About a Verb and a Slogan

You don’t understand how men work. We don’t give each other gifts. We pretty much ignore each other ’til somebody scores a touchdown. - Red Forman, That '70s Show

Rarely are purely things impressionable. Cars, computers, phones, clothes, jewelry, cigars, wine ... Those are nouns. Nouns have little impact in the real world.

Oh, preferences on things are fine and warranted. But, I’ll take the verb any day.

Phone is a noun. Texting and posting is a verb.
Wine is a noun. Tasting is a verb.
Paint and canvas are nouns. Painting is a verb.
Thai Food is a noun. Cooking is involved and requires action (a verb). Eating is a verb. Sharing is an even better one.
The yard and a garden are nouns. Mowing and planting and growing are verbs.

This culture has it backwards. We should care more about actions, happenings, interaction, and change. Seek experiences and events, not the noun itself.

Take a car, for example. Look at a 1965 Silver Cloud Rolls Royce. It is a beautiful car, no doubt. But it holds little value as a noun. It sits in a garage. It is a lump of metal worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. But, throw in a verb (the action) and DRIVE it. Road-trip it with your mom and dad from Palm Springs to the mid-west, and that evokes stories and memories.

Diamonds. They are expensive pieces of carbon. They are worth a monetary value based on a set criteria (the four C’s). Yet, shopping for them, seeking out the perfect gem that speaks to you is an adventure. Finding the diamond holder (the ring) and feeling the adrenaline rush before “Yes”, that is the experience.

MasterCard has it right. Sort of. There are indeed some things money can’t buy. For everything else, well, you know. The concept here is that people don’t always buy stuff for the stuff itself but more often than not get it for the immaterial meanings that attach itself to or are expressed by the stuff.

Verbs, indeed, are priceless.

Touchdown!