Musings at Altitude

We left the house this morning just before 8:00.  The van was completely filled with presents.  In fact, we took all but one passenger seat out of the van, and the rest was completely filled.  We covered everything with blankets to at least provide some form of operational security, but I’d certainly target it if I were looking for one to break into!

Just before 10:00 this morning, the banter inside the van went like this:

14 Year Old – “We’ve been on the road for just about 2 hours now.”

Dad – “You’re a frickin’ genius.”

Mom – Smacks Dad.

Daughter – “You’re just jealous because you can’t wear a bikini.”

Mom – “You want me to smack him again?”

Daughter – “Yes!”

Mom – Smacks Dad again.

If this were an isolated incident, it would be cute.  But dialogue like this continued throughout the 12 hour drive, and even continued into the hotel as we got some food before settling into the room for the night.  That makes it more hysterical than cute, and very typical of what happens in our family.  It’s also typically followed by a few minutes of debate on whether our 14 year old was adopted or not.  I know for a fact she wasn’t, but sometimes I wonder if she didn’t spend nearly enough time in the birth canal being physically shaped and mentally pressured.  I was there when she shot out of the canal with no time for them to even prep my wife for the delivery.  Without being tightly squeezed in the canal, I think she missed a critical step in her mental development and thus comes the incredible statements of obvious genius and the even more incredible confidence in pushing back on her Dad.

The good thing is that the longest leg is behind us.  The bad thing is that we still have 10 more hours of driving ahead of us tomorrow. 

I can’t wait to hear what profound words of wisdom she has for me during this next leg of the drive!

PS.  When we got to Dallas, I went to the check in area of the hotel and asked if they had any rooms.  Fortunately, at this Westin hotel they did.  As I patiently waited for the room rate, the very kind gentleman checking me in said, “I can’t find my rates sheet, so how much do you want to pay?”  I quickly popped back, “39.95!”  He laughed and said he couldn’t match that rate but would put me up for $119 per night.  I was ecstatic!  I expected to pay quite a bit more.  I then asked, “what time does your bar close?”  He said, “11:00 pm, but there aren’t many people in the bar tonight, so they may close earlier.”  I said, “We’ll make it before they close”, and he said, “I’ll drop the room rate to $109 per night.”  I was even more ecstatic!  Nothing like getting a 5 Star hotel for $109 per night!

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Lots of things on my mind tonight – purely random:

(1) I ran my “musings” blog through www.typealyzer.com to see how my writing is rated.  Here’s what it says:

The gentle and compassionate type.  They are especially attuned to their inner values and what other people need.  They are not friends of many words and tend to take the worries of the world on their shoulders.  They tend to follow the path of least resistance and have to look out not to be taken advantage of.  They often prefer working quietly, behind the scene as a part of a team.  They tend to value their friends and family above what they do for a living.

I kind of like this, and I see me and my writing as something very much like what this says.  Some would argue the “not friends of many words” is a flat out lie!  But I certainly prefer being part of a team and I’m often accused of working behind the scenes to get things moving in a direction I sense and see as appropriate.  And I really do take the weight of the world on my shoulders…I’m still learning how and when to ask for help…I’m also still learning to prioritize so that through focus I can make an impact somewhere or on someone.

(2) I’m reading Malcolm Gladwell’s book, “Outliers”.  Awesome!  I’m completely engrossed in this book, and I’m amazed at how well researched it is and how fascinating the reach back to the root cause of success can be.  In a world where everyone seems to assess and assign blame, I’m grateful to Gladwell and this book for assessing and assigning the root cause of success.

(3) My little girl who is now a mom decided to up and leave town with her husband and our little granddaughter.  It’s been smile city having them around, but it’s great to see them now heading out as a family as he pursues his career and they both pursue being the awesome parents that its so easy to see they will be.  With today’s technology, we can still get our daily pictures and our near instant updates.  But it’s not the same.  There’s something magical about your little baby having her own little baby and having them both nearby, and something even more magical about watching that little baby change daily as she becomes her own confident little self.  For now, we’ll smile through pictures:

 (4) My other little girl finished her 5th final today, wearing jammies to school so she could “party with her 1st graders”.  It’s pretty cool that in my 14 year old’s high school, they can take an elective that allows them to be teacher’s assistants in the elementary school.  I think my 14 year old has found her calling, and I’m pretty sure she’ll find a way to work with small children as she pursues her passions now.

(5) My beautiful bride of 26 years got quite anxious a few days ago when the checking account balance got precariously close to zero.  It’s amazing how fast the cash leaves when you have grandchildren, grandnephews, grandnieces, your own children, their new family members and soon to be family members, all that need Christmas presents.  AND, when you use your debit card to fulfill this rapidly expanding Christmas wish list.  AND, you only check your account balance “every now and then” because it’s declining faster than you’ve ever seen it decline before.  My Mississippi math tells me that the pace towards “card refused” because of taking more out than I can possibly put back in, very well should cause just a bit of anxiety.  Fortunately, or maybe unfortunately, the checking account got replenished by my every two week paycheck today, so she now has a new pile of cash to rapidly burn through.  Thank goodness there are only 5 shopping days left till Christmas and two of those days we’ll be driving to the homestead.

(6) We’re heading down to Mississippi tomorrow, and we’ll be following the same path that presented us with one weather challenge after another a couple years ago.  Back then, we left in a near blizzard and made it through the mountain pass in Raton, NM, immediately after the road was cleared.  On the way home though, we didn’t get nearly as lucky and spent New Year’s even in the 1st Baptist Church of Dumas, TX, which had opened their recreation center for those of us stranded in yet another major snow storm.  As I think back on that trip today, it was at first a bit unsettling and then kind of cool to welcome in the new year in that shelter.  Even today, I realize how blessed we were to even find shelter (we were planning to bundle up in the car), how blessed we are today to have a home and a job, and how much we need to be a blessing to others who may be facing adversity today.  We got caught in a blizzard and sought shelter and found shelter.  Many today seek shelter and can’t find it.  That’s something we all need to care tremendously about.  If we care, maybe we can find something that we can do to make a difference.  The need is certainly there, and with one week to go till we celebrate the birth of our Savior who was also born in a shelter of sorts, maybe the lesson we’ve been taught by His birth will energize us towards seeing that need in others and finding that way to help.

I’m looking forward to the 1,200 mile drive tomorrow.  We’ve been blessed this time with incredibly low gas prices.  That’s giving me a smile even before we start to drive!

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I spent today in the Washington DC area and visited many of my friends who over the last 5 years have led their teams from start up to delivering hundreds of millions in revenue with significant profits for their owners.  It’s something special to remember the initial business plan discussions and to now see how accurate those business plans were.  It’s even more special to realize that the most accurate plan was a one page chart that in 5 years has played out exactly as originally envisioned.  That company will be $200M in revenue this year.

It’s invigorating to spend time with these entrepreneurs, and it’s uplifting to hear their stories of success and to listen and learn about the hurdles they had to overcome (still are overcoming) to be at the point they are today. 

There is an incredible bond between those who have faced the intense trials of a start up company.  It’s an elite club of sorts that many people never get to join.  Those that do have an incredible passion, great confidence, great courage, short memories (have to forget the setbacks), and a great respect for those that join the team with them and fight through the start up challenges together.  It’s not unusual for those loyal team members to follow that start up leader into whatever next adventure he/she may pursue…because once they’ve reached that high that comes from business plan success, there is a deep yearning to sustain that teamwork and achieve that high all over again.

I have great respect for those that have the courage to start a company.  I have equal respect for those that willingly join a leader of a start up company and put their careers and livelihoods at risk to be part of that special team at that special time on that special journey together.  And I have utmost respect for those start up teams that deliver as planned and remain humble even in that success.

I met with several of those business leaders today, and even hours later, I’m still in awe of what they have accomplished.

These visits truly are something special.

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I was very fortunate today to be upgraded to Business Class on the flight from Denver to Washington Dulles.  We were on a United 767, and the plane we were on had been recently reconfigured to have seats facing both forwards and backwards in Business Class.

I was one of the lucky ones that got the rear facing seats, and I must admit, I haven’t experienced air flight from that direction since the mid 90’s when I’d fly in the passenger compartment of a C-5 on the top deck during an international deployment. 

Then and now, it just seems backwards.  I’d look out the windows and the ground would be moving the wrong direction.  I’d seek that sensation of takeoff or landing and the nose and the tail were reversed and the mind would be telling me something was wrong when in reality everything was right.  And most importantly, during the boarding process, I’d see the back of people as they boarded rather than the fronts!

I must admit, it was a great flight and the cabin crew was tremendous.  Though everything else was backwards, the service from United was as always top notch.

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My 14 year old began studying for her finals more than a week ago – yep – more than a week ago.  With each passing day the anxiety built because she had that most dreaded final in math first – which is today.  She has four more the rest of this week, but none of them bring out the fear, the worry, the trepidation that math does.

She gets that from her mother, a self professed “I suck at math” evangelist.  Together they create a chorus of self fulfilling prophesies regarding math that rock the halls and shake the walls of the house as they profess their disdain and proclaim their God created inadequacies in math.

I certainly don’t see either one of them as ignorant in math.  And I’m no psychiatrist, but I do see both of them as having created great barriers of self imposed mental deficiencies that now must be overcome in order for either of them to feel any sense of accomplishment in math.  I also see both of them joining hands in a common bond of anticipated mediocrity that very well may play itself out as achieving great success just by getting through the course with a passing grade.

So on this most dreaded of all days when my 14 year old has to face the demons of math head on, I mentally practiced my got-to-pump-her-up speech as I got ready to take her to the bus stop.  I’d need a good speech today, because she had a week of build up in doubt that I had to overcome in a 5 minute visit with her at the bus stop.  I thought of all the great lines:

• “Your hard work will be rewarded.”
• “Don’t worry, you’ll do great.”
• “I can’t wait to hear how great you did when it’s over.”
• “In my darkest hours, I always pray.”

I had a few other choice lines as well, but those are best kept between a father and his 14 year old!

So I was ready.  I was going to tackle her fear head on and through my very own positive words of support, I was going to launch her towards school feeling confident about that test and feeling very positive about her hard work in preparation.

When she popped into my office just before we had to leave for the bus stop, I asked her how she was feeling and if she was worried about the test.  She quickly responded, “Avs won!”  As I tried to probe so I could use all of those magnificent lines that I’d spent all morning practicing to use on her, she ran over to my computer and said, “did you hear who the stars of the game were?”  I gave it one last chance and astutely asked, “so the Avs winning takes all the worry about the test away?”  She responded, “Yah!”  And then she jumped on my computer and went to the Avalanche web site and proceeded to show me the still photo shots from the Avs 3-2 victory over the Red Wings.

Now I’m no genius, but I realized pretty quick that she was in a state of euphoria that no longer required any pump me ups before she boarded that bus.  She had gone to bed high fiving everyone, and she woke up in an extended celebration that took her mind completely off of the test only hours away. 

My guess is she’ll do fine on that test.  She’s no dummy, and a week of preparation and hard work will pay off with a good grade. 

Fortunately, she’ll go into that test now feeling good about life even if she still feels inadequate in math. 

There’s something to that.  There’s a lesson there to be learned. 

I just hope for her sake that the Avs win every time the night before a math test!

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For our wedding anniversary, I got my wife an iPod…she too is now part of the now generation!

Tonight, though, she wanted to download some games and a movie…that would make her complete.  We went out to iTunes and quickly downloaded Tetris, Sudoko, and a Casino game, and then we went to look at the movies.  As we scrolled through the movies to download, she smiled at “Sleepless in Seattle”, a movie that she says is great and that I have never seen.  That’s the one she got.

Once we were done downloading her movie, I went back to the iTunes store to find a movie to download to my iPod.  I went straight by all the movies that are traditionally defined as “chick flicks” and I went instead to the action/drama section.  I chose “Bourne Supremacy”, one that will keep me watching longer than the introductory credits, which is probably all I would watch of “Sleepless in Seattle”.

This in a nutshell points out the difference between me and my wife. 

She plays those games that I have no coordination and no patience for.  She watches those movies that make you go, “ahhh”, and she’ll sit through those types of movies from beginning to end.  She’ll keep herself occupied on that little bitty iPod screen from the time we get off the runway till the time we approach for landing.

I, on the other hand, use my iPod for primarily music.  Instead of playing games, I’ll occupy myself with work on my laptop or by reading the latest in business books.  If I do watch a movie on the iPod, it will be a “man’s movie” with lots of action, and I’ll have no problem watching a couple minutes at a time, and I’ll watch certain scenes over and over again.

One of the things that makes our relationship work is the way we poke fun at each other with our differences. 

Where she cries every time she watches particular movies, I laugh at her as she cries.  Where she focuses intently on the sudoko puzzles or the latest crosswords, I laugh at her as she struggles to complete those daily tear off puzzles that weren’t meant in most cases to be successfully completed.  Where she now reaches for her librarian glasses to be able to see those microscopically small puzzles or watch that itty bitty movie on her iPod, I laugh at her knowing that she once had better than 20-20 vision and now needs magnifiers to see things that once she could see seemingly across the room.  And, where she now enters her pre-menopausal years and has the hot and cold sequences in seemingly ever decreasing intervals, I sit there and smile knowing that our home heating bill will decrease tremendously as we can now use her to heat the house during those ever so frequent hot flashes.

For me, as I fret over the latest challenge at work or focus on the latest email that arrives on my blackberry, she laughs as I focus and she distracts me when I need to concentrate the most.  As I sit fat, dumb and happy in front of the weekend slate of football games, she pulls the “we need to go shopping” card, and then through her own special way of making me feel guilty, encourages me to get off my fat, dumb and happy butt and head out into the world of ridiculous shoppers.  As I wake up in the morning and with my 20-400 eyes feel all over the nightstand to find my glasses, she sits there and laughs knowing exactly where they are and giving me no help at all as I ever increasingly more desperately do my search.  And, as I roll out of bed and with every move creak and pop my way towards the bathroom, I sense her sitting there and smiling, listening and watching and knowing that I’m aging at a much more rapid pace than she is and thus will be completely dependent on her within just a few years (as if I’m not already)!

I often tell my wife in a very sarcastic tone how much I look forward to our upcoming time together in the rocking chairs.  I’ll say something.  She’ll tell me I’m wrong.  I’ll pop off with a retort.  She’ll call me “butthead”.  And I’ll sit there quietly for a while.  Then we’ll repeat this sequence again.  When the discussions of the day get tiresome, I’ll change over to talk about the things I remember from our past.  She’ll tell me I’m wrong.  I’ll pop off with a retort.  She’ll call me “butthead”.  And I’ll sit there quietly again for a while.

We have lasted 26 beautiful years together for 2 reasons:

(1) we poke fun at each other for just about everything in our lives

(2) she’s always right

It’s worked perfectly thus far.  I can’t imagine it won’t work for the next 26 years!

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On December 11th, my wife and I celebrated our 26th anniversary, but this time on the road together as she accompanied me to Baton Rouge.  I keep thinking back to how many of our anniversaries that I’ve missed in my travels, and they are way to many to be proud of.  So this time I wanted to be different.  This time I wanted to be together.  This time I wanted to share this special time together even if I wouldn’t be home.  And she eagerly said “yes”, and I’ve been smiling now for two straight days!

But true to form, I waited till the very last minute to get her a gift, waited till the very last minute to get us hotels and rental cars, and waited till the very last minute to make dinner reservations.  But I work well under pressure.  In fact, I think I excel under pressure, and she’s been smiling for the last two days as well!

But now as this trip comes to a close and as the anniversary smiles already begin to fade as we head back into the regular routine of our normal lives, I want to share why I love this particular lady so much:

• she’s beautiful
• she’s tolerant
• she’s supportive
• she’s nurturing
• she’s honest
• she’s motherly
• she’s thoughtful
• she’s adaptable

In these past 26 years, we have changed together as life has thrown us some curves that we had to quickly adjust to and as my career led us in directions that were often times unexpected and always times of challenge and great growth in our relationship.  But with each curve, we found new smiles and with each move we found new friends.  And with each experience we found new reasons and new ways to love each other.

These last two days have been a microcosm of 26 years – separation during work; sharing special moments with family and friends; and cherishing the short times we have together.  But I’m not sure I would change much of these 26 years if I could do them over again.  Separation truly does make the heart grow fonder, and the resultant independence truly does create deep roots and great strength in a relationship.

As I now look at this beautiful woman 26 years later, I still feel the very same way I felt back then – I am for sure the luckiest man in this world!  I have been blessed to share this journey of life with the very girl that I couldn’t quit looking at from the time she was 14 till now.  And through the smiles and the tears (of which we’ve had many over the years), when I look today, I still remember then. 

I still wonder why she chose me, but I’m so thankful that she did!

And for that beautiful lady that has shared these 26 years with me, I love you, and I’ve loved every single minute of our lives together.  Thank you for being who you are, and thank you for loving me.

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I want to visually compare the difference between snow in Baton Rouge and snow in Colorado Springs:

 

Baton Rouge

12/10/08

 

Colorado Springs

12/1/08

Although my wife’s family is from Louisiana on her Dad’s side, we now live in Colorado.  We used to get as excited about snow as they did in Baton Rouge this week when we were growing up on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.  But now, after living in Colorado Springs for many years and after experiencing up to 40 inches of snow in any one snow storm, we just don’t get as excited about snow anymore.

We do get excited (in an adverse way) about the shoveling that has to occur when there is a big snow storm.  We get even more excited when it’s that very wet, very heavy snow.  But we don’t get excited about a “dusting”, which is what we call a light snow fall that creates no consequence other than those small accidents caused by people who get careless when they need to be careful.

I’m just happy to hear the excitement of people here in Baton Rouge when they experience an event that occurs so commonly in Colorado Springs.  That’s something special!

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I ended up spending some time this week in Baton Rouge on business, and before I left home in Colorado, I received this photo as a warning as to what I should expect upon arrival:

As we were landing in New Orleans, we could see clearly from the air the unusual whiteness around the area.  When we arrived in Baton Rouge, we heard the stories of power outages and accidents, and we saw some remnants of the snow, but mostly slush and lots of water from the melting.  Folks got from 1 to 4 inches depending on which part of the area they lived in, and everyone was talking about this very unusual event. 

I smiled as I listened to all the stories, and then smiled even more when one person said that this was the most snow they have had since before 1900! 

But that was yesterday.  Today, I was hot in a light sweater, and it’s supposed to be back in the 70’s tomorrow!  The strange happenings were not meant to last!  But it sure seemed like folks had fun while it lasted!

 

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As we were getting ready for bed last night, my wife turned up the thermostat from 69 to 71 degrees, because we didn’t want the grandbaby to be cold at night.  That subtle change made it uncomfortably warm in some parts of the house and yet the perfect temperature in the baby’s room.  I thought about that when I woke up this morning because I was tossing and turning all night, taking the comforter off, then taking the sheet off, trying to adjust to the change in temperature.

When I got up this morning and went into the shower, I turned the knob to the typically perfect position for the water temperature that I like, and I found myself turning it just a little bit further toward hot and it got too hot and then back a little bit towards cold and it got too cold.  Each subtle change in the knob caused enough change in the way it felt on my skin that it became uncomfortable.

As we drove to the airport this morning, the traffic was flowing so perfectly (if you worry about getting there on time) till we hit the Castle Pines on ramp just South of Denver.  At that on ramp, a stream of cars were entering the 75 mph speedway, and with each car entering, brakes were being applied and the whole stream of cars were slowing down at least 30 mph. 

In each of these cases, very subtle changes in temperature or volume resulted in very uncomfortable results.  I’m finding that’s the same in business.  I like changing things.  I like getting better even when things may be very good.  I like finding more revenue even when revenue growth is extreme.  I like bringing new people in to change the way things are being done or things are being thought.  I just like change.

But most folks don’t like change.  Most folks understandably like things to be consistent.  They like things to be done in similar ways so that they can be comfortable with the path and the approach.  For those folks that get uncomfortable with change, little changes to the organization or the process or the approach can create great concern and distinctly adverse affects on behavior and sometimes performance. 

As a business leader, I’m learning that I need to think forward and think through how those tweaks and subtle changes will affect all those in our organization.  In the past, I forced change and accepted the affects of that change, confidently believing it was best for the organization.  Today, although I still believe change is good (we are in fact changing all the time whether we want to or not), I fully realize that change affects different people and different organizations in very different ways – sometimes in very adverse ways.  Change is still needed, so I won’t stop encouraging and driving change.  But change with a full understanding of how it affects the organization will be much more meaningful, much more rewarding, and much less painful.

PS.  Just to revisit the change in house temperature last night.  I woke up after a night of tossing and turning with a bit of a scowl on my face.  I just couldn’t get comfortable.  But the one for who the temperature change was made woke up in a very different mood.  That 2 degree shift in temperature was obviously a really good thing!

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