Rise to the occasion

Rise to the occasion

Today’s expression is to “rise to the occasion.” What does it mean to “rise to the occasion?” This is a tough one, but it means that someone does extremely well in an unexpected situation. We usually use this when someone has an unexpectedly large or important job to do, and he or she does it well.

Here’s how I used it in today’s lesson. Many scientists have risen to the occasion and served as the public face of the coronavirus challenge. These doctors and scientists have always had important jobs. They are real pros. But their jobs have not entailed speaking to a nation every day. They have not, in the past, been asked to calm the nerves of millions of people; they have not been placed in charge of formulating and delivering difficult messages for an entire nation. That is a big job. It needed to be done because politicians, for as comfortable as they are in public, are not scientists.

The public wants qualified, well-informed people to be front-and-center in this crisis. So many scientists around the world have risen to the occasion to fill this role. They never expected to be celebrities; they never expected to be on TV every day. But the job needed to be done, so they stepped up and they’ve been doing it. They have risen to the occasion.

A crisis is often the time where you see people rise to the occasion. I love hearing about average people who rise to the occasion and do something great. There are so many stories about companies that have switched from making clothing, say, to making cloth face masks; or from making machinery to making ventilators; or from making spirits to making hand sanitizer. These businesses were making good and useful products, but their products were never life-saving. It was never a national priority that they continue to make jeans or distill vodka. But now they are working around the clock to produce some essential materials for this crisis. There are many great examples of companies rising to the occasion—and many are providing the materials at cost.

In American football, the quarterback is the most important player on the field. Most teams have one good quarterback that they invest a lot of time and money in. They also need one or two backup quarterbacks to play just in case the star player gets hurt. One day, the New England Patriots’ quarterback Drew Bledsoe was injured and the backup had to come in for him. The backup quarterback rose to the occasion and played really well—so well, that the backup quarterback got the big job and Patriots traded Drew Bledsoe to another team. The backup’s name was Tom Brady.

Think about whether you’ve ever had to rise to the occasion. I’ll tell you one example from my life. I was selected to be on a jury back when I lived in New York City. The case involved a woman accused of first-degree assault, which is a serious charge. According to the prosecutors, she had thrown a glass bottle at a store employee in Chinatown after a dispute. We jurors heard the case and went to deliberate. That means, they locked us in a windowless room and told us to decide whether the defendant was guilty or not guilty.

At first, nobody really wanted to take charge of the discussions. As you might imagine, a New York City jury is comprised of people from all kinds of backgrounds, life experiences. There were deep disagreements among the jurors: some thought for sure she was guilty; others thought that she definitely wasn’t; others thought she probably threw the bottle but that it wasn’t as serious as the prosecutors said. What we needed was someone to take charge of the discussion and see if we could forge a consensus on the charge, so that justice could be done.

So I decided, this was going to be my time to rise to the occasion. I’m not a lawyer or in any way an expert in criminal court proceedings. But I thought, we need someone to lead these discussions right now. We need someone to rise to the occasion and do the right thing. So that is what I did. And after three days—three days!—of discussions, just the twelve of us in a windowless room, we reached a unanimous verdict in the case, a verdict we all agreed with and thought served the cause of justice in that case.

And that happens every day. In our system of justice here in the United States, ordinary citizens are requested to serve on juries. And we ask them to leave their day jobs, leave their families, for a few days. And they often rise to the occasion and do their civic duties.

Quote of the Week

I’m not sure how it is where you live, but Starbucks has closed all its stores in the US. They are now thinking about re-opening their stores for take-out only in many markets. So I thought I’d choose a coffee-related quote for today. This one comes from way back. “What would life be without coffee?” asked King Louis XV of France. “But then,” he said, “what is life even with coffee?”

“What would life be without coffee?” Pretty miserable! Nothing to look forward to when you wake up. Nothing to help you ease into the workday. Nothing to jolt you back into coherence late in the afternoon when you need it. “But then, what is life even with coffee?” Well…it’s less than it used to be, just now. But I would say, the average person even under quarantine today is better off than the average European king in the 1700s.

See you next time!

The coffee I’m drinking right now was roasted on May 6. I bought it on May 6. There’s a little coffee roaster about ten minutes away from my house. I went for an early morning walk one day to replenish my coffee and got coffee that was roasted that very morning. My philosophy these days is, treat yourself to little pleasures. We’re denying ourselves so much, but we need little pleasures. And mine is to upgrade my morning coffee game.

I hope you are all finding little ways to stay happy despite everything that’s going on in the world these days.

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