Dad Gets One More

My father had a weekly lunch with two of his brothers on Fridays. I’m not sure when they started doing this but it was some time after their other two brothers passed. If I was in town when they did it I attended and more than once they shifted the date so I could attend. I’ve even blogged about attending before, in particular I recall a time that my Dad sat just listening to his older brother talk. Yet another moment to learn from him.

Dad talked about their lunches often. They rotated paying for each other, but were notoriously bad about leaving wallets or forgetting whose turn it was. Dad especially loved to share how one of the brothers complained when someone else bought Dad always got a more expensive meal. More than once they tricked one another into being the one that paid. All good-natured ribbing from the brothers of the same mother.

The last day before leaving town after my father’s service was a Friday, a Byrd Boy Lunch day. I called Uncle Pat and got myself invited. Uncle Laurence picked him up then swung by to get me. Quite a few years ago I saw a shirt in a catalog Dad had (which my wife purchased for me) that said “Dangerously Overeducated.” I was wearing this shirt when they picked me up. They both laughed and for the third time since the services someone said, “I thought we lost Johnny but he’s still here.” I take all three comments as a compliment.

When I called to invite myself I contemplated making a joke about how Dad would be upset if I missed an opportunity for his brothers to buy his lunch one more time but instead I waited. Sometimes a joke, like a story, needs a little work to get just right. There would be time at the restaurant so I let it marinate for the short ride down the road. Once we arrived we waited our turn to order and continued the expected reminiscing and discussing that had been going on in the car. They nodded for me to go first so I order my (expensive) oyster po-boy, then noticed that the guy wrote their (less expensive) orders on the same pad. So my uncles had out-maneuvered me. As I took the slip to the cashier to pay I was told, “Oh, by the way, it was your Daddy’s turn to pick up the tab.”

As I pulled out my wallet I smiled and showed them Dad’s debit card as I told them both, “I know, and he is.”

They laughed, I laughed, we laughed, we ate. And in Heaven, I imagine, a soul stopped declaring the glory and enjoyed once more getting one over on his brothers.

John Byrd: What He Was

Earlier today (8 Feb) we had the ceremony celebrating the life of my father, John Byrd. He passed away unexpectedly Monday 3 Feb falling asleep in Biloxi and awaking in heaven. As you might imagine it has thrown our family into a whirlwind of activity.

Having just returned to Germany on the first, I unpacked, then repacked, my suitcase as well as one for Ginger and Faith then we headed off for a flight experience from the depths of travel hell. An abandoned bag made for security woes, missed flight, paying the same as an additional ticket for a different flight later in the day, and never having time to stop between ports of call until arriving at the airport in Biloxi.

Somewhere along the way my brain began to formulate the eulogy given below. In typical fashion it was completed shortly before walking out the door to head for the church. After the service I was told that the two Episcopal ministers behind me hastily flipped through their Books of Common Prayer to find the spot which I quoted. That tickles me to no end. Almost as much as when Father Roberts, who provided the homily after me, opened with, “I thought John was gone, but he’s still here.”

This was much harder that I thought it would be, but it did end up being as cathartic to my soul as I hoped. So at the request of several cousins, aunts, and other relatives, here in its entirety are the words I spoke. I apologize in advance for the inside joke at the end but I promise the belly laughs when it happened matched the scene it referred to.

I consider this church to be the church of my childhood. I began life here, spent considerable time in the fluky church, and then found my home in Christ as a Southern Baptist. While I may currently be in a huge backslide I thank God literally that I am not a Methodist. They can backslide all the way to hell but as a Baptist we fall short. 

My cousins and sister know that the church of our childhood consisted of sitting in the pews with Mama Byrd using slips of the bulletin to mark pages in the Hymnal and Book of Prayer to more easily find the spots during the service. Afterwords, we would file across the street to DeMiller Hall where we had canned biscuits and bought a chance on a cake. I don’t think we ever won one, but we came back every week. 

To speak today in my childhood church is an honor, but today I speak because the Byrd who normally would be unable to resist such a platform is no longer able. And while he has spent time with my sister and I at Baptist services his services of choice were Episcopalian which tend to be less seat of the pants as the majority of my discussion will be. However, in his honor I will read from the Book of Common Prayer, albeit a mere note page 507. 

The liturgy is characterized by joy, in the certainty that “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

This joy, however, does not make human grief unchristian. The very love we have for each other in Christ brings deep sorrow when we are parted by death. Jesus himself wept at the grave of his friend. So, while we rejoice that one we love has entered into the nearer presence of our Lord, we sorrow in sympathy with those who mourn. 

My appearance today may not appear to be someone in mourning because I am not here to mourn a loss. I am here to celebrate the life of my father and second, after my wife, best friend.

I am a proud fifth generation Biloxi Byrd Boy and I want to tell you about the man we are here to celebrate today and the many roles he has played in his 76 years. 

Before anything else he was a son. A son to Mama Byrd and Daddy Byrd, born the day before his brother’s birthday, meaning we know when not to knock on the door of the master bedroom at 604 Iroquois. 

Once they brought him home he became a brother. He started as the youngest of four but ended up as the middle of seven. 

Next he became a student, a scout, a friend, a nerd, an avid book lover, an astronomy aficionado, and a scientist. He made a telescope and took it to the national science fair and also made a trip to New York. His fourth furthest trip away from Biloxi. 

Along the way and at the same time he was a grandson, cousin, and eventually an uncle. Family was always big. The way we eat we always only got bigger. As it grew the family went from at least one meal a day together as a family (where Dad was known to cut deals for extra peas), to a meal together once a week.

Doubling down on his student role, he became a university student. Not far from home, Hattiesburg. Close to heaven—or as the rest of the world knows it, Biloxi. Then diploma in hand he entered his next lifetime role, teacher. 

He never dropped a role, only added them, but some defined him more than others and teacher was one of the biggest. He was always learning and always sharing what he learned with others. Whether it was in the classroom, at church, in the car driving, or working on a model B-17 with a bottle of Barq’s and a chunk of Desporte’s french Bread.

For a short while he stopped teaching for his day job and sold insurance but it was not long before he returned to teaching. Teaching, driving a school bus, cleaning the garbage and debris from the Santa Maria, and whatever else was needed to bring in money.

Then he returned to the formal role of student earning a Master’s of Education followed by a Graduate Certificate in Counseling. This allowed him to gain yet another role as Counselor. Even when he put up his “Do Not Disturb, Counseling” sign to take a nap he used his education to make others better.

He gained a role of grandfather and then father-in-law.

Then came the retirement role. Daddy Byrd and I both thought he would only stay retired for the three months of his normal summer break but we failed to realize the importance of his Grandfather Role. In his PawPaw role he was home to help with James but also to continue his other passions until he returned to the workforce as a teacher and later retired again.

Two roles I have left out of Dad’s chronology are of utmost importance to me. Somewhere around 1987 or 88 my father took on the role of idiot. I had never seen someone so clueless and free from the encumbrance of the thought process. Likewise a mere five or so years later he had transformed completely into the greatest genius in history to include Albert Einstein, Nikolai Tesla, and Stephen Hawking. Admittedly, the first of these roles may have only been in my adolescent, hormone addled mind, but the second role is the one that made him my best friend.

So here’s a piece of news that isn’t news to anyone in the family: Byrd Boys are drawn to Biloxi. The girls could get away but the boys stayed home. Dad took it a step further because not only did he not leave, he tried not to go too far from home either. The third farthest he’s ever been from Biloxi was when he came to see Ginger and I when we lived in Washington. The second farthest when he came to see us in Germany and we also went to the Czech Republic. That’s where I drug my Dad into the role of international traveller. Then finally last year I brought him to Vienna, the furthest he’s ever been from Biloxi.

Being as I have now been thrust prematurely into his role of family historian, archivist of anecdotes, and maintainer of useless information just before I close and in honor of Dad I will share the story of how the church of my childhood came to be such a place.

Sometime early in their family life Daddy Byrd asked Mama Byrd why they always went to the Church of the Redeemer. He said they should go to the Baptist church in which he was raised. Mama Byrd told him that was a wonderful idea and that next Sunday he should wake up, get the kids ready, and then take them to his church. There was never another discussion of where to go.

But that doesn’t explain it fully enough though. Mama Byrd went to Redeemer because John and Marguerite Welch attended. Neither history nor my Dad ever relayed where the Welches attended church in the Nebraskan town they founded prior to becoming permanent snowbirds, but once they alighted in Biloxi they were fixtures at Redeemer because everyone who was anyone in society of the Seafood Capital of the World went to Redeemer. This means quite literally that we are Episcopal at our core because of canned biscuits and cake raffles.

From the time I decided I would speak today the note I planned to close on was the scene in the anteroom of the old Church building on the beach at Daddy Byrd’s funeral. In a quiet moment of reflection before the door opened and the whole family walked out to face the crowd and ceremony that would follow, my Dad, in his best stage whisper, said “Mama and Daddy are looking down on us and he’s saying ‘Look what we started.’” We long wondered what the rest of the church thought when just before the solemn moment, raucous laughter erupted from where the family was sequestered. 

No doubt when Dad arrived he was met at the gates by Mama Byrd and Daddy Byrd as well as his two brothers. After that he pestered Saint Pete with enough questions to make Peter re-think the decision that it was Dad’s time, but then he looked down last night on the eleven of us standing around getting one last look. Tara, Ginger, Mom, James, Chuck, Emma, Lizi, Faith, Tim, and Anthony laughing when someone said ‘ogadebogadee.’ 

With a smile on his face Dad is watching the menagerie he started.

Spoken at the Church of the Redeemer

7 Feb 2020

Stupid Practice

There are many words that bother me. Irregardless is one. It has now been used so often that dictionaries include is as an actual word. Regardless, I still cringe when I hear it.

Octopi is another. But again, it has been used so much that the dictionary now says that it is an acceptable variation of the plural of octopus. Its use is a misappropriation of Latin rules but there are several grammar rules that do the same. Regardless, I still use octopuses.

Forte is another one. Now this one is strange because it’s the pronunciation that bugs me. But now it has been mispronounced so much that the dictionaries say that fort-ta is an acceptable alternate pronunciation. Regardless, using octopuses is my forte.

Deconflict is one that really, really grates my nerves. It seems to be a military specialty. Some time back for fun I tried to Google deconflict and the Google suggestion for deconfliction came up before deconflict. That was weird. There’s no cute ‘regardless’ sentence here. Deconflict just stinks as a word.

Along similar lines, I cannot count the number of times that I have heard that the definition of stupid is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. In fact, I’ve heard it so much that I think some people have forgotten the literal definition of the word.

This definition now pains me so much that whenever I hear it I quickly interrupt to point out that it is also the definition of practice. There’s a whole tangent here about how practice doesn’t make perfect but rather perfect practice makes perfect but that’s not where I’m headed.

Persistence can also be defined by a similar phrase. In persistence we keep trying until we succeed. Granted we don’t have to persist by trying the same action, but oftentimes it is. And continuing to do the same thing over and over again until we do get different results is usually described as rewarding. Persistence pays off.

So stupidity is persistence and persistence pays off? When does persistence stop being stupidity and become good? Or when does stupidity stop being dumb and pay off as persistence?

In case you wondered, no, the dictionary does not define stupidity this way. And I really don’t want to wait for it to change to do so. All I really want to know is:

How do we know whether what we are doing is stupidity (bad) or persistence (good)?

Rules of the Salmon

What I call the Rules of the Salmon are a set of guidelines from an unfinished yet still published work by arguably one of the greatest authors of all times. He also happened to write many of the greatest episodes of the greatest science fiction show of all time, but don’t hold either against him they are still poignant rules.

There are five authors to whom I credit (blame) a huge influence on my thinking and writing style. In no particular order: C.S. Lewis, Arthur C. Clarke, James Michener, Clive Cussler, and Douglas Adams. Clearly the first two are iso listed so you understand that my path in life has been partially blazed by Lewis and Clarke. Chief among the writing style influence category has to be Douglas Adams.

In The Salmon of Dobut he poses a set of three rules that govern the situation in the world:

1. Anything that is in the world when you’re born is normal and ordinary and is just a natural part of the way the world works.
2. Anything that's invented between when you’re fifteen and thirty-five is new and exciting and revolutionary and you can probably get a career in it.
3. Anything invented after you're thirty-five is against the natural order of things.

This makes a lot of sense when I consider the world in general and the United States in particular. One could easily see how the younger folks take the niceties of life for granted since they were born with reliable cars, computers that while crashing often because they ran Windows still made it so they never had to worry about how to center a title or make footnotes in a term paper, the internet, multiple 24 hour a day news channels, more than 4 television channels they could watch on multiple televisions without ever knowing the pain of either black and white screens or “being” the remote control, never had to scrounge for a quarter (or worse a dime) while scouring the streets to find a working pay telephone, and never had to use a map thanks to the GPS or map app on their smartphone. I could easily turn this into a political post explaining that never having to fight for or earn these improvements is a reason they might believe in something more closely resembling the socialism we grew up hating, but I don’t want to go there.

The real reason these rules seem to hit home so hard on a day like today is because of rule number three. Anything invented after the age of 35 is against the natural order. And this is why I remain one of the only people over the age of 40 who has adapted to use only one space after a period..

Second Draft

Well I have updated my Prohibition Era story online to include the changes I’ve made for the second draft so far. There’s still a ways to go but the first set of changes are big and ripple throughout the rest of the work.

For the most part this story has been written in a linear fashion. Not just the timeline of the story but from chapter to chapter. The main exception being that the first part of the story I started with is Chapter 3. What this really means though, is that while Chapter 3 may be older than the Prologue and/or Chapter 1, that Chapter 10 is much newer. This work has been in progress since 1984 after all.

What does that mean and why am I typing about it now? Well the newer parts of the book have the benefit of being written after I learned whatever skills I have learned about writing. The first parts had a less mature, less talented, less savvy author working on them. This update really goes back and tweaks some of that in a major way.

The real reason I’ve been able to improve this story so drastically is that I have been working with a writing coach, Edee “BossLady” Lemonier, who will also be my editor when I get it to the point she can edit. As an editor she makes sure I got the right words, but as a coach she helps me make sure I got the words right. Part of the hope is that she doesn’t correct that more colloquial usage of the word ‘got’ because of the parallelism it provides for the second part of the phrase. Then again it’s part of what she’s coaching me on.

Now, she doesn’t edit my blog, so don’t take any grammatical errors on this page to mean she isn’t good at what she does. I wholeheartedly suggest that anyone else who writes look her up if you need help with your writing. You will not be disappointed.

https://www.bossladycreatives.com

A Hole

I am not the most traveled person in the world. I’m not even the most traveled person I know. But I have been a few places. And there’s one place I’ve been that I see a lot of people want to visit. Some have even described it as their dream to visit it. I think this place is a hole. I feel qualified to label it thus because I’ve been to more than one hole, even lived in one (or two). But this location simply doesn’t strike me as that amazing or incredible a place to visit.

Now this locale does have some interesting man-made attractions. And the places within several hundred (maybe thousand) miles of it are even less amazing and less inviting so I could understand why people from those places would want to go there. The people I’m describing that want to go to this hole of a location are already in much better places yet talk about this place as if it is the penultimate place to go.

This would be like someone in the Presidential Suite of a five star hotel wanting to stay at the Motel 6. Don’t get me wrong, the Motel 6 is better than the Thunderbird Lodge in central Washington (at least it was in 1992) plus they’ll leave a light on for you. Not my point. Who would desire the lesser when they have the greater?

Perhaps you’ve noticed I haven’t named the location. That’s on purpose. What if it is your dream vacation spot? I’m not trying to insult anyone who wants to go there. I’m doing a good job insulting them, just that I’m not trying to. Why in the world (literally) would anyone want to go to a hole?

Then again “It would seem that Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” C. S. Lewis.

Apocrypha

Before I get started, I would like to point out my new Subscribe feature. This was much more hidden in the past and if you did find it and fill it out I have no idea where the data went. Now I have found how to capture the information and within the next month will start an email feature. It will not be a particularly persistent or annoying feature and if your definition differs from mine on that point you can simply let me know and I’ll adjust.

I have noticed that stories about my work don’t get much attention on my blog. There is one more story in the queue but I’m avoiding that for now and jumping on to an oldie but a good. One I’ve kind of touched on before. As is typically the case with me, this one needs a bit of setup.

When the Pilgrims (or the Puritans I forget which) came to the United States there were certain parts of the bible that they didn’t like. Some were whole books, others just chapters or parts of chapters. Whether they read more like stories than bible, Jesus never quoted them, or they failed to fit their confirmation bias of cannon I don’t know. I only know they didn’t like these parts, so they asked the publishers to leave them out. Perhaps an odd request, though at the time with the infighting back and forth between Catholics and Protestants maybe it wasn’t such a hard idea to grasp. So the publishers of the authorized bible only sent the remaining books to Massachusetts (or Rhode Island or wherever they were). Most manufacturers don’t like making two incredibly similar products to send to the same market so eventually, the bibles sent to North America were all lacking these particular parts. Is this story apocryphal? Perhaps, but unquestionably the parts that got left out of the book are.

There is a constant debate between whether the bible stories consist of the first and only time the stories happened or whether it is just a telling of the final time. For instance Noah may not have been the first attempt at finding someone to build the ark. The first guy may have given up, so God went to Noah and tried again. David may not have been the first shepherd to look at Goliath, the first may have been someone who looked and said “No Way!” before running off to sip lattes in an Californian pub and reminiscence about the way things should have been.

With that in mind, there is one particularly interesting apocryphal part of the book of Daniel where he was in the lion’s den and fed by Habakkuk. An angel picked him up by his hair and dropped him into the den. Let’s look at the event from Habakkuk’s perspective. It may have gone something like this:

Habakkuk walked over to sit beneath the lone olive tree on the hill overlooking the sparse field where his sheep grazed. It had been a long morning, one sheep kept wandering off and he had to leave the 99 to find it more than once but now it was his favorite time of day, lunchtime.

He sat among the roots and found a comfortable spot leaning against the trunk. Reaching over to open his bag he suddenly felt a sharp pain on his head and he was lifted off the ground. Being lifted by his head he was unable to look up but looking around and using his peripheral vision he could see shimmering wings.

Dropping his lunch he reached for the wings and found himself falling back to the ground. He hadn’t gotten very high up so it was a short fall. He braced himself and when his feet hit he rolled to the side and then scrambled to get behind the olive tree.

He peeked around the tree. His lunch lay smashed where he had rolled over but the field looked the same. He raised his eyes to look up and saw the most incredible sight he had ever seen. A frightening apparition hovered in the air. Light seemed to emanate from the creature as it shimmered and its wings beat. It was looking at Habakkuk but not paying him any mind. Slowly he backed away but the creature didn’t follow him.

Emboldened he turned and ran towards the sheep. The angel remained hovering near the tree. After a hundred yards Habakkuk turned and looked. No movement except the gently up and down hovering that the winged creature did. The sheep looked up at him then returned to grazing.

Cautiouly he began to move slowly back toward his lunch. Still the creature watched him, but made no move. As he neared the lunch he crouched and reached a tentative hand below the angel. He snatched his lunch and ran toward a row of shrubs. He put the strap of the bag in his mouth so his hands were free.

Before he had gone four steps he found himself again being lifted by the hair. He grabbed the hands holding his hair and clawed but it was no use. The angel lifted him higher and higher. He clutched his lunch like a security blanket and closed his eyes.

The soft, gentle breeze was cool on his face. The sensation of flying was simultaneously scary and exhilarating. He opened one eye and peeked. He still could not move his head but he looked down with just his eyes. The people and animals below looked like ants. The trees and shrubs like tufts of green cotton. He didn’t know what a fifth-grade diorama was, but if he did that is how he would describe the scene below.

His heart returned to a normal beat after a few minutes. He was now far from the field of sheep and coming up on a town. The buildings and streets were laid out like an ancient map. The hustle and bustle of life went on below him with no one noticing his flight.

Ahead was the palace grounds. Beautiful hanging gardens beckoned but to the side was a walled enclosure. It was full of pacing lions. Startled, Habakkuk spoke, “Not there! Anywhere but there!”

The angel swooped down lower and lower then at the worst possible second, right above the biggest lion Habakkuk had ever seen he felt the tug on his head disappear and he was falling. The ground had been hardened by the pacing animals and hurt his left ankle. Regardless, he scampered away from the lions and saw a man standing alone.

“Help! Save me!” Habakkuk yelled.

The man calmly reached out to help Habakkuk to his feet, “I can’t help, but YHWH can. Stand with me. My name is Daniel. What do you have?”

Habakkuk stood and quickly pushed Daniel to stand between him and the lions. “Are you crazy? Those lions look hungry.”

A sedate Daniel said, “They are. No one has fed them in over a week. The King hoped they might feast on me.”

“What? That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard,” said Habakkuk while looking in every direction to make sure there were no lions behind him. “I don’t know what’s going on. I sat down to eat my lunch in peace and next thing I know I’m in here with you.”

Daniel turned and reached for the bag, “Is this your lunch? What do you have?” He opened the bag and looked inside.

“Look you crazy goon, you can have the lunch just tell me how to get out of here.”

“Is that tuna fish? I haven’t had a tuna fish sandwich in weeks. It’s all chocolate covered locusts and honey-covered lamb in the palace. And a cheese stick? Whoever packed your lunch must love you.” Daniel said as he poured the contents of the bag onto the ground.

As it had after a minute of flying, Habakkuk’s heart slowed to a normal beat. The calm demeanor of Daniel and the reticence of the lions to attack began to put him more at ease.

“There may be some carrot sticks in there too. My wife knows how much I love those. And there’s a leftover lamb chop, too. I hate leftovers, go ahead help yourself.” Habakkuk said.

The two sat in the shade of the den wall and split the meal while talking about the strange situation they had found themselves.

After the meal, Daniel moved to lean back against the wall and patted his belly, “I haven’t been this full in years. Thanks for sharing, Habakkuk.” He turned to face where his new friend was but saw only shoes being lifted. Shifting his gaze upward he saw the angel had reappeared and grabbed Habakkuk by the head. This time he had grabbed onto the angel’s arms and was shouting as they cleared the wall of the lion’s den.

Silence returned to the enclosure as Daniel remarked out load to no one, “Now where can I get something for desert?”

Mergers and Other Non-Apparent Inefficiencies

Before I start on another rant about working for the federal government, I want to point out that I have added a button at the bottom of the page that should allow you to subscribe to my email list. I am in the process of building an email list to allow me to send more efficient notifications about new posts. When I shifted from a self-hosted WordPress site to SquareSpace I failed to recognize that the email feature of my blog disappeared. The joy of SquareSpace more than justifies the frustrations of WordPress so I’m powering through. If you can call a year later powering through. If you’re interested, sign up. I can guarantee that it won’t be used excessively, especially since I don’t know how to use it yet.

Meanwhile, recently one of my biggest customers merged organizations. The Installation Management Command (IMCOM) has been absorbed by the Army Material Command. As with all mergers and reorganizations, this is an attempt to increase efficiency.

It may have the effect of eliminating a Lieutenant General position and flag officers never operate in a vacuum. They have a couple Major Generals, a few Brigadier Generals, a whole flock of Colonels and below plus their civilian equivalents, and that’s just the upper echelons. At the lower levels most absorptions like this come with cuts. Cuts in staff, cuts in funding, and cuts in logistical support. Almost never cuts in requirements, missions, or duties.

Stepping away from the merger for a second, let me say something about where I work. For those that don’t know about my organization, the Corps of Engineers, we are a mostly civilian organization that is not funded in the federal budget. We are project funded—always. The only things in the bloated budget Congress occasionally passes that has the Corps name on it is the Civil Works projects. There is no line item anywhere for the staffing or operations of the Corps. In order to pay our operating expenses we take a portion of the contract costs. I call it skimming some off the top. Not exactly accurate because we are very up front about it. We are a fee for service organization. Most say that we are very proud of our services (also read expensive), but being the largest engineering company in the world brings a lot to the table.

Back to the merger, there has been talk at high levels about engaging more with the Corps than previously. From the Corps perspective this means more work for us. This will have several benefits for IMCOM though. The biggest benefit to them will be that a smaller staff is needed to oversee the projects because all they’ll need to do is oversee the Corps overseeing the projects. It will also seem that they are spending more on projects because while the personnel budget goes down the project budgets go up. But sending more projects to the Corps means their project budget had to go up since it will cost more to do the same dollar figure worth of projects.

Somebody somewhere is getting a pat on the back and an award for saving the Army money for combining these two commands into one allowing IMCOM to streamline, cut staff costs, and increase funding spent on projects. And that someone is probably getting a monetary award for it, too.

And no representation is made that the views and opinions I share on this page are the views or opinions of the Army, the Corps of Engineers, or any other federal entity. Nothing said here is said in the official capacity of my day job and all of the work on this website is done on my own equipment, on my own time, and completely removed from any government resources.

Maroons not Baboons

Contrary to popular belief, a troop of baboons is not called a congress. Their Infraorder relatives, the orangutans, however are. Orangutans in a group are called a congress. But this is not a post about that kind of congress. It’s a post about the congress that baboons (and orangutans) should be embarrassed to share a name with. The Congress.

I have long made my mantra “Congress gives up efficiency for control.” Many an O-1 through O-3 (and one O-5) have gotten this lesson from me over the course of my time working for the government. Which leaves out the many DA civilians I have drummed this into. This is literally the only way I can go to sleep at night doing what I do for the Corps of Engineers. First, a little background on the statement.

Congress has the power of the purse by the Constitution. The only way American tax dollars can be spent is in accordance with the way Congress has directed. Period. Control established.

Now the methodology they use to appropriate and then fund expenditures is odd, and eclectic, but in the end it follows certain standards. In particular, there are many, many other laws Congress has passed to govern how, when, and why money can be disbursed. Now understand, I don’t mean that Congress is physically controlling each dollar that gets spent on each overpriced widget per se. There are controls put into place, training that is conducted to educate, and audits conducted to insure compliance. Checks and balances, rules and instructions, regulations and directives. Efficiency disrupted.

The myriad array of naive and new faces come into my line of work and immediately think of ways that we can save the federal government money. Then they proceed to get told why it won’t work. Why they can’t do it. And why the completely logical, excellent suggestion on how to proceed they have come up with is illegal and against Congressional direction. Efficiency given up for control.

But some days even my somewhat callous attitude about this is challenged. Today was one of those days. Next a little background on my situation. Different “colors” of money have different rules. Depending on the type it is valid for a period of time (1, 2, 3, or 5 years typically) and can be used for new obligations, then the money is expired for 5 years where it can be used to pay previous commitments and in-scope modifications, after which the funds cancel which means go away. Open, expired, canceled. Confusing because expired seems like canceled, so I say poof. Money goes poof. Clear, unambiguous.

So on my contract I have money that goes poof at the end of the fiscal year (FY). But before the end of the fiscal year our financial system will cut off and we will not be able to make a payment. It’s an annoying process that happens every month several days earlier than the end of the month. At the end of the FY, it moves up even further. Like a month. I cannot (and will not) pay for work that has not been done.

I have a project where the contractor cannot physically do the work needed in time to send me an invoice that I can pay before the money disappears. There is a long story as to why the contract was awarded so late that this is a problem but suffice it to say that ship has sailed, it is what it is. There is some additional work that will be paid for with money that has a different expiration date. Almost all of the work that needs to be paid will be done except for approximately $20,000.

Whammy number 1 is that if I don’t pay the money and it goes poof I get a bad mark next to my name as someone who has had something done that never happens. Then, because of pushing the contractor he will be able to finish it shortly after the date I can pay passes. Whammy number 2 is that he’ll send the invoice I can’t pay because I have to get new money. Even if we get the new money at the start of the new FY we will accrue interest on the invoice because of when it was sent. So I get dinged for paying interest because normally that means that I didn’t do my job and pay the invoice in a timely manner.

WARNING: DO NOT TRY TO MAKE SENSE OUT OF WHAT YOU ARE ABOUT TO READ! It does not sound logical, feasible, or possible. But I assure you it is not only legal it is the only way to accomplish what needs to happen.

In order to combat this double whammy of bad things, I have the opportunity to modify the contract using available money to pay the contractor to re-do the work he can’t get done. This way I can direct him to do the work out of sequence. I have close to $180,000 to use for this effort. Literally, I can pay up to 9 times the cost in order to have the contractor be less efficient and re-do what he can’t do to begin with. Meanwhile, both the Bauamt (the German construction agent we use for this contract) and I would end up getting more in accounts we use to pay for our own time. In particular, this will pay for the extra time I am spending trying to get the work done in a manner I am allowed to pay for it.

What will I end up doing? I don’t know yet. Probably taking the double whammy. We are the Corps of Engineers. We never fail to deliver. It may not look like it’s supposed to. It may not look like the customer wanted. It may not even look like we wanted it to. But we have never failed to deliver.

Congress gives up efficiency for control. They give up all sense of efficiency for their ability to control. Control is the only thing Congress does and they are good at that.

What He Taught

Occasionally in our lives we get the opportunity to see legends in person. Ken Griffey, Jr. playing baseball (in the Kingdome), Marcus Allen playing football. Sammy Hagar (or David Lee Roth if you prefer) playing with Van Halen. All events I have had the good fortune to experience. But recently I was able to see a true master up close and personal.

I attended a workshop put on by a master storyteller and question-creator extraordinaire. His articles have been read by millions, his podcasts have been listened to by similar numbers. His books are hard to find but for those of us in the room on Friday the man himself was available. The one and only Cal Fussman.

I started this post the morning after coming back from München and the Storytelling Master Class with Cal Fussman but it didn’t feel right. So I stopped. And I thought. And thought. And thought. Now the untrained observer might take this as procrastination, or even a lack of desire, but the true writer knows it is neither.

A few nights later as I walked I began pondering the event again. At the halfway point of my walk I had a revelation. You may think it was the Kuchlbauer Hefeweissen I had at my walk’s turnaround point, but I believe it was something more.

Cal writes while he walks. Now again, the untrained eye may think this is crazy. How can you just think about writing and actually be writing? One need look no further than the mildly successful author J. K. Rowling. As she rode the Underground the idea for Harry Potter came to her. She had nothing to write on, so she kept riding and re-playing the important ideas in her head until there was no way she could forget them. For a further example of the power and ability of this technique one need look no further than Cal himself. He went to Florida to interview Harry Crews, a notorious drunk but highly talented author. They began to get accquainted and Cal saw the prodigious quality of Harry’s imbibing, That’s no state for memory so Cal asked how he can remember the things he comes up with when he is out of his mind drunk. To which Harry responded soberly, “The good shit sticks.”

In walk-writing you replay things in your mind. You hit upon the perfect phrase or anecdote and you don’t want to forget it. But the good shit sticks. So you re-play it. You re-work it. You re-write it. And now, you can’t forget it.

The first night of our event was time to get to know one another. We each walked around and talked with almost everyone asking the standard questions: where are you from, what do you do, and how do you know Cal. This was so the next day we would have a pretty good feel for one another.

One of the participants was Christof. But to say he was a participant is an understatement. He is the one who had the idea for the event. Christof is the co-founder and adventurer in charge that runs COKREA in München. An incredible location in the middle of town. Perfect for this event. When he first contacted Kevin the Manager he was shut him down. A few months later Cal himself called up Christof and said he was ready to do it.

The next morning we got started in earnest. Cal shared a story. Not just any story, one of his best that demonstrates his heart, head, soul interview technique. He shared two stories that us regular followers knew. It was truly great to watch a master in action. And I think I realized the only thing better than a Fussman story was watching him tell it. But it also highlighted the key point I think Cal was trying to get each of us to learn.

We did several exercises and both during and in between got to know one another better. It was not just us, though. Cal got to know us better too. Master Story Teller that he is, he also is an awesome editor. He asked us for some of our stories, and after lunch we got down to the heavy lifting.

Cal identified the best type of stories we all had and had us tell them to one another. Then we switched. There was a feedback session after each story followed by a shuffling of groups and re-telling the story. Each time the stories changed a little bit. With feedback they got a little better. Then a little better. By the time we finished we all had a pretty good story that wouldn’t take more than three minutes to tell.

At that point he got to the easy part for him. He pulled short stories about companies from the owners who were there. A main point of the workshop was to be able to tell your company’s story in a better fashion. He pulled some stories out of some participants who at the start would have sworn they had no stories to tell.

Those of us that have followed Cal for years were amazed that there were two participants who had never heard of him. They literally came just for the workshop, not the man. By telling his stories, pulling our stories out of us, and teaching us to tell our own stories better he showed us the important parts of storytelling.

So what was the secret? Cal didn’t say explicitly. But I think I figured it out. There have been two Big Question Podcasts since we all left München. Cal hasn’t talked much about it on his podcast. Maybe I missed my guess, but I think it’s because he has not yet finished editing the story.

Storytellers tell stories, but it’s not just about the story. It’s about the telling. It’s about the experience. Writing is all about the re-writing. The editing, the crumpled papers, the discarded words. The thing that makes a story better is telling it.

Tell it once and watch. Learn where people get engaged, where you lose them, what they want to know. Then edit it. Fix it. Correct it. Most of all, re-tell it. And watch. If you fixed the story listeners got engaged at the same spot, or earlier. They didn’t get lost, or got lost at a different spot. They learned what they wanted to know, or they thirsted for more. Fix it better this time. Correct it and the new issues. Most of all, re-tell it. And watch.

Lather. Rinse. Repeat. The good shit sticks.

At the end of every podcast (save one) Cal always thanks Tim Ferris first. As I sit here in my Sportiqe gear, posting on my Squarespace hosted website, thinking about what to put on my My Intent bracelet I am thankful that I had the chance to meet a master at the height of his game and learn at his feet. Thank you Cal for inviting and teaching me. Thank you for the new friends. And thank you for the lesson. I’ll re-write it tomorrow.

Serendipity

I have often commented that Serendipity takes me everywhere. For a while I thought I took her with me but long ago realized I was not driving this bus.

A perfect example occurred during my recent trip home. I went to visit my father who was answering the phones at church. On the desk were three books with pamphlets on top. I asked what they were and he said records of baptisms and such. Curiosity killed the cat but I was a suspect for a long time so I picked up the top book (with pamphlets) and pulled out the middle book.

My first thought was that it would be amazing to find my name in the book. Originally I was baptized in this church at the age of one. I do not know exactly what day it was and I was later baptized on Super Bowl Sunday the week before marrying Ginger. Thi does make me an Anabaptist though I do not subscribe to the same tenets as the Anabaptist Rebellion in Münster of the 16th century.

Opening the book to just a random page I glanced down and the first thing I noticed were names. Specifically my own with a couple cousins.

This was the entry, from 1991, for my nephew’s baptism for whom I and my cousins are godparents.So it wasn’t my own baptism, it would have been even more incredible for the books to have been that old, although if two books down went back 30 years it may have been in the third book.

As always, I like to point out that I define Serendipity the same way I define Karma, Luck, and Coincidence as synonyms for Providence. And thanks for taking a short trip down Amnesia Lane with me.

The whole page

And the one next to it

Finished First Draft

Well, I met my deadline. The first draft of my Prohibition Era story is complete. Or as complete as it will get before editing. The re-writing will be the hard part, but with luck it won’t take me 34 years to finish. I have set up a page with links to the chapters or the complete work in pdf format. I welcome your comments, even the ones you don’t think I’ll like.

Link to the First Draft.