Head Stuffing

Life in this alternate universe

2026-04-12T11:12:00.002-04:00

Image credit ChatGPT

It’s been about a decade or so since I stopped writing regularly here for Headstuffing.

Life just changed.

A lot. Holy cow did it change. To the point where it seemed to be a parody of itself.

Yeah, that’s about the time that Donald Trump came along and won the 2016 election for U.S. President.

And that’s about the time we all collectively fell into this black hole and went spinning on through the worm hole and were spit out into this alternate universe.

Then we had the pandemic. The pandemic that terrified us to the point where we insisted it was true, that getting vaccinated was a pre-requisite to being alloed back into society as long as you worte a mask as well. To the point where now we all question just what really happened there?

Please don’t think I mean it wasn’t real – it was indeed real – but we do have to wonder how the hell it came to be that the whole world agreed to shut down.

And it did shut down.

And then it opened back up – but different. You experienced it as well. And I bet for each of us it was very different in very different ways – with vague commonalities – like working from home and finding old masks in winter jackets – and not being able to toss out that left over COVID test kit in the back of your bathroom cupboard under the sink.

When we did start going back to work in our physical office workplaces, I found myself asking those I hadn’t seen for the last year – much in the same way I would ask “how was your vacation?” or “Did you have a nice weekend?” – I would ask “So .,. how was your pandemic?”

Some would tell me about how incredibly stressed they were … others how bored … and others would tell me about the loved ones they lost … and yes … we lost a couple of our work colleagues as well.

And I would feel like a jerk, because when they would ask me, I would reply along the lines of … “Frigging great, I loved it! After my wife left me and that horrid relationship was finally over and me and my daughters started figuring out how we were moving ahead I met the most incredible wonderful woman – and we joined forces and went through the most wonderful global lock-down together!”

And we did. And that wonderful woman is now my wife. And the pandemic gave us the most unique opportunity to really get to know each other.

I guess that while this alternate universe – now a decade later – doesn’t seem to be very kind to our geo-political or economic wellbeing, it has in fact been a very wonderful decade for me and Jac. But right now at this moment – this week after Easter 2026, this week after the successful landing of the Artemis 2 space mission. This month after the U.S. attacks on Iran are spiraling out of control, our alternate universe seems to be heading to an apocalyptic event that none of us could have imagined, having survived the cold-war with the USSR. But now Russia’s attention is focused on Ukraine. And China seems to be sitting by quietly ready to take advantage of whatever opportunity such calamity could leave behind in it’s wake.

They say that each decision we make – each time where a choice exists – where more than one path is presented to each of us – that there is an alternate universe for each path or choice or decision we didn’t make or take.

I wonder which opportunity it was that brought me down this one.

Even if I knew, and even if I had that opportunity over again, I’ll tell you this quite sincerely ...

I wouldn’t change a thing.

The time on my hands

2020-07-19T12:18:00.000-04:00

What do you do with three weeks off?

That’s my conundrum today as I begin the longest summer vacation I have ever taken.

In this period of global pandemic, there’s no place to go.

When I made the decision to take these three weeks off, our plan was to travel as our new group of five – Jackie and her daughter Mackenzie, myself and my two daughters Alannah and Ashley-Rae. Her family in St. John’s Newfoundland had reached out to invite us all and we all agreed to jump at the chance of such an adventure.

An adventure for sure for me and the Brill Girls, but for Jac and Mackenzie it would be a great visit back home.

Jac was telling us all of the great sites we would see – like icebergs floating down past the oceans edge of town – and the beautiful rolling landscapes – and all the great people she loves that we would meet. And we all got excited. The pictures all look so beautiful.

“We’ll drive” explained Jac, “It’s a long drive but it’s all so beautiful. And we will ride the ferry overnight to the island province”.

“How long does the ferry take?” asked Alannah.

“About nine hours, and I hate boats”, laughed Jackie. “But we will be there for St. John’s three weeks of summer”

So I booked my three weeks and two days off from work or the long trip.

And then the pandemic got worse instead of better.

Now we have rules like wearing masks in public places and social distancing of six feet and social bubbles of no more than ten people and washing and sanitizing everything you touch.

Some of the provinces in our path out east instituted rules like if you enter that province you have to self-isolate for ten days before you can carry on with your trip. How would they be able to enforce that? I don’t know. Do I want to find out? No – not with the kids with us anyway.

It would have been adventure though - like the old Smokey and the Bandit movie. Only we would be the illegal cargo instead of Coors beer.

Imagine us driving down the Trans-Canada highway – reaching a roadblock at the Quebec – Nova Scotia border – a Gleeson-like provincial police officer complete with polaroid sunglasses standing in the middle of the highway with a bullhorn for us to pull over, and Jackie swerving to the right to heading for a flatbed trailer parked on the shoulder with its rear end down on the ground – like the perfect jump ramp – and Jackie shouting to us all to “hang on – this is going to be fun”.

“Yeee-Hawww” I would shout as the SUV flew through the air.

After the airborne Dodge Durango landed with a couple of bounces, she would have to lose the RCMP chasing us on horseback she would ride down into the valley of the median and up the other side of the highway that people heading west would use – swerving between the oncoming traffic – and the moose and elk that just naturally wander out on the highway.

That would be an adventure.

“Now that’s just stupid” Jackie will say when she reads this.

“I don’t know”, I’ll reply “you’re a pretty crazy driver”

“But now we will never know” I would say before she had a chance to get mad.

Besides, the police would have caught us at the ferry anyway.

So now I’m trying hard to think of what to do for fun on this three weeks of vacation.

“Work on your house Fred” everyone will say.

Everyone will say that.

And everyone would be right. I have a list so long of all the things I need to do – both inside and out. De-tangling it from the past to open it up to the future. Rooms to clear out and carpets to clean or pull out and replace with other flooring. The garage is a horrible collection of things sat down quickly to get them out of the car or another room in the house. A couple of trees to cut down or pull out on the north side of the house. An old car to clean up and sell. A spare room downstairs to clean out to use as my work-from-home office in three weeks’ time. Painting and multiple trips to the dump.

The list is daunting. Overwhelming in fact.

Well, the problem of what to do is solved.

I wonder if three weeks is enough?

You don’t mess with the Brill Girls

2020-07-12T16:45:00.000-04:00

Last year, my youngest daughter Ashley-Rae was determined to update her old iPhone to a newer one.

She saved her money for a couple of months and kept her eyes peeled online for a deal. Finally, by the fall she had saved up enough to buy an almost new model and she found a guy online who had what she was looking for. Ash negotiated the sale with the guy online and then came running out to the living room where I was watching television.

“Dad you have to take me over to Jake's Roadhouse for 6:00 pm” she said excitedly.

“Why?” I replied in my typical Dad fashion.

Ashley explained her desire for a new iPhone, how it was the most important issue on the planet, how hard she worked to save her money, and showed me a couple of pictures of the one she found. She was talking so fast she kept running out of breath and would take a deep breath and continue on speaking way to quickly understand some of the important parts.

So I asked her to tell me again – slowly – so that I could understand her and so she wouldn’t pass out in mid-sentence.

She rolled her eyes as if I’m the dumbest Dad in the world and began again – only this time more slowly.

We held the regular discussion about how expensive it was and was she sure she wanted to throw all her money she worked so hard for at this. And of course, being the most important thing in the world – she assured me it was. She then explained – slowly – the arrangement to meet in the parking lot of Jake's Roadhouse.

Skeptically – I agreed. And we hopped in the car to drive to the other side of town to Jake's Roadhouse.

Halfway there – on route – Ashley received a text on her perfectly good old iPhone from this seller guy.

“Dad – he says to meet him at the Smoke and Spice instead”.

“huh” I replied. It’s just down the street but my skepticism was growing.

We arrived at the Smoke and Spice rib joint and she texted the seller guy that we were here. A couple of minutes later – a well-groomed bearded fellow in a silk patterned shirt appeared in the lot – walked past our car noticing us on the way by. He opened his back door and pulled out an iPhone box. Ash and I got out of the car together as he approached. He held out the phone – till wrapped in plastic – and handed it to Ashley-Rae. She in return handed him her savings.

I reached out my hand to shake his and said softly but firmly to the seller guy “she’s worked very hard and saved a long time for that money – if this isn’t legit then I will find you”.

“It’s legit” he said with a smile and handed me a business card for a mobile phone shop in town. “You can always reach me here”.

When we got home – Ashley-Rae took the phone out of the box and started the instructions for setting it up. When it got to the point of putting in the SIM card, her SIM card was not being accepted in the new phone. So we hopped back in the car and took it to the store where Ashly-Rae bought her phone plan. An older fellow my age was working. He fumbled with it for about a half hour and then confessed “I don’t really know how to do this, can you bring it in tomorrow when the manager is here? He will fix it in no time”.

I had to work the next morning but my eldest daughter Alannah promised to bring her.

That morning, while I was at work, I received a phone call from Alannah.

“Dad, the guy here at the store says the phone is stolen”.

“How does he know that?” I asked.

“The serial number on the box is on a list of stolen phones”, replied Alannah.

I reached in my wallet and pulled out the business card the fellow had given me.

“I’ll take a drive over to this guy’s store later and find out what’s going on!” I replied.

“No Dad, I got this. Send me a picture of the card” said Alannah firmly. I did so and sent it to her phone.

“Don’t you be confronting this guy alone. Go to the police” I said.

“We’re on our way there now Dad”.

”I’m walking into a meeting now – but keep me posted okay?” I said.

I was hosting this meeting so I set up the room’s video conference to call the rest of our team in Toronto. Our team had been working together for a couple of years together so while we waited for all the participants to gather in each meeting room, I told them the story of the stolen phone. All agreed it was horrible and showed interest in the dilemma. I told them Alannah was taking Ashley-Rae to police department –and all agree that it was likely useless. And then we dove into the agenda of the meeting.

About fifteen minutes later I received a text message.

’The LaSalle police weren’t interested. Heading to the Windsor police station now’ read the message.

I told the attendees of the meeting the status update and we continued through our work session.

Another fifteen minutes later another text message arrived.

‘A lady officer at the Windsor Police was interested but couldn’t leave right now. So we are heading to the mobile phone store.’

Again I conveyed the message to the group and after a few minutes of discussion – all agreed this was more interesting than our working session. But we continued on with our work. And again fifteen minutes later – I received another message:

‘The guy who was working at the store said this guy doesn’t work there, but he told us he works at the Volkswagen dealership down the street.’

Twenty minutes later my iPhone rang. “It’s Alannah” I announced to the group.

“Put it on speaker phone – please” they all chanted.

“Hey Alannah what happened?” I asked into the phone.

She told me it was done and I asked her ”Can I put you on the speaker? I have a room full of people all dying to know how this turned out!”

“Sure!” said Alannah proudly. So I hit the speaker button and put it next to the video conference microphone.

And Alannah told the story:

“Ashley texted the fellow and told him the phone was stolen and we were outside with the stolen phone. Ashley told him either he comes out in the lot now or we are coming in and we will make a big noise about it.”

“Hold on”, said the guy.

Shortly the same bearded seller guy appeared from the mechanic’s bay of the dealership. Ashley-Rae and Alannah got out of the car and yelled ‘OVER HERE!’. The seller guy ran to his car. He grabbed a couple of boxes and came over to Ashley-Rae.

“I’m so sorry about this” he said. And he gave Ash two boxes – one was for the newest larger size iPhone in red and the other was a wireless charger. And he asked for the old phone box back.

Ash opened up the old phone box – took out her SIM card and said ‘Make the new one work first!’

The fellow unwrapped and opened the new iPhone box, started it up, answered the few questions on the screen and then put the SIM card in.

“It worked Dad!”

The whole meeting team in Windsor and Toronto erupted in a cheer.

“What was that Dad?”

“That was both Windsor and Toronto rooting for you guys” I replied proudly. “Well done”.

And the rest of two sides of the meeting chimed in with “Way to go!”, “That’s so great!”, and ”Great Job Honey!”

“Thanks!” said Alannah, “You don’t mess with the Brill Girls”.

Just like falling off a bike

2020-06-28T13:51:00.004-04:00

I’m trying very hard to return to writing my stories here on headstuffing.

My problem is that there is just too much to say. The world has gotten so strange.

“Just write”, I tell myself. “Just write something”.

You have to start somewhere right?

“Just get back into it”.

Just start typing a bunch of words and it will all come back to you – like falling off a bicycle – right?

What? It’s supposed to be “like riding a bicycle – not falling off one?”

Okay – well which is easier? Falling off, right? No? Well you must be pretty good at it then.

When I fall off a bike the thought before I hit the ground is always “… man this is going to hurt”.

And it always does.

But I’m not going to write about falling off a bike. That would simply be a waste of everybody’s time. Mine and yours. Hell, you probably already stopped reading.

“But what CAN I write about?”, I ask myself.

“I could write about Trump?”

See there’s a problem right there. That’s all anybody talks about anymore.

It’s way too easy to discuss Donald Trump. And it’s way too difficult. How could you come up with anything new that the late-night talk show guys or the political pundits on both sides haven’t already come up with?

Well, let me give it a whirl.

I’m a John McCain conservative.

“We don’t like John McCain because he lost the election – to Barack Obama” say the Trump base. The newly proclaimed “conservatives”.

“He lost because he ran with Sarah Palin” I reply.

“But we love Sarah Palin” reply the Trump base.

And this makes you come to a level of understanding. We should have seen this whole Trump era ushered in when the Republican Party got behind Sarah Palin. “I Can see Russia from my back yard [in Alaska]” – that Sarah Palin.

Ahhhh ….

John McCain was a war hero. He was a prisoner of war (which is Donald Trump’s reason for disliking him – because he got caught). He knew how to reach across party lines, and get stuff done. That used to be considered a huge positive attribute for a politician. To work together with a colleague of a completely polar opposite point of view to come to a mutual agreement to pass a bill that benefits both sides of that opposite polarity boundary. A win-win result.

We used to call it compromise. A negotiation to a positive conclusion. But now we call it concessions. I looked it up the word compromise in an old Webster’s dictionary from 1978 that I keep still on my bookshelf and it read: “To reach an agreement of mutual benefit by two opposing sides”

Then I looked up the definition on-line. This is what popped up:

“an agreement or a settlement of a dispute that is reached by each side making concessions.”

Concession means ‘give up’. To Concede. Not exactly a positive win-win mentality anymore.

So now, to compromise Is now to concede or give up your position.

And that’s sad.

Both sides of the political spectrum now believe this. And the negotiation tactics of the day reflect this. The left and the right. It either has to be all the way to the left or all the way to the right. The negotiation tactics of today are that there will be no negotiation with “the other side”.

You have to pick a side, they will say. And if you’re not with us then you are against us.

And the pendulum swings back and forth faster than ever before and the faster it swings the higher the end of the pendulum reaches at each swing. More extreme. Because those in the middle of each “your either with us or against us” side keep switching sides because the other side swung just a little to far on that last swing.

Right?

No Left – No right – damn it’s left again, wow did we ever go right, Holy cow the next swing left will really be extreme – and the next swing right even higher.

The momentum of it is hard to stop.

But we have to figure out how to slow this political pendulum down. We need this pendulum to spend more time in the middle.

Or civil war is going to break out.

And this swing of the pendulum is not just “an American condition”. It’s global. You see it across the world.

Look around the globe. Look at the places where the pendulum doesn’t swing it all. It always stays locked in the extreme position. Places like Iran and China. Places like Russia and North Korea to name only a few. Their political pendulums are stuck so high that if it swung on a clock face the pendulum would be frozen at one or eleven o’clock.

Notice that these places are all the same places led by regimes where the leadership in control will stop at nothing to enforce their ways? They concede only the bare minimum to avoid a populous overthrow – like we saw in the Asian Spring era earlier in this decade. And they enforce with an iron fist.

But they all eventually fall. All that hold too tightly to power eventually lose their grip – and fall to their demise. The higher up the pendulum, the farther the drop.

Left or right. It doesn’t matter. And Those on the left will say the examples I gave above are all on the right. And those on the right will disagree and say those examples are all on the left.

No negotiation. No compromise.

Compromise means concession now, remember?

And this has happened throughout history. The result has always meant the downfall of every civilization that has come before. Every empire before us has fallen or greatly diminished to less dominant state.

Power will shift. But to others who simply want to attain the control. Sometimes on the same side of the pendulum, and sometimes all the way to the other side.

At some point we have to re-embrace the original definition of compromise. We have to get back to looking for win-win solutions to our problems.

We all have to recognize each other again. Or maybe we all need to start recognizing each for the first time?

It should be as easy as riding a bike. All it takes is balance, eh?

But if we can’t find our balance, we will fall off that bike.

And if we all fall off, man is that going to hurt.

Crazy Times

2020-05-10T14:16:00.003-04:00

It’s a beautiful day here on this 2020 Mother’s Day.

The world seems so green and lush and healthy with the deep blue of a clear sky, the yellow rays of sunlight and the colours of the flowers springing up through the ground.

It’s hard to believe the world is sick.

Well, not the planet - but the global population of humans that inhabit our world remain under a stay in place isolation order of varying degrees.

It’s crazy.

You’re living through all of this too, so I won’t bore you with those details you already know.

As for our little family, a lot has changed.

My wife Darlene and I have have separated now for two years, amicably and there is no reason for anyone to shed a tear on our behalf, as it has a been a very positive experience for all.

My two little girls - Alannah and Ashley-Rae are now 19 and almost 18 respectively and have both become quite accomplished young women in their own rights.

And some eight months ago I met one of the most special people I have ever known and fallen madly in love with her in the process.

During the last nine weeks of pandemic self-isolation I have been working from home, my laptop set up with three monitors and a keyboard in the corner of the living room, with the honour and pleasure of working with a fantastic team on one of the most exciting projects of my career - using Microsoft Teams and Zoom to collaborate we meet online several times a day.

Alannah has successfully completed her first year of college, and Ashley-Rae participates in online classes and course material for the remainder of her senior year. If anyone in our house has suffered from the self-isolation mandate during this pandemic it has been Ashley-Rae. Her Senior Year Prom cancelled, her final year of both high school softball and dance team competitions eliminated, she, like most other high school seniors is constantly impacted by a string of disappointments.

The next disappointment is likely to be the cancelation of this summer’s travel fast-pitch softball schedule. The majority of the team’s schedule slated to play in both Michigan and Ohio in a time when the opening of the U.S. - Canada border to non-essential traffic seems highly unlikely until at least the fall, it appears apparent that this season will be another casualty,

Given my age nearing sixty, my daughters have mandated I do stay home - no shopping - no visiting - except to visit Jackie and her daughter Mackenzie - who is the same age as my two daughters - I am now homebound.

I’ll admit I spend a lot of time with Jackie, either at her beautiful home a few miles away, or here at our modest little homestead.

But there is so much unsettled in our world right now.

There are a lot of questions that will be decided by the laws of economics as the world awaits the opportunity to reopen after this shut down.

Will we ever return to a normal office work-life again is will it be the new norm to work from home? Given that there will likely be a six-foot separation rule when businesses try to move back their traditional workplaces - will that reduced optimization of office space make I cheaper to have staff work at home? What will the productivity rates of people working from home be?What will these shifts really mean to our local, provincial, national and global economies?

Will we ever enjoy going to restaurants, movie theatres, shopping malls and such places ever again? What happens to music concerts and professional sports events now?

Or will we simply open up and go back to life exactly as we left it?

To me, it comes down to confidence levels - at several levels. From the global level to open up borders depending on national confidence levels, the more local levels to determine what the safest number of people to gather in one place will be, and our individual confidence that interacting with our world is safe enough yet.

But certainly there is still great opportunities out there for those who have the skills to chase them. We are already seeing some - such as delivery services - from food to purchases - even entertainment. And the realization that we reached our technology level just in time.

And other new opportunities will arise - the most notable in my mind is to offer the skill to help companies and corporations figure out how they will pivot their business practices to survive in this new world.

But will we see the end of professional sports? The end of arena sized music and entertainment concerts? The Theatre? Will we ever again celebrate events with parades and fireworks? And how can the way we take care of our senior citizens change - because nursing homes and long term care facilities definitely need to be overhauled.

What can we afford to do?

Who knows? I don’t. But I suspect we will never again be able to feel comfortable in large crowds - at least not without masks and gloves?

But I think it’s safe to say that if your industry supports health care, delivery of goods, or any kind of internet based transactions or home improvement services, you are likely to boom after this. But manufacturing has no option but to further automate using robotics.

Our world - I believe - will be different.

And I hope that the impact to your world is more positive than negative.

The next question though - when this is all over - will be “did we handle this right?” A lot of retrospective about self isolation and personal distancing will happen - after the crisis - after we are immunized - if we are ever immunized. There will be a lot of finger pointing and blaming. And the current great divide between the left and the right will likely grow larger - as will the divide between the have’s and have not’s. And conspiracy theories - already appearing - will fire dispute in that each will claim that the other is lying or covering something up.

And the scientists will be monitoring closely how this incredible reduction in human activity has allowed this planet we live on to heal. That should be interesting. Or even more concerning - depending on what we find out.

It’s bound to happen.

It’s who we are.

And these are crazy times.

Rolling Around the Sun

2018-08-20T12:45:00.000-04:00

This big blue waterlogged rock of ours keeps spinning around the sun.

I guess this means that time just keeps moving forward, one second after the previous one. Baby steps along.

It did so before we got here. It will continue to do so after we leave.

I find time so fascinating. It is the only man made invention that was here before we got here and will continue long after we are gone to no longer measure it. Even long after our water logged rock and our blazing sun. Even after the Milky Way galaxy that our sun orbits is gone.

It hurts my brain to think about this.

Time that I am speaking of is the measurement of consecutive moments and knowing where we are in that measurement.

Others – much smarter than I – talk about it as an entity – relationship with and a dependency on gravity. The stronger the density of gravity – the quicker time passes – supposedly proven by using atomic clocks to compare time between the earth’s highest peaks and at sea level, several nanoseconds of difference between the two.

Is that really proof, or a flaw in the mechanics of an atomic clock?

I think of this as people I know and love pass away. It’s part of that conceptual question of “what happens when we die?”

Do we continue to exist? Or is it the same thing as turning off and unplugging the living room lamp?

Well, I certainly am no Einstein.

But all things of nature are so perfectly designed. Perfectly balanced. Perfectly fit to fulfill a role. Leaves on trees stretch out to receive the sun, or collect the rain. Seeds from those trees dispersed by wind or animal or both to extend be reborn after the parent tree dies, and rots away, becoming the nutrients needed for the next generation of all things around it.

So why would our being – our soul – be any different?

We have no math to prove it. No scientific experiment to shed even a hope. We do have legends, and antidotal accounts that demand it is true. Our religions tell us it is true. But we have nothing scientific to back it up.

Our existence on this planet, our cognitive awareness that we are here and our interaction with the world and the thoughts – thoughts is the key word – our perception of what we see and smell and taste and feel, combined with our emotional responses – that’s what makes us … us.

It’s brilliant. So if everything else produced by nature is regenerated again – lakes to gas to clouds to rain to water as food to lakes again as an example why would we just assume that the lights go off when we die?

That seems too easy an answer. But scientifically it is the only conclusion we can make so far.

We have no data to support anything else.

I used to have a boss named Bob. Bob would never say that we didn’t know anything or couldn’t do anything without adding the word “yet” to the end of the sentence. It was always a challenge to learn. The subtle instruction was “go figure it out”.

I loved working for Bob.

And I don’t believe the lights go off at the end. Maybe our consciousness doesn’t continue in a manner that remembers the existences before – maybe it all gets rewired – re-used somehow. Maybe we do get planted elsewhere. Around and around again and again – waiting for the right opportunity to develop to exist.

Just like our big rock spinning around the sun, once molten lava, then drenched with water, then frozen, then thawed, then green with life and then the next thing – whatever it may be. And whatever it may be again after that. And after that again.

We just really don’t know … yet.

And before I close this – please do not pummel me with comments about heaven or hell or reincarnation. Those are ideas, perhaps even theories. And their truth to you is directly related to the amount of faith you have in those beliefs.

I am not here to debate or even question your faith. Honest.

I’m just reiterating that as a collective, we don’t know …

Yet.

But when we pass away, then will we know?

I sure hope so.

Conceding the Gap

2017-09-02T11:59:00.000-04:00

It’s interesting how the generation gap makes itself evident every once in a while.

Sometimes it’s even kind of awkward.

One evening after work last week, I was unwinding with a drink, my iPad, and a Bluetooth speaker on the back deck by the pool. I have tons of old music loaded on a media server that sits in the living room, but no matter how much music I add, I never seem to find the music I am in the mood for at a given moment. I never really know what I'm in the mood to hear until I hear it.

Such was the case this evening.

So I switched the setting of my app to simply play random selections in “shuffle mode”.

One song comes up from a live Bruce Springsteen concert album. You can hear the cheers and crowd noise in the background and then the base guitar kicks in hard with a familiar repeating riff interrupted by the smash of drum and cymbals between each. And then the Boss starts in …

I’m driving in my car …

I turn on the radio …

I start pulling you closer …

At that point my youngest daughter Ashley-Rae comes out, bored from a summer day with nothing to do, and sits down beside me.

“Ash, this is a great great tune … listen …” I said to my fifteen year old who thinks music before 2012 is too old to be bothered with.

I hit the double arrow icon on the tablet to start the song over. The crowd noise rises again as it did before, and Ashley-Rae sits patiently to humor me.

I’m driving in my car …

I turn on the radio …

I start pulling you closer …

But you just say No ….

You say you don’t like it …

But I know you’re a liar …

Because when we kiss … ohhhh …

Fire …

“Dad, is this song about rape?” asks Ashley-Rae.

“Huh? What? No …. No no no”, I stammer … shocked at this twist, not sure if she’s teasing me or seriously asking. “No this about when a man … you know … and he thinks the girl is playing hard to .. you know …”

And I stopped.

“Dad, no means no”.

“Uh yeah – yes it absolutely does … “ remembering my audience is my very pretty fifteen year old daughter that I am very proud to hear say this back to me.

“So is this song about rape?”

At that moment the neighbor lady across the corner came to the back gate announcing her arrival with “Hellloooo?”

Perfect timing. I jumped up and hurried my way to the arbor gate and let her in. She was asking to borrow a garden tool. I found it surprisingly quickly in the shed and as I was handing it to her I asked “Hey do you remember an old Springsteen song … “I’m driving in my car …”

“I turn on the radio …” she continued and she sang the next two lines as she did a little dance.

“Ashley-Rae just asked me if that song is about rape …”

The nice neighbor lady looked up at me surprised. “huh?” and she started to sing the next lines … “ohhh … gee … I don’t know … it’s such a great song … how do you handle that?”

At that moment that I realized that whether or not we thought it was a great song or not didn’t matter.

“ASH” I yelled, hoping she was still outside.

“Oh hi miss Melinda”, she said as she appeared around the corner.

“I asked miss Melinda, and she agreed that the song is about rape”, I said and the nice neighbor lady played along by nodding, accepting her new stance, understanding why.

“Okay” said Ash as she spun back around to go back in the house. “Too bad though, it’s a pretty good song”.

Oh and Four and a Wedding

2017-08-22T19:22:00.000-04:00

My daughters’ fastpitch softball has been over for about a month now. The season ends way too soon for me.

This was the year they would have more talent than any other year before. A team of strong bats, and team of strong defensive players. But for some reason the team never got on that roll we were all waiting for.

Both my daughters played for this team.

A team of 16 year old's with the exception of my daughter Ashley-Rae who didn’t turn 15 until the final week of the provincial championships.

Ash had a break out year, earning outright the second base position. And moving up to the top half of the batting order. She made clutch hits, she made clutch plays.

Alannah – my eldest – did not pitch her best this year. She blamed a tough school year, her new part-time job, and my inability to catch her pitching practice due to a leg infection I fought off the first half of summer.

Excuses. Teenage girls.

There were some highlights – at least for me as a sideline dad.

There was the beautiful double plays from Alannah at third to Ashley-Rae at second to McKay at first. I got one of them on video – well – I have the ground underneath the plays on video – I was too busy watching.

There was Alannah’s home run – which I also have on video – a hard swing at a fastball up around the letters she caught square on the barrel. In the video it looks effortless – all she was looking for was a line drive for a base hit, but it flew over the right center field fence with barely an arc.

There was another game in Toledo – the girls playing an elite Michigan team – down by three – with Ashley-Rae hitting a line shot off the fence in left field to bring in two runs – followed by Alannah hitting a line drive the opposite way to right off the fence to bring in two more – one of them being Ash.

Great moments for this Dad.

In my years of being a Dad on the sidelines I have mastered the ability to cheer humbly for such things – cheering for the team, not for my girls – I do that privately with them when it’s over. And never to be the loudest parent cheering. The humbler the better.

This year we also had some coaching challenges. One of the coaches was the boyfriend of the manager. Our manager was and still is a great player in her own right in her own day, and just now coming into her own with this squad of four years together. I hold her in the highest regard. One day she was running the bases as the team was working on those “where to throw the ball under what circumstances” situation defensive skills sessions. In a run down, one of the girls tried to make her throw too quick and caught the manager right in the mouth. A hard thrown ball, the manager couldn’t hide her pain. As she went to the side to recover, the boyfriend coach gathered the group into the middle and used every swear word in the book to chew the group out for this accident.

Every word you could imagine was used.

Every parent attending behind the fences heard every word of the obscenity lased diatribe strung together as only swearwords can be that makes no sense but gets the anger across.

That was never forgotten.

In the following weeks – one night sitting outside the hotel in Toledo, I asked the boyfriend coach about this over a beer.

“I have been to many clinics and workshops and listened to many great coaches talk about being a great coach”, he said justifying, “and they all say that you should be very supportive during games – but a real prick in practice”.

“And you think this works then?” I inquired – suggesting he should re-think his pontification.

“I have coached elite boys in hockey and baseball …” he started.

“I have coached and raised girls”, I replied, “and that shit don’t work with girls”.

“Well it’s getting late”, he said, and went back inside.

I tried.

We had yet another challenge this year as well. My wonderful cousin whom I consider a niece although she considers me a cousin was getting married. We received the invitation the summer before, and my girls – never having been to a wedding yet – were very excited. The date was a Sunday in late July.

It was in Kitchener, Ontario.

Shortly after we received the wedding invitation, the date was announced for the next provincial grand championships. It was that same weekend – the final games to be played on that Sunday. But which town in Ontario was going to host them was still unknown.

“It’ll work out – it always does” I told the girls, because it’s true.

In late April the decision was made that the Grands would be held in Stratford – a tiny town known to the world for its Shakespearean plays … and yeah … it’s the home of Justin Bieber.

Stratford is only 45 minutes away from Kitchener. And since hotels in Stratford in the summer are so hard to get – we would stay in Kitchener.

“There ya go”, I said to the girls.

“Great Dad, but we will be playing Sunday, we are better team this year, and we always make it to the Sunday final bracket”.

“It’ll work out”, I promised. “It always does”.

The week before Grands, the girls played in a warm-up tournament in Brantford, Ontario, the home of The Great One … Wayne Gretzky.

At sometime early in that tournament the coaches were warned for “chirping the umps” from the bench. It was the boyfriend coach – the one who was being supportive of the girls during games. Balls and strike and safe and out calls were all being questioned.

After that first game, the team received a “bench warning” sometime during that first inning of each game following. The word was out, the umpires were not putting up with this guy.

Games were played – more lost than won, and we exited Branford early Sunday morning.

The next weekend – we headed to Stratford.

The truck was loaded down with ball equipment and canopies and lawn chairs and coolers and medical bags and suitcases – and dress bags and make-up kits and suit bags. Twice our normal cargo – because we had a big wedding to go to.

The first inning of the first game, our pitcher was throwing fine, but no strikes were getting called on close pitches. The boyfriend coach chirped. The bench warning was administered. These were the same umpires from last weekend.

The Saturday afternoon game came due. The girls had to win this game to earn a spot into the Sunday bracket. A record of three losses and no wins of course put them below the cut-line. A win here might still get them in to the bottom seed.

In the first inning – they hit our starting pitcher hard, and after she took a hard line drive off the knee cap, she was done and injured on the bench. Alannah came into pitch – knowing that she would not get a strike called unless she threw it right down the middle of the plate. Balls on the corners, drop balls and risers were all called balls. So as hard as she could she threw fastballs down the middle. And they hit her all over park too.

Finally the boyfriend coach said something about a pitch that caught the inside corner. The ump stepped from behind the plate and took two steps towards the dugout and said “It was this far inside“, holding his fingers an exaggerated distance apart.

“Sure it was” mumbled the boyfriend coach.

“You’re outta here!” screamed the ump who whirled around with his arm in the air.

The manager stepped out to try to talk to the ump – but before she got both feet on the field he whirled back around and yelled “You too!”

With both the manager and the boyfriend coach gone, our remaining two coaches – both with more experience alone had than most of the opposing managers and coaches in the tournament, led our girls to a comeback – rallies were countered by the other team’s rallies. Great defensive plays on both sides. And the gap was being closed by our girls. But no close calls went our way, and the strike zone for our pitchers remained the size of a keyhole. And in the end – our girls fell short. But not for lack of trying, and not for lack heart.

And it was over. They were done on the Saturday afternoon.

And in the car, Alannah muttered “well, at least we know we can go to the wedding”.

“I told you it would work out darlin’, it always works out.”

The wedding was awesome, but that deserves a story of its own.

The Smoke Obscuring the Horizon

2017-08-16T02:17:00.002-04:00

Where there’s smoke, there’s confusion.

North Korea is threatening. So is Iran. The Middle East tensions are now global. Racial tensions have reached a boiling point again. Something’s up with Russia, but for now it's speculation.

And our climate is changing.

And the rich are getting richer.

The history revisionists have their quills wet with ink, wanting to rewrite what the world already went through to make it more palatable to the masses.

Where there’s smoke there’s fire. And man, there’s a lot of smoke.

Man there’s a lot of confusion right now.

Where there’s confusion, people make blind choices. The smoke of the confusion is blinding.

Blind choices make one search out a side to join. There is safety in numbers. You have to say you agree with one side or the others views – facts are dismissed as alternate facts – you have to buy in before you can join a side.

Man the water is really murky. The media forces the people to make murky choices.

You either like team CNN or you like team Fox News. Or you have given up on both.

You read, but the papers and the new media of the internet make you choose the same teams.

People who were moderate now are taking firmer stances on the left or the right – succumbing to the forces pushing them there.

The common definition of what is right and just is now not accepted as right and just for some. The Alternative Truth. Ignorance is complimented by laziness. Thinking is just too hard. People beg to be told what to think.

The real truth lies somewhere down the middle – and we all know that. But to go with the flow, the path of least resistance takes one down the road in quest of the approval of the side you chose, you dismiss what you know as reasonableness.

Reasonableness is just not sexy. Reasonableness doesn’t sell.

Extreme sells.

Say all this took place on a stage. A world full of actors. A global play, or a global wrestling match and the world is the ring. Twists and turns of plot. Overacted and deliberate but grandiose wresting moves and dirty foul play.

It all makes reasonableness look boring.

But say you could look down on this stage. Remove yourself from the scene. Perch yourselves above it all – sitting on a rock in a cool breeze as you watch the world unfold. And you quietly contemplate what it is you are really witnessing.

Is this the start of the end?

The pot on the stove is starting to boil over.

People are pissed. On both sides. All over the world. People have had enough of what was. They want what should be – again based on the side you have chosen to dictate what should be.

Is this the crossroads that will determine what kind of people we become? Yes.

Does America traverse this crossroads alone? Or do we all get caught up in the wake. Do we all go through this metamorphous together, or do we all change based on how the falling dominos impact us directly.

We all go through it together.

What will this world look like when we come out of this change? What is the world my daughters will grow up in?

Will this world make it through this?

There’s a lot of rash threats flying around out there.

And there’s a lot of people vying for attention.

All thoughts are now broadcast worldwide in a mere second. Twitter and Facebook and Instagram are the new network news. And everyone is an anchorman.

The world now truly is a stage. And yes, we are now truly are all actors.

But I wish I could read ahead in the script and see how this all ends.

But it’s just too damn smoky and too damn murky.

The masses will follow the path of least resistance. You see the path, it always flows downhill. If the flow builds up to much speed it will crash at the bottom.

And then, only then, will the world come to a more common conclusion.

Ode to the Eccentric Computer Programmer

2016-06-18T14:22:00.000-04:00

I’ve been in the IT industry for 30 years now.

The most memorable people I have worked with have been software developers.

I’ve seen the change from guys wearing white short-sleeve dress shirts with pen protectors in their breast pocket and thick black rim glasses punching holes in cards and running them through card readers to compile the code to run on the only computer in the company or institution, to guys wearing ear-bud headphones listening to their playlist of death-punk rock as they pound out code on the keyboard and reviewing it on the top middle monitor out of six that wrap around their workstation.

And while it seems like these guys are totally different, they are in fact the same guy.

They don’t live in the same world we do.

Their view of art is code that compiles cleanly the first time and passes every unit test without fail.

They dare the testers on the QA team to find a bug, and offer them a reward if they do.

They tell jokes using binary code and tape them to the office fridge, taking joy in the fact that nobody else understands it, let alone gets the punch line.

They stay late. They come in early. They would rather be at their workstation than out in the world of social interaction. They decorate their workstations with strange posters and knick knacks of comic book heroes and science fiction space ships. They greet you with the Vulcan salute of the raised hand with the middle two fingers spread apart.

They speak perfect Klingon.

They only venture out in public when a new Star Wars movie is opening, fully dressed in their best Darth Vader, Storm Trooper, or Jedi Knight costume – but they look nothing like the character. And the weeks afterwards are spent dissecting the movie, where it betrayed the historical knowledge of that universe, and how they believe it should have been scripted.

These people are different.

They are committed.

They should be committed. But we need them.

I have known so many of these guys.

They care little for the real happenings in the world.

They do not pay attention to or are oblivious to the office politics that arise in every IT department.

They are loyal to the systems they create, not to the leadership of the team. And they will defend their creations to the death if they have to, often grabbing the nearest light sabre at their desk to defend themselves, leaned against the wall next to the skate board they rode to work that day.

And when you do convince them that there is really and truly a bug in their code, using rational they understand and test case scenarios targeted specifically at that trouble spot, they have it fixed before you can return to your desk, and unit tested, and promoted to the staging environment, and they appear as you sit down with your fresh cup of coffee that you poured on your way back from your desk expecting you to test it right there and right then to prove to you that it works – and for you to take back all those mean nasty things you said about the quality of their compiled application.

If they could, they would promote right into production. After all, to them, it’s more important that the world uses their code in perfect condition than any of that pomp and circumstance layer of protocol, process and paperwork that a production release entails.

“Just let me deploy it”.

And they debate the requirements that you gave them, and explain to you again and again how your requirements are really wrong, and this is what the code is supposed to do.

And when there is a problem someplace else in the system, an application that is not theirs, they dive into that problem like a wake of vultures attacking a now dead possum on the side of the road – looking for the bug, and telling the unfortunate programmer responsible how to fix it, and sharing between them the comments of how stupid the bug was to begin with.

And they hate peer reviews.

I love these guys.

But it’s hard to keep these guys around.

They move on. Usually for the next most exciting project they can find, or for an environment that sees their odd behavior as pure genius. They want cool stuff to work on, and your respect of the obvious fact that they are the very best there ever was.

They rarely move for the money. Or the benefits.

These guys can drive you nuts.

If you should find yourself out in public with these guys, like at a Friday lunch at the local hangout, or a team building night out at the local watering hole, you will find yourself quietly sitting, looking at your watch or your phone, waiting for this genius to finish regaling you with their word by word dialog re-enactment from the scene from Star Trek Wrath of Khan where Spock dies inside the chamber that powers the warp engines and Kirk watches helplessly outside.

And in that restaurant, this brilliant programmer will end their re-enactment by screaming “KHAN!!!” at the top of their voice, and once they get their breath back, state “I love that scene”.

They don’t make movies about these guys. At least not where they are the central character. Who would pay to watch a guy sit at a keyboard, staring at a monitor, shaking their head to the beat of the guitar silently playing through their ear-buds.

Okay, there was Zuckerberg in The Social Network. But he was rarely at the keyboard.

And he’s a billionaire.

A rare find to see the guy who wrote the code wind up in charge and with all the money. Ask Bill Gates or Steve Jobs who wrote the code.

So Zuckerberg is an anomaly.

There should be a story about a team of these guys – all as eccentric as I have described – faced now in a world where there is no electricity or computers – and they have to survive.

I’d pay to see that movie. Even before one of these eccentric fellows put it up on Kodi to stream for free.

Now, before I get an inbox full of women saying “Hey, dipshit, women are programmers too ya know!”, let me just say that in 30 years, I have never met an eccentric female programmer. They have been brilliant, but not eccentric. They are highly organized persons who can juggle many things at one time, understand the requirements without you having to specify them, and their code compiles and runs as perfectly as their male eccentric counterparts.

But I haven’t met even one yet that is nuts.

And these guys are all nuts.

And I love them for it.

I just don’t want to have one for a roommate.

Timely Advice

2016-06-07T11:29:00.000-04:00

When it comes to life in general, there are two schools of thought.

Some will tell you to live for the moment. Look no further than right now and savor it.

Others will tell you to live your life today in preparation for tomorrow.

Today is just a passing thing.

And tomorrow never comes.

But every action you take today will have an impact on your tomorrow.

You cannot see your future today because you have not taken the steps yet that get you to tomorrow.

So we set goals. Objectives. And we plan.

We plan for tomorrow. But when tomorrow gets here, it is always today. There’s another tomorrow to plan for. And we spend that today planning for the next tomorrow.

But technology, it seems changes everything. So far it has changed how we communicate, how we learn, how we are informed. And how we travel.

Technology is not done yet. It’s just begun. And much of what we have today was dreamt up in science fiction a hundred years ago.

So what’s next?

A time machine? One that takes you back in history, and forward into the future? So many stories have been written and movies made about time travel, that well, given our drive to make these science fiction dreams come true, it just seems inevitable. Impossible just doesn’t exist anymore.

But as I sit and ponder this for even a moment, it becomes clear to me that if we were to build a time machine, one that takes you forward in time, that machine would use totally different calculations than one that would take you back in time.

To travel back in time would simply be to retrace the steps that we have already taken. Kind of redundant, don’t you think? So the bigger opportunity would be to invent one that takes you ahead in time, to the unknown.

To move forward in time, you would not simply pick a date and wait to be surprised at where you land. No, it would be more like the navigation system in your car. You pick a destination, and the system tells you step by step how to get there.

My car has a cheaper version of the GPS. It does not show me the route I am about to take, but it simply points me down the next road. I blindly follow the female automated device. And voila … I reach my destination.

So in the future, time machines may very well have the same types of features and models, based on price range.

If it were to be possible to set your time machine future destination and then to be at that spot instantaneously, you would then look back at the history of the steps that were taken, and you would see what you did to achieve your goal.

If you were to type in a destination of a wealthy future, once you arrived, you may find yourself sitting in a jail cell, waiting for your trial.

“How did I get here?” you would ask. And you would look at the travel log, and see that you did despicable things. And you would say “this is not the future I hoped for”. So you would use your one phone call to call the customer service desk of future travel device.

“How may I help you?” would answer the voice on the other side.

“It appears that your device has landed me in jail, awaiting trial for fraud.”

“What destination did you enter into the user interface?” the voice would ask.

“Wealth”.

“Oh. Yes. Did you read the instruction manual?”

“I tried, but it was a little too quantum physical for my understanding”, you would reply. “I just wanted to test it out and see how it worked”.

“So you jumped right into the “Wealth” option then?”

“Yes",

"Did you select a route?"

"Uh .. no".

"Well, the default value is 'fastest route possible', and you didn't take the time to go through the options to teach it about you as a person. You really should have read the instructions".

"How can I undo this?”

“You can use the ‘back-in-time’ feature”.

“I only bought the future traveling model. I couldn’t afford the back in time feature”.

“Oh, I see. Well, Mr. Brill, I see here that you did accept our end user agreement”.

“Yes, I clicked on the ‘accept’ button. Who has time to read all of that legal mumbo jumbo?”

“And you didn’t read the user manual either then?”

“No, I told you that”.

“Well, I am very sorry, but you are where you are because of your own actions”.

“Look, if you don’t fix this, I will sue you for every penny your company has!”

“But you already waived us of any liability for the use of our product when you clicked the ‘accept’ button on the end user agreement”.

“Can I buy the ‘back in time’ model now?”

“Will you be paying in cash?” asks the customer service representative.

“Well, no, I do not have any cash on me and they have taken all my personal belongings, so I don’t have my wallet, but apparently I am quite wealthy. Surely you can accept my credit?”

“Mr. Brill, you are on trial for defrauding everyone you know and love. Why would I accept your credit? Besides, it says here in our records that all of your accounts are now frozen”.

“So I am screwed?”

“You did it to yourself Mr. Brill”, says the customer service representative, with a deep sigh, likely because they have answered this same type of call a thousand times before.

“Is there anything else I can help you with today, Mr. Brill?”

Later, at the trial, the lawyer approaches the bench to speak to the judge.

“Your Honor, it appears that Mr. Brill was just testing his new time travel device”.

“Let me guess. It was a Fabco Time-Forward 3000” replies the elderly judge, peering down over his bifocals impatiently at the lawyer.

“And this fellow bought his device before the Federal Government shut them down for reckless endangerment to the public …”

“Yes Your Honor”.

“And he didn’t read the user manual”.

“That’s what he said”.

“And he clicked ‘accept’ on the end user agreement …”

A deep sigh from the lawyer. “Yup”.

“And he can’t afford to now purchase the “Back-in-Time” model …”

The lawyer hung his head. “All of his accounts are frozen. I am doing this pro-bono.”

“So in fact, he did all the things he is accused of”.

“Uhhh … yes, it’s all documented in his Time-Forward 3000 history log.”

“And all these people sitting in this court room should just forgive him, it was all a big dumb mistake made by an impatient idiot too lazy to read the instructions?”

“Well … yes …?”

“Guilty”, and the judge slams down the gavel. “Next Case!”

It’s just a matter of time before this technology is invented, and just a little more time until a company like FabCo develops a means to deploy it to the masses. In all of its models, with various options available at affordable and not-so-affordable prices.

And when this time comes, my advice to you is read the user manual. And understand the end user agreement before you hit accept.

And pay the extra thousand dollars for the Back-in-Time feature.

I did.

The Bus Stop

2015-12-10T01:37:00.001-04:00

There’s a bus stop in Pensacola.

It sits on the westbound lane of 9^th Street at the Beverly Avenue intersection.

It sits in front of the emergency entrance to Sacred Heart Hospital.

I spent many moments during the Thanksgiving week standing at that bus stop and trying to figure out what was the right thing to do.

Praying for an answer.

And the answer came.

Sometimes the answer of a prayer is not the answer that we want. But it’s the answer that we get. It’s the answer that we need, like it or not.

I had flown out of Detroit on the Saturday night before, in a snow storm. The first storm of the season. I had spent the night sleeping in a chair in the Charlotte airport by the American Airlines ticket counter, hidden by a Nissan Sentra displayed in the lobby by a local car dealership. The next morning I landed in Pensacola, emerging in the baggage claim area to find my brother Paul waiting.

We drove directly to Sacred Heart Hospital, to find my sister-in-law Leigh Ann sitting in a chair beside the bed of the intensive care unit room. My mother was sitting beside her, covered in blankets to keep her warm, and wrestling with the grogginess induced by the sedative medicines, an oxygen tube in her nostrils to assist her breathing.

I don’t know if Mom recognized me or not. I thought she did. But looking back now, I think she was too confused.

The next four days were spent at the hospital from the early morning to midnight, and returning to Mom’s little apartment only ten minutes away where I slept until the next dawn.

On the Tuesday morning, as I sat beside her, Mom woke up. She looked at me and her face lit up with a delighted surprise.

“Oh my goodness, what are you doing here?” she asked.

“I came to be with you, Mom”, I replied.

“When did you get here?”

“Two days ago”

“Oh my”. And the happiness remained as she looked around the room and herself, trying to determine the status of her situation. “I have so many questions!”

But she asked none.

So I explained her situation.

“We really need you to cough the stuff out of your lungs” I said. “And we … well … we really need you to … uh .. to poop”.

“Oh, I see. I have so many questions”. She raised her hand and took mine. Smiling as she looked into my eyes. She was actually with me for those moments.

But she wore down after a little while, and she fell back into drowsy confusion.

No questions asked. And the answers I gave were likely not understood.

Over the next hours Mom grew weaker and weaker.

Mom could not cough hard enough to clear her lungs. And she didn’t poop either.

The doctors and nurses asked me to speak to the Palliative Care team.

When I first arrived on the Sunday, I asked the security guard where he wanted me to smoke.

“Go to the bus stop”, he said, “Everyone goes to the bus stop”

So every three or four hours I would succumb to the nicotine cravings and would take refuge standing at the bus stop on 9^th Street.

I would stand there and think.

I would stand there and remember.

And now with Mom under Palliative Care, I would stand at that bus stop and pray. Pray for a miracle. Pray for the wisdom to make decisions. And pray they would be the right decisions.

And each time I went to the bus stop, I would be more confused. And the miracle seemed less likely each time. And Mom seemed weaker each time.

Paul and I would discuss the options and agree on our decisions throughout each day.

Sometimes I could get Mom to eat. And I thought she was turning the corner. Then she would sleep. And she would not eat. And that corner seemed to be missed.

On the Wednesday, when feeding her soup, her instructions were simple.

“More”, and I would fill another spoonful and place it in her mouth.

“Done”, and I would cease, clean the spoon, and place it back on the tray.

That day the Palliative Care team asked Paul and I to meet with the Hospice counselors. They said that our only option left was to comfort. Comfort until the end.

And we made the decision.

And I went down to the bus stop, and I asked God if we were right. And he said yes. Not in a booming thunderous roar with lightning bolts. No, he just put the words in my head that yes, this was right, this was kind, and this was love.

God is love, you know.

Not all prayers are answered with the answer we want.

Later that afternoon they transported Mom to the Hospice by ambulance. The place was beautiful. It was out in the country, and her room was spacious with large French doors looking out on the wooded back yard where the gazebo is. It was warm. It was very nice.

In the early hours of Thanksgiving Day morning, Mom passed away.

And the words in my head said “it’s alright” and “she is safe”.

Maybe prayers do come true. But maybe sometimes we don’t know what to pray for.

A Dad's Letter to His Daughters

2015-09-23T12:11:00.000-04:00

Love is an amazing measure

You can love many people

But you will never love two people in the exact same way

Each measure of love is unique to that individual

It should not be measured in how much or how little

It should simply be measured by that you do love

The main aspects of love are appreciation and caring

Combined it will always calculate you a unique measure of love

You only need one or the other, both are not required. But love is more fulfilling if both are present.

Love can be extended to anyone in your life; near, distant, familiar or even obscure.

If people love you, do you have to love them back? If you love someone, do they have to love you back?

No. Love shared by two people are always at two different measures.

You may love your friend enough to think of them as your best friend. That friend may love you back, but they may refer to another as their best friend.

Familiarity with someone should not be confused with love, unless that familiarity brings appreciation and or caring.

Infatuation is not love, not yet. More than likely though this is a transient or temporary love that could potentially dissipate to familiarity. But infatuation could also potentially grow into a very high measure of love.

You never know.

But when someone tells you they are “in love with you”, understand that their love for you is an infatuation.

People who truly love you do not say “in” or “out”. They simply do love you.

So what is “romantic love”?

This is the most rewarding love, when shared with another.

This is the cruelest love, when the measures of love between two people differ significantly.

Romantic love goes beyond caring and appreciation – although caring and appreciation are the foundation of all loves.

Romantic love often extends to include passion, desire, commitment, and then contentment.

Romantic love most often begins as infatuation, which entwines the passion and desire.

This is the most dangerous phase of love.

This is the phase of love that requires the most courage.

This is also the phase of love that requires the most caution.

Because, as I said earlier, infatuation can end as quickly as it begins.

And should the end of infatuation occur for the other party before it occurs for you, the pain can be devastating.

And should the end of infatuation occur for you before the other party, I urge you be honest and polite as you dismiss it. Be kind.

But be cautions of the desire and the passion you feel in this early state. Acting to aggressively may well have very severe penalties.

I implore you as someone who loves you and wants only the best for you, that when you feel the strong passions and desires of infatuation, please employ patience and restraint. Not forever. But until you at least gain an understanding of how transient – how temporary or how potential the prospect of feeling commitment and contentment from this love appears to be.

Do not waste your passion and your desire on temporary infatuation. It is dangerous. And potentially costly.

You will know love when you feel it.

And you will recognize romantic love when it blossoms from infatuation.

And you will know when infatuation ends

And you will know when true love takes over as you desire to commit to that love and quite content to do so.

Loves will come.

And loves will go.

Some will pass quickly.

Others will endure a lifetime.

It is important to be honest with those that you love about your love

But it is even more important – and a prerequisite to your own happiness – that you be honest with yourself about your love for others.

Pitching to Towering Redheads

2015-05-12T00:23:00.001-04:00

This story is true, I swear it's true, especially the parts I made up.

My daughters' fast pitch team played a tournament in middle Michigan last weekend.

In the first game of the tournament, they faced their toughest challenge in a team wearing red jerseys. These girls were at the older end of the age bracket with fourteen and fifteen year old girls. Our team was a year or two younger.

Our team, the Wildcats, were wearing their most intimidating black uniforms – with Wildcats scripted in bright red across the front.

Our starting pitcher Chantel is a very good pitcher. She throws fast and accurate. She is very effective. On this day though Chantel did very well to hold the opposition to only four runs in three innings.

In the fourth inning, my eldest daughter Alannah came in to pitch. She was throwing very well too, but runners were still getting on base. With bases loaded, a young lady stepped to the plate who towered above all the other players. She was as strong as she was tall. She had curly red hair and freckles that almost covered a sneer of confidence that would make Elvis look insecure.

Alannah threw her best pitches at her, but the third pitch caught too much of the plate and this young lady smashed it as hard and as long and as far as I have ever seen a ball hit in this division. The outfield fence sat 300 feet away from home plate, and this young lady hit the ball to that fence on one bounce.

She crossed home plate before our talented outfielders could even get the ball back into the infield. She crossed the plate to the salute of high fives from the three others that crossed before her.

Even though Alannah was pitching so well, she had just given up her first grand slam.

Our second game was rained out. We were drenched in the downpour racing for our cars.

Driving home, as Ashley-Rae slept in the backseat, Alannah and I discussed the event of the Grand Slam and the towering powerful young lady who hit it.

"I threw her my best stuff, Dad"

"Yes, and I never saw a softball fly so far", I replied. "Was the ball still round when they finally threw it back to you?"

"Shut up Dad"

Alannah sat quiet for a minute.

"Sometimes, Alannah, you can't strike everybody out", I finally said breaking the silence. "She hit Chantel pretty hard too".

"So what do you do then? The next time I face her. What do I do? Do I walk her?"

"I wouldn't waste the energy of throwing her four pitches", I replied. "I'd hit her".

"Dad, you're not supposed to say that", replied Alannah, a glare of slight shock that I would even suggest such a thing"

"Yup, maybe so. But I would hit her. I might say 'I'm sorry after. And if she came up again, I would say 'you know the drill', and I would hit her again.

Alannah kept looking at me.

"Does she respect you right now?" I asked.

"No"

"She will after you peg her in the butt a few times with a fastball"

That was all that was said.

The next day when we arrived at the park to play the game rained out the night before, Alannah joked with a couple of her team mates about what we talked about. She told Chantel, the starting pitcher, she told Maddie the third baseman, and she told Lilly who catches. And I guess they discussed it, and in the end it sounds like they all agreed.

But what were the odds they would even play that team again?

Well, those odds were much better than any of us suspected.

Our Wildcat girls in black uniforms went on to win their next three games. And the Gold Medal game was now set for 8:30 PM under the lights of the main diamond. Their opponent of course was the same red uniformed team that had beaten them the night before. And of course the towering redheaded left-handed batter.

Chantel had pitched a lot that day, and she had pitched very well. But that was enough for one day, so Coach Sue gave Alannah the mound to start the game.

I must say, this was the most motivated that I had ever seen Alannah pitch. She threw her whole body through the pitch, and let out a grunt as she released the ball that was louder than any grunt ever grunted by Monica Seles. Her accuracy was dead on, and her velocity was as fast as I had ever seen her. Her eyes were focused and concentrated. And with each pitch she gained a little bit more of a confident sneer that would make Elvis look insecure.

She held her own with that red uniformed team. She held them off. And the second inning, who led off, but the towering redhead. Alannah's eyes met the sneering redhead's. And Alannah sneered right back at her.

Lilly who was catching behind the plate, winked at Alannah through her mask and yelled to the fielders, "Here we go!".

And then, with all her might she fired her first pitch at the powerful left-handed batter.

"Strike!" yelled the umpire as he pointed a strike call with his finger. The pitch came in hard and fast and made the redhead back off the plate, but it caught just the black edge of the plate for a strike.

The ball hit Lilly's mitt with a loud snap.

The redhead looked at Alannah, who simply sneered larger.

The next pitch came in even harder and even more inside forcing the redhead to back away to dodge the ball, but she swung the bat in self-defence.

"Strike TWO" yelled the umpire.

Alannah sneered even harder at the redhead. The redhead didn't sneer back.

"Let's get her Alannah!" shouted Lilly.

The next pitch came in even faster, this time at the redhead's helmet-protected noggin. The redhead fell to the dirt to avoid the pitch.

"BALL" screamed the Ump. "One ball two strikes ladies".

Lilly punched her mitt as Alannah stared in. Her sneer glaring even more confidently now.

Now, Alannah had two strikes on her. And in my mind as I watched from the stands, I thought to myself "Oh my goodness, she's going to strike her out".

This time when Alannah uncoiled with her pitch, she wasn't looking at Lilly's glove. She was looking at the redhead. And as the pitch came in with all the strength that Alannah could muster, all the redhead could do was turn away. And that's when Alannah's fastball caught the redhead dead square in the right buttocks.

The redhead dropped her bat and lumbered to first, rubbing her butt as she did.

"Sorry!" Alannah said to the redhead – her sneer still sneering.

After the game, as Alannah was showing me her silver medal, I asked her about the redhead.

"You almost struck her out" I said. "You had two strikes on her?"

"I did?"

"Yes, I was sure you were going to get her"

"I did, Dad. But she wouldn't stand still. I had to chase her all over the batter's box to do it!"

God’s Miraculous Shot

2015-03-22T15:23:00.000-04:00

It is remarkable to realize that for the vastness that can only be described today as infinity, how incredible this tiny little dot in the universe our planet Earth truly is.

The perfect blue of a sky on a warm spring day. The warmth of the sun in a cool breeze. The green of the grass, soft on the ground to cushion a bare foot.

All the pieces so perfectly crafted.

Even in a barren dessert there is the beauty of the reds and browns of the sands sculpted by the wind and baked by the sun.

Even in the middle of the vastest of oceans, the shades of the blues and rhythm of the waves dictated by the Moon some 238,860 miles above.

The caps of the world, more barren than the desserts comprised only of ice and snow, are beautiful in their lights and shadows.

Masterfully designed, perfectly crafted, brilliant in their inception, and flawless in execution.

The physicist will tell you that all of this is a result of extreme luck – the laws of motion and gravity and probability all calculated in one big bang 13.8 billion years ago.

The spiritualist will tell you that it is all God in every second of every flutter of a butterfly's wing. That this was all done for man, for man's benefit, and that the world did not even exist before man was here to experience it.

If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?

"The vibration of the force of the fall would impact the atoms of the matter in the surrounding objects to cause an effect" would state the physicist.

"If it wasn't heard, then what does it matter?" would state the cleric.

Me? I think the answer lies someplace in the middle.

I think there is an intelligent creator, responsible for all that we know now.

But not sitting right above us, not involved in every nuance of every action.

Think of a very skilled billiards player, one who can sink all the balls on the table before missing.

His break is very important as he shoots the cue ball into the mass of balls on the other side of the table.

Yet he knows where to aim and how hard to hit and what type of spin to use to achieve the result – precisely planned but seemingly chaotic movement of the mass of balls all reacting to each other as they bump off each other and the rails of the table - to finally rest in a position.

Where the billiards player can now pick the right order to easily make each shot.

And he makes it look so easy.

The balls all go where he wants – but his impact is only the split second that the tip of his cue – a cue shaped and chalked to his design – hit's the white cue ball. Everything else results from that precise strike.

Think a golfer who needs to sink his golf ball in the hole that more than five football fields away, and he needs to do so striking that ball only three times to score an eagle.

Like the billiard player, the golfer only controls the result at that precise moment he strikes the ball. After that, the laws of physics take over.

And so, in that same fashion, it seems to me to be completely viable – that a grand intelligence – a deity if you wish – God by any name you choose – made the most miraculous shot when triggering that big bang – patient for the resulting billions of years – to see how that shot would work out – and is still playing out.

God looked at the Sun and said, "That's a beauty"

God looked at the Earth and said to himself "Nice shot. And I got the moon just right too".

God looked at Mars and maybe he said "crap, I overshot all the water to Earth".

Remember, all the balls are still in motion from that one shot almost 14 billion years before.

The result we will never know.

The original intention and target of that shot, we will never know.

But we have and will continue to derive answers that for now satisfy our desire to know a truth.

Maybe there is still a big asteroid that was set in motion in that same shot that is out there still spinning it's way around the gravity pulls of other planets and suns in other surrounding solar systems not yet on the final swing towards striking Earth – and resulting in that miraculous shot where some of the oxygen and water and particles that would comprise life – would then also wind up on Mars afterward.

And then God, who had been waiting 14 billion years to see his result – would give a little shriek of joy and high five himself, and confirm to himself yet again ...

"I love this game".

Someplace Between Hollywood and Pyongyang

2014-12-18T19:59:00.001-05:00

Rogen and Jong-un review script notes between tokes.

This recent debacle between North Korea and Sony Entertainment over what looks like a B movie that entertains the plot of assassinating North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un has really crossed so many boundaries of discussion, it's hard to pick one.

Cyber-terrorism by hackers who are supposedly members of North Korean elite squad of IP savvy ninjas who cannot only break into a poorly secured network infrastructure of a Japanese gadget company who bought Columbia Pictures to get into the Hollywood business.

How they did it?

Not interested. They waved their fingers over a keyboard at a Linux prompt and magically found themselves at the root drive of all evil.

What they leaked that embarrassed Sony Entertainment executives?

Not Interested. These are Hollywood executives, did you expect any sense of appropriate decorum?

How the now never-to-be-released Seth Rogen movie insulted the regime, or maybe only Dennis Rodman?

And the Dennis Rodman connection still seems to defy the law of socio-political physics.

The first thing that came to my mind as this story broke last week and continued to escalate, was envisioning the author - perpetual stoner Seth Rogen - continually replying to questions and comments from Sony, the media, and the Homeland Security boys in black suites and sunglasses - and likely every friend Rogen ever had with the same answer that is the anthem of every comedian who went too far with a joke or a gag:

"It's only a joke".

When the conversation elevated to the movie being pulled from four major movie chains in the United States after the North Korean Cyber Ninja's eluded to an ability to somehow blow up every theatre that projected the mocked-up Kim Jong-un on its silver screen, then escalated to the movie not being released, and the United States finding itself suddenly involved investigating potential acts of terrorism based on these threats.

"It's only a joke".

This answer implies that no one is ever allowed to be offended by a comedian, as though the joke is a sacred cow not to be judged for appropriateness, but only by how funny it is.

And funny is such a subjective scale. Believe me, people remind me of this on a daily basis.

The decision not to show the movie in theatres was made by the theatre owners. In their defense, I believe it was the responsible decision, no matter how unlikely the realization of such threats may be.

The decision to pull the movie from being released was made by Sony Pictures. This is a business after all, and while it may sound heroic to some, releasing this movie was proving to risk their bottom line rather than show profit. Their stocks rose 3.68% in the twenty four hours following the announcement.

Here is the reality. Kim Jong-un, as cartoonish a buffoon as we westerners may believe him to be – a political reincarnation of a South Korean pseudo-musician Psy in a virtual loop of Gangnam Style, is still alive and the leader of contentious albeit isolated land smashed between China and South Korea with Japan just across the Sea of Japan.

And while other movies have mocked and even killed off living heads of state in the past – as far back as Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator from the days before The United States even considered diving into World War II, none of those movie's premise was the direct order of a government to assassinate the offending leader. They didn't even try to parody this leader. Nor change his name. The leader is Kim Jong-un.

And the problem with such ruthless dictators who squash human rights on a daily basis and live in luxury while the population he reigns over is that they just don't have a sense of humor. They certainly can't appreciate a good parody, let alone a poor one likely conceived between tokes.

"But really, it's only a joke".

Joke or not, political affiliations aside, the taste of Rogen's joke is quite questionable.

"Pulling this movie flies in the face of freedom of speech. It reeks of censorship".

Now look. As Voltaire may or may not have said, "I may disagree with what you say, but I will defend to my death your right to say it". Well, maybe not to my death, but at least until somebody complains about me.

The fact is, there is no global belief in free speech. Clearly not in North Korea. And when you release a movie for the world to see, you better be ready for the world's opinion.

Because, I tell my daughters several times a week:

You have the freedom to express yourself, and I will stand by you when you do. But that freedom is not intended to protect you from the repercussions of your hurtful stupidity.

And this was just plain stupidity. Hell, damn near bullying.

Try explaining to your twelve year old daughter who sees insults flying on Instagram everyday why its not okay for kids to make fun of an tease other kids in a YouTube video, but it's absolutely fine for a stoner jackass to write a simpleton story about how funny it is to kill another person – a real person who is still alive – and then explain how a major movie studio would see this as entertainment to release to be seen worldwide.

Seems kind of hypocritical – don't you think? Even if the target of the joke appears to be one of the most tyrannical and corrupt leaders currently in power at the time.

If you want to mock an easy target like Kim Jong-un, go for it.

But why should it surprise anybody that the Galapagos-like isolation that this leader contains his countrymen under would have enough peek-holes through his iron curtain to see this film coming. Maybe Dennis Rodman told him, over a beer …

"Dude, you should see this kick as movie they're making about you".

Maybe it was one of his Ninja cyber-punk hackers looking to impress his leader by sending him link to the movie trailer that's been out since Halloween. The subject of the email probably stated "check this out" and in the body of the email the ninja might have stated something like …

"The actor who portrays you doesn't come close to capturing the greatness of your character"

Then below that link is another link to the video about the guy telling the dog he fed his steak to the cat instead.

I can't get enough of that video either.

To me, this is the perfect collision between the two furthest poles on the spectrum of reality: Hollywood and Pyongyang.

And so far Pyongyang is winning.

This isn't about being North Korean and defending your leader, even if done so with a pistol to your head.

And this isn't about being American, and holding the position that you can do anything you want to and how dare anybody challenge you claiming such a stance as "my God-given right as an American".

Wait, yes it is. It's about both these perspectives.

Well, say what you want. You have the right.

But watch out for those that disagree, because they have the right to be pissed off at you for saying it.

But the worst outcome of this circus of the stars is yet to play out.

Because you know, you just know, that Rogen is likely already halfway through writing the screen play about what he perceives to be the most talented writer in Hollywood starting a nuclear war over the brilliant script he wrote about a pompous boy-dictator ruling over the land of make-believe.

And I wouldn't mind receiving a royalty check for that idea.

The Time Before This Time

2014-09-01T14:14:00.001-04:00

Scientists estimate that the big bang – the cosmic event that scientists speculate marks the beginning of our universe – happened some 13.7 billion years ago.

When considering values in the billions – I find the need to exact to the additional seven tenths of a billion quite pretentious.

But regardless, the question remains – in a universe that is supposedly endless – what existed before the big bang occurred?

My understanding – one of only a very simple and uneducated layman to be sure – is that everything that existed in the universe was sucked in by an unimaginable force of gravity into the space that a pea would occupy, and then at its ultimate limit – exploded everything encapsulated in that small space all across the universe – in a gaseous molten form that when it finally came to cool enough to form shapes filled our universe with the orb like masses that we see today.

So the theory goes anyway.

But what was that final period like of the prior universe? When everything was being sucked in? If things were spread as far and wide today – it must have taken at least a million years to collapse?

Think of today – light from neighboring stars taking thousands of years to reach Earth. At the speed of light. To suggest that the collapse happened quickly would mean that the speed of light is not the fastest speed there is.

Or perhaps it's that speed which slows down time, like Einstein postulated. So the million year collapse seemed to happen in an instant.

Seemed like an instant? To who?

These ideas are as staggering to conceptualize in our limited human brains as the concept that the universe is endless.

Perhaps it was not the entire universe that was sucked in – perhaps it was only a galaxy. A collection of solar systems – much like we have today. Could the universe before the big bang at first glance really be that much different than this one that exists in this universal collection of time?

If there was an after, then there had to be a before. Right?

And where did all that stuff come from that exploded into the universe?

That piece of rock, lying there in your garden, where did it really come from. Originally?

And then what about all the pieces of life? This consciousness that has to exist to experience what there is? Did all these pieces, the DNAs of life that are needed to spark an existence – did they all arrive here with all the other matter that congealed into this blob of matter that spun itself around our sun to become earth?

Did they exist before us? Before the bang? Snuffed out as the universe collapsed? Gathered up as part of that gigantic collection of matter that compressed and exploded all over again? If so, then these pieces of life should be all over the universe – planted - tossed out from the big bang like a gardener tossing wildflower seeds into the loose soil in hopes some of it will catch and grow?

The truth is that all we can truly do is speculate on all these things and try, using mathematic and scientific laws that may not even have been applicable before or during that bang.

'We' of course meaning people much smarter than me.

But we are all free to consider, to speculate, to hypothesize.

That big bang was like a reboot of all existence.

A natural cosmic cycle of happenings that occur over and over and over again?

Like searching through the square root of pie looking for the sequence in decimal places to finally start recurring, albeit we haven't found it yet. But it's there. And then we will start looking for the place where it started again after sequence is defined.

Maybe the square root of pie is simply a clue left behind.

Because if you stop and think about it – everything really stems from a circle. Repeating, rotating, orbiting, and spinning start and finish that even though it repeats it never starts or ends.

If this is the case – then the same must be true of our universe, it simply goes round and round inside the blob-ish sphere-ish orb that is our universal boundary?

But of that's the case, what exists on the other side of that boundary?

Time Enough For Me

2014-05-31T08:34:00.001-04:00

Again another summer is rolling into our little burg on the cusp both Canada and the United States – nestled into a quiet corner along the bordering Detroit River.

The breeze is warmer each morning as I sit on the back deck by the pool listening to the water flow around the pools edge, the ever so gentle hum of the pump that moves it.

And of course, my faithful black lab Suzy, yet another year older, laying on the deck at my feet.

The coffee tastes great this morning, seemingly the perfect complement to the sounds of the birds in the neighborhood as they execute their morning routines.

Life is very busy right now. Almost too busy. Almost. My days are filled with exciting work on interesting projects. Those days flow into the night as I continue my work from home, between two teenage girls travel ball team practices and tournaments, and the chores that come from simply being a homeowner and a father.

I have been too busy to write, and my head to full of the information I need for work, and information I need for home and the girls ball teams, too full to make room for interesting things to write about here.

There's just so much going on.

But this weekend is as calm as they will get this weekend.

Sure, there is still some grass to cut and some weeds to whip, and both girls will have practices over the next two days, and yeas, my laptop will come out of my bag and I will put some of my attention to the backlog of tasks outstanding from the current project at work.

But other than that, the weekend is my own.

But then there is a birthday party sleep over event that Alannah will attend at a friends house, and she will need to be driven to and back at some point. And there is laundry and kitchen tasks outstanding, and the house could use a good vacuuming. But other than that, my time is my own.

Time, what time is it now? Alannah's practice starts in twenty minutes. Damn. I still need to shower and shave and stop to put gas in the car. I'd better think about going.

But after that – it's only a three hour practice today – after that the day is mine – aside from the chores and the driving and the project I need to work on.

The day is mine. All mine.

Almost.

Wildcats and Turtles and Disharmonous Harmony

2014-01-18T00:28:00.001-05:00

Here we sit at the middle of January, and all that is green is buried in white.

The skies filled with those big grey and purple clouds that hang low packed with snow.

Sometimes it falls. Sometimes it doesn’t.

Sometimes I shovel it. Sometimes I wait for next week’s thaw to clear the laneway for me.

But summer ball is right around the corner.

Yes, it’s a very wide corner still but it’s there on the horizon’s horizon.

This season will be very exciting as both Alannah and Ashley-Rae are playing at even higher levels, both playing on traveling rep teams here in the Windsor area.

But this year they play on different teams under different clubs. Alannah will be playing for a bantam team of girls born in 2001. She is playing for the Wildcats.

Ashley-Rae will be playing for the Squirt team of girls born in 2002. She will still be playing for the Athletics of the Turtle Club, on the same team that Alannah played on last year but is now too old.

While the Wildcats and Turtle Club share a mutual need for diplomatic mutual gain, the fact is these two clubs don’t like each other. And one of her coaches this year coached another team from yet another club Alannah played against last year.

And that club didn’t like the Turtle Club either.

None of these clubs like each other – but years of competition mean that many of these coaches and players have spent time in more than just one of the clubs.

It’s likely very common from community to community, rivalries like these. They are great as long as they don’t get personal.

So far so good.

But it is extremely interesting to me, the observer I seem to have retired to. Seeing both sides, seeing both styles both so completely different despite their undeniable similarity. Like two competing churches each searching for the more perfect doctrine. Both reading from the same book and interpreting the same things differently.

It’s fun.

Ashley-Rae’s team has three of my players from my Gold ’99 team from last summer. Now I’m just a dad but I’m proud of each one of them. Now they join forces with the girls that Alannah left behind.

The other girls from Alannah’s team that moved on because their age moved them up to Bantam now play on the same Wildcat Alannah does. Great kids. Great parents. So I am not so alone now straddling the Wildcat – Turtle Club line. Although the Athletics team parents seem like extended family to me.

The best of the best.

So I am looking forward to watching both teams.

They have both been practicing since the summers end. In different elementary schools in the same way, doing different things looking for the same results.

Both managers are also excellent. One a wily old veteran of the coaching circle – the other a young woman who’s extensive and impressive player career and coaching experience has now culminated to her first managing position.

I'm very happy that both girls have such great leadership to play for.

Yet so similarly different.

Just like Wildcats and Turtles.

A Chat with Dad

2013-11-10T11:08:00.000-05:00

In my first book, Sowing My Father's Garden, I have this amazing new ability to simply call up my long deceased Father on a screen and hold conversations with an artificial simulation of him.

I didn't really plan to write this story this way. When I came up with the concept, it simply sounded like a cool little aspect to the story.

But after I wrote the first interaction with my Dad, it took me a long time in the story before I went back to it. It was just too real.

In the story, I find my main character to be in a position where he (he who is me) getting advice from a lot of people. But no matter how much I respected the others feeding me their insight and opinion, I found that I still had to go back in the story and run it past my artificial Dad.

And it felt good to me, writing these conversations, these pretend dialogues with the man I respected more than any other in my life, focusing on my memories of every little nuance about his mannerisms, his speech cadence, his sincerity, and how he always balanced his rational with humor. How thoughtful he was, and how he could dissect the simplest idea to find it's real intention and meaning.

And I realized how much I really truly miss him. I didn't really know this until I delved into trying to resurrect him in this artificial simulation.

Below is that first excerpt from Sowing My Fathers Garden … where I discover inside this amazing network the Planter's Society had built, that my Father – the founder of this society – had been artificially modeled so that other members could "bounce things off him.

Tomorrow is Dad's birthday. He would have turned 81.

Ironically his birthday falls on a day we call Remembrance Day.

Happy Birthday Dad. You are indeed remembered.

14 – A chat with Dad

I quietly re-entered the bedroom so as not to wake Anne as she was sleeping. I picked up the remote control and went to the front of the room where the video screen stood. I moved a comfortable chair to a location in front of the video screen, and worked my way through the menus back to the Angel flying into view.

"Let me talk to my Dad, please." I said, just – if for nothing else – to see how smart this thing really is.

"Certainly", responded the Angel.

The screen went black.

After a couple of seconds, a little orange glow appeared near the middle of the screen. As I looked closer, I could see the outline – the silhouette of a figure, lying on the couch, the orange dot grew brighter – then dimmed, and a puff of smoke drifted past. The dot then moved in a fashion to a lower position and stopped – as if set down in an ashtray.

Even though the screen was nearly pitch black, I could still make the silhouette out to be my Dad. – laying on the couch in a pair a tennis shorts – a tee shirt on, laying on his side with one arm propping up his head.

"Dad?"

"I've been wondering when you would get around to coming to see me", said the silhouette. "How was your flight?"

"Great", I said.

"How are Anne and my two granddaughters, Alex and Rae?"

"They are great too".

"I can't wait to see them". It was indeed my Dad's voice. Same professional speaking voices, a little tired, with a touch of gravel from smoking.

"Dad, you quit smoking, remember?"

"I started back up.", said the voice. The orange dot lifted into the air – grew brighter as it sat in front of the face of the silhouette, then grew dimmer. It landed to a position on the side of the silhouette's hip.

Just like Dad did as he laid on the couch in the dark smoking and thinking.

"So where do we start, then?", I asked the silhouette.

"How about asking how I am?"

"Okay, I'll bite, how are you ... Dad?"

"Dead, pretty much." Said the silhouette, with a dead pan delivery of a joke.

Just like Dad.

"Yes, and I don't really find all this very amusing", I replied. "I'm kind of pissed off that Mom would let you be … well … reverse engineered I guess is the best way to say it."

"Capiche", said the silhouette.

"But I will say this, you sure do look and sound and act like my old man."

"I told you, I hate the term 'old man'."

And Dad did, too. I referred to him as my old man one time, he reached over and cuffed me good in the head.

"At least you can't reach me now", I laughed, "And I'm too old for a whooping."

"You would be surprised at what this thing can do", replied the silhouette. And for a second I considered he might be right.

"I don't think I can let the girls see this … see you … this way. Do you understand?"

"Not only do I understand, but I agree with you a hundred percent!" replied my digital silhouette of a father. "At least not yet … when they are older … that's why your mother agreed to put me in here."

"So you have a pre-recorded message to play for them then?", I asked.

"Not pre-recorded – but a script I guess you could say. Your mother made a collage of video clips for the girls to see, and some instructions for me to … well … show my best side to them. Some day they may want to meet me."

"We'll cross that bridge when we get to it", I replied. "Do you have anything scripted to say to me? This is a lot of … shit … to grasp. I could use some guidance."

I swore on purpose. I was never allowed to swear around my Mom or Dad. Not even as a young adult.

"You mean 'Stuff', a lot of stuff to grasp."

"Sorry, just testing you".

"I know." The orange dot again drifted from the silhouette's hip to his face, grew brighter then dimmer, and another puff of smoke drifted across the screen.

"The only advice that I have for you is to use your best judgment. These are very good people. They sincerely are trying to do the right things. They are trying to carry forward on a mission I left them with over twenty years ago."

"I think I need a history lesson, Dad. How did all this come to be? Where did you get all the money to fund all of this? "

"Tonight is not the night for a history lesson, kid. The Angel can tell you the history. She can probably play it back for you like a movie." .. there was a pause … then the silhouette continued .. "Yes, I just checked, and the Angel has the order and sequence of this to unveil to you all queued up, but not tonight, it's still too new to you, all this … shit."

I laughed. That was my dad.

"But this I must tell you. I am not the one who brought the wealth to this group. That was Abercrombie. John is a genius. He built all of this. I just provided … well … the inspiration I guess. That's why they wanted Mom to let them put me into this thing. So they could remember what they are here for."

"Oh".

"You are an invited member. This is not some family legacy left to you. This is serious stuff and you better treat it as such. What John has asked you to join is his – the Society's. What they expect of you is … well, a little bit of me. Got it?"

"I got it."

"Good."

"Remember …." Said the silhouette.

"The old man's always right", I said, beating him to the punch.

"That's right".

"I miss you Dad."

"I know."

The orange dot floated over to the silhouette's face, again grew brighter, then dimmer, then floated to the ashtray, the hand of the silhouette putting out the orange glowing dot as a puff of smoke again floated across the screen.

"That's enough for tonight … we'll talk again tomorrow. G'night". And the silhouette got up from the couch and walked out of the picture.

"G'night Dad".

Change Is Inevitable

2013-09-14T10:44:00.000-04:00

I think Mother Nature must be going through menopause.

Hot flashes one day, cold flashes the next; and the gusty winds and thunderstorms.

But this morning the air is still and the sky is blue. And the sun light is bright with a slight tint of orangey yellow.

And it's chilly.

The dew that dropped out of the sky has coated everything on the ground with a thick coat of wet.

Even though I pulled out my heavy black woolen sweater from the closet that stores winter coats, I'm still chilled by the slight breeze as I sit on the back deck by the still waters of the swimming pool.

I guess it's time to consider that summer is over and fall is starting.

It's time to close this swimming pool down. It's time to give it one final vacuum, empty the water to the half-way point, poor in the winter doses of chemicals, and put the black tarp on.

But not yet, at least not today.

We still have ball practices to attend, and the Major Leagues still have two weeks of the regular season left. But then, ball always starts before the pool opens and ends long after the pool is closed.

Many have told me that they feel ripped off by the summer we had this year. Too cool, too wet they all say. But I disagree.

This has been a fantastic summer.

There's a humming bird hovering next to a bush of blue flowers in the garden, sipping the dewy nectar that lies on the tiny petals, oblivious to the fact that it's forty seven degrees outside. But he is in the sunshine while I sit here in the shade.

I wonder if he thinks the summer was too short.

Maybe.

The trees don't think so. For all the maples that I see in my surroundings, only one has leaves starting to turn orange and red. And he always starts early, as though in a rush to be first. The first with leaves in spring, and the first to change colors and fall in autumn.

The impatient one, while the rest still stand high and sturdy with lush green leaves in no hurry to see the season end.

It is still summer you know.

My eldest daughter Alannah has ball practice shortly at noon. Still a practice / tryout of sorts for a new team with another club called the Wildcats, having been cut from the next age group up at the Turtle Club. The experience left me questioning the concept of loyalty – and how do I convince her to hold the value true when the club she was so loyal too was not loyal back to her in return.

But you have to earn your spot to make the team. And this year the competition came from every nook and cranny of our peninsula of a county nested between the great lakes St. Claire and Erie. I watched most every moment of those practices, and I thought Alannah did terrific.

But I must have misjudged her competition.

Last year, my youngest Ashley-Rae missed the cut to play on the same team Alannah did. She spent the summer watching from the side with me, and together we went through house league and all stars. And together we had a ball. Now this year, she made the team that Alannah grew too old to play for anymore. She won her spot in convincing fashion. And so as a family we now get to remain with the other families who will still travel together next year from tournament to tournament, while we make new friends on the new team that Alannah seems certain to earn a spot on. Families from a different club who may not hold the Turtle Club in as high esteem as we do, out of loyalty.

Next year we will be both inside – and on the outside looking in. On both sides of the window.

Alannah's new team does look like it will be very strong though. I haven't seen a single weak player on the team. And two of her old team mates from Turtle Club will be there to, both Lilly and Rachael suffered the same breakdown in what they presumed to be a two-way commitment.

I'm very proud of my two girls – both equally – as they grow up with fast pitch softball as one of their anchor points in their development into young ladies. In fact I am very proud of all the girls I have had the pleasure to manage and coach this year – and those that I simply rooted for on Alannah's team.

There isn't a bad apple in the whole group.

And so, with Ashley's experience of being cut behind her, and now Alannah, the older sister, just learning the experience now – and moving on with a maturity that inspires me, I reconsider my position and understand that relationships, be them with people or with organizations, are more often than not fleeting. They are ever-changing, growing like the huge maples that grow around my yard.

And some change colors early, while others stay green as long as they can.

It's been a fantastic summer for me and my family. Travelling to play ball and watching them step up to each challenge and conquer their own self-doubts. Both Alannah and Ashley-Rae grew up a good bit this year in the most positive ways any father could ask for.

And now they are confident in their own abilities and in each other's as well. They know how to face obstacles, how to meet challenges, and how to succeed.

It's been a fantastic summer.

Winning for Losing

2013-07-25T12:22:00.000-04:00

Sometimes it's just inevitable.

Sometimes you just can't win for losing.

But, then again, sometimes the line between winning and losing is blurred.

Last night, my little Gold '99 fastpitch team was in the semi-final game to see who would go one to play in the championship game. It was a very close battle.

We were in the top of the final inning, and down by only two with one out and knowing that if we could hold them to a couple of runs, we could come back and win it in our final at bat.

The first out was made at first base, the player picking up a ground ball down first base line and the runner beaten to the bag.

But then with only a runner on second, their team hit a hard ground ball to our third baseman who looked up and saw the runner on second heading to third.

So she ran to third base and touched the bag first.

But she didn't tag the runner.

I know this because I was chatting with the other team's third base coach and was standing only a couple feet away, watching intently.

"OUT" screamed the umpire – all of fifteen years old – from left field.

There was no way he saw the play.

"She didn't tag her" screamed the fans from the opposing team's bleachers.

They were right.

With my scorebook in hand, I trotted out to left field. And I explained to the umpire that this was not a force play at third.

"But she tagged her", he said – while the fans of the other team were screaming the same thing at the fifteen year old Umpire.

"No she didn't. She didn't even make the attempt to tag her".

That was my fault. I didn't teach my young third-baseman well enough.

I waved to the other team to bring the runner back to third.

That runner scored on the next play when we achieved another out at first on the next batter.

That would have been three outs right there.

And the rest of the inning was a comedy of errors by my infield.

Balls thrown over the first basemen's head, dropped catches on pop-ups. And a dropped ball at first.

My closing pitcher, who I adore as a person – who always gets the job done – then had a hard time finding the strike zone. After eight runs I switched pitchers – even though this admirable young girl had done so such a great job to that point. As I pointed to my little centerfielder to replace her on the mound, my admirable young closer's face started to crumble under the emotion.

And my heart sunk into my stomach for doing that to her.

My next little pitcher came out to warm up – while my admirable young closer walked out to center field. The whole team except for the catcher went out to centerfield with her. And while my next little pitcher threw her practice pitches – the rest of my team consoled my admirable young closer – apologizing for their mistakes – and telling her how great she was – and telling her jokes until she finally laughed.

My next little pitcher struck their batter out with three pitches to finally end the inning.

And we couldn't make up the ten run deficit in our final at bat.

In the huddle after the game where the girls sit on the grass in left field while I stand and talk about the game, I explained to the team what happened at third base. And why I called back the other base runner to third and gave the other team back the second out.

"We don't want to win that way, do we?" I asked.

The girls all said nothing. But they all shook their heads no in agreement.

"You don't want to hear all your friends from the other team tell you we won by cheating or by a really bad call by the umpire, do you?"

"No way coach!" replied my sturdy catcher who is the oldest on the team, a fantastic leader on the squad and top in her class at school.

And the others all chimed in as well muttering "Nope" and "Uh. Uh".

"And we still won the regular season, right?" I continued. "We know in our hearts we are the best team, right?"

"Right", the all replied.

"Sometimes girls you just have to do what's right, even though it's not in favor", I said. "And that, I really believe was the right thing to do".

I doubt the other team really thought much about the out we gave back.

And I doubt very much that our sense of right and fair play will go down in Turtle Club lore – in fact the other coaches would likely think me nuts for not taking advantage of a really bad call by the Umpire in left field.

But all the girls on my little Gold '99 team will remember it. And as the pain of losing washes away as it always does quickly with kids, I think as they grow up, they will remember that call, and that decision, and be proud.

And I think they already feel like winners.

Even though we lost the game, we won.

Perhaps sometimes you can win for losing.

Because sometimes the line between winning and losing gets blurred.

But I sure will miss my little team of Gold '99s.

My Turtle Club Gold ‘99s

2013-07-01T12:30:00.000-04:00

It's July 1^st – Canada Day to us Canukians.

A cool morning with the sun hidden above a thick layer of cloud that is spitting fine droplets of rain as my faithful black lab Suzy and I sit on the back deck this morning.

The hot summers of years before do not seem to be the plan so far this year. Instead today it feels more like May.

I am pouring over the spreadsheet that is my roster and line up for my Turtle Club house league fast pitch softball team of twelve girls aged from ten to fourteen years old. I'm looking over the combinations of our players for innings one through five, who works best with whom in which of the nine available positions, and the order they will bat in.

You might think that having a team of girls with such a broad age range is too much. That the older girls play too hard – to fast – for the younger ones. I know I did when this season started.

But I was wrong. Dead wrong.

The older girls, at least on my team, are all mentors to their younger team mates. And the younger girls have learned so much more this season than they would have simply by playing against teams exactly their age.

The younger girls' skills have risen so much faster. And the older girls still continue to improve.

The older girls, almost young women about to enter high school either this year or the next have all been fantastic role models.

I am so proud of each and every one of them that I cannot tell you in words.

My best pitchers come from both the older and younger girls alike. And the older girls give the younger ones tips and tricks.

And while our little league has only four teams in total, the talent appears to be pretty evenly spread across the pool the players. And we still play under the rules that all girls must bat in a game, and all girls must play both infield and outfield in a game – and all girls must get a chance at pitching – a very hard skill indeed to hurl a yellow eleven inch leather sphere bound in red threading with a cork center as fast as they can underhanded consistently in a strike zone that changes as the size of the girls change.

But all my girls are up for the challenge – eager for their next opportunity to stand at the center of the diamond and do their best to throw strikes across the plate thirty five feet away.

It's so much fun to be a part of a team that is stepping up to each challenge as well as my little team has done. We are turning double plays, and making the throws from third to first to get the fastest of base runners.

Our team is in first place so far with a third of the season left to play. And I do admit that while the premise of house league play is to be fun, with winning being a secondary, perhaps a tertiary thought to skill improvement and a love for the game, I always tell my girls that while winning isn't everything, it is funner than losing.

They seem to like that mindset.

And when we do lose, they do not like it.

We live in a very competitive world, shrinking day by day as our technologies make our experience on this planet one of a global community. It's not a place where an indifference to winning will help you succeed.

There are no participation trophies given in life. You have to get them and earn them. There are no rewards for simply showing up. And that is what sports can teach our children, if we use the metaphor correctly. Honor and integrity and fair play and justice must all be equal key ingredients for this magic potion to really teach our kids the lessons they so desperately need to learn.

No video game console invented yet can replace sports for teaching our kids true competitive drive. And no game where there are no losers and there are no winners – can help our kids evolve into the kind of kids that help keep our community, our society strong. But it has to be an equal mix of all.

There is no social network they can belong to online – chatting to the world that is more influential than that of a ball diamond dugout – when the team is down by four runs and you need a rally – and the cheers the girls sing together for their team mate at the plate gets louder … and more inspiration.

And you have to learn how to take the unfair with a smile that only makes you try harder the next time. You can't blame the umpire because they made a bad call. You can't say the other team got lucky on a fantastic catch.

I guess that's what I love about all these girls the most. They already seem to know this. And they all want to strive to be better. They are not looking for handouts, or easy solutions. Instead each time they step up to the plate – they want to drive that ball into the center field gap for a double or a triple or even a home run. Each time that ball is hit to them, they don't step out of the way in fear, hoping someone else behind them will make the play. No, instead they charge the ball and take ownership of the opportunity to get the out. And if they bobble it, they fight harder to get it back and still attempt the play.

They don't give up.

And when they step up to the challenge, our whole team is on their feet to congratulate them – to make them feel as special as they deserve to feel at that moment. And then that moment is over and the next challenge is faced.

And when they make a mistake – or they don't do as well as they think they could do, there is no blame chided by their team mates. Instead the whole team is there to tell them …
"it's alright, it's okay we still love you anyway!"

I think that's my favorite cheer of them all.

There is not a kid on this team that I am not incredibly proud of. And while I and my two fantastic coaches might have taught them just a little teeny bit about playing softball, they in return teach me so much more.

Our little Gold '99 team is a fantastic group to be a part of this year. And I am so happy that I and my youngest daughter Ashley-Rae – only ten herself – have had the opportunity to share this experience with them together.

"Hey one-zero, come be my hero, and hit the ball, over the wall"
"Seven seven, hit it up to heaven"

I love those sing-song cheers.

And to all the parents of these exceptional young ladies I have the privilege to manage, I sincerely want to thank each and every one of you for the outstanding job you have done so far.

Because I'm here to tell you it's not easy raising kids today.

But I think these girls are all the cream of the crop.

I can hardly wait for our game tonight against that dastardly Red team. To watch these girls go out there and try their best. And while I hope we win, I know there is a another great lesson out there just waiting to be learned.

What a great way to spend a July First Canada Day.

I just hope it doesn't rain.

I got a buddy, eh ...

2013-06-22T12:13:00.001-04:00

I don’t care much for self-proclaimed experts.

For all that I have met, there is one guy who sits at the top of my list.

When I was a younger man, still living in London, I played on a fastpitch softball team with some friends and we were a pretty good team.

The guy who coached us was a bum of sorts. And we dismissed him and usually coached our team by committee. If we all agreed we did it. And this guy would always say that it was his leadership that brought us to our conclusion.

Anytime this bum needed to sound authoritative on any subject, he would always preface his next statement by saying “I got a buddy eh, …” and he would go on to tell us what this expert buddy told him.

And for every subject there seemed to be a different buddy.

This guy was not so likeable that he would have that many buddies. Or that they would all be so incredibly knowledgeable, and more so to be so generous with their knowledge to share it with this bum of a coach guy.

It drove me nuts, and the tripe that spewed out of his mouth after declaring his buddy status was usually quite useless.

So I have never really held much credence to those who start to impose their wisdoms with the sentence “I got a buddy, eh …”

Until now, because you see …

I got a buddy, eh … a fellow I work with who over the last two years who is a coach of a much older team than my girls play on. His daughter plays on this team and he has always described her as very good. And we would talk about softball, usually with me asking questions and he giving answers. His answers have always been very good ones.

One day this spring I was telling him about our upcoming trip to a tournament in Toledo. Let me first say that the level of play in Toledo is fantastic, with clubs that that recruit players from up to a hundred miles away. Their coaches are paid instructors – not the volunteer parents and neighbors our leagues here offer. Not coaches like me, who try to work with the basic knowledge of a fan.

So I was telling him about our Toledo trip and he told me to try to get the girls ready to be beaten badly – mercied if you will – every game. Then he told me “spend the remaining part of your time teaching your girls how to defend against the bunt. These teams will test you early, and if you can’t make the right plays, they will spend the whole game simply bunting on you and taking your defense apart. Train them every scenario with runners in every combination – runner on first. Runner on third, runner on first and third – bunting up and down the first and third baselines – teach them all of those until they know it cold.”

So I shared this knowledge with our team manager, but I prefaced it by saying “I don’t know what level of authority this is coming from … but here is what he told me …”

Our next practice was devoted entirely to bunting – just as my buddy Len had suggested. And it paid off. While we did get beaten badly every game - losing by ten runs easily as we entered the third inning of each – the other teams only tried bunting on us once or twice, maybe three times a game, and our girls handled most well enough that the other teams just resorted to hitting home runs and line drives to every open spot they could find on the field. And when batting, we only had one base runner that entire tournament.

The next week, when I saw Len, he asked how we made out. I told him how humbling the experience was, but that his advice about bunting was great advice that worked, and even though we got completely annihilated, it wasn’t because they bunted us to death,

Our second tournament in Toledo we won a game from a Toledo team, and played close in a couple others, but annihilated by the best teams.

He smiled and told me that was great progress.

This week, I ran into Len in the hallway again, and he told me with beaming pride about how his team actually won that weekend’s tournament in Toledo.

“Really?!, That’s fantastic!”, I said.

“Yes, but we have a lot to work on still he replied”.

That struck me.

Thursday, our coach mentioned that we were going to have one of the other clubs coaches come to one of our practices. I was curious, so I looked at the other clubs website to find out about this other coach. As I was weaving my way through the teams on their site, I tripped over their under 18 girls team. And there was my buddy Len as the coach.

And below in the list of players – his daughters name was listed. And above that list there was another list of accomplishments.

Ontario Provincial Woman’s Softball Association Silver Medalists

Len’s daughter was listed as the PWSA Top Batter from two seasons before, and the PWSA most valuable player last year.

And I realized the true quality of advice that I was getting.

And I felt kind of silly in my boasting of my own two girls, who are both doing very well and I am very proud of, but not anything like Len’s daughter. We are truly just beginning.

All of Len’s advice had been excellent advice, and I did take and followed it when given. But I did not realize the level of authority that my buddy held when he told me.

But now I have this conflict. I really don’t want to sound like that bum of a coach that we all dismissed on that team from long ago.

But I’m afraid I probably will now.

I can just hear me during our next practice, standing at the fence with the coaches, and saying ….

“I got a buddy, eh …”

Peddling Papers

2012-11-20T14:00:00.000-05:00

Remembrance Day has come and gone again.

My Dad’s birthday was November 11th or Remembrance Day here in Canada. Everyone here dons a red poppy pinned to their lapel to remember our fallen soldiers.

When I was a little boy, I always felt bad for Dad having a birthday on Remembrance Day – because everyone would be remembering other people and nobody would remember his birthday.

Birthdays are important when you’re a little boy.

But since Dad passed away some 22 years ago, I spend a good portion of that day simply remembering my Dad.

My Dad had some really great sayings.

When he would greet us in the morning he would ask “How’s your belly for spots?” instead of “How are you?”

When someone would offer Dad something he would smile wide and say “We take all free gifts”.

When he would find my brother and I to be a bit to rambunctious, he would tell us to “go peddle your papers” or “go play in traffic”.

But my favorite expression was used anytime that my brother and I and Dad would know that we were in trouble with our Mom.

Before Paul and I could even conger up any feasible resemblance of an excuse or alibi, Dad would simply smile at and almost with a wink he would say to us

“You lie and I’ll swear to it”.

This year I was thinking about all the technology that has evolved over the last 22 years. I was thinking about how it was too bad that Dad didn’t get to experience how personal computers would have revolutionized how he did his job as the Manager of Southern Region for Business Products Sales for the 3M Company.

He likely would have fought it.

Dad would spend hours working on the visuals – the transparencies that he laid on top of the lighted screen of the overhead projectors he sold to schools and businesses as he prepared to give presentations to very large audiences.

Of course, programs like Microsoft’s PowerPoint would have made this task a breeze – although Dad was very much a person to pay attention to detail.

Spreadsheets and word processors would have greatly helped both my Dad and my Mom – who appointed herself as Dad’s private secretary.

They were a great team.

But Dad got very sick in 1983. He was forced into an early retirement just a year or so before the very first IBM PCs came onto the market. Dad passed away in 1990 a couple years before the Internet came along in such a way that the public could access it.

Dad never saw e-mail, or instant messaging. He never saw a web page like this one. He never would have dreamed of things like Skype or Facebook or Twitter or YouTube.

Or the iPhone.

In retrospect – much of what the personal computer came to be replaced what the very business products my Dad’s teams sold.

Except Post-It notes.

Sad, Dad never saw the 3M Post-It notes. And the computer never really found a way to replace them.

And Dad never saw any of the professional social networking sites like LinkedIn.

My Dad often told the story of being hired by Blue Cross Blue Shield in Michigan – about how when asked what University he went to, he replied “Why the University of Western Ontario”. When challenged by whoever he told the story to, he would rebut, “I most certainly did go to Western, every Thursday … to sell Encyclopedia Britannica”.

And Dad would laugh.

I like to tell that story on behalf of my Dad now. But that was then – before the Internet - before Google – before being able to validate such facts nearly instantaneously online.

I don’t think my Dad would have tried to pull that kind of stunt today.

It’s funny though, because most people I know have their professional credentials on LinkedIn. Their whole resume is on their profile; their education, their certifications, their acquired skills, and their employment history.

It’s all there.

IT people are funny when it comes to listing their skills on a resume. It’s as though they list every technology they ever heard of as a skill they have acquired. There seems to be no regard as to what they will do should they get hired to work with that technology they know by name only.

And now, others can attest to your mastering the skill. They simply click on the skill link in your list of skills and select Endorse.

That person does not have to prove that they know that you know that skill. But with a mere click of a mouse such a claim becomes a verified fact.

Or as my Dad would have said, “You lie and I’ll swear to it!”