Musings at Altitude

I was sitting on my front porch this morning with my chair pulled over into that one spot of shade.  The sun was beating down on the east side of our house, and the temperature difference from the bright sun to the cool breeze in the shade had to be 10 or 15 degrees.

I let the dog roam the front yard as I comfortably looked up and down the street for any other dogs heading our way, and as I finished my north to south sweep, the dog took off across the yard.

I quickly looked back north and out from behind the shade providing pillar emerged a golden retriever on the opposite side of the street, yanking on his leash trying to get to our dog.

I rushed out to the street to make sure I provided a barrier between the two dogs just in case our dog got brave and darted towards the other side or the golden retriever broke free and came across.

Thankfully, all was well in the end.

As I sat back down, I realized how much of a blind spot that shade providing location really was.  I also realized that my natural tendency is to see the things that are in view and assume that anything that might be in one of those blind spots couldn’t possibly a threat.

That’s wrong.

I certainly know it.

We all know it.

And yet I’ll do it again tomorrow.

And I’ll scramble back out to the street again no different than today.

It’s risky to ignore blind spots with our aging dog.

It’s even riskier to ignore them in business or in life.

I need to account for or eliminate the blind spots.

The consequences are too great not to.