Hello everyone:

You know, it’s the little things in life that matter. Take, for example, a recent visit I made to my local food store.

They want you to buy their food, right? I was walking into the store on a Saturday morning, having noticed that one of their workers was scrubbing the sidewalk outside the front door (which also serves as an exit, since they closed the other entrance due to the corona virus). [Wouldn’t it be better for social distancing if they made one door an entrance and the other an exit? But I digress.]

So this young man had a bucket of soapy water and he was really going to town on that sidewalk. There weren’t going to be any germs there, once he was finished. Soapy water was going to be carried in on the feet of the shoppers, however. He was trying to clean things up, obviously.

So I waded in past him to do my shopping, as did everyone else who was entering. Others had the opportunity to track the soapy mess across the parking lot and into their cars. Oh joy.

Once in the store, I walked around, picking up one item after the other and placing them into my cart, when I got to the frozen food section of the store. I received a text and, as I looked down to answer it, I noticed that the frozen food counters had about three inches of absolute filth underneath them. Dust bunnies were everywhere! It seems that the store cleaners only clean what they expect you to see and leave the rest of the store a mess. What Disney World would call the “backstage area” was absolutely horrid.

The takeaway on this is that you should do more than expected in college and in life. Under promise and over deliver, rather than the other way around. Don’t worry so much about the sidewalks outside when the interior (where the food is, I might note) is what is really important. Do your work, do it well, and don’t let the dust bunnies take up residence in your work.

Best,

Dr. Sheri