, certainly was a member of Tom Brokaw’s Greatest Generation.  And, like many men of that age, he was always working.  We were a three-income family, he had his regular 7-4  (or 4-12, 12-7am shiftwork) job, but always had two, or maybe three, other jobs to fill in the gaps of money and time.

He farmed, he made farm gates, and he wired some of the houses that were springing up all over Eisenhower’s favorite town, Abilene.  The best was when my sister got married and moved out, a family of chinchillas moved in to her bedroom.  For a couple of years, we raised  them, selling the fur.  I was the hit of the year in 5th grade Show and Tell.  I don’t think they bit anyone when I got to bring the little bundles of fur to school.  Anyway, Dad was an early entrepreneur, but we didn’t call it that, he was more like Archie Bunker’s ‘entramanure’ –life was hard, and the manure was deep, and he owned a shovel, and not much else.

The next post is from Seth Godin, who graciously gave us some time and is encouraging folks to start their own business.  There has never been a better time.  With the internet today, anyone can have a spare business in their bedroom.  It doesn’t matter if you have a job or not, either.  Start small, adjust, learn fast, be honest with yourself, give it some time, but not too much.  Have some fun.

It’s ok to try and fail.  So what?  Just keep going, you have all of our permissions to fail.  And remember what my dad’s dad told him, “Sliced store-bought bread will never be any good.  It will dry out too fast,” when someone tells you that your idea won’t work.

You can’t push on a rope…or can you?