A Jack Story

     A traveling salesmen is traveling through the desert one night, coming back from a meeting with a big client from another city when one of his tires unexpectedly blows. He pulls over and gets out of the car, surveying the damage. He remembers that he has a spare tire in the back so he gets it out, but then realizes that he lacks a jack. He tried to use his phone to call someone but before he could look at is contacts to decide who to call his phone abruptly lost battery. Defeated, he slumps down onto the ground on the side of the road, waiting in the empty highway for a car, any car to pass by, but that too soon proved to be fruitless. In a sudden flashback he recalled a lonely farmhouse, five miles back from his present location.

     He gets up and begins the long walk towards his last string of hope, and as he walks he talks to himself. After the first few minutes he murmurs to himself, having a bright view of the destination,
"I hope they have a jack. The farmer will probably lend it to me, maybe even give me a ride back."
     As he gets closer and closer to the farmhouse he starts to become more and more pessimistic,
"I wonder how much they'll force me to pay for using the jack. Maybe three dollars, or even four. If they're anything like the bastards I work with they'll recognize there is no other place I can go for this and knowing they've cornered me in the market drive the price even higher, which is gonna be ten more dollars. But it is also the dead of the night, that will cost me even more. They'll be pissed that I woke them up and just for the sake of my sanity drive the price up to a total of twenty dollars!"
     At the sight of the barn his usual present demeanor contorted into an all killing all consuming manner. His nostrils had flared beyond recognition, his eyes flashing a soul retching pose, and his mouth quivered and drooled from an explosion of obscenities he was prepared to say. He jolted up to the house door and slammed his fist red into the pane door.
     The farmer comes out, and despite the salesman's distressing attitude he calmly asked what was wrong. Too bad that the saleman would have none of it.
"You got the nerve to talk to robber. You can just forget it. Keep your goddamn jack to yourself.:
     And then he walks back. The whole five miles that he just came from. Without a jack.
     Don't build a jack story. There are many different versions of this story but they all lead to the same end: assuming things too quickly, and ruining relations because of it.
     There are many things you face in your life that you can turn into this story. What if my friends won't like me if I am not funny. What if my teacher gives me bad grades because she hates me. What if the barista messed up my order because I have a weird accent.
     Obsessing on the worst things that can happen cloud your judgement from the best things. Pessimism doesn't pay well, and sometimes optimism is hard. But in the end, just remember, to do whatever you can, to ensure that you don't make a jack story.