Post July 4th Post

The Opportunity...

The Fourth of July was a bit of a stretch.  During my working career it was a long weekend, some consideration of the sacrifices of others that allow us to live freely and unfortunately sometimes it was a long weekend to do system upgrades.  The corporate world likes to use those long weekends to enhance their IT environments.  I've never seen a long weekend used to revise marketing plans, to set corporate initiatives or bring all the cost accountants together for a 3x24 activity.  Five years ago I told my staff that we'd done as many long-weekend upgrades to meet the lifetime requirement and we were done with that.  Over the next couple of years there were suggestions from the people who flew on the corporate airplane that we leverage a long weekend.  We successfully found other ways and the IT staff regained a bit of their lives.

This year over the Fourth we did not have the pressure of a work upgrade but we took the opportunity to
create some memories for three young children.  My wife taught them how to bait a hook, the basics of fishing from a dock, shared the excitement of their first catches and the hesitancy of removing hooks from fish and doing the "release."  I put the dock in the water (first time in three years) and launched our legacy fishing boat and took them for their first boat rides.

If they remember their first catch, their first boat ride and the wind and water in their faces as much as my wife and I remember our firsts this was the best three-day weekend ever.  It was far better, far more meaningful and important than an Oracle 10g to 11g database upgrade.

The Loss...

Every week in my wife and daughter's small cafe and market store we meet new people.  Much effort goes

into putting healthy, local food on the table and we are an island in the middle of a sea of nameless but nationally branded food options.  We're different because we care about the food and we care about the people.  Every day we ask people's names and call the return patrons by the name we learned the week before.  We ask about their families, their plans, console them on job issues and one in a while we have to say goodbye.  Some good friends have been made, we see them often and then they are gone and we wonder what happened.  We do hear nice stories.  A guy brought his 90-year old neighbor in for lunch on the way to the grocery store.  The elderly man claimed it was the best sandwich he'd had in his life.  Of course the sad part is that he died that evening.  Smiles, conversation and friendship and good food does make a difference.  You don't get that at Subway.  This past week our good friend Curt lost his best friend Zinnia.  Soft-spoken, polite, patient and content to be seated outside we're saddened by this loss but ever-thankful for our time together, and hopeful and certain new friends will enter our lives.

27-Year Gig Reflection...

My life is increasingly filled with events and multi-faceted opportunities that make the 27-year gig increasingly part of my life history that I'm working to forget.

If I could find the dead mouse in the basement I'm be a complete person.