New transformations
confront a common focus
creative freedom

Will not the good people respond to a united, and earnest appeal from us?

Can we, can they, by any other means, so certainly, or so speedily, assure these vital objects?

We can succeed only by concert.

It is not “can any of us imagine better?” but, “can we all do better?”

The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present.

The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion.

As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew.

We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.

Abraham Lincoln
Annual Message to Congress —
Concluding Remarks
Washington, D.C.
December 1, 1862

old shoes like old friends,
comfortable, as old shoes
new shoes, someday old

If there were things more comfortable than an old pair of shoes, the saying, “As comfortable as an old pair of shoes”, would not have lasted in the list of english language idioms.

Three pairs of low cut, white (at one point in their lives), leather Nike sneakers.

The first pair is at 30 years old with a white swoosh.

I sent a clerk (who was a Wiedeman if I remember) back into the storeroom at MC Sports to find ‘that old fashioned smooth leather look.

The second pair, with the black swoosh stripes, I think are about 10 years old and were a birthday present from my wife, I think the first year we were Georgia.

The last pair, my FRESH sneakers, were a birthday present this year.

They are free of the past snow and rains and mentioned in the book, Dandelion Wine, by Ray Bradbury.

” with this new pair of shoes, he could do anything, anything at all,” writes Bradbury.

And they have the potential to, one day, like friends who stick around, become old shoes.

Comfortable beyond belief.

As comfortable as an old pair of shoes.

Based on the time to takes to break these in, are they the last pair of sneakers I will need to buy?

huge trucks, left and right
north and south, run me over
daily life at work

The commute is bad enough but the real traffic problems often don’t start until I get to work.

Imagine a tic-tac-toe grid.

I am standing in center square and there is a land mine in all the other squares.

My first email of the day says, ‘take one step in any direction.’

Complicating the issue is the inbred all American feeling of work place justice.

A feeling that this situation isn’t right, it isn’t fair.

I don’t have to put up with this.

I am not going to put up with this.

The notion persists that THEY can’t treat me this way.

This is the country of The Caine Mutiny after all.

Young American Men, in a time of war yet, a national emergency, take on a petty tyrant and expose the injustice of their workplace situation, list the faults of their commander and triumph against the system.

Yeah, well kinda sorta maybe.

The movie shows the scene after the trial where Barney Greenwald confronts Tom Keefer and belittle’s Keefer’s and the other officers for their actions.

The book is a little more in depth on the after trial.

The verdict in favor of Steve Maryk and the other officers is vacated as a miscarriage of justice.

And this is somewhat overlooked, Willie Keith goes back to the USS Caine.

The same ship.

The same crew.

The same Navy.

The same rules and regulations.

Queeg was gone to be sure.

Consider this.

Had all the officers let go of their personal outrage and supported Queeg the best they could have, Queeg would have been moved along by the Navy.

I understand this.

What changed.

What was different.

I think I am watching the wrong movie.

Reading the wrong book.

Perhaps I should turn instead to the classic No Time For Sergeants.

The first night in boot camp, Sergeant King comes out to explain life in the military.

He says, “Well, I’ve been in for 18 years and it ain’t like you think it is at all.
It’s a quiet, peaceful life, if you mind your own business.
It’s like there was a big lake, nice and calm.
I’m in a canoe, you’re in another, the captain’s in a canoe and the colonel.
You know what you do if you report somebody or complain about somebody …or request something?
You make waves.
I hate to pull rank on you, but for your information … you got the smallest canoe in the whole lake.”

On the whole, this is a much better outlook for the modern american workplace.

I am writing it on my office wall as you read this.

Because tomorrow we are all back in our canoes out on the lake.