Back in 2000 author Malcolm Gladwell’s best-seller “The Tipping Point” hit the bookstores. The book’s major discussion point is summed up by on-line dictionary Wikipedia as “the level at which the momentum for change becomes unstoppable.”
Though I’ve never read “The Tipping Point,” I’ve thought about the concept often.
The subtitle of “The Tipping Point” is “how little things can make a big difference.” And it’s true – little things can make all the difference. I saw this play out with my next door neighbors and their eccentric Cocker Spaniel. During week one of the dog’s stay, the lady of the house, told the humorous story of how the dog ate a family member’s slippers. “How cute!”
Next was the tale of mayhem caused when the dog somehow got up on the kitchen table just before meal time. “Hilarious!”
More stories followed including the pricey trip to the doggy psychiatrist. But when the dog lifted his leg to the family room sofa, the “momentum for change” reached the unstoppable point and the pooch was history. Lots of Lysol disinfectant was sprayed, but not a tear was shed.
Whereas “The Tipping Point” explores the moment when change is inevitable in one direction, there is a moment before the tipping point when things are not yet determined, where someone or something could take the matter in totally opposite directions. I call that moment “the tottering point” that unstable, undetermined point in time when things can go either way.
On the local scene the current sparring between the County Council and the Clerk of the Circuit Court seems to be at such a tottering point. This is a saga desperately overdue for a nickname, so I’m dubbing it “checkbook gate.” Something is going to happen in “checkbook gate.” Those bank numbers are going to get balanced or something’s going to change. Can you sense the tottering?
The tottering point can hit you personally. It can kick in on the family level, community level or on the national level.
Personally, my waist size seems to be perpetually at the tottering point of 35 inches. Thanksgiving tips me from 35 over to the 36-inch area, but a wedding to attend with enough advance notice tips me in the opposite direction towards my suit pants size of 34.
The other night we got carry out Chinese food. The dinner came in three plastic containers with resealable lids. They were sturdy containers and the lids fit tightly.
“Let’s save those containers,” my wife said when we finished dinner.
In my legal career over many years it has fallen to me to serve as the executor for dozens of decedent’s estates. In carrying out executor duties, my helpers and I have dealt with numerous households where accumulations have gotten – to put it delicately – out of hand. One clear sign of out-ofhand accumulating is not knowing when enough is enough. And saving plastic containers is a real litmus test for when the old personal thrifty meter moves from practical to frugal and then to crowded and finally to certified cuckoo.
As I stood washing the containers at the kitchen sink, I pondered where my wife and I currently register on the plastic container hoarding meter. There have been times, dark times, when these tempting containers got the best of us. They and their companion lids would hold up in otherwise perfectly useable kitchen cabinets and would spring out at us whenever we disturbed them. But unless I missed a cabinet, we seem to currently be tottering at the frugal level and I tucked our new plastic containers in with the others with little trepidation.
I suppose a lot of life is spent at the tottering point where things could go either way. But self-knowledge is always helpful. This case is no exception. And from where I sit, I can see where too much take out food could move us away from tottering and into tipping – two fold: a husky guy waist and a kitchen overrun with plastic containers.
Fortunately, taped to our refrigerator door are two wedding invitations (RSVPs are already mailed). For the moment we’re safely tipped towards less carry-out food, a smaller waist and a minimum of tottering.