On the Passing of an Icon, From Someone I Trust to Do it Right

As most of the English speaking world knows, last week our nation lost one of its longest and most visibly dedicated public servants. Myself being someone--personally and professionally--who takes a deep interest in the public service, I thought that I should comment on the passing of Senator Ted Kennedy. Before doing so, I chose to wait and read the reflections of my brother Ross on his own blog (rosslevanto.blogspot.com).

Ross, a smart man and brilliant writer in his own right, has devoted a substantial portion of his own adult life to serving Boston, MA through various committees and public activities. As such, I consider him a trustworthy source to reflect on the passing of Massachusetts' native son. I feel that Ross aptly captured the life of a man who dedicated himself to serve his nation, state and community. Ted Kennedy was a public servant, and as such there are plenty out there who will challenge his body of work, who will disagree with his decisions and doubt the validity of his accomplishments. That's all part of the job, sadly, and all the more reason to highlight the admirable qualities of a man who would donate his entire life to such a challenging and (at times) fickle cause.

I've said enough, I'll leave you with my favorite line from Ross's blog. A good writer knows when someone else has already said it all:

"I admired his determination for public service, which we need now in a time when our public servants are often derided. While not a perfect person, Senator Kennedy was perfect in that he stood for the very best of government. He believed the government could and should do good."

Chew it Over with a Text

There's a well-known candy company, perhaps you've heard of them, that has a series of commercials designed around the "Chew it over" concept. The basic structure of each ad is rather simple: some oafish (though un-threateningly attractive) man finds himself in a precarious position that usually relates to his "female companion." These magical gems of masculine stupidity include sneaking back into a bedroom after a night of partying with the guys or being caught reading a lewd book in a shopping center. You know, the kinds of things us men just can't turn around twice without doing.

There's a hook, of course. These men are loaded with a non-melted Twix bar, which they pull out and begin aggressively chewing. This is not only a natural action--arousing no suspicion in their girlfriends--it gives them precious few seconds of "chewing over" time to think their way out of the mess. The ads, while ridiculous, do have a logical theme: when you take a moment to consider your options in any situation you are more likely to make a better decision.

Shifting gears a little, I'm a big fan of texting. I've never really taken to talking on the phone, it's something I've done often for work and when I really need a pizza, but I find little recreational value in having my centro pressed against my ear. As such, I've become an outspoken advocate of bringing the rest of humanity into the texting world. I've espoused the benefits of unlimited texting plans to all of my friends, cited data that texters more actively respond to texts than the general public does to voicemail messages and have unrelentingly texted even those friends I know not to have texting plans.

This obviously has a selfish motivation. I like to communicate with my friends and would prefer to do it over text messaging. However, I can't help but see a universal value to society in the text message: it gives you a little time to think. During spoken conversation, your partner will think the call has been dropped if you take more than a second or two to respond to a statement or question. We all want to use our minutes wisely, so wasting any portion of them while "thinking" is ludicrous.

There is no such time pressure with a text. When someone sends you one, you're completely within your rights to contemplate your response for a few minutes. Most likely, they're not on the other end desperately waiting to hear your answer. Here's a magical thing I've learned about myself--and I imagine is true of everyone--when I have a few minutes to think about a response I'm funnier, more insightful and at the very least coherent.

An example:
Spoken Conversation

Friend: Hey, I saw your favorite sports team lost again.
Me: Oh???
Friend: Yes, I did, they are terrible and you are terrible for liking them.
Me: Well you're terrible because you, um, have a car that gets less than 20 mpg.
Friend: I plant a certain number of trees each year to offset my clunker's carbon emissions.
Me: That's very responsible of you.

Text Conversation:

Friend: Hey, I saw your favorite sports team lost again.
Me: Ah, well I saw that your face is still ugly. At least there's a chance my team will win tomorrow.

So, my friends, embrace the beauty of the text message. It gives you a few extra moments to compose yourself. The world moves faster every day, let's try to embrace the few remaining situations in which we can actually take a moment to chew it over. Even when you're not in relationship peril for being a stupid man, it makes life a little better when you can actually think it through.

Remain Seated While the "Don't Be Stupid" Sign is Illuminated

It's clear that I'm an airplane geek. Though I will admit that I don't often blog about aviation-related issues because I generally write about whatever strikes my fancy. This is my little corner of the wired world and I'm not going to restrict myself to limited topics (at least not until someone offers me large sums of money to do so).

Today however, my silence will be broken. My brother Ross forwarded me this from USA Today yesterday (I don't know why he was reading USA Today, maybe he's suffering from dementia). It's an article about a number of injuries aboard a Continental airlines flight that encountered heavy turbulence en route from Brazil to Texas. From the updates, it's relatively clear that a considerable portion of the passengers were not wearing their seatbelts at the time.

This seemed to me to be a good opportunity to discuss the "Fasten Seatbelt" sign, which I think about often. I would assume most people could easily tell you what it means, but I think it is vitally important for a brief reminder of a few things it doesn't mean.

The Fasten Seatbelt sign means none of the following things:

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you really have to go to the bathroom.

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you just remembered that you're most recent Luanne Rice book is in the overhead bin.

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you just realized that trying to wear your coat through the flight was a bad idea.

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you and your freind need to trade seats because they're not going to be able to sleep without putting their head on the bulkhead.

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you dropped your pen and it's really important that you finish your Sudoku game before the plane clears 10,000 feet or you'll lose a bet.

Please fasten your seatbelt...unless you know that you're smarter that every pilot, flight attendant, weather forecaster, ATC operator and Airline mission controller AND you've been relentlessly studying the weather charts, forecasts, maps and PIREPS (pilot reports) regarding the air between your exact location (which of course you can't be sure of) and your destination.

I know you think that you're smarter than everyone else involved in the decision to illuminate the sign. Maybe you are. However, the fact remains that the seatbelt sign (and that cute little "bing" that accompanies it) represents an instruction from the crew, which to ignore would be a violation of Federal law...along with an increased possibility that you're going to lose a tooth on the ceiling.

When the Fasten Seatbelt sign is illuminated, SIT DOWN AND FASTEN YOUR SEATBELT. The SkyMall catalog is a great way to pass the time.

Our Wiki-World

Today I was outside of my friend's apartment in Arlington and I saw a window sticker on a car identifying its owner as an alumnus of Johns Hopkins University. Seeing the name reminded me of long minutes spent at my old office (where we dealt often with the names of big research hospitals connected to major universities) trying to explain to coworkers that it was in fact "Johns Hopkins" not "John Hopkins." While plumbing this memory, I realized that I really didn't know what the origin of this interesting name was. Was there one man whose parent's had chosen to name him as if he was a group of Johns? Did two individuals with the last names Johns and Hopkins contribute to the establishment of the university?

Turns out that a single man named Johns Hopkins bequeathed a hefty sum for the establishment of the university in the late 1800's. Twenty or thirty years ago, finding this information would've required some effort and time in research. Today, all I did was check on Wikipedia and found out in all of 20 seconds.

I use Wikipedia often, as I'm sure many people out there do. While it's somewhat beyond my paygrade (I'm a GS-0, in case you were wondering) to consider the implications of an open market for information such as the free online encyclopedia, I have formulated an opinion on Wiki's place in the world of both academic and personal study.

I recently finished my graduate work at William and Mary, and during my time there I heard repeatedly about the taboo nature of Wiki sources in academic research. It's relatively clear that one should never submit a serious academic paper with a citation to the popular website, that would be some shoddy research. However, I think that with the appropriate focus Wiki is both a useful personal tool and also (and I think more importantly) a valuable academic exercise.

What makes me think so is that Wiki contributors are required to offer some type of citation of their own when providing information. Un-cited facts are typically accompanied with some type of warning that a citation is needed. As a result, a conscientious user must check all citations for any information they might choose to depend on. This is a good thing.

There is such a glut of information available to us right now. We can find just about any answer (correct or no) on the internet. Likewise, television and radio are constantly throwing answers to us for questions we haven't even asked. In this world, it can be tempting to just take what people (or machines) tell you and be thankful to finally close the issue.

Sadly, this tempting ease of knowledge is dangerous. We should always be willing to ask where information comes from. Who is sharing? What do they think? Why would they think that way? How can they help us to study the topic more deeply? What we learn in the world is only as valuable as our trust in the tools that helped us find it.

So, I don't think that you should consider a Wikipedia entry on Post-Modernism or the Second World War to be an encompassing education on the topic, but as a stepping off point for whatever you're trying to figure out. If it's a simple thing (like the origin of a university's name) you can probably just find what you need to know and move on. If it's more complex (like the intricacies of European health care) Wiki gives you a friend (or a lot of friends) who can help you decide how to start.

There are a lot of things in the world right now that are very confusing. Our country is struggling to reform its health care system. Every day our soldiers and sailors are putting themselves in harm's way overseas. It is increasingly unclear what type of environment we will be passing on to our children. Our neighbors in this world are struggling through political and cultural turmoil. It can be a lot to try and wrap your mind around.

I don't suggest you try to learn everything about these topics on Wikipedia, certainly not. Instead, I implore you to take the lessons of the online encyclopedia with you as you try to make sense of our challenges. Think about the sources you choose to trust. Dare to ask why you trust them. Most importantly, remember that even Wikipedia entries can be changed, it would be a fool's errand to never allow your mind to do the same.

In case you're wondering, my fact about Johns Hopkins was cited to "A Brief History of JHU" from the university's website.

Hog Heaven

I'm a firm believer that you should often seek out opportunities to experience new things, especially when they force you to exit your typical comfort zone. Unfortunately, this is not something I often do; it's so much easier to stick with what you know and what you're good at. However, this past weekend I got the chance to exit my own halo of understanding and learn a skill that I've long coveted at the same time.

Friday night through Sunday afternoon, I struggled through the 14 hours of instruction involved in the Basic Rider Skills class offered by the Motorcycle Safety Foundation. I say "struggled" because that's exactly what I did. The classroom instruction--over on Friday night--was valuable and simple. Beginning at 7AM on Saturday, I boarded a motorcycle for the first time in my life and things got a little crazy.

I felt in over my head from the beginning: I was the only person in the class who'd never been on a bike before (most were experienced riders trying to get the MSF endorsement for either insurance reasons or so they could get their bike on a military base). Several of my classmates had never been in the front, but had years of experience as passengers behind their spouses/significant others, so they still had an advantage of experience over me. I'd always known that riding a bike was a complicated feat, it is an intricate machine that requires the constant use of both hands and both feet for basic operation...not to mention the required physical effort to maintain upright.

The class started with the most elementary steps (I'm very thankful that the riders with experience were patient). We started with "mounting the bike" and learning the basic controls. It was over an hour into the lesson before we even moved the bike with our feet off the ground. After this first exercise I felt quite elated: I joked with a classmate that as long as my final destination was always a dead-straight line from where I started I'd be just fine.

Of course, the experience became quite humbling from there. We moved rapidly through a series of 16 drills (over two days) that were designed to teach the basics of starting, stopping, shifting, cornering, etc. Each was challenging in its own way and one in particular (the off-set weave) demolished my morale for a short time.

At the end of the first day I gave myself a 50-50 chance of passing the final riding exam. I called my brother Mark (who took the same course in Connecticut years ago and just bought a new bike) to tell him that my hat was off to him for surviving the experience. He laughed and assured me that he "barely" passed himself and that he remembered well his amazement at the difficulties of bike operation. We'd finished our morning lesson at 11AM and I was so drained--physically, mentally and emotionally--that I was basically useless until about 6PM.

On Sunday, things were better. I expected as much; your mind can assimilate new experiences so quickly. In the end, I never dumped the bike and only had a few embarrassing moments. One time I was sitting with my bike in neutral and I was running through the procedure for an emergency stop in my mind. I was so focused on the steps that I unconsciously started doing them: popping my right foot onto the shift lever and engaging first gear. The bike jumped forward a foot before stalling. My classmates got a good chuckle--for which they apologized--I explained that I'm always dangerous if you give me idle time.

Miraculously, I got a 95 on my riding test and 100 on the written. I successfully navigated the U-turn box, the obstacle avoidance swerve, the emergency stop and the corner. After I finish this blog I'm going to the DMV to get my official motorcycle endorsement on my license (passing the MSF course is the same as passing a DMV licensing exam). I'm not sure when I'll get a bike or even if that will ever happen (though I definitely want one today even more than I did before the class). Even if I get a bike, I don't consider myself ready for the street yet. I'd probably practice for a month or two on parking lots and small roads before ever riding in real traffic. None-the-less, four days ago I didn't know how to ride a motorcycle and now I'm licensed to do so in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

In all, I considered the experience to be at once humbling, challenging, exhausting and satisfying. The instructors were great and I'm thankful for their patience and encouragement. It was also a great chance to be around a whole group of people that I don't think I'd otherwise have gotten the chance to know. Typical "bikers" are very different from me...frankly a lot cooler and more grounded. It was also the first time in recent memory when a ten-minute smoke break meant that everyone actually had a cigarette. This was another little bit of being out of my comfort zone, and it was really satisfying.

I'm really glad for the entire experience. I know that hot-shot bikers can be annoying (and oftentimes dangerous) on the road. These are obviously only a small portion of the riding community, though they tend to be the most visible and memorable part of it. From now on though, whether your cursing a bike on the road or just sharing your lane with one, I advise you tip your hat at the very least to the skill required to successfully handle their ride.

Random Chance

I feel like if you've spent a little time studying Statistics (or maybe even if you haven't) it's difficult not to become a bit fascinated with the concept of random chance. In the classroom, of course, randomness is an academic concept that must be defined and implemented as you examine data; it's a bit difficult to wrap your mind around, since our minds are not random instruments but tools that we use to sort out the world into series of discernible patterns.

If you pay attention, though, you can see random chance as more of a metaphysical force in the world. I was reading a book on airline incidents and policy called The Plane Truth by Roger Cobb and David Primo (Yes, an offshoot of my obsession with airplanes is a corresponding morbid interest in plane crashes). The authors, in their introduction to the issue, exorcised our general need to know the "cause" of a plane crash. Knowing the cause, we feel, means that future incidents will be prevented and we as a traveling public will be made safer on the whole.

Cobb and Primo, however, offer a single explainable cause for every air disaster: random chance. Of course, there could be mechanical issues or pilot error, but the possibility of preventing every last one of these misfortunes is non-existent. Aircraft are incredibly complicated pieces of equipment, and a series of concurrent failures will abruptly end a flight in an unpleasant way. When this happens, we search to connect these combined failures in a way that makes sense out of them. Cobb and Primo explain:

"[The public] perceive links between rare events that occur close in time, even if none exists, so they can avoid accepting that randomness is to blame." (Page 10)

Denying random chance inside the aircraft is a helpful way of keeping people flying. It's difficult enough to cede control over your safety to a team you've never met--pilots, flight attendants, ATC, etc.--without having to cede control over your safety to randomness.

On our street right now is a rather striking reminder that it's not just inside the aircraft cabin that your life is subject to the harrowing nature of random chance. A few weeks ago, we were hit with a short but ferocious thunderstorm. During the storm, Holly heard an odd sound outside, which we quickly discovered had been one of our neighbor's trees falling into the street on top of a car. From our perspective, is seemed like an impressive but innocuous scene out in the street.

The next morning, however, we saw differently. The tree had not just fallen over a car, it had basically obliterated it.

Random chance at work on East Cummings Ave.

We later learned from our neighbors that the driver of the car had been sitting in it just moments before the fall. He had waited for a "lull" in the rains before running into the house and had done so a few heartbeats before his car became a carefully crafted paper weight.

The car is still sitting in the road, giving our street a bit of a war-zone feeling to it. I don't consider it an eye-sore, but an ode to the random nature of life. How many times have we heard that inside a car is a "safe place" during a thunderstorm? Yes, safe from lightning, but not from the ton of wood that could be waiting to pounce on your chassis.

The natural human response, as Cobb and Primo note, is to take this as a lesson: "Okay, if I'm in my car during a violent storm, I'll just make sure I'm not under a big tree." This is a valuable bit of strategy, but misses the point of the discussion. There are so many variables that control where, when and how that tree fell that the odds of it falling on top of a sitting car are infintessimal. Being caught by such an event would make you a dazzlingly tragic victim of a magically random event.

Don't get depressed though, because sometimes random chance makes really good things happen. Oh, and keep flying: based upon current FAA safety statistics you'd have to take a flight every single day for 35,000 YEARS before you could expect to be involved in a major incident. You'll be fine.

In Defense of Lameness

In my lifetime, I've noticed a bit of a pattern. New things emerge in the world or become popular on a wide scale and I scoff at them. I might even let loose a diatribe on how ridiculous they are or possibly attack them with my particularly snide brand of sarcasm. Of course, time passes and I find myself with the opportunity to try these new treasures for myself, at which time I invariably fall in love with them.

Historically, the best example of this is with my coffee drinking habits. When complicated espresso based drinks were made popular by such chains as Starbucks, I was still in high school in Eastern Connecticut. Being relatively rural, we were not infiltrated by the tall lattes and venti caramel macchiatos as quickly as more "cultured" areas, so these new drinks kept the sense of "otherness" that made them foreign and dangerous. I can remember defending the simplicity of a Dunkin Donuts coffee (at the time Dunkies did not offer café options, as they do now) as the way a real American drinks coffee, vowing never to succumb to the allure of the new "fancy" drinks.

Now, of course, I often enjoy a grande latte with no foam. If you put foam on my latte I am going to pour it on the drink counter and storm out (not really).

Having recognized this pattern, I would like to share the two most recent things that I have opened my eyes to that I initially dismissed as "lame."

The first is the Wii Fit: the next step in Japanese-based Nintendo's quest to take over the world. It's a video game for the Wii that, along with the accompanying balance board, guides you through a series of exercises and focuses your attention on things like balance, core strength and endurance. My initial reaction to this contraption was that it's ridiculous: yet another way people could make exercising more convenient. Well, I survived enough basketball practices to know that exercising should be anything but convenient. Furthermore, the concept of working out to a video game seems like the kind of thing that would make Red Auerbach roll over in his grave.

Now, Holly and I own the Wii Fit. I used it one morning and I was very impressed. As a former personal trainer, I know that there are some very simple concepts to focus on when building basic fitness, concepts that people tend to ignore. These revolve around having a strong core and building functional strength while balancing your muscle groups. The Wii Fit "trainers" do a great job teaching these basic concepts while helping you work through an exercise routine...not to mention that the balance games are really fun. So, I retract my initial declaration of "lame." I was wrong and I now see the light.

The second example from the past month comes from the TV show "Battlestar Gallactica." (The new one, I'm not interested in the 70's version yet.) Beginning a while ago, Holly became a fan of the show after watching the first season on DVD while on duty on her ship. She became quite involved in the show, to the point of interjecting stories or lessons from BSG into our daily lives. As you can imagine, I rode her pretty hard about this. I'm not necessarily sure why, because I actually like science fiction (Star Wars, Star Trek, Ray Bradbury books, for the most part) but I couldn't help being a little cynical about the whole thing.

So, one day I offered to watch an episode with her. I was confused, terribly confused. The storyline of BSG is ongoing and jumping in at a mid-point is rather difficult. Early on, Holly would have to stop the show and explain to me some backstory item that made the action onscreen understandable. As I got into it, though, the show gathered me in it's momentum. The effects are good and the characters are engaging (an essential component for me) and it's a lot of fun.

Most important, though, is that the writers and producers have used their medium to tackle some major issues: things like how we define loyalty, freedom and justice. Many of the issues facing the crew of Gallactica can be drawn back to the challenges we've faced in our real world over the past decade. If you're willing to let it, the show really get's you thinking.

So, call me a turncoat or a flip-flopper if you want. I just like to think that I allow my eyes to be opened to my own ignorance. I guess the lesson is that stereotypes and snap judgements can be useful (we'd never get anything done if we carefully weighed all information in the world) but every now and then a little investigation will bring you a nice surprise.

If you disagree, you can go frac yourself.

Reflections on My US Open Experience

I'm back on my couch at home after an all-night drive from Long Island, and with the US Open final round playing out on TV I thought this an appropriate moment to share my thoughts on our weekend at Bethpage.

Obviously, I would've loved for the weather to have been perfect and to have seen the final round play out before my eyes rather than on my flat screen. However, life can't always go as you'd like, and I still had a fantastic weekend with the USGA.

First, I have to tip my cap to Holly. She overcame blisters on muddy feet in less-than-perfect weather and was the perfect golf-watching companion. My favorite moment with her was when I realized that I didn't have to point out who people were or try to explain what was going on because she'd figured it all out for herself and had actually started to do it for me. She even let me spend $8 bucks on one of those yardage books that I always dream of checking from the fairway. She's a real stud.

My next nod of appreciation goes to the USGA, the Long Island Rail Road and every other agency/person that was involved in the organization of the event. They did an amazing job. The golf courses at Bethpage were not constructed to host a hundred thousand spectators. Parking and transportation could have been an absolute disaster and instead it was an amazing choreography of busses and zig-zagging lines. We took the train on Saturday and drove on Sunday and NEVER waited in a line for more than two minutes. We always were immediately ushered onto a waiting bus and on our way with little idling time. You know that a system has been organized well when it can be executed to flawless perfection by a team of teenagers checking their text messages. Everything that was within human control (translation: everything but the weather) was very well done.

Speaking of the weather, it would be unfair to be handing out kudos without mentioning the Bethpage ground crew. Golf is a weather-sensitive sport, mainly because the course is so delicate in heavy weather. The rains this week were the continuation of three weeks' worth of bad weather. Keeping the course playable and the spectator areas passable was a Herculean labor.

There are a lot of things I could share about the experience, and maybe I'll post again to cover some more, but I'll finish here with my "moment of the weekend." Golf is one of those sports that, in terms of actually seeing the action, there's nowhere better than in your living room at home. When you're actually there, you spend a lot of time scrambling around to see 10% of the major action and a lot more time trying to figure out what's happening in all of the places you can't see. Still, the experience of being there is electric, and the one magical moment that you see in person is worth hours of ESPN or NBC coverage.

Yesterday afternoon Phil Mickelson came to the 18th, where Holly and I were sitting in the grandstand, at -1 for the tournament after a hard fought day of even par golf. Phil is my favorite player, I play with his putter and even find myself waddling like him sometimes when I'm on the course. He is always a crowd favorite--especially true this week because of his wife's publicized battle with breast cancer--and he approached his ball on the final green to a standing ovation from the jam-packed grandstand.

He stood over a 30-footer for birdie and the radio in my ear (a life-saving contraption offered by American Express to cardmembers) chirped about how the crowd would erupt if he found a way to make birdie. Holly quickly agreed with the announcer, noting that she certainly would. I was hopeful but skeptical: we'd been watching players finish the home hole for about two hours and we'd seen A LOT of putts missed on all sides of the hole. As Holly had noted earlier, it was like there was a lid on the cup and your ball would break away from it no matter where you aimed.

Phil was putting towards us, and we could see that he was aiming a full six feet left of the cup. As the ball was on the way, the crowd rose in anticipation. With ten feet to go, it looked like it was going in, and when it did the eruption was instant. My heart didn't calm down for 20 minutes. Here is a low-quality You Tube video I found this morning, (not bad considering it happened less than 24 hours ago) and I am proud to say that Holly and I are just a little part of the roar you hear when the ball finds the cup.

I also learned this week that my Mother-in-Law went to school with Major Champion Justin Leonard's mother. I will now be sure to root for Justin whenever I can.

Virginia Gubernatorial Primary

This morning, I will be voting for Creigh Deeds to represent the Democratic party in the 2009 Virginia Governor's race.

If you're registered to vote in Virginia, remember to vote this morning. Virginia primaries are open so even if you're not a member of a party (technically I'm not, since we don't register voters as members of parties) you are welcome to vote.

Efficiency Complex

With the type of studying that I did in graduate school, I've become very enamored with the concept of efficiency. It's clear, looking around, that the rest of the world is as well. This makes good sense: we have computers and microchips in everything that can be programmed to do the "little" things for us, thus freeing up our minds to focus on the bigger things.

In a way, this might be a bit of double-edged sword. We've all read the little dictum that "sweating the small stuff" can be hazardous to our health, but it's a dangerous situation when we decide to stop paying attention to details.

I thought about this a lot during the spring, as my class mates and I pored over cover-letters and resumes for each of the countless job applications that we sent out. Invariably (I dare you to write 20-plus cover letters and not have a typo) we'd realize that we'd sent one in with some grammatical error that would surely disqualify us from consideration. I'll admit it, I sent in an application packet to a consulting firm and then realized a week later that my cover-letter was missing a period.

These depressing realizations were always accompanied by the same exclamation: "But the green line didn't appear!!!"

Our word processors and web browsers have become so "smart" that they now do most of the work for us. We can write an entire document without even capitalizing our own letters or bothering to put apostrophes in our contractions. Isnt that awesome?

And yes, in the rare occasion that we misspell "excited" or confuse "there" and "their," we expect our computers to either correct it instantly or throw one of those magical lines underneath it so we can do it ourselves. Of course, we don't usually have to figure out how to spell "apostrophes" on our own, we can just right-click and the computer helps us again (yes, I did that in the previous paragraph).

I never thought too much about this. It made my life easier and didn't seem to have much cost associated with it (other than the $500 price tag of some office-software suites that shall remain nameless). Yet, the implications of it all came crashing upon me as I was getting out of my car last night.

Holly and I bought a new car, and for our purposes it is basically "tricked out." Among other things, its entry/ignition system is such that you have to do NOTHING in order to get into and out of the car and start it. You walk up to the door with the key in your pocket and it unlocks. You press a button on the dashboard and it--recognizing the key in your pocket--starts. Once you're driving, if it gets dark or starts raining, the headlights come on for you (I've always had such a difficult time recognizing darkness, so this is very helpful to me).

When you get to your destination, don't worry about turning off the headlights or locking the door. Just walk away and the car--sensing your departure--takes care of everything for you.

Now, this is all fantastic. In fact I think it's the coolest thing I've ever seen. But it scares the dickens out of me. This whole situation is just begging for me to lose my keys or leave my other car's headlights on--for it I still have to do all of the luminary work, like a sucker--and kill the battery.

So, I've become worried. Will the efficient-riffic (yes, I invented that word just now and no, Firefox is not happy about it) technology at our command cause us to lose track of the small stuff? I have an efficiency complex, but I also have a "details complex." Life is what happens in the details: the stroke of a paintbrush or a note on a page of music or (in my professional life, sorry) the meaning of an individual observation to a larger truth.

Don't get me wrong, I am very thankful for technology. I'm hardly a Luddite. I prefer using analysis software and a calculator to a slide-rule and a pencil. I don't want to turn back the clock or banish my Macbook from my life. I just want to remember that though we're not supposed to sweat the small stuff, it all turns out to be "small stuff." So, with computers and cars and software geniuses taking care of it all for us, what is left?

The Last of the Pictures

Megan on a locomotive, there were a LOT of them there.

Me in the engineer's seat of a locomotive. The best part of this setup was that there was an entire drawer to my left dedicated completely to an ashtray and cup-holder for your coffee/tea/scotch.

Just in case you ever doubted my parallel parking skills.

More Conestoga Pictures

At the Pennsylvania Railroad Museum. I was pretending that I was riding the train to try out for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

An artistic shot of Megan in the engineer's seat of a locomotive.

Good thing I snapped this picture when I did, because she pulled the break lever so hard that I then went flying through the front window of the locomotive. It hurt.

Megan in front of the "Tahoe" locomotive.

Me sitting on the roof of the Good house, enjoying my morning coffee with the goats.

Riding the Conestoga Wagon

I've spent the last week traveling to visit family and friends up and down the eastern seaboard. While it's tempting to expound on the existential ramifications of my trip--as I did in my recount of the visit to NFA--a picture is worth a thousand words. These are some pictures that I snapped while visiting my great friend Megan Good in Conestoga, PA. Incidentally, the Greater Lancaster area is a beautiful place and I was very impressed in my short time there.

Me in front of the sign for Megan's Elementary School.

Me in front of the sign for Megan's High School (This sign was apparently a gift made by her class, she had no idea). I'm so wet because we'd just gone for a two-hour hike in the rain.

The wood stove in the Good house. I thought this was really cool, it is actually their main source of heat during the winter months. Here's to self-sufficiency.

I'm a terrible bowler, which is why it was both entertaining and confusing to witness myself bowl 8 strikes on my way to a 217. This is about 80 pins better than my previous best. The most fun thing about it was that since I know I'm a terrible bowler I really never thought: "wow, if I practiced I could be really good." Instead I thought: "This is amazing!" P.S. I really blew Megan (Megood) away during our two bowling games, but she got my back in our air hockey matchup.

A Priceless Pearl

Image from www.norwichfreeacademy.com. Slater Museum is in the Background, Norton Gymnasium ("The Old Gym") is centered on the Photo, the lamp in the foreground is on the front facade of the Cranston building (home to all Freshman and nicknamed "The Playpen").

I came back up to my childhood home in Franklin, CT this week. I had planned on visiting the Nutmeg state after graduation to see my family, but it also turned out to be a practical opportunity to help my parents move out of their house. After a couple years on the market and over 35 at this address, Bonnie and Dave Levanto are finally free.

In general, it's been an interesting experience for me. I have many good memories in this house and have known a lot of happiness here. It will be strange coming back to Connecticut and going somewhere other than 12 Southgate Circle. However, the whole concept didn't really strike home until I visited my high school, the Norwich Free Academy, in neighboring Norwich.

I'm incredibly proud of NFA. It was founded in 1854 by the wealthy merchants of Norwich (at the time awash in money from the bustling harbors on the Thames River) and while it was endowed like a private academy it was open to all students in the area. It has a museum on campus, complete with casts of classic works such as the Piéta, the Nike statue from Athens and the front facade from the Parthenon. It has a beautiful, sprawling campus that a substitute bus drive once mistook for a college and over 2,000 students from every conceivable walk of life.

That's all very impressive and most of my friends have heard me brag about it at some point. However, that's not what makes it so dear to my heart. When I attended NFA, I was the 17th member of my immediate family (by the best count of my parents and I) to do so. My great-grandmother attended for three years before leaving to work, all four of my grandparents, my parents, aunt, uncles, brothers and I all graced the halls.

Of course, that's just my immediate family. I couldn't even begin to list all the cousins and relatives that have been part of the NFA tradition. My grandfather, John Friswell, was on the Board of Trustees. My brother Mark was a record-setting basketball player (my individual career was less impressive than his, but I was the captain of a team that it would not be ridiculous to call the best ever to play in the long history of the school...sorry, I had to brag a bit). My Aunt Reggie has taught there since I-don't-know-when, and several cousins have worked there including Joseph (Guiseppe) Levanto, former superintendent and namesake of the Levanto-Alumni House on campus.

Yes, you read that last sentence correctly. When I was a senior in high school, my school named a building after my family. Growing up Levanto, most of my highest ambitions revolved around going to the Norwich Free Academy.

So it was a strange experience to visit yesterday. I still know a few teachers and remember the good old days on campus, but it is just not where my puzzle piece fits anymore. When I checked in to get a visitor's pass, I didn't know a single person in the office. While visiting Aunt Reggie's classroom, I realized that I was a decade older than her students. Worst of all, I'll admit that it did not feel like yesterday that I roamed around as a lost greasie (traditional NFA slang for a first year student, who are officially known as juniors, not freshmen) or stood on the football field during the Homecoming ceremony. The only thing that made me feel like I did back then was my awkward self-consciousness whenever I walked passed a group of giggling girls.

However, this blog post is not really about me. It's about the reason that I visited in the first place. A good friend of mine from my own NFA days, Amy Rygielski, is now in her third full year as an English teacher. This concept blows my mind. Somebody that I clowned around with in the cafeteria and watched play for the softball and volleyball team is now teaching at the school. I'd always said that I'd love to be a teacher, but I felt the only place I could do it and be happy was at NFA. Amy is living the dream.

I sat in on Amy's...ahem Ms Rygielski's...last period class and watched her public speaking students give talks based on an assignment she designed. The kids were really impressive, especially how patient they were with each other while presenting. One student broke into tears while telling the class about his problems at home and family's recent foreclosure notice. Amazing. I never would've done that in school and I was very impressed by how kind and receptive his classmates were.

What was so striking, and wonderful, about the experience was the time was the time I got to spend talking to Amy about her job. She loves it. She told me that she laughed every day and multiple times during and after the class she looked at me and said: "How great is my job?" She spoke glowingly about her students and the opportunities she's had, and remembered with amazement the fated chain of events that got her the job.

The most telling part of her happiness was that it was not all sugar-and-honey. She certainly had her complaints: red-tape bureaucracy, co-worker frustration, challenges dealing with the problems of students, commuting to work and then bouncing over to Rhode Island to visit her still-close group of friends from her URI days. Yet, she just kept repeating: "How great is my job?"

So, thank you Amy (I'm assuming she's not a levantoair reader, so if one of the four of you bump into her you can let her know), for refreshing my soul a little bit during my own job search. You struck gold, but the real magic is that you focus on the most shiney parts even when some of the luster is lost. I'm happy for you.

As far as my own departure from the NFA stage, I'm not worried. My time is up, but the Levanto legacy lives on: Jack Levanto, Class of 2016; Madalyn Levanto, Class of 2019; Frank Levanto, Class of 2023.

But whene'er we see that banner,
And we watch its folds unfurl,
We will cheer for alma mater:
NFA, a priceless pearl.

Doughnut Theater

If you know my brother Ross, then you'll understand. If you don't, I couldn't possibly do him justice here; the best I can say is that being around him is always an adventure. He has his own blog, which I encourage you to read, and he almost always selflessly donates his posts to the interesting exploits of his friends and family. I've been thinking for a while about the fact that this is a darn shame, because he is just too interesting.

Yesterday in Dunkin Donuts I witnessed a little live theater of Ross at his best. We were waiting for our order (nothing too complicated, we both believe that DD has let its menu become far too complicated and should stick to doughnuts, coffee and bagels) when the guy behind the counter started talking to Ross. He was pretty big, with a goatee and a gold chain necklace and I'd judge him to be in his mid thirties. His tone was familiar and friendly, Ross responded in kind--just a little hint of recognition in his voice.

I had no idea who this gentleman was, and I didn't particularly feel like engaging in the conversation. So I listened from the other end of the counter as they caught up with the typical 'how ya beens' of two casual acquaintances reuniting. They discussed the holiday and work and all that fun stuff. At only one point did it get specific:

DD Guy: "How's Tilley?"

Ross: "I'm sorry?"

DD Guy: "How's Tilley?"

Ross: "Ah...She's great!"

DD Guy: "Is she still working at Stop & Shop?"

Ross: "Yeah, yeah."

DD Guy: "She's been there a long time."

Ross: "Well, just having a job right now is a good thing."

DD Guy: "I hear ya."

By this point our food was ready and we were on our way. We both said a cordial goodbye and headed out to the car. The door to the Dunkin Donuts hadn't even swung closed behind us when my brother said:

"I have no idea who that guy was...I have NO idea who 'Tilley' is."

A Few Spoken Words

I had the honor of being the student speaker for my program's "Pre Commencement" Ceremony on Saturday. Though I didn't choose to read from prepared remarks, I took some time this morning and transcribed what I said from the video my mother took during the speech (thanks Mom). The video quality isn't great, so I'm going to see if I can track down a better video to post. In the meantime, for your reading pleasure (it was really hard figuring out how to punctuate some of it), here it is:

__________________________________________________


There was considerable debate as to what my time limit was. It actually changed many times throughout the course of the past few months. I do have a reputation for being a bit long-winded, so if I begin to prattle on too long we decided that the best remedy was that Sophie and Dottie were going to charge on stage and tackle me and drag me off. So hopefully my incentives are in place to actually be brief.

It’s a great honor to be able to speak with you all here today: my new colleagues and our friends and families. But in a way we all have a connection in that we are all students of Public Policy. If you can’t define what exactly Public Policy is that’s perfectly fine. I assure you I can’t really do a very good job of it either.

But Policy is the business of the public; it’s how we take those little bits of ourselves—good, bad and ambivalent—and turn them into a larger community. As I was thinking about what I wanted to say to you all here today, I thought very hard about how I would distill and make concise and break down the two years of experience that I had here; turn it into some useful nugget: something you can take with you, you can carry around in your pocket and pull out as a means to make decisions, to investigate your world and try to figure out how to make it a little better tomorrow.

I stumbled upon what I think is a pretty apt, little, three-word nugget; a bit of advice you can carry with you, something to use to assess your world. Despite the political excitement of the past year it is not “Yes We Can,” it is not “Put America First.” It’s a little, underutilized bit of knowledge that we gain very early in our lives and seem to forget soon after. I haven’t used it enough and hopefully I’ll get more chances.

The three words of which I’m speaking are: I, don’t, know.

It seems a little foolhardy to stand up here after two years of hard study and say that the best that I have to offer you is that I just don’t know, but I find it very applicable in the types of questions that I get to answer. Friends and family come up to me and say: “Brett, do you think the bank bailout’s gonna work?” “Do you think the economic stimulus is correctly put together?” “Do you think that we’re on the right course to make things better in our world—overseas and here at home?”

The honest answer to all of those questions is that I don’t know, and there are a lot of other people out there that don’t know either. And the first step, on the journey of knowledge is to admit that. Those words are not admissions of defeat they are recognitions of opportunity; they are the key that unlocks the door to the next step of our lives.

Great people in our world have dared to say that they didn’t know. In 1962, John Kennedy—standing in a room much like this, except filled with our most brilliant scientists—said to them that as we increase our knowledge, so increases the breadth of our ignorance. Seven years later we landed on the moon, and only because we dared to admit that our ignorance existed. And that’s because “I don’t know” is powerful, but it’s only part of the story.

The entire motto—what I want you to carry with you as you leave here today—is “I don’t know, but I’ll find out.” What’s going to happen to our country? What’s going to happen to us as a people? I don’t know, and few people can claim to, but I will find out.

I know that these types of speeches usually leave people with some type of a “charge” and this might be a tough one to swallow, especially for my more recent B.A. graduates. When I graduated from GW I assure you there was very little in the world that I didn’t know. I had to get married and come back to graduate school in order to figure out exactly how wrong I was. So if you need any less than that, you’re doing better than I was, I assure you.

And I realize that this bottom line—this frame of reference—can apply far beyond the walls of policy and the discussion of things we do in the classroom, but to your entire life. How can you be a good citizen? Or a good friend? Or a good brother, or sister, or spouse? How can you be a good person? How can you apply to your life the values that you want to see in yourself and others?

I don’t know, but I’ll find out.

So if I leave you with anything, I want to leave you with this charge—my colleagues and all our friends in here: find something in your lives everyday—whether it be in your office, or in your home, with your friends, or enemies, or neighbors, or strangers on the street—find something every day about which you can honestly say that you don’t know. What you do next is up to you. But those of us who choose to say that “we don’t know, but we’ll find out” will be those who write the next chapter of our story as a people, as a community, as a nation and as a world.

That’s what I’ve left William and Mary with, and I hope that you walk out of these doors with a little bit of that for yourselves: that we all charge out and find millions of things—because they’re out there—about which to say that we don’t know.

I don’t know if I’m to my limit. I might stand a round for a while.

Thank you very much for having me. To my friends and colleagues: thank you and good luck.

A CrossWord to the Wise

When I was a junior in college, my roommates and I took on a new Hobby: the Friday morning crossword puzzle. At GW, we never had class on Fridays (parents were told it was because so many students had "Friday Internships" but my friends and I always saw three-day weekends as an inalienable right). We'd spend a good portion of the morning sitting around in our PJs and pouring over a crossword.

Of course, the Friday morning crossword became the every day crossword over time. Though true aficionados insist that the New York Times is the standard, my loyalty has always remained with the Washington Post. I now print and enjoy my puzzle for free every day from my computer. I apologize that this is not very "green," but it would be less green to buy an entire newspaper when I only really want one 8"X 8" square buried in the Style section.

It's been almost six years since I slowly started this addiction, and I've become much better. People argue that doing crosswords makes your mind better at solving problems and keeps it "young." I don't know about that, but it certainly makes you better at doing crosswords. Over this time, I've found that there are a lot of lessons about the world in general that I've taken from my puzzling habit (pun not intended) and I'd like to take this opportunity to share:

1) Getting Started Doesn't Take Much.

When I used to try a crossword puzzle as a teenager, I would typically go through the Across clues and get maybe three or four. There are usually 35-40 clues in the Across section, so my ten percent success rate used to be quite discouraging. I'd then just give up. In college I realized something: three or four is enough. Then you go through the downs and you get three or four of those. Sure, you've still got a long way to go, but now there are some letters on the board to help you along. If those letters can help you get just a few more then you're off and rolling. Don't be afraid of a slow start.

2) Specialized, Not Useless Knowledge.

When I'm doing the puzzle and I'm confronted with a four-letter word for "Bits of Food," the answer is obvious: "O-r-t-s." How about a four-letter word for "Spread?" That would clearly be "O-l-e-o." Is orts not a word that you use in your daily life? Could you pick oleo out of your grandmothers fridge? For me: No and no. I have never in my life called a friend to see if they wanted to go find and ort or two for lunch and I've never used a margerine-like product that said "Oleo" in big letters on it. This doesn't matter, these are words that are incredibly useful in getting some momentum going and they appear a lot. Many people will define knowing words like this as "useless knowledge." Absolutely not, this is specialized knowledge. Be proud of your specialization. How useful to the outside world are most of the things we've learned while doing our "real" jobs?

3) Admit When You're Wrong

You were so sure that "C-o-u-c-h" was the five-letter answer to the clue "Sofa." You're still sure of it even though that was twenty minutes ago and you haven't been able to match a single word through "couch" that works. Well, I know it's hard but it might be time to rethink your decision. When you do, you'll discover that there's a backless type of sofa called a divan. D-i-v-a-n, five letters! Scratch out couch and move on, you'll find the rest of that little section will finally start to fall into place. Good things happen in life when you can admit that you were wrong.

4) Change Your Perspective

Puzzlemakers often try to use clues that could have different interpretations, meanings or parts of speech. Invariably, we all have different snap interpretations of each word we read, especially with no larger context to help us out. A clue might present you with "Punch ingredient." Well, I was a bartender so I immediately think of one of my favorite rum-based drinks, a Planter's Punch. R-u-m. Sadly, this inspired answer doesn't fill the four-letter space available for it (and neither will vodka, gin, or whiskey). As it turns out, this "punch" refers to "A blow with the fist," well, there's one ingredient in a knuckle sandwich: a fist. F-i-s-t. Don't lock your mind into one way of doing something when plenty of others might work better.

5) Fresh Eyes See Better

I rarely finish a puzzle in one sitting. Usually I can get about three-quarters of it done before hitting a wall. So I put it down. When I come back to it later in the day, those answers that just seemed impossible now pop into my head. Of course, there always might be some stubborn leftovers. No sense being ridiculous, I always give myself three chances to sit down with the puzzle, after that I'm probably not going to make much more headway. That's when I pass it off to someone else, and their new eyes (and new perspective) typically can blow through what's left with no problem. Be patient and enlist help, it doesn't take anything away from the effort you gave.

6) Some Days You Just Get Killed

I would say I finish (filled and all correct) about 20% of the puzzles I start. For another 70% I can whittle them down to the last few letters (two or three blank spaces) before running out of momentum. Not too shabby, I think. However, there are those remaining 10% where I just get obliterated. I take my three separate tries and can't get more than four or five answers, period. This is always tough to swallow, but there's nothing I can do. The puzzle wins. I print out a new one the next day and try again. As I'm sometimes fond of saying: "Sometimes you're the windsheild, sometimes you're the bug."

7) Tomorrow Never Dies

Besides being the title of a pretty good James Bond movie, this is also a good final crossword lesson. You finished today's puzzle? That's great! You couldn't fill in a single letter? I'm sorry to hear that. You tried to do the puzzle but some guy on the Metro insisted on reading over your shoulder and shouting out answers and ruined the whole experience? I HATE THAT! Regardless, take your joy or sorrow for what it is and remember that the paper will print a new one tomorrow.

In life, each day is a new set of blank squares and unread clues.

A Man in a Box

Alice in Chains sings a song called "Man in a Box." It's a pretty vulgar, coarse description of a dead guy considering the world from his supine repose inside a coffin. I found myself contemplating the world last weekend from inside my own box. It wasn't dirty and debased as the Heavy Metal anthem illustrated. It was bright and brilliant, it was sanitized and crisp, it was a tanning bed.

When my wife raised the idea of 'fake baking' I thought: "I've never been tanning...might as well check it off the bucket list." So on Friday we went to Color Me Tan, a charming little establishment just a few blocks from our house that promises to save us all from worrying about "the weather or messy sand." (two things I spend way too much time worrying about, I assure you)

If you've never been tanning, let me share the basic spirit of the experience with you: it's terrifying. You go into a little room, take off all your clothes, douse yourself in orange-cremscicle-smelling lotion and turn into a human hot-pocket. Once you lay down on the tanning bed, bathed in the most unnaturally imposing light imaginable, you have to close the top of the bed over yourself in order to get the full effect. For someone with even the most mild clostrophobia, this is somewhat of an intimidating feat. Once you've the lid is closed, the top of the bed (complete with a series of mind-numbing flourescant lights) is just a few inches from your nose. If you listen carefully, you can actually hear your skin cells silently calling out "Why have you forsaken us?"

After a few minutes my breathing stabilized. I had on my neato little goggles to protect my eyes (Holly took the pink ones so I got the manlier green) and was trying to fight my natural habit of resting my hands on my chest--a bad idea when looking to avoid giving yourself a racing stripe.

As a beginner, I had seven minutes of baking time so I only had brief period for reverie. My mind began to consider the rather base situation I was in: naked on my back in a tight capsule. I couldn't help but have a little "pre-ja vú" (a term I just invented to describe deja-vú before the event has happened at all) that I'd probably again be in a situation a lot like this, but under less...living...circumstances.

I thought about the great scene from the movie Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead (originally a fantastic play by Tom Stoppard that was made into an equally fantastic movie starring Gary Oldman and Tom Roth). In the scene, which I really hope you'll click on the link and watch, Oldman considers the future of eternity in a box. His logic is air tight in its comedic candor (I'll let you watch rather than do it a disservice in the retelling) and he quickly arrives at the line that I think is central to my tanning bed encapsulation: "Life in a box is better than no life at all."

So here's where I try to close out the rather broad metaphor I've gotten myself entrapped in here. We all live in little boxes to some degree. Some are our own creation and others have been constructed around us. Life on the outside might be much better; it could be drastically worse. There's really no way of knowing without opening the lid. Leave death in a box to playwrights and poets. When you open your eyes to the inside of a lid, do you want to see what's on the other side?

I enjoyed my tanning experience. I don't really think that I look any tanner and am not sure how soon I'll do it again. I'm glad, though, that I got a little time to consider the world. Life in a tanning bed, after all, is better than no life at all.

A Player at the Masters

Forgive me, but I'm in the post-major-championship-euphoria of the typical golf fan. I love golf in general: I've drilled myself into the ground with frustration trying to play it, I search online for all the random merchandise connected with it and I completely buy into all the "honorable" hype about one of the world's oldest past times.

On a typical weekend, though, there's little chance that you'll find me sitting down to watch a golf tournament. They are really fun in person, and I've even spent the day with my father marshaling at one and had a great time, but it's a little tedious watching a series of mid-level golfers shoot 40 under par while the best players in the world practice at their home courses and look forward to the next major; this is what tournaments like the Greater Milwaukee Open or Hartford's Travelers Championship tend to be like.

Then the majors come around. When the Masters, US Open, British Open (challenging because of the time change) and PGA Championship are being played, I could watch every second of coverage and recap and not feel a moment of impatience. The best players on the biggest stage, every one of whom would leave every bit of themselves on the course in order to win (we all remember Tiger's pained steps around last year's US Open course).

This Masters' weekend was fantastic. Sure, there were a few things we might have liked to change. If Disney producers had been writing the script, Mickleson and Woods would've played in the final playoff with Kenny Perry (or some other likable underdog). Of course, Perry (or whatever amiable anti-hero was put in his place) would triumph and earn the respect of his superstar competitors and the undying love of the fan galleries.

That didn't happen, but we did have some great drama. Tiger and Phil did make an incredible charge; watching their round was four hours of tedious excitement. Each man clearly wanted to make something happen with every single shot and in many cases they did. Once their round ended, the air did seem to deflate from the course, but that doesn't take an ounce away from how great the finish actually was. The playoff featured three lovable also-rans (Cabrera was the 2007 US Open Champion, but most non-golf fans wouldn't be able to pick him out of a police line-up).

Cabrera won, robbing us of the "oldest player to win a major" storyline offered by Kenny Perry and the "baby face wins first major" possibility of Chad Campbell. Though it wasn't the best soundbite, his victory was impressive. He hit his ball off a tree on the first playoff hole and rallied to win. I have a lot of personal experience hitting trees on golf courses. I can't remember a time when I've ever rebounded from such an event to make par and would've deflated like a leaky blimp if I'd done it on the 19th hole at the Masters on Sunday.

So hats off to Cabrera. But for me, the moment of the week was actually on Friday afternoon. Gary Player, who won the tournament three times and played in it more than FIFTY, walked up the 18th hole for the last time. The 74 year old South African was 14 strokes above the cut line and wouldn't be playing in the weekend excitement.

As he approached the final green for the last time, Player was amiably chatting with playing partner Stephen Ames. Ames is hardly a superstar, but finished in the top 20 at the tournament and has a name a golf fan would recognize. He and the legend were laughing together as they came within 30 yards of the green, when a magical thing happened: Ames patted Player on the back and stopped walking.

I know that the whole "golf-as-honorable-exercise" thing can get a little nauseating--Jim Nance always overdoes it when he covers the Masters--but you've just got to love a moment like this. There were no stage directions, ceremonies or tv time outs, just the simple gesture of a young player towards the Player, who was allowed to take the magical walk all by himself.

As he entered the green, there was no doubt to whom the standing ovation of the immense 18th green gallery was directed. Gary Player, a humble and spiritual man, briefly got to his knees and clasped his hands together before finishing his round and his Masters Career.

I'll take my lesson from Ames for the week. Let's all take a moment to find a way to honor those around us. There may not be cheering galleries or half-century long championship careers to celebrate, but it's a great gesture to let the other guy walk onto the green alone.

The Writing on the Bathroom Wall

There's a story from the book of Daniel. It's got all the great action and drama that you'd expect from Biblical verse: idolatry, doubt, disembodied fingers writing on the wall of a banquet hall, stupefied scholars and a single wise mind.

When I discussed this blog post with my wife, Holly, she offered this parable as the right inspiration for a title: I wanted to write about bathroom graffiti at William and Mary and this was the story of "writing on the wall" in a "throne room." What could be better? What could be more snarky than that?

I try to do my research, so I looked into the verse and considered the events: a banquet of worship to false idols, a warning from God that no trusted adviser could interpret and the incisive mind of Daniel, whose faithful servitude gave him the single clarity to understand the message.

It may seem a stretch to relate this tale back to the scribblings of undergraduates as they stand at a urinal. It may even seem insulting or blasphemous. I promise you now that is not my intent. The message of the story for me is that we should read the writing on the wall regardless of the fingers that wrote it--and whether or not they were still connected to their body.

I've been a grad student at William and Mary for almost two years, and have stood in the bathroom and stared at the wall many times. With each visit, my anticipation grows as each bit of penned graffiti comes into view. Apparently, some of my invisible schoolmates take quite a shine to sharing their thoughts while doing their business: clearing their mind as they clear their body. I don't know any of them personally, but we've got our own little relationship through the medium of painted cinder block.

Most of these posts are either vulgar or inane, but they're all pretty entertaining. One writer declared how a fictional character performed a certain unmentionable act, then two more edited the sentence for grammar (the description of her performance developed from "real good" to "very well" to "adequate"). Another discussion began with the seminal question "Why does everyone pee with a pen?" After several rounds, the final answer seemed so simply beautiful: "Because it's so difficult to write with a penis."

These little discussions usually center around the things that would interest typical college kids. Cynical expressions of life meaning or the value of a good Saturday night. One artist wrote, cryptically: "I am the way, but I cannot show you the way," he apparently thinks he's invisible. Another offered some uplifting encouragement: "The future of the world is in your hands," an interesting thought considering the environment.

Last week, a new post appeared: "Trust Jesus." There was an immediate response: "Trust me." If I were the type of person who peed with a pen, I would've been tempted to continue: "Trust something." I suppose I'm letting my inner grafiti artist/collegiate metaphysicist get drawn into the whole game.

Our whole society screams out to be heard, to be listened to, to make a dent. Some do it on bathroom walls, others in tweets or blogs, some write songs or poems while the rest of us tune in and hope for enlightenment. I don't know why this is such a necessary human trait, why we all yearn to believe that what's inside of us will be valuable to someone else. Like the wise man said:

"Be careful whose advice you buy, but be patient with those who supply it. Advice is a form of nostalgia; dispensing it is a way of fishing the past from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly parts and recycling it for more than it's worth."

In the story of Daniel's wisdom, the hand appeared and wrote what needed to be said. The next time you find yourself with the future of the world in your hands and a few moments of peace, take a chance to read the writing on the wall.

Smoke and (Rearview) Mirrors

Close your eyes and imagine:

You pull up to a stop light after exiting the highway. You're the third car in line, and you're listening to the latest Josh Groban smash hit on the radio. As you wait for the light to change, you notice some smoke filtering out of the sides of your hood and blowing backwards across your car.

That's all we need for imagining right now, thank you. So what do you do? Pull over? Call your mechanic/spouse/parent/friend and ask for help? Flag down another motorist? Walk home?

Those options sound sensible, but only if you are not the third owner of a 1991 Honda Accord with 200,000 miles on it. This is the category into which I fall, so I take a more subtle approach. I just turn off the car. I turn it off and wait for the light to change, then I turn it back on and drive away.

I want to assure the concerned of you that I know that the car is not in danger of exploding or catching fire and that the smoke comes from some oil burnoff that happens when the engine is hot and the car is not moving. I keep a close eye on the oil level and the engine heat. So, in advance, thank you for your concern.

Plus, I don't really have many options. I've poured more maintenence money into the car than I can rightfully justify anymore. The time is obviously right for a new car, but the time would be more right when I'm out of graduate school and have a paying job. So, for now let's avoid the obvious and focus on this car and what it means.

I bought the car for $100 from my brother Mark, who bought it for a lot more from my grandfather John Friswell. I actually remember sitting in Papa's garage when the car was new; I was in the driver's seat and pretending that I was a tv detective driving to solve a caper. It's been in the family for 18 years (I tried to register it to vote in the last election, but I couldn't find a birth certificate) and has served us all in a slightly different capacity.

It's carried my grandparents to the A&P to buy us little apple pies and whatever else was on sale. It took my brother to and from work at Acorn Acres Campground and withstood a smiley-face sticker attack from my neice and nephews (most of these still gaze at you from odd angles around the car). For four years now it's guided me around the streets of Washington, DC and Hampton Roads and everywhere in between.

So now it smokes at stoplights and is clearly nearing that parking garage in the sky. Yet everyday it starts. Everyday it carries me safely home...and sometimes the radio even works. What would life be like if there were more things around us like this car? Beaten and tired, it fights every day to stay at highway speeds; it struggles against inevitability to serve its purpose.

It's been a tough year. We're all beaten and tired and waiting for a chance when we can stop to investigate what's under our own hoods. Jobs are being lost, savings disappearing and hopes are faint. And I don't want to be a downer, but someday we'll all be smoking at the proverbial stoplight. Let's take a moment to think now, not just about how we'll carry ourselves then, but about how we plan on travelling all of the miles in between.

Life is about more than smoke and mirrors, and we've got to keep our engines running.

The Job Soul Search

(This post is dedicated to my friend Megan Good. Who first came up with the pun about "Airing" my thoughts and was also present for the "April's Fool" story before I callously chose to omit her from the retelling. Megood, you deserve better.)

Right now, I am a second year graduate student who is furiously sending out job applications. For some of these vacancies I'm overqualified, for some I'm not sure I even want to work in the field, for others I've never even heard of the agency/company to which I'm sending my information. Well, for those of you (un)comfortably in the working world, I will reassure you that this is now a bit of a harrowing process. A friend of mine actually admitted being jealous of my two rejection emails, because at least I was hearing something back from potential employers.

Through all of this, it's all too easy to lose sight of what is really important. Why we go to work and care about where we go to do it. I was pondering this concept today, and I remembered an old cliché rationalization that was popular when I was an undergrad: "I just want to help people."

I can be cynical, so I always translated this response as "I want to make a lot of money, but I'm too socially-aware to say that out loud."

The honest truth, though, is that this is a valid response. We go to work because we want to help people: to help ourselves, to help our families, to help our clients/customers/coworkers. We may not all be handing out blankets to hurricane refugees, but we're helping. As I thought this, I remembered a story from my bar tending days that I hadn't thought of for a while:

I made friends with two of my Saturday Regulars when I was working at Capital City Brewing Company. They were a really cool, young couple who came in for drinks and nachos (with a whole bunch of stuff on the side, I used to remember it all but now I've forgotten) most Saturday nights. This was usually not a terribly busy night for me so we always got a chance to talk and became quite friendly. I even invited them to my wedding and they came (and bought Holly the pasta maker that had been discontinued since we'd registered for it).

One night, as they sat down, Emily (name definitely changed) ordered a ginger ale. In the months I'd known them, she'd never had anything weaker than our lightest beer so I was certainly surprised by her temperance. I gave her an "am I dreaming?" look and she blushed.

"Well, we haven't told anyone yet, but I guess you should know...I'm pregnant."

I was very excited for them because I knew this was something they'd been working towards for a while. I was also quite flattered that I, their Saturday barkeep, knew about their bundle of joy before their parents and family members. The rest of the night progressed as normally as a Saturday night at a bar can.

Two weeks later, Tom (name also changed) stopped by the bar alone during a busy Thursday happy hour. He stood behind the full bar, among a mass of young professionals, and sipped a couple of pale ales while watching TV. I was busy and didn't have much time to chat, but as he paid his tab he caught my attention.

"Brett, so you know, when Emily and I are in here again, don't raise your eyebrow if she orders a drink...we lost the baby."

Such is the danger of knowledge I suppose. I got to be a part of their joy, and I was now a part of their loss.

Two days later, they appeared for their typical Saturday ritual. They sat at the bar for a few hours and each enjoyed a few beers and several different appetizers. It was a slower night so I spent time chatting and joking with them. I tried to make it a normal night at the bar, let them get out from whatever cloud was hanging over their heads.

When the time came to pay the check, they found they'd gotten the best deal in the history of the DC bar scene. They spent about three hours in the bar and had only a happy hour nachos and a diet coke to pay for on their bill. I'd done everything I knew how: comped items, used my own meal allowance and even thrown some money from my tip jar (Sorry Benni, I know we pooled our tips but I always made more anyway) in to cover the cost.

I dropped the check with their credit card receipt to sign and went about my business. I really didn't want to make a big deal out of it and had other things I should've been doing anyway (trying to make back all the money I'd lost the bar). As I was standing at the service bar and Tom was putting his coat on and Emily approached me alone.

"Brett, I just wanted to thank you for making this week a little bit better."

I appreciated her thanks and they went on her way. That story has always stuck with me. I was just a bar tender, a guy who worked late nights and knew how to make a good Cosmopolitan, but I know that in that moment I got to make someone's life a little better. I got to "help someone." I was Sam Malone but got to pretend--for a second--to be Mother Teresa.

Though I've lost touch with them I still keep up on the growth of their family through the miracle of Facebook. I don't know if they still visit my old bar but I'm sure that wherever they're going they've found some other bartender to pour their beer and put their guacamole on the side.

They now have a beautiful son.

So, now, I'm going to keep looking for jobs. There's probably not a "dream job" out there right now and I don't exactly know where I'm going to fall. I promise, though, that wherever I land I will never again commit the sin of believing that there is any job in which I can't help someone: no work that is invalid.

April's Fool

I am not much of a trickster. My mind, when I press it into this mode, tends to fall immediately to the obvious and overused options that I really don't think anyone would find amusing. So no, I did not post on Facebook that my wife was pregnant or that I won the lottery (if you're reading this and you did that, then I think it was a very funny and clever little trick).

However, I do tend to fall into the ploys of others rather quickly. Yesterday (April Fool's day--which actually developed from an interesting history, you should look it up) I played Bozo to both Google's "Auto Pilot" and Pardon the Interruption's story about Rick Pitino muscling John Calipari out of his new job as basketball coach at Kentucky. Apparently I really trust media outlets and internet search engines.

Being April's Fool is humbling, but I've found that when I pay a little attention I actually get a chance to learn something:

I was at my friend Stefanie's house yesterday when she came home from Happy Hour. As she walked in the door, my other friend Kaitlin--with whom Stefanie had been out--also called my cellphone. Both were eager to share this extraordinary event that had happened at Williamsburg Steakhouse and great Happy Hour spot Opus 9.

So, I listened in stereo as each related the tale of a mirror behind the bar crashing down from its moorings. As it fell, it spewed glass in every direction and took many of the liquor bottles sitting on their shelves to an early doom. Sitting about ten feet away, both Stefanie and Kaitlin were apparently in the shooting gallery of glass shards created by the collapse and had to take action to avoid greivous harm. (In defense of the restaurant, I should point out that I've been there twice and have not yet had to fight for my life.)

As you can imagine, this was quite a jarring experience for them and they were very eager to share the story. And I was as caring, concerned and compassionate of a friend as I could be:

"Baloney!" (Okay, so I didn't say baloney, but I told blogger that there wouldn't be adult content on the blog.)

I'm sure you can imagine that, having already been duped twice on such an auspicious day, I was not going to let my guard down and fall victim to what was obviously such a simple minded ploy. I was smarter than that!

Not only was I smarter, but I was willing to go the extra mile to revel in my victory of un-gullibility. So I had Stefanie get me the number for Opus 9 and I called. A very nice sounding gentleman answered the phone (I've changed his name to protect his identity):

Very Nice Sounding Gentleman: "Thank you for calling Opus 9, this is Dmitri."

Me: "Good evening, Dmitri. I am sorry to take up your time, but two of my friends were just in your dining establishment and came home with a story that, frankly, I have red-flagged as a blatant--and rather simplistic--April Fool's prank. Did you have an incident tonight involving a large falling mirror and an explosion of liquor bottles? Again, sorry for wasting your time with this."

Very Nice Sounding Gentleman: "Honestly, I wish I could say that they were trying to play a trick on you. Unfortunately, we did have one of our large mirrors decide to attack the back of the bar."

Me: "Dmitri, I can now see that you are a part of this prank. And frankly I'm disappointed. Good day."

Okay, so I'm willing to be the big person and--even though I'm still considering going by the restaurant and seeing this with my own eyes--admit that I was wrong. My friends were telling the truth and instead of sharing in the dazzling fright they must have had, I chose to skeptically deny the possibility that it was true. April Fools made me a failure as a friend. I'm so disappointed.

Don't worry, I will not allow this disappointment to ruin me. Instead, I've sought deeper meaning from this experience. April Fool's is a day when we try to play light-hearted tricks on each other for no other reason than to pass the time. I'm an April Fool, not just because I fell for two tricks but because I doubted a truth.

In life, I'm probably going to fall for many more tricks (some not so light-hearted as yesterday's) and deny many more truths (some far more important than whether a mirror fell). I hope that I can discover my errors with relative ease, but that probably won't be the case. All I can do is own my mistakes and try to chuckle about the oddities of the world and incompleteness of my own knowledge.

In the end, we're all April's Fools.