Toward feeling chipper

Ya gotta love the name “Chip.”

Somebody named “Chip” plays polo, graduated from prep school and wears all the stuff in the Land’s End catalogue. He’s the guy who scores the game-winning touchdown, runs for class president, is admired by all, and all, in no small part probably because no one can resist the wholesome, unsullied decency inherent in the name…Chip.

Indeed, for those of us who love and respect our parents, there’s no greater compliment than being told you’re a “chip off the old block.” Can you have a successful party without potato chips or cookies without chocolate chips or a card game without poker chips or a golf game without a chip shot? A successful stock portfolio contains blue chips, a roaring fire contains wood chips (or buffalo chips,) a fast-food joint features fish and chops, and a computer is defined by its microchips. Better than one broken is a chipped tooth, while nothing is cuter than a funny little chipmunk (except, maybe, a cute little “chippy”).

Respected Native Americans were the Chippewa while respected police are the California Highway Patrol (“CHIPS”) even as there’s no finer furniture than a classic “Chippendale.”

Truth is, there’s nothing negative associated with just about any “chip” except the chip that’s found on the shoulder of one bearing a nasty, hostile attitude.

As a kid, I always thought a guy “with a chip on his shoulder” was a guy looking for a fight, that the chip was placed there just to trap someone into trying to knock it off in a physical altercation someone not named Chip but rather Irving or Alvin or Marvin or, for that matter Ronnie, couldn’t possibly win.

As I’ve grown older, however, I’ve come to recognize that he (or she) with a chip on their shoulder is not necessarily a physical bully, but rather one with an irrepressible impulse to negatively (and often needlessly) challenge everybody and everything around them. Thus, one with a “c” on their “s” always looks to find what’s wrong or what’s missing or flawed or less than perfect. Such folks resist having a good time or seeing the good or even doing good. They only wish to find fault and assign blame as that chip on their shoulder somehow morphs into a splinter that pieces not so much their flesh as their being. Sad are they who don’t understand that shoulders should bear responsibility, not chips, and that a chip on a shoulder should be shrugged off. As any red-blooded American named Chip (or for that matter, Irving or Alvin or Marvin or Alice or Jane) knows: the secret of life is not to criticize and chip away, but rather to be positive and chip in.

© Copyright © 2011 Ron Goldman

Ron Goldman is an attorney in private practice with offices in Cedarhurst and can be reached @ 1-800-846-9013