The age old
debate regarding the right blend of talk vs. action has always fascinated me. I
suspect much of that interest comes from my father, who as a quiet veteran of
WWII, abhorred people that talked a good game but genuinely admired those that
just put their heads down and got things done. I suspect too that part of my
fascination comes from being immersed for years in an over confident culture
where we’d probably have saved the world had we’d actually accomplished even 5%
of all we boastfully talk about. It reminds me of a line at the end of a David
Brooks article I read awhile back that went something like…
“It’s
funny how the nation’s mood was at its most humble when its actual achievements
were at their most extraordinary”.
I was
reminded of this talk vs. doing phenomenon in a rather simple way this past
Saturday when I got up early, made a pot of coffee and flipped on the
television to chill a bit before my weekly Saturday run (I wish talking or
writing about the run had as much benefit as doing it). On one of the cable
channels, they were running reruns of the old black and white show “The
Rifleman.” The classic American western starring Chuck Connors as
widower rancher Lucas McCain and Jonny Crawford as his young son Mark was a
staple when I was a kid, and though it’s rare anymore these days, it’s nostalgic
to catch an old episode or two once-in-awhile to remind me of the simple but
still relevant values I too often abandon today. The 30-minute episodes of the
ABC program which aired from somewhere around 1958 to 1963 were set
in the 1880s in the New Mexico Territory town of North Fork.
The dramatic
climax of this particular episode took place in an abandon mine shaft, were the
younger McCain (Mark) and a neighboring ranch boy Billy had
uncharacteristically decided to skip class rather than face the continuing
condescending taunts of a new high-browed teacher (Mr. Griswald…played by
Arnold Moss) who had just arrived from the east to teach in the modest one-room
country schoolhouse. The new schoolmaster is unimpressed with the plainspoken
culture of the ranching territory, and routinely admonishes his students for
their lack of academic and cultural polish. Griswald harshly criticizes the
younger McCain after his father Lucas inadvertently drops his Winchester
firearm near the school house while picking Mark up one day after school. The
disgusted teacher also attributes Mark’s inability to get his homework completed
to his father Lucas’s “preference for evening conversation over academic work.”
Rather than face continued punishment (Griswald had taken a switch to an
innocent Mark…wrongly punishing the boy for allegedly defacing a textbook) and
scorn from the dictatorial Griswald, the boys decide to play hooky and hide in
nearby mine.
As often
happens in Hollywood, the truant boys no sooner enter the otherwise stable
abandon shaft when the timbers start to creak and ultimately give way. A part
of the mine’s ceiling caves in, seemingly covering Mark in a cloud of
dust and rubble. The other boy Billy panics and runs out of the shaft, only to
run into the elder McCain and the frightened teacher, who after being shammed
by McCain earlier in the day, had joined forces with Lucas to go looking for
the missing boys.
Upon entering
the hazardous mine, the senior McCain and the terrified teacher don’t get far
before realizing they are separated from the partially buried boy by a wall of
fallen debris. Griswald stalls and starts to theorize about possible options,
when McCain abruptly cuts him off and sternly shouts “we don’t have time for
that now…just start digging.” As the supporting timbers above Mark continue to
ominously weaken, McCain and the obviously out-of-place Griswald quickly begin
clearing a path in a frantic attempt to reach Mark.
When seeing
his rescuing father, the relived and bloodied Mark assures him he is OK… but
notes that his leg appears pinned beneath an old mining car. As the supporting
beams above bow and splinter signaling imminent doom, the teacher remains
motionless and again beings to talk about possible moves while McCain jumps
into action and tries to manually lift the small mining car. It doesn’t budge,
so McCain frantically searches for and finds a piece of wood to help pry up the
car. However after trying valiantly, his son remains hopelessly pinned. Then
McCain screams “we need a rock for more leverage,” to which learned Griswald
replies “ah yes…a fulcrum.”
Griswald
quickly grabs a rock and frantically hands it to Lucas to place under the
wooden lever, the teacher explains theory of fulcrums and opines on the
appropriate placement of the rock to achieve the optimum leverage. As the
supporting ceiling timbers begin to spilt and give way, McCain who is already
desperately leaning on the wood turns to the pontificating Griswald and
violently shouts something like, “Griswald…enough with the talk…just shut up
and pull him out when I lift the car!”
Lucas
puts all is weight onto the makeshift fulcrum, and Griswald tugs on McCain’s boy
who is finally freed. They make a beeline from the collapsing area, just as the
mine’s roof gives way in Hollywood avalanche of rock and timber that would have
surely killed them all had they procrastinated and spent any more time talking.
The
great thing about many of the old TV shows of my youth is that they always had
a lesson. This particular episode had a few, but clearly the most vivid point
was there is a time for deliberation, and a time for action. It reminds me of
the old Andrew Jackson quote “Take time to deliberate; but when the time for
action arrives, stop thinking and go in.”
Another
cool thing about this show is that it was pretty balanced…and it didn’t attempt
to make the case for action only. As the episode winds down, Lucas, Mark, Billy
and Griswald are nestled at the mouth of the cave reviewing the day’s harrowing
events when Lucas notes they’d better head back to the ranch. Mark laments the
late hour, and stresses it will be “awfully dark to ride back now.” “No”
contradicts Griswald, “tonight is the first night of a full moon…and we will
have more than ample light to get us home safely.” “See Mark” says a smiling
Lucas…”I told you all that learnin’ would come in handy.” As Andrew Jackson
wisely noted, the marriage of deliberation and action can be a good thing.
Have
a wonderful weekend and if you can, don’t just talk about it…actually do some
things with the people and pets that matter the most to you.
If I'd had paid better attention in school, I'd be a better writer. Sorry for all the pour grammar, misspellings and lousy writing.
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