Prince died today, age 57.
It's been a rough 2016. We've already lost a lot of great artists this year, and it's only April 21st.
One would be hard pressed to find anyone under, say, 65, who either doesn't know who Prince is, or who doesn't have a story or anecdote about him. Prince didn't perform the soundtrack to my life, but if my life had a soundtrack, he would certainly be on it.
I have recollections of his music dating as far back as 1979, and I can remember<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;clear as day<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;the ratty little theater and the names and faces of high school friends who sat, equally enraptured, watching 1984's breakout movie&nbsp;Purple Rain.&nbsp;
Not twenty feet from here I have a turntable, and against that turntable is a stack of Prince vinyls.&nbsp;
On January 12th of this year, I sat at Burgers and Brew on the UC Davis campus, downloaded HITNRUN Phase Two,&nbsp;mashed earbuds deep into my ears, and must have played the buoyant new song&nbsp;Baltimore&nbsp;about two dozen times in the span of ninety minutes, noshing on a guacamole burger with pepper jack cheese, sweet potato fries, and that elixir of life, Dr Pepper. It was a typically gorgeous California evening and, as one thing leads to another, I eventually found myself on Wikipedia, then on site after site after site recounting his childhood, his musical influences, his recording contract difficulties, his litigious copyright attacks on fans and others who surreptitiously used his content without permission, his infamous record deal emancipation, his inscrutable moniker (TAFKAP era), his recent health difficulties, his religious beliefs, his concert dates, his forthcoming autobiography, his on and on and on.
I came across countless photos, of course, but one, in particular, caught my eye. He was standing on a tarmac beside a small private aircraft, just a few weeks prior (circa December 2015) to perform a private concert for some queen or socialite. Beside him was his bodyguard, who held his black leather duffel bag and personal effects. And in Prince's hand was a snazzy walking cane.
It made me feel sad, worrying a bit<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;for perhaps the first time<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;about his health.
I read of rumors regarding his recent ailments, including chronic difficulties with his hips (having performed so physically over the years in high heels, and periodically coming down wrong on one stage or another). As the tabloids would have you believe it, he allegedly refused to pursue double hip replacement surgery because it would require a blood transfusion, verboten among Jehovah's Witnesses.
Interesting as it was, he had denied it all.
No matter; it's irrelevant.
As we each do, I wandered and puttered and clicked and investigated one story after another while the music played and college kids and professors out with their families swirled around me on this gorgeous deck beneath an enormous swaying tree, eating and imbibing, everyone warming her and himself beside outdoor heaters like moths beside flames.
I remember thinking to myself, "He has outlived Michael Jackson. I'm glad he's still with us. He's endured a lot."
I then recalled a story from a friend, Bonnie, who had once seen Prince perform in some small, sweaty bar in Minnesota, years ago, in the early 2000's. Apparently, it was during a low point in his career, and what he preferred as an 'intimate venue' sounded, according to her, more like a literal dive. "Everyone was ignoring him, carrying on, shouting over his music. He was standing right there. It was bleak."
Oh, how times change.
In the years immediately following Purple Rain, he could have filled something as large as an AT&amp;T Stadium to the rafters. As recently as the past few years, he sold as many shows as he wanted.
But yes, he was known for being reclusive, and for playing lots of private gigs, but also for recently appearing on TV and at random theaters and awards shows. It would seem he was becoming less 'shy,' if that's a word one might associate with Prince.
Clearly, all careers<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;particularly public ones<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;have their fair share of ups and downs, highs and lows, springs and winters. Prince was no different in this regard; no one is immune from failure, much less the changing tastes and aesthetics of a fickle public. Everyone tires of most everyone and everything after a while, particularly when they are as omnipresent as someone like Prince or, say, Phil Collins, once a darling of radio, now a virtual clich<span style="font-size: 11pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: Verdana, sans-serif; color: #666666; background-image: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-size: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; background-position: initial; background-repeat: initial;">&eacute;d schlocky pariah.
Prince was always, however, timeless. A true maestro; master of the hook, the beat, the wonderful riff and soaring guitar solo, and dominator of some thirty-odd instruments. He was similarly a starmaker, a ghostwriter, album producer extraordinaire, and the flawless performer of Purple Rain&nbsp;the single which, clocking in at nearly seven minutes, was good enough on stage to make the released album in one single take.
Whether writing something as bare, sparse, and stripped down as Sinead O'Connor's Nothing Compares 2 U or producing something as elaborate as a multi-city concert with pyrotechnics and thirty musicians in tow, Prince was a luminary, a whistling thrush, a virtuoso from whom music emanated as naturally and essentially as from a songbird.
He always sang his little heart out, all 5' 2" of him.
I shall miss him dearly, as shall hundreds of millions more, evidenced by his breaking both the internet and every streaming music service today.
Public controversies, private and personal missteps, and periodically profane musical pursuits notwithstanding, he had talent galore, voice, and something to say. He had a point of view. In a world of same-same and derivation, it is refreshing to hear someone who, like he, continued to grow, to evolve, to create, to challenge convention; to reinvent and remain relevant, releasing as many as three new studio albums in the past two years alone, each of which possesses one gem or another.
That's remarkable. Lots of artists become jukeboxes, repeating their hits into oblivion, snapping the record needle off the arm. Prince created anew again and again and again. I admire that.
Say what you will about his shortcomings and failings; he lived. He produced songs as iconic today as they were thirty-nine years ago, and I doubt very much that's something we'll be saying about Bieber, West, et al. in 2049.
The music industry has changed to its core, and we've lost lots of great folks recently, but I thank my lucky stars<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;as perhaps you do, too<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;that I got to experience Prince in his heyday. At the height, dancing as a dorky teenager to amazing songs played on someone's thunderous boombox at a summer of '85 barn party at Babler's. And at the lowest, retrieving an ejected cassette from my CJ7, totaled in '86, just relieved I'd snatched the slippery tape before the wrecker hauled the larger muddy mess away in the rain.
Lots and lots of memories with that guy.
Good and bad, I treasure them all.
Thank you, your Purple Bedazzled Highness.
May you rest in music, forever bathed in His light and surrounded by fluttering doves that coo and never cry.

The Day the Music Died. Again.

For seven rambunctious years, 6th grade through 12th, I had the most affable friend, David Feagins.
Or, as everyone affectionately called him, "Feags."
You know how a sound<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;like a smell<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;can take you back in time? In the same way baked cookies take me back to my grandmother's kitchen, a particular stereo sound takes me back to Feags.&nbsp;
Feags played the trumpet, a mean trumpet. He could squeak and hiss and DOMAIN that thing, man, like a limb.
It was part of him. He practiced forever, had callouses on his fingertips, and was always putting Chapstick on his swollen lips to recover.
Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, anything by Chicago or a big brass band...these were all his scene and certifiable hipcats. He would play Spinning Wheel by Blood, Sweat &amp; Tears so frequently and so fully that the cassette tape would squeak from stretching and the deck would plead for its life, very nearly overheating in its protestations.
Feagins loved music. Absolutely loved it.
It accompanied him everywhere.&nbsp;
Walk into his bedroom, and he'd head straight to a bank of Technics receivers, turntables, decks, equalizers, speakers, you name it. Cords running this way and that and taped down everywhere. He'd flip the switch on some particular hardware, fill the air with ominously humming electrical promise, tinker with a dozen silver and black dials, get things just so and perfectly right, then crank an oversized master knob 'til the whole house vibrated off the blocks.
As a teen, I and my entire family could hear Feags approaching in his pick-up truck from a mile away.
He would arrive up our gravel driveway in a stop-cloud of plinking rocks and flying dust&mdash;more friends in tow spilling out of the bed&mdash;then honk the horn and I'd gamely pile in for another rowdy night heading to Furneaux Creek or Prestonwood Cinema to catch something like Fright Night or Top Gun or anything loud and raucous with Stallone, Norris, Van Damme, Seagal, and eternally unfortunate bad guys. 
In the summer, Dave would appear everywhere with a boom box, those blastable cassettes of his carrying the pool party and eventual night away on a wavy sea of sound.
He was quick to smile and wink, ceaselessly mischievous, and that soggy toothpick he'd twist mercilessly between his teeth usually indicated he had gotten himself into one crevasse or another jam. As we neared college, his upper lip finally grew some black fuzz, and he'd twirl the makings of a moustache while "scheming a scheme" or hatching new plans for future daredevil jumps, rope swings, zip-lines, dirt-bike feats, or skeet-shoot shenanigans (like ingeniously luring unsuspecting bats to nighttime feasts of cantaloupes or watermelons skewered on a barbed-wire, moonlit fence post) where he could dust them one at a time with his trusty .12 gauge.
Every year, a couple dozen of us from church would make our way northwest to Durango, CO and ski our novice feet off for the better part of a week at Purgatory. We were all sloppy Texans, christened by our chaperones as "The Wolfpack," because several of the boys were literal and figurative howlers, but Feagins was unquestionably the most maniacal man on the mountain. The second we'd slide off that lift at the top, he'd immediately twitch right or left, draw those yellow goggles down hard, gnaw his gloves off, crouch into a goofy squatted stance and, very nearly biting two fresh fingers placed masterfully between his teeth, whistle like some demented sheep herder, point those rented skis toward the bottom of the hill in the same way Babe Ruth pointed afar and<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;with unzipped jacket flailing and flapping around and behind him and that tattered ski pass fluttering like a flag in March<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;arrive at the bottom of Demon's Run in three minutes' flat, often one or two poles lighter, and usually festooned with pine needles and tree branches springing from his cap. Circling moguls was for locals and proles, not Texans who came to claim air.
Predictably, he'd get stern warnings from Ski Patrol to "watch it" or "slow down or I'll shut you down." If they had issued traffic violations, I'm certain Dave woulda wound up in court by 10 AM, with sheafs of stuffed paper spilling from every orifice of that raggedy parka.
By college, as is often the case, I suppose, virtually everyone I knew moved away, scattering like seeds to the wind.
Twelve years later, I found my way back home and, clear out of the blue, Feagins walked into my office.
He greeted me with laughter and a bear hug that nearly lifted me off my feet, we exchanged numbers and emails, began to correspond, and promised to get together soon.
I saw him twice more.
And then, one horrific afternoon, I heard the news that he and one of his two sons had died in a tragic car accident en route to New Mexico. Red River, as I recall, perhaps destined for boating or camping or summer fun.
I eventually found myself once again at his childhood home, speechless this time as I sat on the couch where I'd sat hundreds of times before yakking and yammering my young-adult face off. I was surrounded now by his young, grief-numbed widow, their eldest boy, thirty extended-family members, and friends from days long since passed&mdash;the characters found in the bed of his pick-up truck.
I stared into the presently dark and fireless fireplace, the one we had hitherto faithfully fed pellets at his father's bidding to warm his twitchy socked-and-tired feet after a long day's work at the plant. "You boys make yourselves useful," he'd cajole and wink, "and keep that fire a roarin.'"
Feagins' mother, Linda, had already succumbed to cancer, and his precious father, Jimmy, was ill-fated to die in a car wreck en route to East Texas not long after David's passing.
David was an only child.
There were no sufficient sympathies to be shared on those occasions, and certainly no words as we watched the disproportionate caskets of Feagins and his beloved boy lowered into the dry ground on a scorching Texas morn.
Fifteen years later, Feagins is still with me.
I see him every time I enter the megastore or any of the half-dozen surrounding restaurants that sprawl needily across the vast acreage of his family's former homestead where we shot rabbits and raced Yamahas and Kawasakis.
I often park far away, so I can walk the remembered trajectory of the long drive that led to his garage.
I pass the beautiful, enormous, silently swaying pecan tree<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;the one&nbsp;literally right outside his former bedroom window<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;to which&nbsp;we nailed 1x4's for target practice and which is, today, surrounded by well-groomed, crushed-rock walking paths and black iron benches for unbeknownst shoppers who pause to snarf or smoke beneath its shade.
They have no idea, of course, nor could they&mdash;the comings and goings that happened there&mdash;and sometimes my Forresty heart longs to sit on a bench and tell them, if only to resurrect David one more time.
Dave comes alongside me, though, when I hear the recognizable screech of a teenager's truck begrudgingly halting beside me at a stoplight.
When I hear a cassette tape strain to start or squeal to stop.
When I hear static on a receiver, or in the enormous, pendulous, parabolic speakers swaying overhead at concerts, groaning to life during sound check.
He is always here when Wynton Marsalis blares his trumpet from our television set during some news program or late night talk show.
And he came rushing back to me when I saw the trailer for Don Cheadle's forthcoming Miles Ahead.
Yes, Feags is always here, from pick-up truck to pellet gun to pellet stove, from summer tunes to ski slopes to all things stereo.
I see a glowy dial on a Technics or Marantz receiver, and blam, it's 1985 and I'm standing in his room, surrounded by posters, staring into the same horizon that I see now when I'm checking out at the megastore and stuffing claptrap into a plastic bag.
Gimme the reverb from an old Ohm speaker, and snap, we're listening to tapes and demos he's made, the ones he hopes might be tickets up and out and forward to someplace else, or better, or just different.
He was restless, knees always bouncing, eyes often on the door.
And though his land haunts my memory, my mind knows that his soul is free.
He is music now.
When it comes to great music, especially jazz, I'm liquified jello on the floor. A man, now 46, who wishes his crazy friend was still here, showing up loudly and unannounced at his office, asking when the Leathal Weapon can knock off and head to a show in that fiery, snorting, stomping, fuming rig running right out front.
What I wouldn't give to run outside, hop in, and join him for one long, loud, last ride. Windows down, radio blaring, heads bobbing in time, lips pursed and cheeks puffed and fingers playing those imaginary air trumpets.
Life is short, my friends.
Enjoy the music.
###

Ode to Feagins

I remember at about age 11 or 12 standing in our Morgan tool shed&mdash;searching for God knows what&mdash;and Dad remarked, &ldquo;You find what you&rsquo;re hunting for in the last place you look.&rdquo; He was absolutely right, and I don&rsquo;t think he was talking about pliers.
Success or cessation.
When we believe we have found what we are looking for, or actually have, well, I guess we have &ldquo;succeeded&rdquo; and, naturally, we stop searching.
When we don&rsquo;t find the thing, well, we often quit, having failed. Or, said another way, having &ldquo;ceased,&rdquo; and perhaps too soon.
I&rsquo;m not necessarily suggesting we search forever.
&nbsp;
But I am suggesting the hunt and the find might very well be one and the same.
###

Searching

In preparation for this weekend's snarky&nbsp;#Deadpool,&nbsp;@madam_sloth is workin' her magic:
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="http://res.cloudinary.com/leath-group/image/upload/v1456612922/fuevvdrf8pc6qroneldc.jpg" alt="" width="177" height="266" />
&nbsp;
She's an unsung hero (if you ask me), and in a Kardashian/Trump/self-promoting America, I just think it's cool how she stands to the side and allows her bold art to speak for itself.
In that vein, I offer these observations from watching her work recently: 
At the absolute ZENITH of her inspired, creative, then fastidiously methodical real-time sketching, chalking, and painting the latest one-of-a-kind knockout mural upon the busy corridor wall of @LOOKCinemasLLC (as in-plain-sight as Michelangelo painting the Sistine Chapel), (1) One obnoxious passerby touches his popcorny finger to a fresh chalk-line while making an awkward attempt at impress-his-girl date-humor by suggesting a change. Unflappable Gura smiles warmly, thanks the man sincerely for his [unsolicited] feedback and remains unfazed but is surely left to wonder, "What would I do without you?" (2) Another passerby will inevitably inquire, "Did you draw that?" (3) A third (in what now resembles a Boston St. Paddy's Day Parade of Interrupters&mdash;myself included&mdash;so I really must go!) will predictably stop and ask, "So, are you an artist?"
<img src="http://res.cloudinary.com/leath-group/image/upload/v1456613164/otmxhovdwuq4e0brd5lw.jpg" alt="" width="243" height="181" />&nbsp;
&nbsp;
She kindly indulges everyone, and eventually me, too, with a request for a parting photo (perhaps commemorating the last time I will mess with her mojo).
She remains, then as always, cool as a beatnik yet warm toward all who pause and marvel and photograph her and her work (and she knows all too well that what makes these creations so dang cool is their materializing under her spell and right before our very eyes, only to vanish a few weeks later like butterflies). 
It gives me pause: were I as artistically talented&mdash;and obligated by the very nature of the task at hand to perform it in public (where customers, critics, jokesters, hecklers, interrupters, peers, admirers, zealots, and outright fawners may as well be one and the same)&mdash;would my capacity to suffer fools be so elastic? My outputs so reliably quick, yet great? Would I be able to retrieve and refocus my linear concentration in the face of such distraction, whatever its source or intent? I doubt it. Seriously doubt it. I would probably beg for a key and permission to paint&nbsp;at 3AM, or take a friend to behave as my "assistant" (aka bouncer) during peak hours, or wear a passive-aggressive t-shirt with the words MAN AT WORK: WET PAINT HERE printed loudly across my back in an attempt to broaden the psychological and physical barriers. 
Alas, Unflappable Gura remains steady, replies as if all questions are novel, logical, and fair&mdash;equivalent to those asked earnestly by youths considering art for their career&mdash;then mashes her buzzing earbuds back in, grabs a napping paint pen from the pile at foot, rattles it awake, and merges effortlessly back into her zone, having never missed a beat.
<img style="display: block; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;" src="http://res.cloudinary.com/leath-group/image/upload/v1456613286/vwfoby4qgvoynfabtvxr.jpg" alt="" width="237" height="185" />&nbsp;
<a href="http://lookcinemasart.tumblr.com">lookcinemasart.tumblr.com</a>
#jlhart&nbsp;#muralist&nbsp;#thrivingartist&nbsp;#trapezeartist&nbsp;#lookmanonet&nbsp;#performanceart&nbsp;#lookcinemas&nbsp;#captainobvious&nbsp;#womanatwork&nbsp;#inspiringtomorrowsgeneration&nbsp;#noquestionisastupidquestionunless

Unflappable Artistry

Ego, "the 'I' that distinguishes us from others," including "our self-esteem and self-image," but also "our conceit and self-importance" is a tricky, tricky&nbsp;beast.&nbsp; A devil on our shoulder, a gremlin in the machinery.
On the one hand, it is necessary, essential.&nbsp; Without it, we are paper dolls, folded by the least life has to offer or brings our way.&nbsp; But too much of it and we are rigid, always right, enrobed in our self-righteousness and sense of entitlement or destiny.
In its extremes<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;too much and too little<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;it is&nbsp;as easy to spot as the peacock.&nbsp;
Too Little, Exhibit A: The abused, who apologizes for her abuse.
Too Much, Exhibit A:&nbsp;The tyrant, whose way is the only way.
In between, we find a&nbsp;diorama of figurines, from the insecure who, like the puffer fish, make themselves appear larger than they really are as an act of self-protection.&nbsp; Or bullies,&nbsp;the&nbsp;hyenas of humankind, who identify those whom they perceive as a step slower or out of sync with the herd, catching them alone at the watering hole or in a wild turn on an open field.&nbsp; Or the indignant.&nbsp; Or&nbsp;sometimes even martyrs, who originally felt called to champion a cause in someone else's name, or on behalf of others, but who&nbsp;may lose their way once they close their ears and become tone-deaf to the changing landscape or situation at hand.
There are dozens and dozens of archetypes smeared across&nbsp;our little&nbsp;stage, each of us&nbsp;having played many such parts in the course of our life.
I see it every day; we all do.&nbsp; For all his "honesty" and "straight talk," Donald Trump is periodically behaving&nbsp;rather badly: mean, divisive, sometimes employing hateful speech that borders on bullying, leaving very little room for the gray of life and which is, to my way of thinking at least, sexist, racist, superior, bigoted.&nbsp; I'm as ready as the next guy for a transparent leader, for spin-free and politics-free zones.&nbsp; Gosh, our country needs&nbsp;this desperately.&nbsp; We are lost; marooned.&nbsp;&nbsp;There is no America, just islands, camps, tribes, parties, factions, lobbyists, separatists.&nbsp; And Trump's absolutely&nbsp;right: political&nbsp;correctness can be a blight.&nbsp; But to lump entire people into&nbsp;categories, to deride said&nbsp;categories, to marginalize others, to be dismissive about what Warren Buffett succinctly describes as "the lottery of birth" (having been blessed, due to grace or chance alone, to be born in the United States or any progressive country) is absolute foolishness.&nbsp; Trump's&nbsp;name is so fitting, because his ego trumps everything.&nbsp; He appears to believe that he is right about everything and is equally intolerant of&nbsp;contrary opinions.&nbsp; I cannot fathom the circus his governance style would&nbsp;create.&nbsp;&nbsp;As much as people might like it&nbsp;to be&nbsp;the case, government does not operate like business.&nbsp; There are times I&nbsp;absolutely wish it did, but our government is a legislative democracy, not an autocracy or private venture or profitably oriented enterprise with shareholders and so, on the face of it, his approach will always be unsuitable.&nbsp; We need a statesman or stateswoman, but one who can, in fact, effect change to create unity, whether through the next figurative moonshot or something else larger than partisan politics.
But he is not alone, for if we are not careful, and when we are our worst selves rather than our best selves,&nbsp;a great many of us could be castigated for our example.&nbsp; It's not just politicians who believe they are above the law, or professional athletes, or celebrities.&nbsp; No, in&nbsp;a world that Andy Warhol would have loved, we are each enticed to create, proliferate, and maintain a cult of personality, be it through Facebook or Instagram or Twitter or&nbsp;Tumblr or wherever.&nbsp;&nbsp;
And the irony is not lost on this writer,&nbsp;who named a company after himself.
But we shall get to that.
Whether we lack ego, and&nbsp;forfeit ourselves to others' pleasures or dominion, or overcompensate for our shortcomings by bullying, or believe we are the smartest person in the room...chosen, designated, called, destined, whatever...and adopt a narrow-minded and "me-centric" worldview, we all fall short.
When things must be our way, or our way is the only way, or our way is the right way, well,&nbsp;one's world becomes very tiny indeed.&nbsp; It is inclusion, involvement, collaboration,&nbsp;diversity, delegation,&nbsp;even situationally appropriate submission that&nbsp;returns oxygen to the room, enlarges the table, leads to variety and better ideas and more amazing outcomes.
The "heroic manager" (be it a command-and-control throwback to 1955 or Steve Jobs himself in his early days before his dismissal and wandering in the desert which led to contrition)&nbsp;is a dying breed.&nbsp; I still stumble across it now and again, but even in the&nbsp;military, and paramilitary organizations, and the church itself<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;organizations which have every right to practice bureaucracy, considering they are among our oldest and were originally designed as hierarchies<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;I see&nbsp;autocratic management&nbsp;becoming all the more pass&eacute;.&nbsp; People are simply too aware, too educated, too empowered to abide it.
So where does this leave the leader?&nbsp; How does he or she strike the right balance, the right chord?&nbsp; How much ego is too little, and how much is too much?
As was put to me yesterday in conversation, "Perhaps like all things, Blake, it's a matter of moderation.&nbsp; One must constantly shift and find the right gear."
Well said.&nbsp; I couldn't agree more.
In hindsight, and with foresight, this is true.&nbsp; There are certainly issues in life which are black and white, but it is also true that most are quite complicated, and with complication comes&nbsp;different perspectives on&nbsp;the same issues, alternative paths up and out and, therefore, a whole lotta gray.
Among others, which are arguably too esoteric or spiritual for a business blog, two northern stars which have often guided my own sensibilities are derivatives of The Golden Rule and&nbsp;The Craftsman's Pride.
Regarding the former, I often ask myself, "In this situation, how would I want someone to treat my daughter?&nbsp; If she were to come home and share this scenario with me, to describe others' treatment of her, how would I feel about that, about them, about her behavior in this situation?&nbsp; And what would I do if the shoe were on the other foot...if I was 'the jerk' in her story?"&nbsp; It is true: only at my best am I so enlightened, but it's a star nonetheless, one which usually compels me to pause, to breathe deep, to ponder, and which later convicts me to re-think my ego, stance, position, or sense of self-righteousness or indignation.
Regarding the latter, a craftsman's pride, the company is called Leath Group because we are a group.&nbsp;&nbsp;And foremost, one that stands behind&nbsp;its work<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;so much so that we are willing to sign our name to it, like a silversmith or cobbler of old who put his initials on the bottom of his&nbsp;wares or inside a pair of boots he'd lovingly stitched.&nbsp; It's not&nbsp;ego behind the name, its personalization and accountability and a nod to simpler times.&nbsp; We could have named ourselves ACME Inc. or Consortium Consulting but, honestly, I prefer buying from Jim or Bob or Steve, not some faceless conglomerate, and so we began our work in that vein, and it stuck.
Our ethos, however, which may fly in the face of our branding<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;and gosh, I hope it does not<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;is generally one of anonymity.&nbsp; We are, at our core, creators and cultivators commissioned to plant and grow something small which, if successful,&nbsp;becomes our client's, not our own.&nbsp; Like any parent, our ultimate success and joy&nbsp;are best revealed in the well-being of our child.&nbsp; Try as we might, there are always genetics and internal/external forces beyond our control with which we must contend, but we strive mightily to be good examples, good role models, and to love unconditionally and without bias.&nbsp; To create great work products, deliver great services, then let them go.
Along the way, whether one is a politician, business leader, military leader, church leader, parent, you name it, one is constantly shifting gears while also remaining consistent and directed and pulled toward a northern star.&nbsp; This creates the much needed sense of stability, for oneself and others, while also fostering adaptability, malleableness, suppleness to bend in the wind without breaking.
To know oneself, one's strengths and weaknesses, and to be confident in his or her being, while also being willing to become invisible when it is the right thing to do, or to take the reins and grab the mic and take the stage when it is the right thing to do is precisely the shifting of gears that I'm describing.&nbsp; And as you know from personal experience, there is no rulebook, it is often gray, and it requires a deft touch, an ability to read the room and the situation, and the courage to vanish or show-up and absolutely represent.
Sometimes, it even requires we, as told to me by a former mentor, "Know when to lay it down and walk away."
I find, and perhaps you'll agree, that sometimes "the I" that is in each of us can become an Idol.&nbsp;&nbsp;Or, something that we do, or are, or perceive we stand for can become idolatrous because it means too much to us, it defines us, is addictive to us, or we cannot walk away from it when we should.&nbsp; We become obstinate, intractable, stubborn; we cannot let it go.&nbsp;&nbsp;
Consider these examples, all of which are complicated and have 50/50 sides:
If the day came, weeks or months from now, that Donald Trump found himself unsupportable or unelectable as the Republican nominee, would he fade quietly into the sunset, returning to his enterprises, supportive of those who remain, or would he bash the remaining and perhaps choose to run Independent, thereby splintering the country further and weakening his professed party in the process?&nbsp; In his rulebook, what comes first: self or the greater good?&nbsp; And what is right?&nbsp; Is there a right?
If a County Clerk found herself in violation of the Supreme Court's ruling and refused to issue marriage licenses to&nbsp;same-sex couples, should she stand her moral ground or yield to public opinion and let someone else do the job?&nbsp; What is right in this situation, who determines it, and what's the proper gear for the terrain?&nbsp; These are thorny issues for our Republic, the sort that define church, state, and the separation thereof.
If a hygienist in a dentist's office found herself to be the source of division and gossip, should she walk away for the health and betterment of the practice, or remain?&nbsp; Should she be loyal to the hand that feeds her, or loyal to her own personal convictions, cause, and sense of justice or injustice?&nbsp;
If a corporation becomes a cult of personality, or is represented in the public sphere by a spokesperson who generates hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue then does bad things in his or her personal life, should this person remain the spokesperson?&nbsp; What is the cost of collateral damage, the price of&nbsp;a corporate soul, and how does&nbsp;an organization&nbsp;tally it?&nbsp; There is a sea of examples to represent this conundrum, from Evel Knievel and Ideal Toys to Tiger Woods and Nike.&nbsp;
In each of these scenarios, one's ego is relevant.&nbsp; The candidate, the clerk, the employee, the representative: each&nbsp;is forced by circumstance to&nbsp;take stock, every conceivable&nbsp;path forward&nbsp;having gray alleys and obstacles, each alternative leading to personal consequences, some of which result in more or less polarization and none of which are simple, easy, or politically unambiguous.
In David Simon's HBO miniseries, Show Me a Hero, Yonkers' mayor Nich Wasicsko initially finds himself victorious, largely because of an unpopular political issue, public housing, which creates an opportunity for him to be the alternative candidate and steal the race.&nbsp; Two years later, the same thing happens to him, and for six more years he pursues the idol of political fame and purpose, repeatedly falling short and, rather than simply walking away and starting a legal practice, he clings to the past, fails to see it for what it was, becomes chronically depressed, and takes his own life standing at his father's grave during the week of his final election loss.&nbsp; It is a searing, heartbreaking story; a Greek tragedy of epic proportion, but set rather intimately in the fourth most populous city in the state of New York.
Kenny Rogers crooned, "You gotta know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em, know when to walk away, and know when to run."&nbsp; It's good advice, and we only wish the gears were thusly labeled.&nbsp; They are often inscrutable, caked in mud, clogged with debris from life's trails, and impossible to free.
I have walked away, and I have doubled down.&nbsp; I've won some, and lost many more.&nbsp; There were rarely buzzing, directional neon signs pointing the way; it was often a sense of intuition that necessitated a light touch (which is in contrast to being grabby-grabby, like the raccoon in Where the Red Fern Grows who won't release the shiny silver object within the log and gets scooped up by Billy and placed in a burlap sack).&nbsp; The illusions of power, of control are precisely that, as Anthony Hopkins&nbsp;reminds Cuba Gooding, Jr. in 1999's Instinct.&nbsp; 
Most everyone learns this lesson, eventually.&nbsp; Our sense of importance, of power, they can become idols in our heart, things which&nbsp;over-inflate our sense of self, distracting us from what is right,&nbsp;or pure,&nbsp;or good.&nbsp; Virtuous.
Left to one's own devices, he or she can lose sight of the big picture, or the long game, or the fact that our lives are but brief sparks, and legacy casts the longer shadow.
So stand for something, and be up for something, possessing a strong and firm foundation of ego that is not subject to whims, or peer pressure, or bullying, or popularity, or the transient in life like fad or fashion, but also be as selfless as possible, as modest and humble and quiet in spirit, knowing that one's works and craftsmanship and contributions to others and to causes greater than oneself are what matter far more, benefit multitudes more, and ultimately lead to greater peace, fulfillment, and contentment in this world.
###

Ego: Destroyer of Worlds

It occurs to me that, at least on some level, the terrorists have made inroads.
On some level....
I have traveled, almost monthly and without fail, since 1992.&nbsp; And while it was never fun, it was a change of pace, and I have always relished the anonymity of travel.&nbsp; Here you are, some stranger; a&nbsp;weary traveler, with earbuds, book and reading glasses in hand, always&nbsp;seated in the quiet corners of restaurants to read and tune-out.&nbsp; No one to recognize, no one to say hello, just...peace and quiet.
I enjoy visiting with people, of course; perhaps many of us do.&nbsp; But I have also always enjoyed the silence of the road; the momentary quiet and isolation that allows me to detach, ruminate, and reflect, particularly at the end of an exhausting and/or fulfilling day.&nbsp; The sort of day that allows&nbsp;me to feel I made a difference here.&nbsp; 
In the last 2-3 years, however, I have noticed&nbsp;something.&nbsp; Something&nbsp;rather trivial, of course, and not representative of real issues with which others deal, but it has come up in conversation with fellow travelers, many of whom are beginning to notice the same weird phenomenon.
It seems this stranger (the one hostesses always seated in the quiet corners) now gets a second look.&nbsp; The same happens at movie theaters, which I frequent almost nightly, usually after dinner, to further detach and&nbsp;still my mind.&nbsp; And I also get "that look" at malls, grocery stores, hotels, elevators, seemingly everywhere, whether on the road or at home.&nbsp; The only common denominators: I'm alone and dressed for work.
It has heightened my empathy, to be sure.&nbsp; I am all the more attuned to "the conversation" that is happening as recently as now with regard to race relations in this country,&nbsp;and with diversity,&nbsp;and with preferences,&nbsp;and with discrimination,&nbsp;and with prejudice,&nbsp;and with intolerance,&nbsp;and with bias,&nbsp;and with profiling,&nbsp;and with inequality,&nbsp;and with segregation through economic means;&nbsp;with the sort of things Bryan Stevenson and Ta-Nehisi Coates and even David Simon are&nbsp;so&nbsp;fervently describing every time anyone will read their work or listen to them speak.&nbsp;
And I admit, on the lighter side,&nbsp;one miscalculation&nbsp;may be that when I travel I'm always wearing&nbsp;that dang sportcoat or any sort of jacket with pockets (I mean, where else am I to put two sets of eye-glasses, a wallet, my phone, chapstick, change, receipts, hotel valet stubs, room-key-cards, and that huge jangly cabled key-ring that usually accompanies a rental car?), but I've worn jackets for years<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;and&nbsp;they were&nbsp;never a problem before!
No, I attribute it to a more fragile world, a world rife with theatrical TSA security checks ("If you see something, say something."), crazy gunmen and&nbsp;radicals on airplanes and in airports, trains and museums, at newspaper offices, churches, cinemas, campuses, courthouses, political gatherings, along roadsides and city streets as recalled nightly on the news, and in our public schools.&nbsp; It seems that everywhere, anywhere, there is a wacko about to whip-out a pistol and start shooting innocents for reasons as old as religion, race or a sense of marginalization.&nbsp;
And the media is no help, sensationalizing everything and putting it in our daily feed.&nbsp; All the world's miseries brought to bear on a 2x2" screen, reaching out from the great beyond and grabbing us by the throat with terror levels and threat warnings and hysteria.&nbsp; I often wonder whether things are worse, or have simply worsened due to information glut and the power of the internet, social media, and how they can bring heinous acts right into the cells in our pockets.&nbsp; Is there any virtuous news anymore, or is it all hate, evil, death, perversion?
There are few things in this world&nbsp;more profane or sacrilegious than hate-driven holy wars, but here we stand, surrounded by them and slights thousands of years in the making.&nbsp; Every night on the news, we see decapitations and holy places desecrated or altogether blown to bits, and men shot in the back as they run for cover.&nbsp; Even police<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;the good guys<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;have become suspects.&nbsp; It would seem that everyone is under attack and we are living the X-Files: "Trust No One."
But back to my teensy glimpse into the coal mine, to my one sugar packet that has washed up on the shores back home.
This past week, I attended a movie in Destin, FL.&nbsp; 8pm.&nbsp; Me in my sportcoat, and a dozen others in flip-flops and t-shirts at the end of a clearly wonderful and hot vacationy day.&nbsp; A policeman was monitoring the front door, and boy did I get a look-over.&nbsp; After the movie began, a manager entered and stood at the end of my aisle, as if to say, "I am here, and we see you, Crazy."
But I get that look quite a bit these days, and I never did before.&nbsp; Certainly not pre-9/11, and ever so rarely before, say, 2012 or 2013.
I appreciate the vigilance, and demonstrate it myself.&nbsp; "Situational Awareness" is key for each of us.
That said, I rue what appears to be coming, and&nbsp;hope the day never&nbsp;arrives&nbsp;when we find our restaurants, theaters,&nbsp;schools, parks,&nbsp;or public places&nbsp;locked down with metal detectors, security,&nbsp;or militaristic paranoia writ large.&nbsp; Martial law.
With the best intentions in mind, the freedom and innocence of yesteryear have been eroded bit by bit.&nbsp; Long gone are the days we, as kids, hopped on our clangy bikes and&nbsp;pedaled&nbsp;up the street to adventure and unfettered joy.&nbsp; Today, it appears we're nearing a cultural tipping point.&nbsp; Pervs on every corner, including in the schools and churches,&nbsp;a state of security at the drive-in theater.
Three steps forward, two steps back.&nbsp; For everyone.&nbsp; Fear, the great equalizer.
With the day coming when we each fear our neighbor, our child's teacher, or suspect anyone and everyone, from young boys in hoodies doing their best to get out and beyond and men with&nbsp;bushy black&nbsp;beards to men on social media and businessmen on travel in sportcoats, well then, yes, I suppose the&nbsp;baddies of every sort and stripe have made inroads.&nbsp; Their&nbsp;wickedness poisoning our every well; everyone a suspect or, worse, guilty until proven innocent.
So keep your wits about you, but don't allow others to rob your sense of joy, of potential, of love, of relationship, of trust, of hope.&nbsp; And have some fun out there.&nbsp; Make eye contact, say hello, give firm handshakes,&nbsp;and encourage your children to&nbsp;stay in groups and hold hands if&nbsp;they have to.&nbsp;&nbsp;Live life on your terms, working from the supposition that there is more good than bad, and that a smile and kind word are&nbsp;great ways to engage the world while also getting a quick read on the person in front of you.
&nbsp;
"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."
<span style="line-height: 107%; font-family: 'Calibri',sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA;">&mdash;Benjamin Franklin, November 11, 1755
&nbsp;# # #

Happy-Go-Lucky

Though I perceive it&rsquo;s somewhat unusual for siblings to see eye-to-eye on many issues, it has long been my understanding that Tracy and I agree on most hot-potatoes like religion, politics and pop-culture, our one brief kerfuffle regarding Tom Cruise notwithstanding because I subsequently joined her boycott.&nbsp; Chief among our important agreements, I shall add, is the view that when it comes to dads, we undeservedly won a lottery.
The fact that parental identity is both &ldquo;out of our hands&rdquo; yet &ldquo;immeasurably influential on our being&rdquo; is a top tier paradox, if you ask me.&nbsp; We choose neither our parents nor our genes and, whether it was good or bad, are mightily influenced by our upbringing.&nbsp; Matters of nature and nurture&mdash;biology and behavior&mdash;pre-date our volition, happen unto us, and cast bright lights or long shadows across the stages upon which we will perform our entire lives.&nbsp; For the goodness, we can take no credit.&nbsp; For the darkness, we must bear no blame.&nbsp; From whence we come and whether because of it or in spite of it, what is true now is that today&rsquo;s decisions are our decisions.&nbsp; An eternal architect precedes and succeeds our entire lineage, so regardless the temporary software, great or glitchy, our source code (&ldquo;under-ware,&rdquo; let&rsquo;s say) can guide us forward if we&rsquo;ll let it.
Volumes have and are and will forever be written about such existential and ontological matters, but for this particular Father&rsquo;s Day, I would simply like to pause and give thanks to my own precious pop because, in a bad and broken world where memories fade and life is short, it&rsquo;s both the least and the most I can do.
Olfactory being a primal sense, it should come as no surprise that the earliest memories I summon about Dad always involve the way he smelled.&nbsp; It would seem that he has worn the same cologne my entire life and, to this day, when he enters the room I am immediately transported four decades back in time.&nbsp; Shaving cream, sawdust, gasoline and gun smoke have similar effects.&nbsp; In equal measure, I remember watching him shave and being fascinated that his face didn&rsquo;t come clean-off with the razor, padding around beside him while he wielded his hammer and saw on countless projects, studying with great curiosity as he maneuvered that weed-eater and topped off our push-mower with a guzzling, gulping, burping tin can that accordioned in and out like a gasping lung, and standing in awe as he worked his 30-30 lever action rifle or various 12 and 20-gauge shotguns.
From our first lily pads in Dallas on Purdue and Harvard, we&rsquo;d make the rounds shoveling sand at his fixer-upper jobsites in the &rsquo;hood.&nbsp; As able, he would relieve my mom and lead Tracy and me first to the public pool and then onward to the pharmacy where we&rsquo;d plop down at the old-timey counter for chocolate malts and grilled cheese sandwiches.&nbsp; Back in our kitchen, we&rsquo;d set up obstacles for Evel Knievel&rsquo;s stunt cycle or rescue small fictitiously stranded objects from around the house with a joysticked and whizzy battery-powered helicopter that was tethered to a plastic aircraft carrier.&nbsp; Out in the street after heavy torrential rains, we&rsquo;d race red wigglers vs. grubs down curbs&rsquo; rushing currents in six-inch-long magnolia leaf skiffs or halved walnut shell boats replete with toothpick masts and postage stamp sails, the winner being the first worm into the nearest gutter.&nbsp; We&rsquo;d catch a peek of the Dallas Tornado practicing on campus or playing at Ownby, &ldquo;all American&rdquo; in their red, white and blue.&nbsp; Weeknights, we might find ourselves at The Rib and, Sundays after church, at Sing&rsquo;s for mandarin chicken with bean sprouts and steamed rice.&nbsp; He took us to see &ldquo;Jaws&rdquo; and we hunkered down weekly to learn what bullied and unsuspecting town &ldquo;Kung Fu&rsquo;s&rdquo; Kwai Chang Caine would liberate through his misty flashbacks, fortune cookie advice and slow-mo chop-socky moves.
We irretrievably flew a styrofoam airplane with a 3&rsquo; wingspan from the top of a parking structure clear into the heavens and palmed whirlygigs toward blue skies on long afternoons.&nbsp; Once, to my great amusement, he allowed me to stand on the hood of his car, tie the loose end of a spool of thread around the legs of an immeasurably annoying and obnoxious cicada that grunted and groaned and buzzed and heaved and rose and circled high into the air like a kite in a cyclone before an uninvited and opportunistic bird swooped down and devoured the buggy-eyed B-52, resulting in a slack thread that rapidly descended toward earth.&nbsp; To my father&rsquo;s chagrin, I idiotically dove from the car to catch the floating noose, landing on my forehead in the street.&nbsp; I treasure the prized scar that reminds me&mdash;every time I look in the mirror&mdash;of our mischievous mayhem that day.
Subsequently migrating north to the undeveloped wilds of late 1970s Flower Mound, Texas, Dad outfitted me with a yellow fiberglass Fred Bear bow for target practice and a Daisy pellet gun for plinking.&nbsp; On Tuesday nights, we&rsquo;d head ravenously to Mama&rsquo;s Pizza and, on Saturdays, eagerly to see era blasts that included &ldquo;Rocky,&rdquo; &ldquo;Star Wars,&rdquo; &ldquo;ET,&rdquo; every Chuck Norris movie, and &ldquo;The Deep.&rdquo;&nbsp; The fun continued at home with jumpy classics like &ldquo;The Legend of Boggy Creek&rdquo; and the inimitable &ldquo;Incredible Hulk&rdquo; in which Dr. David Banner picked-up where Caine left off, journeying from town to town and participating in convenient contrivances that now began with a mysterious stranger turning green, then back again, then slinging his jacket over his shoulder and heading up the road accompanied only by the spare &ldquo;Lonely Man&rdquo; piano tinklings.
Side by side, my father and I raked heavy leaves every autumn, forming piles bigger than cars and encircling them with tree-stump seating before roaring bonfires with friends, Young Lifers, Fellowships of Christian Athletes, and the First United Methodist and First Baptist Churches of Lewisville.&nbsp; We played games of HORSE on our basketball court, the same court upon which I later tried to smash one of my lost baby teeth with a hammer (interesting fact: teeth are strong; way stronger than concrete and hammers).&nbsp; We erected a volleyball/badminton net in the back yard.&nbsp; I cleaned and swam in the Penguin Pool he commissioned.&nbsp; We knobbed our behemoth gold Marantz receiver over to 96.3 KSCS, threaded a pair of 2&rsquo; tall speakers through a wide front window, jammed to Twitty, Gayle, Mandrell, Rabbit, Jones, Milsap and Rogers while we drank tea, ate warm egg salad sandwiches prepared by Mom, and constructed a wrap-around wood deck that began in the front and concluded 270&deg; clear on the third side that was weeks in the making and is surely visible from space.&nbsp; We piered deep into concrete a 25&rsquo; tall hollow steel pipe T-bar structure from which we suspended a whooshing disc-swing that became the most insanely exhilarating and popular ride on Timbercreek Trail.&nbsp; We gleefully dune-buggied at 40 mph with mechanically gifted neighbors adorned in wild motorcycle helmets and goofy ski goggles across adjoining fields and forded muddy creek beds together, the very creek beds we zip-lined over and would, every spring, unloaded box after box of shotgun shells upon, performing our small civic duty to eliminate the writhing and twisted masses of moccasin and copperhead snake-balls that emerged alongside the receding river banks after sustained rains and flooding.
In the midst of these myriad chores and shenanigans, our family could be found&mdash;religiously, if you will&mdash;serving, periodically revivaling, and attending church two to three times a week, Dad always in his real McCoy and me in my clip-on tie.
For Christmas, he manufactured a go-cart with a co-worker so I&rsquo;d have my first set of wheels and, when I became sufficiently responsible, built a large stall for a beautiful black quarter-horse named Sugar who was my beloved companion for several years, carrying me adventurously and full-throated across the eighty acres behind our few before the land gave way to three-hundred houses and Marcus High School.&nbsp; In subsequent years, my friends and I would see FloMo&rsquo;s Founding Fathers and key stakeholders (the Trietsch, Feagins, McGee, McMakin, Gerault, Morriss, Kirkpatrick, Huffines, Marcus, Nasher and Rheudasil families among them) do their darnedest like Tolkien&rsquo;s Ents to forestall and then navigate the slow but inevitable tractored cavalcade of modernity as it marched across utopia, all but consuming the entirety of our idyllic Hundred Acre Wood.&nbsp; Before that eventuality, however, and perhaps with a wince, Dad got me a mini-bike upon which I pretended to be Evel Knievel incarnate, performing stunts with Quinten Witherspoon, Lisa Durham, Tim and Grant Rocket, and Wally Berryman.&nbsp; I relished the sound, shape and smell of that clangy, sputtery, gassy forked ride that carried me along rural trails, crunchy gravel roads, and steaming and sizzling cracked asphalt to visit friends&rsquo; houses and their refreshingly chlorinated swimming holes for hourless games of Marco Polo, diving competitions and elaborate underwater fight scene choreographies.
As an adult, I left Flower Mound for twelve years to begin a new life with my wife and would, upon my return, discover that the many signposts and landmarks of my youth existed now mostly in memory, virtually every notable pasture, homestead, ranch, farm and prior hunting ground eclipsed by &lsquo;progress&rsquo; and replaced with gas stations, grocery stores, churches, banks, restaurants and fast food joints, schools, medical complexes, neighborhoods or apartments, and strip malls comprised disproportionately of nail salons and donut shops.&nbsp; As if in amber, the third street of my childhood&mdash;the one that so prominently figures in the sweep of my jubilant adolescence&mdash;has become a shadowy ribbon of archaeological pavement, still preserved, but what began with Morriss Road to the east, then houses and MHS to the north nears its lamentable conclusion with the now begun &ldquo;River Walk at Central Park&rdquo; to the south.&nbsp; It is true what they say, &ldquo;There is no going home.&rdquo;
But I shall not forget the time Dad took me pheasant hunting in Kansas with several of his friends or, in 1981, drove me to Deer Valley Resort the first week it opened.&nbsp; I remember the new carpet smell, gleaming interiors and brass handrails as if we experienced them yesterday.&nbsp;
Year after year, Dad taught me to play pool and ping-pong and golf, many times over again and then some more for extra measure and, while none of it stuck, the memories and mechanics themselves are super-glued to my gray matter.
We tubed the Schlitterbahn, swam at Padre and Mustang Island, and he canoed our sunscreen-slathered family of four down the clearest, coldest river in Hot Springs, Arkansas where I recall his uncanny ability to spot teensy sunning turtles and dangling vipers a half-mile away.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ve watched him waterski backwards, do twisty somersaulting acrobatics off diving boards, whistle louder than a braying donkey, and scare an unsuspecting trailer-full of Halloween kids astride hay bales when he leapt from the deep, dark woods in full-blown werewolf costume, armed with a just-fired and still smokin&rsquo; shotgun for good measure.&nbsp; He faithfully attended every football game, every track and taekwondo meet, and drove me to and from SMU for my SAT, calming my nerves along the way.&nbsp;
He now paints owls and more, but has always drawn crazy cartoons and clever caricatures for family, friends and neighbors for reasons no more complicated than the &ldquo;just thinking of you today&rdquo; variety.&nbsp; Like still waters running deep, his steadfastness and love have always abided, often through his hands and their work, but equally in the small or entirely unspoken gestures.&nbsp; As a boy, I inadvertently flooded our home on two occasions, once because I turned the shut-off valve at the street in the wrong direction before he performed repairs, and once because I clogged the toilet.&nbsp; On each occasion he said nothing&mdash;simply fixed it all (which took days and cost untold fortunes), overlooked the accident, and moved on.&nbsp; As is the case with many sons, I surmise, I lacked the frictionless ease with which one might articulate Sorry and Thank You and I Love You and Can We Just Move On, so Dad never needed me to, always sensing my innards and scooping me up and over to the other side by way of some handy distraction for which I am incalculably grateful.&nbsp;
I&rsquo;ve observed him carefully, peacefully, solitarily sharpen knife after knife to whittle seahorses, tortoises or ornate nativity scenes from raw blocks of wood, engrave figurines atop gnarly tree branches reborn as slick walking sticks, and carve four-inch-long bows &amp; arrows from ordinary shrubs that lined the sidewalk of his childhood home.&nbsp;
In conversations with friends and strangers from here to Timbuktu, I&rsquo;ve watched him channel, with equal measure and to great effect, the broad affectations of knowingly sly and aw-shucks orators like Samuel Clemens and Will Rogers, sharing fascinating facts, sweet jokes about frogs and the duck&rsquo;s bill, and meandering stories about this, that, the other thing, everything, important things, the most important thing, and nothing in particular.
Though his gait is somewhat wobblier than before, rarely a week has passed during any given year that he has not held a weed-eater, knife or golf club in his hands, which themselves remain virtually unchanged: tawny and tan, equally strong and gentle, as capable of lifting a heavy load as tying a knot in thread.&nbsp; At 77, he drove two days to organize my garage and install an overhead light he made for above our office conference table that is the wonder of all guests.&nbsp;
Perhaps most importantly, he shows me what it is to be a husband and father, always using &ldquo;Darling&rdquo; when speaking to my mom.
Nearly sixty years ago he left his home, studying architecture, psychology and religion at Kilgore College, the University of Houston, and Baylor.&nbsp; He has always enjoyed the outdoors and frequently shoots better than his age on the course, recording another 70 for the record books on the dewy morning of June 6, 2015.&nbsp; Twenty-three years ago, at age 55 and possessing a 2-handicap, he began golfing competitively, culminating in five club championships and qualifying for and playing twice in the Texas State Amateur as well as the U.S. Senior Amateur.&nbsp; In October of this year, he will golf in the North Carolina Senior Games (where he took Gold last year), preceded in September by ping-pong (in which he last took Silver).
Still vigorous and vibrant at 78 years of age, Dad lives with his bride of fifty years in the mountains of North Carolina, &ldquo;Near where they filmed &lsquo;The Last of the Mohicans,&rsquo;&rdquo; as the Leaths like to say, seemingly demarcating everything with a movie reference.&nbsp; The setting is wistfully apropos, because he is very nearly the last.&nbsp;
Their current home, a modest mountain cottage, is quaint and colorful with a warm and welcoming entry porch that proudly flies the American flag and is buttressed in the rear by two tidy wood decks, each of which is festooned with bright flowers, drippy hanging baskets, lots of seating, a menagerie of red and brown bird feeders, and a couple nifty wasp traps (the old fashioned kind: water-filled mason jars screwed below tiny wood coffins barely bigger than a Rubik&rsquo;s cube, designed as if by God&rsquo;s undertaker&mdash;with a narrow pitched entrance and no way out).&nbsp; Dad can frequently be found around back, Shenandoah, John Gary, or The Tenors&rsquo; &ldquo;Angels Calling&rdquo; blaring from a speaker.
He remains my finest example of manhood, fatherhood, marriage.&nbsp; He loves the Lord and knows His promises, treasures Mom, and treats his children tenderly, always preferring to be the sermon than to give one.&nbsp;
I accepted long ago that his example was far more than I could ever hope to replicate in my own life; his knowledge too vast, his skills too great, his bridge too far, his watermark too high.&nbsp; I agree very much with the notion that one&rsquo;s reach should exceed his grasp, so I strive valiantly for the knight of my childhood but mostly just count myself fortunate to have accompanied one portion of a life so extraordinary, to bear this scar on my forehead, and to possess hands that are similar to and had the great fortune of being held by his.
###
&nbsp;

A Father’s Day Tribute

&ldquo;Happy Thirteenth, Lauren!&rdquo;
Week of June 3, 2002&mdash; I&rsquo;m in Billings, MT with a small group of HR professionals.&nbsp; They know your birth is imminent (I told them as much when I agreed to the gig), subsequently promising to accommodate my schedule as aggressively as possible, up to and including flying me home at a moment&rsquo;s notice should your mother go into labor.&nbsp; Near the end of the week, she&rsquo;s experiencing such discomfort that I prepare to return home early.&nbsp; I remember it vividly because as I say my goodbyes, the client hands me a thoughtful gift for you: a large doll in a crib.&nbsp; After thanking him, I begin to ponder where I&rsquo;ll put the thing.&nbsp; It won&rsquo;t fit in my backpack, and if I cram it in my otherwise small suitcase, it might get crushed (to say nothing of the fact that the bag will become so large I&rsquo;ll need to check it, delaying me a good half hour at baggage claim).&nbsp; In the end, I board the plane with my suitcase, backpack and this unwieldy doll in a crib under my arm.&nbsp; It is a sign of things to come; so long, Coolsville, welcome to fatherhood!
June 8-9, 2002&mdash; Your mother&rsquo;s discomfort amounts to a false alarm, but a few days later we do find ourselves at the hospital again and rarin&rsquo; to go.&nbsp; On the 8th, it&rsquo;s just us and some frazzled nurse with syringes and too much authority.&nbsp; The ward is so quiet you can hear keystrokes at the nurses&rsquo; station down the hall.&nbsp; It&rsquo;s eerie, &ldquo;The Shining&rdquo; eerie, and I think to myself, &ldquo;Is there a doctor in the house?&rdquo;&nbsp; For something so big, so important, so seemingly overdue I expect a red carpet, a parade, streamers and air horns and pop guns and confetti but, instead, it&rsquo;s more like I have to rap on the glass door with my car keys and awake Barney Fife to let us in while, somewhere across the 'burbs in a tony, leafy enclave, doctors sleep on 1,200 thread-count sheets and dream of sugar plumbs and timeshares.
Many fruitless hours later, your mother and this nurse (now nearing the end of her shift and the sun&rsquo;s arrival) mutually decide it&rsquo;s time to escalate the delivery and get the gosh darned doctor down here, stat.&nbsp; Upon conferring with the powers that be on the other end of the phone, the decision is made to perform a C-section and so, nearly a day after we arrived, your hornet of a mother is wheeled into the big show, a million dollar operating room with stage lights and enough machinery to silence Tim &ldquo;The Tool Man&rdquo; Taylor.
And then literally, within seconds, the doctor stands there, I am told to stand here, on this side of a vertical sheet and, blammo, your slippery body is placed in my arms.&nbsp; I am completely aghast&hellip;awed by the procedure&rsquo;s precision, the speed with which such a circuitous and arduous ordeal has reached its conclusion, and confused by the fact that this bowling ball has been handed to me so abruptly without requiring any training, testing or certification on my part.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here she is,&rdquo; the doctor pronounces, and the hands that dropped many a high school football are holding this squiggly and squirmy and stretching life form.&nbsp; Just like that, the old trope, &ldquo;Yeah, my parents dropped me on my head when I was a kid&rdquo; could have become your Chapter One.
Beyond your weight, I make two additional observations: your density is so high you must be made of lead!&nbsp; And your toes; you have your mother&rsquo;s toes!&nbsp; Eventually, your mother and I make it to a holding cell, you are zipped through the baby wash, and we are united for one sleepless day before I tape you in bubble wrap, insert you into a sheepskin-belted car seat with clicky buckle (NASCAR!), slip sunglasses and a tiny bonnet of your head (both of which might have come with a recently received doll), and drive you home in the right lane at 5 mph.&nbsp;
2002-2015&mdash; You are our constant companion.&nbsp; Constant.&nbsp; I learn to wash dishes and sterilize pumps with my eyes closed in the dark.&nbsp; You cry, we rock.&nbsp; Sleeping aids are purchased.&nbsp; A rotating nightlight that casts stars on the wall and plays &ldquo;Twinkle Twinkle&rdquo; becomes a prized possession.&nbsp; Pacifiers are to you as Precious is to Gollum.&nbsp; I learn what love smells like: Johnson &amp; Johnson baby lotion.&nbsp; Your foot-in pajamas are the cutest things ever, especially as you begin to outgrow them in every direction, testing the tensile strength of seams at your belly, shoulders and toes like a ripe caterpillar.&nbsp; What amounts to expensive and organic gruel and, a couple years later, messy spaghetti dinners followed by bath time are blasts.&nbsp; Round, chubby silverware and rubber-bottomed bowls, banged on a plastic tray by the short prisoner from atop her high chair is adorable.&nbsp; Your johnny jump-up, from which you dangle and prance and preen and spring upward into the air like a grinning madwoman in Cirque de Soleil brings tears of laughter to our eyes.&nbsp; Your crib, bassinette and our bed become, one after another and in rotation, fair game on any given night.&nbsp; We spy on you with a wavy first-generation B&amp;W camera and static-y eavesdropping monitor that looks like a walkie-talkie I had when I was nine and played &ldquo;Starsky &amp; Hutch.&rdquo;&nbsp; At ages four and five, we awake to find you swaying in your white nightgown while standing silently beside our bed; you are sleepwalking, we deduce, and it is freaky to the fourth power.&nbsp; Though you never do, I joke that one night you will surely bring us a steak knife, your shuffly walk accompanied by choppy violined horror music.&nbsp; Fortunately, you outgrow this nocturnal phase (sorta), become a world-class cuddler (entirely) and, several weeks after beginning kindergarten, have your first existential crisis.&nbsp; Having tucked you into bed and said our prayers together, I turn to leave the room and you ask, &ldquo;Is this all there is to life?&rdquo;&nbsp; I am momentarily dumbfounded&hellip;stunned&hellip;processing&hellip;and inquire what you mean.&nbsp; &ldquo;You know,&rdquo; you say, casual as khakis, &ldquo;getting up, brushing my teeth, sitting in plastic chairs all day long while a teacher talks at me?&rdquo;
From that moment &lsquo;til this, whether watching you at ballet, soccer, piano or beyond, I note the duality we all possess.&nbsp; Sometimes, it would seem that you are an adult, jaded and cool.&nbsp; Other times, you are huggy and warm and I am reminded that your life has just begun and a girl needs her dad.
You are a great listener, a sweet friend, and the most loyal movie-watching buddy.&nbsp; Your humor and comebacks rip your mother and me to shreds and your knowledge is profound and eclectic.&nbsp; You frequently correct me and question.&nbsp; We watch lots of the same shows, including &ldquo;ABC News,&rdquo; &ldquo;Charlie Rose,&rdquo; and &ldquo;Diners, Drive-Ins &amp; Dives&rdquo; featuring the perfectly charismatic Guy Fieri.&nbsp; You are witty, a strong speaker, and both figuratively and literally a tireless cheerleader.&nbsp; You are abundantly creative and if you set your mind to something, it&rsquo;s a done deal.&nbsp; Above all traits, however, you have the most innate moral compass I have ever witnessed, a conscientiousness that points so robustly and rudderfully and magnetically and incorruptibly northward that it is equally awe-inspiring and humbling.&nbsp; Like some zealous, inexplicably reincarnated puritanical Amish elder first born in 1850, you will be the equivalent of a seeing-eye-dog for one whose compass might be erratic or point too inward or south.&nbsp; Rather than hearing you say, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sorry, I shouldn&rsquo;t have,&rdquo; I usually find myself saying, &ldquo;Live a little, Lauren!&rdquo;
2015&mdash; You have the next decade of your life in mind, but I encourage you to savor your youth, to relish it.&nbsp; Do not worry about tomorrow.&nbsp; Remember what they say: worry doesn&rsquo;t take away today&rsquo;s troubles, it takes away today&rsquo;s peace.&nbsp; Nearly everything of significance begins with the decisions and choices one makes, whether proactive and volitional or reactive and in response to the curve balls life throws your way.&nbsp;
When you were seven or eight, I watched you tell your mother about a girl whom you didn&rsquo;t want to invite to your birthday party because every time she came to our house she stole more and more Polly Pockets.&nbsp; Dawn paused, knelt down very deliberately on her knees, stared purposefully into your big blue eyes and said, &ldquo;Choices have consequences,&rdquo; as if you had the vocabulary, wisdom and understanding of someone who would know what the heck that meant.&nbsp;
If I were wiped from the face of this earth like a bug off a windshield, I would have lived long enough to see that you, indeed, know exactly what that means.&nbsp; Just the other day I was brusque with someone and, in the moment, you were gracious and kind.&nbsp; Moments later you said to me, sure as a sensei, &ldquo;You hurt his feelings, Dad.&nbsp; You should say you&rsquo;re sorry.&rdquo;&nbsp; And so I did, and so shall you be fine.&nbsp; Better than fine, in fact, for you are becoming a fisher of men.
&nbsp;

Happy Thirteenth, Lauren!

This past Sunday night during the series finale of Mad Men, AMC previewed the <a href="http://www.stevejobsthefilm.com/#/">first official trailer</a> for Universal's forthcoming Steve Jobs biopic.&nbsp; Adapted from Walter Isaacson's book by Aaron Sorkin and directed by Danny Boyle, the film stars Michael Fassbender, Kate Winslet, Seth Rogen and Jeff Daniels, with much of the action taking place during three 30-minute scenes, each of which occurs backstage during three separate product launches.&nbsp; The film is rumored to culminate in 1998 with the launching of iMac.
I anticipate lotsa dense dialogue...
One can only hope Steve Jobs is as electric as Sorkin's The Social Network, avoiding the Sorkin curse of becoming too enamored with itself.
Its cast, in particular, has been a revolving door, but filming completed in April 2015, so the October release is certain and I, for one, look forward to an accurate telling of Jobs' life, both the good and the bad.
For those of you who like originals, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BNeXlJW70KQ">here's a great 20-minute documentary of Jobs in action</a> just ninety days after launching NeXT.
&nbsp;

Steve Jobs' Style

Hey there, faithful followers!&nbsp; I received the following note in my inbox this morning and thought I'd share.&nbsp; Folks are often asking me for book recommendations and because I enjoy the Heath Bros., I thought you might enjoy them&mdash;and their recommendations&mdash;too.&nbsp; Time to load up that Kindle for the summer vacays!
-blake
&nbsp;&nbsp;
* * *
&nbsp;
Greetings everyone,
Welcome to our erratically-published newsletter for readers of our books: Made to Stick, Switch, and Decisive.
As our long-time newsletter readers know, we rarely make book recommendations, because it can get dicey for us. We have a lot of friends who are authors, so calling out a few books is asking for trouble ("Hey, where's my recommendation? I thought we were friends!!"). We also try to avoid mutual-back-scratching situations, where we plug books in hopes that the authors will repay the favor someday. Bottom line: Both of us are old-school enough to believe that when we recommend something, we should really believe in it.
Below are some books we believe in. We gave ourselves three constraints in making recommendations: (1) The book must offer great *practical* advice. It might not be so captivating that it keeps you up at night, but it will deliver a big return on your investment of time; (2) The book must be a &lsquo;hidden gem&rsquo; &ndash; not something you&rsquo;ve seen 100 times at the airport; (3) We must avoid a &lsquo;conflict of interest&rsquo;&mdash;i.e., we&rsquo;re not friends with the authors or otherwise biased in their favor.
Given those three constraints, we came up with 7 books. Please read the descriptions carefully; these are not really &ldquo;general-interest&rdquo; books&mdash;they&rsquo;re more like specialized tools that will be absolutely perfect for 6% of you and irrelevant for the other 94%. Here goes:
1. Getting to Plan B: Breaking Through to a Better Business Model by John Mullins and Randy Komisar. This is a terrific book for entrepreneurs and entrepreneurial advisers. If you love Lean Startup, you&rsquo;ll love this. We both find ourselves teaching the analog, antilog, and &ldquo;leap of faith&rdquo; framework at least every month or two.
2. Inside the Box: A Proven System of Creativity for Breakthrough Results by Drew Boyd and Jacob Goldenberg. There is no shortage of creativity books in the world. Almost all of them include quick exercises that are fun to do in the moment. The strength of this book is its more robust and research-informed system for inspiring creativity. Good stuff.
3. The Complete Guide to Writing Questionnaires: How to Get Better Information for Better Decisions by David F. Harris. Again, this is not a general interest book. But if you need to write questionnaires that yield data you can trust, this is a must-read. Who knew questionnaires could go wrong in so many ways? And this book is actually more fun to read than it has any right to be. By the way, this is an expensive book and it should be; it is absurd to expect such specialized knowledge to cost the same as a Jack Reacher novel.
4. Sleeping with Your Smart Phone: How to Break the 24/7 Habit and Change the Way You Work by Leslie Perlow. We are puzzled by the title and cover of this book. Do NOT buy this book because you work late and obsessively check your iPhone at night. Rather, buy this book because you want to read a brilliant case study of how to improve the performance and sustainability of a team in a high-pressure environment. Our #1 takeaway: To have outstanding team performance, the team must build self-awareness&mdash;that is, a team must be good at what it does AND be able to have a dialogue about how to get better at what it does.&nbsp;
5. Alpha Project Managers: What the Top 2% Know that Everyone Else Does Not by Andy Crowe. If you want a book that keeps you reading until the wee hours of the night, read Presumed Innocent. If you want a book that draws distinctions between great project managers and mediocre ones&mdash;distinctions that may surprise you&mdash;read this one. One huge &ldquo;a-ha!&rdquo; for us: The alpha project managers are rated much more highly by their peers on communication, even though they don&rsquo;t spend any more time communicating. Want to know why? Read it.
6. Collaborative Intelligence: Using Teams to Solve Hard Problems by J. Richard Hackman. It&rsquo;s all too rare to find a book that does a good job blending academic research, practical experience, and concrete examples/stories. For teamwork, this is that book. If your job requires you to assemble high-performing teams and to equip them with the right tools for success, then drop everything and spend a half day reading Hackman&rsquo;s book.
7. [bonus] Scarcity: Why Having Too Little Means So Much by Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir. Confession: This is a technical violation of our standards on two grounds: Shafir and Chip shared the same graduate advisor so we do have a conflict of interest. Also, Scarcity does have many practical implications, but it is not a &ldquo;nuts &amp; bolts&rdquo; book like the other 6. Nonetheless, rules are made to be broken, and this is a book that we find ourselves thinking about frequently. The concept of &ldquo;tunneling&rdquo; was a huge eye-opener for us. If you loved Thinking Fast and Slow, you&rsquo;ll love this.
Hope you found this helpful. We'll watch the response rate to this email and if it seems like you're finding these tips useful, we'll plan to do a new list every year or two.
That&rsquo;s all for now -- enjoy your spring and we&rsquo;ll be in touch again sometime in the near (or distant) future.
Best,
Chip &amp; Dan Heath
&nbsp;

Summer Book Recommendations by The Brothers Heath

This past December, a precious friend of many retired after a quarter-century with the USDA Forest Service.&nbsp; A few weeks prior, a former co-worker of his (himself a recent retiree) contacted several of us inquiring whether we'd be willing to submit a few photographs or modest remembrances of said gentleman during his storied career with the Agency.
When I received the email and began internalizing the news, the wave of emotions that swept over me was really quite surprising.
On the one hand, gosh, I was so very happy for him.&nbsp; On the other, it signified the end of an era; one of many I&rsquo;ve experienced in the course of my own career.&nbsp; Of the gentleman, whom many affectionately called &ldquo;Guido,&rdquo; I wrote in part:
Guido&mdash;part emcee, part film historian, part entertainer, part A/V wonk, part moralist, part servant, part cheerleader, part storyteller, part prankster, part waiter, part confidant, part consigliere, all friend and all heart and all encourager and all leader&mdash;would rally us each morning, mic us every hour, guide us every step of the way, make connections we&rsquo;d never seen before, and encourage us as we concluded every exhausting evening.&nbsp; He was then, and is now (even more so, in light of his retirement), a National Treasure.
I have never known a human being with a more effortless combination of humility, authenticity, wisdom, wit and flat-out joy.&nbsp; In a world of disappointment and ne&rsquo;er do wells, Guido is the person who serves as North Star, reminding us that we are, indeed, here for a reason; we are, indeed, going someplace; how we live our lives does, indeed, matter.&nbsp; And perhaps equally important, there is a story to be told in there somewhere, and told well.
Eventually, I was to learn that more than 52 pages of content was received: paragraphs, anecdotes, mischievous recollections, full-blown stories&hellip;tributes, one and all&hellip;compiled into a document that was lovingly curated, laid-out, bound and presented at his retirement ceremony, which I was so terribly disappointed to have missed for reasons I can only attribute to inexcusable travel woes.&nbsp; I would have given my eyeteeth to have seen this beautiful human being receive his document, take it in his hands, weigh its meaning, rotate it this way and that and then&mdash;perhaps over the course of two or three nights thereafter&mdash;slip on his reading glasses and comb through the pages as his wife, Sue, sat by his side and elbowed him the ribs as if to say, &ldquo;See, I told you so.&rdquo;
Guido, like my own father and Oliver Warin, Dick Reynolds, Terry Millard, Ed Wingard, Lou Romero, Dalton Jantzen, Steve Buchholz or the dozen other gentlemen who entered my life at precisely the right time and made a particularly necessary impact on me for myriad reasons will be forever etched in my brain and branded on my heart.
I wish that each of them, and every deserving mentor, could receive a document as meticulously crafted as Guido&rsquo;s.&nbsp; I pray that each of them hears me when I say, &ldquo;Thank you.&rdquo;
I can think of few greater satisfactions than to arrive at the end of one&rsquo;s career or life and feel like, &ldquo;Yeah, I was here.&nbsp; I made a difference.&nbsp; I accepted and gave love, lived a life of faith and faithfulness, and will be forgiven my failures and remembered for my efforts.&rdquo;
Eventually, these bodies return to dust and, some years hence, our existence from this place will be all but expunged.&nbsp; There will come that day when the last person who knew us or was impacted by us will speak our name for the final time and, poof, whatever we were or thought we were or hoped to be is a story for another realm.
But until then, for the generation now and those that immediately follow, either through our blood or our behavior, may we do good works, remain steadfast, and positively impact as many as possible.
My personal hope is that I will die entirely empty.&nbsp; Dried up, having left everything on this field.&nbsp; Perhaps preceded by my phenomenal parents, a cousin or two, succeeded or not by a precious sister and remembered foremost in the minds of a beautiful bride and daughter and a few friends who overlooked my sizeable flaws and eccentricities and movie shenanigans.&nbsp; Folks whom I pray will be able to truthfully say as they lower me into the cool clay on a hot Dallas day, &ldquo;Yeah, he was here.&nbsp; He made a difference.&nbsp; He accepted and gave and persevered in faith and shall be forgiven, remembered and redeemed.&rdquo;
May we be so fortunate, right?&nbsp; Abundantly so.
As for Guido, you exemplar, may the balance of your years be the best yet and regaled as earnestly as those in Volume One.
It has been a privilege, my friend, and I wish you a restorative retirement.
&nbsp;

The Meaningfulness of Mentors

Another school year is coming to an end.&nbsp; Our daughter is so excited!
I am bummed.
Sure, I look forward to a trip or two, to the usual change of pace, routine and scenery.&nbsp; And, of course, the sense of relief and joy and levity that animates my daughter for the next couple months is a wonderful blessing.
But you know what?&nbsp; With the advent of summer, it seems that we all fall away.&nbsp; Folks and families head for the hills.&nbsp; There are vacations galore: road trips and flights and cruises and mountainhikes and beaches.&nbsp; The dress code changes considerably as kids squeeze into last summer's swimsuits and men don their goofy shorts and sandals.
Children braid their little bracelets, cut their hair, develop their tan, and parents and adults everywhere imbibe&mdash;while also keeping an eye on the calendar.&nbsp; Sure, it goes fast, but gosh, when will September be here?
The trough between Memorial Day and Labor Day is punctuated by Independence Day, but is otherwise a moonscape.&nbsp; People are hither and yon, running this way and that.
It&rsquo;s great, yeah.
But that falling away&hellip;the sojourns&hellip;the summer&hellip;it&rsquo;s always tough for me.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m an October-February kinda guy.&nbsp; I prefer the cool to the warm, and love being able to wear my jacket with all its pockets.&nbsp; The one where I can stash my phone and car keys and wallet and earbuds and kindle and whatnot, and not slosh around in baggy shorts and awkward flip-flops, slathered in sunscreen and bedecked in sunglasses and odd baseball cap.
No, I greatly prefer the chill.&nbsp; The early evenings, the darkening skies, the silence of snowfall, the sounds of high school bands practicing and plastic helmets clicking as two-a-days begin and football looms on the horizon.&nbsp; Baseball, basketball; you can have &lsquo;em.
Give me football, any day, and the Oscar race.&nbsp; Halloween and Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Years.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s my stretch; my spread.
As far as I&rsquo;m concerned, Valentine&rsquo;s Day marks the beginning of the end!
Gone is the sense of Christmas&hellip;or &ldquo;Winter Break,&rdquo; if you must.&nbsp; The &ldquo;something,&rdquo; anything, that motivates a few zealous folks to decorate their homes like crazy, to look out for one another, to shop a little, to give a lot, to sing carols offkey, to watch TV specials with aging stars, to eat pie and drink nog and unite as a family in some distant land of old while wearing ugly knitted sweaters.
Say what you will about the holidays&mdash;whatever yours may be&mdash;but my take is this: the end of the year brings with it a sense of national consciousness; a oneness.&nbsp; No matter our beliefs, our religions, our lack thereof, the year's end is a natural time for thanksgiving and reflection, and with the New Year that looms over each December, the holidays are also a time of hope and promise and potential.
I love the holidays.&nbsp; And I love Christmas.&nbsp; I feel like we&rsquo;re in something together, even when we're not.
Sure, I appreciate the irony and the hokum and the prestidigitation.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m not a complete idiot.
But for those few weeks&mdash;the ones that fall somewhere between mid-October and January 2nd&mdash;I feel like anything is possible.&nbsp; For everyone.
I&rsquo;ll enjoy my summer, but probably not as much as you.
I&rsquo;ll savor my time with my girls, my time with family, our trips with friends.&nbsp; And I&rsquo;ll appreciate and value the long days and warm sun on my pasty, vitamin D-deficient skin.
But God bless Christmas, and the moment I hear that marching band on the field up the road.
&nbsp;