Missed Chances
In 1977, I moved from State College, Pennsylvania to Gainesville, Florida with my family for a tenure-track position at the University of Florida. We survived the trip in a blue ’68 Chevy station wagon well-suited for where it was and completely ill-equipped for where it would be (e.g., we crossed the Georgia/Florida border with our son close to passed out after traveling miles in the August heat in the not air-conditioned “way back” from South of the Border to Jacksonville, Starke, and points south. Later, I believed we were living in the hottest, most uncomfortable place on the planet but remained convinced that it was better than the place we left.
Exercise in State College consisted of walking to and from classes up and down South Pugh Street with timely pauses both ways to recover and admire a naked neighbor with perfect breasts frying potatoes and eggs in her kitchen. It was a good life. Plenty of time for me and later for telling my students that they would never have more “me” time than now.
Despite the heat and humidity in Florida, those were “get in shape” by running years of Jim Fixx in a “get in shape” by running home of Marty Liquori and other also rans. On one of my six-mile-around-the-block runs with timely pauses both ways to recover and admire…it came to me. With celebs and wannabees paying a bunch for Perrier and other “designer” waters, Coke and Pepsi could make a fortune selling a simple can or bottle of water in vending machines like the one outside of Publix on the corner of NW 16th Avenue and NW 34th Street. Nah, never happen. Who would pay for an ordinary bottle of water? After the run, I was making my usual post-exercise BLT and no-flip (serving top on the bottom) condiment containers came to me.
Recently, while thinking about it after hearing that my daughter’s aging Frenchie “dropped a deuce” on the floor of the elevator in her apartment on his way to “go outside,” another one came to me. Diapers for dogs. Nah, never happen. Who would…? How about disposable and portable artificial grass pee and poo (PP) pads for high-rise apartment patios and balconies?
Watching “breaking news” with the sound off about “porch pirates,” I imagined Amazon making billions with a home locker subscription for PrimePlus deliveries that could be advertised with silly commercials and fictionalized narratives like those for Ring and SimpliSafe home security systems.
Watching a bent over actor struggling to contain his emotions after accidentally shooting a crewmember dead on a movie set, I wondered: Why is the simple solution so often overlooked? How difficult can it be to invent a gun that looks and acts real but that cannot discharge real ammunition?
This stuff comes to me and it’s a lifelong curse that I have lied to myself that there is no profit in it.
