I have been married for one year. I recently sold my motorcycle, which pleased my wife a great deal. She has never liked motorcycles and never will. They are dangerous, and we don't have the money to buy another one, she tells me. I'm trying to meet her halfway. I'm taking a safety course and I'm willing to get a bike with a smaller engine. Unfortunately, she hasn't even acknowledged there is a middle ground on this issue, so I'm at my wits' end. Do I bite the bullet and dream of motorcycling from my La-Z-Boy? Or should I buy it and see if she will eventually come around?

Wannabe Rider

Dear Wannabe,

I don't think you should need your wife's permission to own a motorcycle, any more than you need ask her permission to hunt deer or drink a martini. Realistically, however, you put yourself in the hole when you sold the old bike. Bad mistake. And now she's put you on notice. So put her on notice. Bring home some bike brochures and leave them lying around. Keep your helmet on the fridge. Get some bike-insignia magnets and put them on the fridge, too, and some pictures of bikes. Books on bike trips. Gauge the climate of opinion and make your move.

Dear Mr. Blue,

I've worked for the same company for (gulp) 20-some years now and find myself in a low-level supervisory position, which I enjoy. I'm close enough to the actual work, the heart blood of the company (agri products), but with the pleasure of doing things my way. Now, however, a new management team has come in, and suddenly the culture has changed. Everyone is working their asses off and going home with bulging briefcases. I don't mind working hard, but these sharks are cutting costs by decimating the workforce. And now they're insulting us by requiring us managers to attend three-day seminars to learn about leadership. We go to a seminar center and sit in a circle and listen to a facilitator named Terri explain how important it is to look the other person in the eye when you speak to him and smile and always say his name. This is idiocy. There is a lot of jargon about empowerment and commitment to the quality process and value structure and I am fed up with it. I have 10 years to go until retirement, and I am sorely tempted to quit this bullshit and find something else, at whatever cost. My wife is aghast at the idea. But she doesn't have to deal with these gibbering idiots. What do you think?

Drowning in Jargon

Dear Drowning,

In every system, there are people who try hard to do good and people who try hard to look good, and it's the least productive people who get all enthused about jargon of the sort you mention, and believe me, they don't last long. In the end, it's the work itself that's interesting, and not the decision-making process. Simple declarative sentences will win out over gibberish. In the end, reality is what we crave. Resist jargon; keep asking for translations. Sit through the Monkey Island of corporate psychobabble and then go do your job. As long as you still enjoy the work, then you can endure the gentle rain of rabbit pellets. But do explore the alternatives and get your parachute ready, your plain brown parachute.

Dear Mr. Blue,

I'm overpaid and overworked and about to lose my dot-com job, and as my father keeps pointing out, now would be a great time for me to figure out "what I really want to DO." I'm 27, and I've sort of flitted through life so far. I have things I'm good at, but none of them drive me or really seem to please me. I like to write and sew and take pictures and travel and drink good coffee and read good books, but nothing really beckons to me yet, and says, "Here is your life's work!" I enjoy things for a little while, then I get bored and frustrated and want something new. Everything else in my life is good, but this longing to find work that fulfills me leaves me so sad. I've taken career counseling tests and aptitude tests and the results are all over the place. What to do?

Precocious Child, Adequate Adult

Dear Precocious,

Not everyone has a Life's Work. Some people simply have a Life. It may be peaceful and domestic, or it may be restless and searching, but their fulfillment is in life itself, not in a large mission or career. Perhaps the precocious child was burdened with large expectations that she'd become Athena the goddess of wisdom and light, but don't take it too seriously. Travel and write and read and drink your coffee and keep on flitting. Maybe your life work will come tiptoeing up behind you in Starbucks and tap you on the shoulder. Maybe an owl will give you some direction. In the meantime, don't work too hard at untying the great knot all at once. Don't take no more tests. No way should you take aptitude tests at your age. Fire your career counselor. Enjoy the summer.

Dear Mr. Blue,

Three and a half years ago, my dreams came true and my husband and I had twin girls. They are the light of my life. I left my corporate job and started my own business from home so I could be with them 24/7. Now that they are old enough for me to start thinking about preschool, I am scared. Look at what is out there today -- school shootings, kids killing other kids and any number of horrible things.

I live in one of the safest states in the country, but I am still nervous. Part of me wants to move to several acres of land to homestead and home-school. We have good friends who have done just that since their children were small, and the children, now teenagers, are the most polite, well-adjusted, interesting people you would ever want to meet.

How does one get over this fear and let their children live in the real world? Or have things just gotten so bad that this is an impossibility?

Afraid

Dear Afraid,

The home-schooled kids I know are just as you describe, wonderful and interesting and mature people, so there's definitely something to be said for the idea. I faint at the thought of home-schooling my child (I also shrink from the verb), but you're young and smart and no doubt could do the work. Don't embark on this out of fear of violence, though. That's like moving to Canada to get away from rattlesnakes. Before you start the Little Home School in the Big Woods, make sure that Pa shares your commitment and be sure that you're moving toward something, not fleeing from something. I also know public school kids who are polite, well-adjusted and interesting, by the way.

Maya Angelou reads from "The Heart of a Woman"