What is the half-life of an assignment?

I have a meeting this afternoon for a software demo. I'm a minor player in this software, though it has the potential to make my life a lot easier (although probably not). Anyway, I had thought this particular project was dead, which may explain why I can't find any notes from the previous demos.

Or maybe it's because my office is a pigstye at the moment. Either way, I was looking through some other file folders, and once again confirmed my theory that, if you just let an assignment sit long enough, you have about a 75% chance that it will just expire. People will lose interest, or the Next Big Thing will come along and render it irrelevant.

I remember the first time I pored heart and health into a project, only to have it lose steam and then die completely. I was outraged that my bosses had proclaimed it the answer to our company's woes (this was a previous job, at a failing company that eventually folded) and then slowly, talk about the big project slowed to a trickle, until no one would give me answers.

The trick is to surf the project crest. Learn which ones are crucial, and which are pipe dreams. And when even some of the crucial ones die, let them go peacefully. Recognize that none of us really knows what we want, and we're allowed to change our minds. Life moves on.