...It’s Never Ok To Lack Effort

I don’t remember how old I was, probably 11 or 12. I wasn’t particularly thrilled with the job I had been given by my Dad of mowing the lawn, and it showed. I had missed several spots, and was dragging myself around the yard with lots of attitude. Next thing I know, Dad is standing next to me tapping me on the shoulder. I turned off the mower...

Dad: What are you doing?

Me: I’m cutting the grass...(the reader will notice that I didn’t add...What does it LOOK like I’m doing?...to this statement, because this sort of snarky disrespect would have resulted in a severe, draconian response from my very Old School, greatest generation father, who didn’t appreciate snark)

Dad: No...you are cutting the grass poorly. Look at all the spots you’re missing! 

Then it gets a little fuzzy. I don’t remember the exact words, but he launched into a speech about the integrity of work, about how a man’s reputation is made by what kind of job they do on even the most insignificant assignment, about how you never want to put your name on something that wasn’t done to the best of your ability, blah, blah, blah...All I was thinking was, Dad, it’s just the grass!! But he was having none of it. He ended the speech with this...

Son, it’s ok to lack skill, but it’s never ok to lack effort.

It took me years before I understood what wise advice he had given me.

I thought about this last night while watching the World Series. Manny Machado, the most gifted baseball player on either roster, lifted a high fly ball towards the left field bleachers, stood at home plate briefly, admiring his work, then broke out into a self congratulatory trot towards first base. Only, the ball didn’t quite make it to the bleachers, instead, glancing off the wall, 365 feet from home plate. Instead of sliding into second base with a double in a tie game of the World Series with his team down two games to zero, Mr. Machado loafed into first base with probably the longest single in Major League history. I watched it with my mouth hanging open, astonished at his shameless lack of effort. This isn’t the first time, even in this post season, that he has loafed while running the bases. It’s what he does, it’s part of who he is as a player...a supremely talented, lazy player.

It is always this way in sports. It’s always the graceful prodigy who dogs it, it’s always the most gifted athletes who show the least desire. Maybe it’s because the game comes so easy to them. All through my life as a baseball fan, it has always been the scrappers, the gamers who I have loved...the guys who had to compensate for their lack of natural talent with relentless drive and hustle. It’s always been those guys who I can identify with. There’s a life lesson somewhere in all of this. But it all boils down to what my Dad told me that day nearly fifty years ago...

...its ok to lack skill, but it’s never ok to lack effort.

Do Teachers Have A Cushy Job?

My daughter is a middle school English teacher. She happens to be an award winning middle school English teacher. She is making a real difference in the lives of her students, instilling in them a love of reading and an appreciation for language. In doing so, she is doing God’s work. I am very proud of her. But her job is insanely difficult. She is reading a book right now by someone named Jane Morris called Teacher Misery. Last night, she texted me an excerpt. To say that I was appalled would be an understatement:

As I read this story, I tried mightily to imagine something like this happening in any classroom when I attended the Hanover County public schools from 1968 through 1976. I simply could not. This is not to say that we didn’t have foul-mouthed, disrespectful students back then. We had plenty. But had any of them used this kind of language, or behaved in this manner, it would have taken maybe five minutes for that kid to be escorted out of that classroom. Full stop. That’s how long it would have taken the principal to run from his office, and physically remove Raptor and his cocky smirk from school property. Maybe another ten minutes to draw up his expulsion papers, then another for his next of kin to be summoned to drive him away. 

But Kaitlin informs me that expelling students is frowned upon by today’s education bureaucracy. If the goal is to educate children, why would we want to expel them from school, they ask. My answer is simple and unpolluted by educrat groupthink:

Me: Education is a privilege. If some jackass doesn’t desire an education and his or her antics makes the education of others more difficult or in this case, impossible, then escorting said jackass off the premises seems wise. There is no way that any sane person can call this progress.

Just in case you might be laboring under the false notion that teachers have an easy job because they...have the summers off... consider the following disgusting asshattery:

Honestly. If I had to deal with this insanity on a daily basis, it would take more than a summer vacation...

Pipe Bombs

The complete and total collapse of our civil discourse now brings us pipe bombs. Yesterday afternoon, eight of them were mailed to a series of high profile Democrats, including former President Obama. This comes less than two weeks before the 2018 mid term elections, against the backdrop of a caravan of Central Americans making their way across Mexico. Even if, like me, you’re not one who takes politics all that seriously, it’s hard not to feel like something big and ominous is about to happen.

I consider myself a cynical observer. The last time I felt anything approaching confidence in Washington was at the dawn of Ronald Reagan’s first term, because finally we had a President who promised to reign in, to constrain, to loosen the government’s grip on American life. The fact that Reagan was largely unsuccessful in this effort convinced me that it was never going to happen, that my country would always be a place where government’s power and influence would always and forevermore grow. The best I could hope for was a slower growth rate. Consequently, ever since Reagan, I have had very low expectations of politics and politicians. I withdrew from the partisan wars as an active participant. I concentrated my actions and passions toward my business, my friends and my family. Whatever was going on in Washington was merely one of a thousand entertainment options for me, something to roll my eyes over, and crack jokes about. Voting became an excruciating experience. How could I possibly pull the lever for that insufferable moron? Well, if I don’t that leaves me with that other blithering idiot. 

But, suddenly, politics isn’t funny anymore. It’s becoming harder and harder to dismiss what’s happening in Washington as theatre, as merely a playground for egotistical narcissists. Now, faux hatred has turned in to real hatred. Now, scuffles are breaking out, and pipe bombs fly through the mail. The political and ideological divide is rapidly becoming a tangible, physical one. We are now red states, blue states, deplorables and resisters. There is talk of secession in the air. There are millions of people out there who have convinced themselves that if the upcoming elections don’t go their way, the country is finished and their lives will be over. I feel helpless to stop any of this. I’m just holding on to the rails of this national roller coaster.

But, you know what I’m really tired of? The blame game. The calculations that start with every new news cycle...who benefits? Who will be hurt? Does the Caravan help the Republicans? Will the pipe bombs boost the Democrats?

Here’s what I know...anyone who would assemble an explosive device, place it in the mail, with the intent of killing a politician, is a treasonous coward. I shouldn’t ever have to say this, but it’s 2018 so...it doesn’t matter who the politician is. I have no interest in living in a country where people feel justified in killing their political and ideological enemies. That’s not America. That’s the 1930’s Soviet Union. That’s Nazi Germany. That’s Mao’s Cultural Revolution. That’s Che Guevara’s purges.

I never thought I would long for the day when the people in Washington were just harmless buffoons. But, when buffoonery meets violence, it’s a game changer.

That’s where we find ourselves in 2018.

9 Miles in 52 Minutes

Yesterday was one of those days. I don’t have very many of them anymore. Up at 5:00, out the door at 7:45, home at 8:20 in the evening. Thirty years ago, this would have been like every Tuesday. Now, it’s a rarity.

I met with some clients in Burke, Va. late in the afternoon. I make the trip every year, usually in October. Since it’s in northern Virginia, there’s no good time to make that drive. But, yesterday was especially awful. I backed out of their driveway at 6:15. It’s exactly 9 miles from their house to the Occoquan exit onto 95. It took me 52 minutes.

In the midst of this interminable slog, it occurred to me that there are thousands of people for whom this is totally normal. The vast majority of the commuters around me on that 9 mile, bumper to bumper, 10 mph soul-crushing journey have to endure it every single day. To ponder this reality is to confront the disturbing truth that contemporary Americans who choose to live in such places...ie., most every large city in the country...have simply lost their minds. When, in the course of human development, did it become acceptable to live in a place where it takes 52 minutes to drive 9 miles? Can you imagine a real estate agent back in 1955 telling an upwardly mobile young couple with two toddlers that the rancher they have their eyes on is a steal at $18,000, and what’s more...It only takes 52 minutes to get to the interstate!!

I suppose it’s possible that eventually you would get used to it. Maybe after a couple of years you would learn to adjust. You would discover books on tape, and other Jedi mind tricks designed to distract you from the fact that you have become a hampster on a treadmill. But Doug, but Doug, you say...eventually self driving cars will mitigate these sorts of commutes. Well...I am here to inform you that the only thing more terrifying and dehumanizing than sitting in a 9 mile long parking lot with 10,000 total strangers is the thought that I might one day do so, surrounded by 10,000 people... fast asleep in their reclining drivers seats.

No thank you.

The Age of Adjustments

It’s 5:00 in the morning, and I am wide awake. My eyes opened at 4:30. I gave it thirty minutes but finally gave up. I have a mountain in front of me, no point staring at the ceiling in the dark. Might as well get up.

One of the great deceptions of life is the notion that at some point, by dent of hard work, discipline and force of will, it gets easier. Not true. What it gets is...different. I’m 60 years in and I find that I’m constantly having to learn new coping skills. The only constant seems to be the constancy of change. Just about the time you master something, a new challenge arises. 

Just about everything in this world is unrecognizable from how it looked when I was a kid. The differences aren’t all bad. Some things look better...my bank account for one. Other things are worse...our politics, while never truly civil, has now become toxic. Most everything else is just...different. A few examples:

Church. Completely different from what it sounded and looked like when I was a boy. I grew up with robed choirs, hymn books, ladies in their finery, men in their gray suits, older men nodding off, older woman fanning themselves with the funeral home fans provided them in the hymn rack right beside the King James Bible. The preaching was loud and forceful. There were alter calls, pleas for public professions of faith, emotional appeals.

Now, where I go to church, there are no robes. There’s a band. The words to the music are on a screen hanging from the ceiling. The ladies don’t wear hats, even on Easter, and not a single man wears a suit. The pastor wears jeans and an untucked shirt. There are no hymn books, no hymn racks, no pews, just metal framed chairs hooked together. There aren’t pleas, emotional or otherwise. The preaching is conversational, no yelling.

Some of these changes have been difficult for me, others I’ve welcomed. But, despite it all, I have come to love my new church. I have adjusted. I have chosen to make peace with some of the new stuff that I don’t prefer, and embrace the new things that I like. Like everything else in this life, it has been a work in progress.

Parenting. Completely different than it looked and felt like twenty five years ago. Back then, we were in charge. They depended on us for everything. We dominated their lives. Now, there’s the empty nest. While some parts of empty nest-ism has been wonderfully freeing, being separated from their lives by hundreds of miles is quite different from what it would be like if they were merely across town. We are no longer in charge, they no longer depend on us, and while this is mostly a huge relief, it is also strangely jarring. 

Pam and I have made the adjustments to our new rolls in their lives, but not without some struggle. We have learned to cope with the distances that separate us. We have learned to make the most of the few days a year when we get to be with them. It is the new reality, and we are learning to make the most of it.

Work. Building a business is a very different animal than maintaining one. I spent the first five years of my career trying to survive. Then I spent the next fifteen years establishing a working formula for success, the next ten years consolidating that success, and now trying to figure out how to maintain it all. Each of these things requires a different skill set, which has forced me to learn new things, change some habits, establish new ones. Drifting doesn’t seem an option.

Health. I was asked the other day by a doctor a series of stupid questions which were...Can you run as fast today as you could when you were twenty five? Can you lift as much weight now as you could when you were thirty? Are you as sharp and quick on your feet mentally as you were when you were thirty five? If not...welcome to the Age of Adjustments.

So that is pretty much what life is like now. It’s the Age of Adjustments. I can’t eat the same things I’ve always eaten. I can’t do the same things I’ve always done in exactly the same way and expect the same results anymore. This older dog must learn new tricks.

But, what’s the alternative? I can become a stubborn old dude, stuck in the past, refusing to adapt to the facts on the ground all around me...or I can adapt, make some mid-course corrections. I can complain about the sloppy dress around me at church, bemoan the musical style that doesn’t suit me, rail against Nashville and Columbia, become embittered by the ageing process. Or, I can learn a new way and cope with my changing world with a mixture of grace, humor and flexibility. There are but two choices.

I choose grace.

But it won’t be easy. Life never is.

What Ever Happened to...Manners??

If a nation’s sporting events are simply a reflection of it’s underlying societal evolution, yesterday wasn’t a very good look for the United States of America.

This morning’s sports pages are dominated by three big stories:

The Dodger win over the Brewers, the melee which occurred on the field during warmups of the Michigan v. Michigan State game, and this:

At this point I should keep in mind that if I’m not careful, this blog could quickly turn in to one of those...Get off my lawn!!...old gent rants. Maybe it already has, and if so...sorry/not sorry.

First, baseball. Ok, I’m not a purist on the subject of displaying emotion after a big hit or a big strike out in a pressure packed moment. In the old days, this was strictly forbidden, one of the maddening number of baseball’s unwritten rules. You hit a home run? Run quickly around the bases and get back into the dugout. Don’t stand and stare at your work or flip your bat. But, like everything else in this world, this slice of sportsmanship and decorum is being discarded in favor of a whatever floats your boat attitude. Indeed, MLB has been relentlessly promoting this new freak flag-flying showboating in their ads during this postseason. Enough talk, let the kids play, intones Ken Griffey Jr. in one particularly annoying ad which is always followed by some hip hop act asking us...Is you ready?? So, when I say I’m not a purist what I mean is, I’m ok with a relaxing of some of these old school ways. Baseball is, after all, a joyful game, and I see nothing wrong with a fist pump or an eruption of emotion from players. But, last night, the Los Angeles Dodgers got caught up in an outbreak of hysteria, their collective ids running rampant all over the place. Some guy, I forget who, got a single and looked back into his dugout and made the suck it gesture to his gleeful teammates. Another, after homering, pointed to his biceps while trotting around the bases. By the time Yasiel Puig hit his three run bomb late to seal the victory, I have no idea what they were doing...lewd gestures, wild, unhinged gesticulations, a full fledged dance party broke out in front of the dugout. Sorry...too much, too soon. It’s like professional baseball players have suddenly lost all impulse control. I mean, I tune in to watch a baseball game, and a political protest broke out!!

The Michigan v. Michigan State thing was just more of what has become routine...college football players putting on sportsmanship clinics, as in...Here’s an example of horrible sportsmanship. One team marches, lock-armed across a field that is occupied by members of the opposing team. A game of chicken breaks out. Which team is going to stop first? When neither team does, somebody gets too close to somebody else and before you know it, some player who isn’t even in uniform because of an injury goes full bats**t crazy and starts tearing up the Logo at the 50 yard line. At least these guys have the excuse that they are kids, not fully grown adults. (Think of how stupid you were in college).

Finally, we have the basketball brawl at the Staples Center. This was LeBron James’ home debut with his new team, the Lakers. We are told that the NBA is the most progressive of the major sports in America. We are told that basketball is the sport with the cultural power, and LeBron James is everywhere worshipped as some sort of Demi-god. Well, last night at his latest coronation, someone allegedly spit on someone else prompting a melee of wild punches and scrums...in game two of the regular season of a sport which has the most meaningless regular season in the history of organized sports. But, isn’t this just a reflection of...us? Any provocation, real or imagined is cause for a fight, right? Wait...is that a politician I don’t like eating dinner with his wife over there? That cannot stand!!! Wait...is that politician a left of center Democrat? Obviously she wants to turn us into the next Venezuela!! To the barricades!!!!

Here’s what I think when I watch sports...this is what happens when you come to believe that simple manners are a bourgeois straightjacket meant to stifle your individuality. Treating others with simple grace and dignity has morphed into a sign of weakness. 

And now...even baseball isn’t exempt.

Found a Great Restaurant

So, last night, I walk up to Pam and say...I feel like Italian. I can’t explain why really. I just had a hankering. If you live in Short Pump, the World headquarters for chain restaurants, there are lots of options...Carrabba’s, Olive Garden, all the usual suspects. However, I don’t know about you, but as I’ve gotten older I’ve started to resent National chains. Not resent, really...that’s too strong a term for it. It’s more like that when I see a chain restaurant I know that ultimately the profits from that chain go someplace else. Yes, I know they supply jobs to local people, etc.. but chains are a local manifestation of some far flung enterprise that benefits it’s corporate owners who wouldn’t know a Short Pump from a long one. Maybe when I see what a hash our government in Washington is making of the country, something in me feels the need to withdraw from that faraway place, to more closely identify with our state...our town...our Italian restaurant. So, what did I do? I did what every red blooded American does...I googled....Italian joints near me.

This is Vinny’s, less than a mile from my front door off of Lauderdale. If this place looks familiar it’s because it probably reminds you of another famous Italian restaurant in the Bronx where Michael Corleone killed the two dirty cops...

But, I digress.

So, we walk into the place and are greeted by a grandmotherly woman with a thick Italian accent. Nice. Pam notices that there is a special on the chalkboard beside the front door...something-something with pancetta and Asiago cream sauce. There’s a nice crowd, mostly families, not so loud that you have to shout, but not so quiet that you have to whisper. Our waitress greets us with a cheerful smile. She is young, pretty, with an even thicker Italian accent. Even nicer. I ask her for her professional opinion...What’s the most delicious entree on this menu? She doesn’t hesitate. The name of the dish rolls off her tongue with beautiful flair. She points to it and I see the word sausage in the description and I’m all in. 

Our waitress, who we have discovered has just moved from Sicily eight months ago with her husband, and who’s mother was the one who greeted us when we arrived and is just here for a visit but didn’t want to spend a minute apart from her daughter so volunteered to be the hostess, brings me a frozen glass mug for my beer, then seems thrilled when Pam orders the special and I take her advice on the sausage thing. Soon, a basket of garlic bread appears, and fresh, cold salads.

Ok, my dish was amazing. The delicious sounding name for it is Tortellini Campagnola. It looked like this...only with a lot more sausage!!

Pam’s dish was the special, and as such there was no picture on the menu. However, I am here to bare witness to the fact that it was the finest thing I have placed in my mouth inside of any restaurant in years. The tortellini was homemade, the pancetta was exquisite and the Asiago cream sauce tasted like some sort of diabolical plot cooked up by a cabal of Mafiosos determined to turn me into a 300 pound couch potato. The minute that sauce splashes over the tastebuds, you realize that you are powerless to resist it. Maybe if the choice was...eat more of this or save your children...you might be able to put down the fork, but beyond that, it would be hopeless. It was just that good. Pam couldn’t finish it, so there’s a styrofoam container in our refrigerator with the remains. I am currently plotting a way to trick Pam into letting me eat it for breakfast.

So, we are thrilled to have found Vinny’s Italian Grill. It’s local, run by real Italians, and is five minutes from my house.

Go ye, and do likewise.