THE BIG PICTURE

Today I came across a cartoon in the New Yorker of two seemingly happy guys sitting at a table in the local tavern making a toast. The punch line was "To missing the big picture".

Well after smiling a bit at the premise and moving on, it seemed to stay with me as I thought more of what they were saying. Isn't it a fact that most of us have probably missed the big picture, if in fact we knew what it was.

I suppose it varies for all of us. To me, since I am getting up in age, it encompasses a complete life, the plusses and minuses, and seeing if I end up with more credits than debits. I can say that in the big picture I am more pleased than not with the way it, my life, has turned out.

But that slippery term means many different things. It was a metaphor at one time for the second world war and that made sense trying to tie all the countries involved into the, you got it, the big...

In an ad agency, all the elements of an ad campaign, media, testing, research etc. would be merged into whatever would sell the product, or person to a less than wowed public...the big picture.

Having to cope with the big picture seems to indicate we have some power over it. Most of us do not. Most of probably would not want to.

I don't think that is an indictment of our lack of ability, but rather our desire not to have the responsibility of exercising some control over other peoples lives. We sleep better at night after spending a hard, long day keeping our own big picture in focus.