Looking Out From the Garage

I had just sat down with the wife and kids for dinner.  When the phone rang, I wasn't expecting what I heard... 

My best friend's wife was calling to get directions to a trailhead that we regularly 4wheel.  I gave her the directions and asked what was up.  She told me that Pat had rolled the Jeep, but everything was OK.  He had been out on a simple trail with his boys (aged 2 and 4) and had a problem while helping recover another vehicle that had a problem. 

As soon as I got off the phone with her, I started calling around to find out more.  Cell coverage in the area is pretty spotty, so I wasn't shocked that I got a lot of voice mails.  Then my phone started ringing back as the people I had left messages with started calling back.  Nobody knew what was going on, but everyone wanted to be in the loop.  If I needed help or he needed help, they wanted to lend a hand. 

Pat called me a few minutes later and let me know part of what happened.  He was on a borrowed phone.  After hearing the real story, I was on my way out of the door to drive up to the trail (about 2 hours away) with his wife.  We would be driving separately, but I could lead her up.  The plan was for her to pick up the boys and head back and for me to stay with him until we got things squared away with the Jeep. 

At this point, the Jeep was laying upside-down on the trail.  He had walked out to a campsite with the boys.  There were some other folks in the area, largely made up of firefighters and police officers camping and 4wheeling for the weekend.  The wives and girlfriends of the campers swung into action feeding and making sure the kids were OK while Pat tried to find a way to get the Jeep off the trail so that it could be recovered... 

I still didn't really know what happened... but I had 5 trail rigs and a trailer on their way to help if needed.  All of this 1 1/2 to 2 hours from where we all live...  At 8:00pm on a Saturday.  Personal lives interrupted.  Plans changed.  

After an eternity, I arrived, with Helen right behind, at the campsite.  The boys ran up to me looking for Mommy (our vans look pretty similar... I wasn't in my truck or Jeep).  They were fine.  Pat's knee was pretty torn up, but he was mobile and trying to get everything ready to tow it back to town.  Pat's Jeep was hurt... 

One of the first things we recommend is to upgrade the rollcage.  In the case of a Jeep CJ, the factory cage doesn't protect rear seat occupants... Pat had built and rebuilt his cage to protect the rear seat passengers.  The boys both were sitting in the rear seats with full harnesses.  They were unhurt, despite the wild ride they took... 

Pat had gotten out of the Jeep to make sure the winch cable didn't have any binds.  The Jeep he was helping to move suddenly lurched while it was being re-rigged and he had to dive out of the way... getting run over by it in the process... only to see his Jeep launch down the hill with his two young boys along for the ride.  It ended up sitting upside-down on the cage after hitting a tree hard enough to break off the top of it and flipping off of it back into the trail. 

The boys were pulled from the vehicle within moments by the guys that were helping with the recovery.  They were understandably upset and scared, but unhurt...  Thankfully. 

What began as a quick, easy trail ride turned into a a recovery.  The recovery turned into the worst nightmare for a parent, watching helplessly as your kids are in danger.  Fortunately, that gave way to the thankfulness that they were unhurt. 

Six hours after the call went out, the kids are in bed, the Jeep is in Pat's garage, and all of the participants are at home... keep in mind that it was more than two hours before the first of us could arrive on the scene to begin bringing everyone and everything back home...  And the trip back required two hours as well. 

But the most important thing to me is that our friends were eager to help in any way they could.  In the allotted time we could have had enough volunteers to carry the Jeep off the trail by hand.  All asked the same questions... Were the boys in the Jeep?  Are they OK?  Is Pat OK? What happened to the Jeep?  How can I help?  What do you need? 

My simple plan of enjoying dinner with the family, and then going to Bruster's with the neighbors to talk about how much fun our kids had at hockey camp... then spending a little time blogging and an early night was gone.  And I am SO thankful that the only real damage was to the Jeep... It can be rebuilt, and it will be...

There is a social networking lesson here... but that is for another time...

Back when I was a kid... early 1970s... I played little league baseball for a season.  And it was a truly terrible season.  I don't know if Jackson, MI had ever seen a worse team.

There were two distinct levels in the Little League program at that time.  And we weren't in the higher level.  After try-outs at the Field House at Parkside High School, I along with a few of my friends were sentenced to placed on a team.  The upper league got names (Yankees, Tigers, etc.).  We got colors.  We got Orange. 

The upper teams had a Coach, Assistant Coach and Team managers.  We got a guy that had never coached a team in any way before.  We didn't complain.  He was a nice guy. 

Let me skip ahead and mention that we didn't win a single game.  In the loser conference, we were at the bottom.  Actually, I think we were given a gift by having a team show up with too few players and they had to forfeit.  But we didn't earn a single win. 

The team started with about 15 excited little boys.  We would have been around 9 or so.  We were all ready to play... 14 pitchers and a catcher.  And the only kid that was any good was the catcher.  The rest of us just sucked... ok, maybe there was another kid that didn't suck, but most of us HAD to be pretty bad.  We couldn't manage a win. And none of us were really pitchers... we just all had the same dream.

But, as the season progressed, there were fewer kids.  In some cases, their parents got them on better teams.  In other cases, they just stopped showing up.  We even had an adult quit... our coach didn't make the last three weeks of the season.  I was ready to quit after losing half of the season. 

My dad wouldn't let me...  I got on my bike on the two days a week we practiced and I rode to the field.  I carried my bat, ball and glove.  I either rode my bike to the games or rode with my parents.  I made it to every game... my dad wouldn't let me NOT show up. 

We went from proudly wearing our orange shirts and hats to mumbling about playing baseball... or outright denial. 

At the end of the season there were exactly nine little boys on the team.  I sucked too bad to play 1st Base... so I played Right Field (the coach thought that there should be a leftie on 1st base... there were two of us). There were nine kids that were forced to finish the season (either by pride or parents).  One of those kids was the catcher.  He made the All-Star team and got moved up to the "big league" for the following season.  I think they felt sorry for him for being good and having to be on our team. 

But there was a life lesson there.

Actually there were lots of them... 

• Life isn't fair.  We practiced as hard as everyone else... and we sucked.  Nine of us kept at it.
• Equal opportunity doesn't yield equal results.  If it did, there would be a bunch of teams tied for first/last/every other place in the league. 
  
• Sometimes you have to just do it.  I had to be at every practice and game.  I was.  It wasn't a choice. 
  
• People will let you down... get over it.  Our COACH quit.  He walked away.  One of the mom's actually stepped up.  I don't know if she knew which end of the bat to hit with, but she brought the gear and prayed for rain.  BTW, I respect her for stepping in even though she knew that she was in over her head.
• Others count on you and you don't know it.  The kid that was the catcher wouldn't have had the opportunity to be in the All-Star league if even one more of us had quit. 
  

I never played Little League Baseball again.  We moved to Hampton, VA soon after that and I took up other activities.  (Boy Scouts, Speed Skating, Skateboarding and doing stupid things on a bike come to mind.)  I played softball on a church team and we did quite well.  We played other churches, bars, businesses... pretty much anyone.  I still wasn't any good. 

My son had decided to try T-ball in addition to hockey.  I'm letting him.  And I'll take him to practice and games.  And I'll tell him to suck it up when he isn't liking it... and I will ask him if he is having fun... just to know, because when he makes a commitment, he has to stick with it.  The group he is playing with doesn't have set teams, and they don't keep score... it's like a weekly pick-up game... but if he plays competitively next year, he will have to follow through. 

Four isn't too young to learn a few things about life... and it also isn't too young to teach a few things about life.  Those are other posts...

After writing about Cap'n, I couldn't help but think of some the other great people I have had the pleasure of working for. 

My first job was at a skating rink.  That would be a roller skating rink...  I was a speed skater (short track) and was there pretty much constantly, so it was a great fit.  I worked in the skate room (repair and rental) as well as working as a floor guard (I was actually a DJ at the next skating rink I worked at). 

The owner was a guy named Nicky... specifically, Big Nicky (as opposed to his son Little Nicky).  We just referred to him as 'Big'... and 'Little'.  Nicky was a second generation American.  His parents (and his wife's) had come to America from Greece with little that they weren't wearing.  He hand his wife had been Pairs Champions, and he turned that into a position of rink manager... then finally owner.  In fact, he bought several rinks and successfully ran all of them. 

The rink I worked at was the main one... it was where he was focused, and much of the time I worked there, it was the only one.  And the over-simplify a point, there was NO job in that rink that Big did not do...  And there were jobs that he would only accept volunteers for... those jobs involved toilets. 

There was a specific job that had to be done twice a year according to Big.  It was the most disgusting thing I've ever done.  We pulled the toilets off of the floor and cleaned then inside and out... and then put them back.  There was no law.  There was no health regulation.  There was something higher... Big's Standard.  He was not going to let the bathrooms smell, and that was what he thought it took. 

So, twice a year on a Saturday morning, we would gather.  Nick would pull the toilets out into the "yard" behind the rink and we would get to cleaning.  Nick would offer cigars to anyone that wanted one (we were teenagers... it probably wasn't legal) because they covered the smell.  After about 3 hours, they were clean as new, and back in the bathrooms. 

The guys that did this (only guys volunteered when I was there) were a team.  But more... we had tremendous respect for Big.  He didn't tell us what to do and then hide in the office... he was right there.  He was at least as dirty as the rest of us.  And after doing that job... or even hearing about it from somoene that did it, there were NO complaints about mopping up barf or any of the other wonderful tasks that could pop up. 

Big was a leader.  He didn't expect others to do what he didn't do himself.  He didn't demand.  He offered.  And he was given.  We gave him our loyalty.  We gave him our service.  He gave us chances... he let us make mistakes.  He gave trust...

I learned a lot of valuable management lessons from Big.  I learned that I could never demand respect, loyalty or commitment.  But, I could earn them...  And there are few days that pass when I don't wonder what Big Nicky would do.

I used to work for a guy named simply , Cap'n.  There were 8 of us in his department, some were employees and others were contractors, like me.  There were rumors about his name, but the plant manager wasn't even sure... he always called him Cap'n, too. 

Cap'n was a 66 year old black man.  He was counting the days until retirement, and he knew the number... often led with it when there was something to be dealt with ("I have 417 workdays until I retire. I don't intend on wasting another one of them with your BS!").  He was born at home in 1917, his great-grandparents had been born slaves... and remembered when they were freed.  He made it to 9th grade... best in his family to that point.  His parents still lived in the home he was born in... but not for much longer.  He even knew exactly where his great grandparents had been born and freed. 

His daughter was a Doctor (Pediatrician).  His older son was a Navy Aviator.  His youngest was a school teacher.  He had a grandson that was looking at West Point.  He had a grand-daughter that was looking at MIT.  It is pretty obvious that Cap'n had done a pretty good job. 

The reason I know so much of this stuff is that we had a little tradition.  The schedule was ten days on, four days off.  Half of the crew was there on the four day weekends, and everyone was on deck Tuesday through Thursday.  We were in "maintenance"... light bulbs, trash can liners, painting, clean-up... whatever.  This was a coal fired power plant. 

During my four or five months, Cap'n and I got into a habit of wasting an hour or two on Sunday afternoons "on the deck", which was a open air platform about 130 feet up, overlooking the river.  It was serviced by elevator, but was outside of the generator building.  We also called it the tenth floor.  I would stop and pick up a couple of oatmeal creme pies and some NeHi Grape Sodas.  We'd sit there and BS.  He liked that I had traveled a bit, and liked history.  I thought he was one of the smartest people I'd ever met.  He understood SO much about the way things worked... and people... and the way people worked things. 

So, one day, Cap'n and I were enjoying a snack and watching some sailboats on the river.  It was sunny and warm... a perfect day.  We were talking about his son's adventures flying in the Mediterranean off of a carrier.  Cap'n's elevator buzzer went off (he cobbled together an alarm so that anyone sending the elevator to the tenth floor would notify us... we had to look busy).  We hopped up to look busy.  When the door opened up, it was one of the other maintenance guys.  Chuck had done something stupid, and there was a problem... Chuck doing something stupid was not a shock... 

Cap'n told Chuck to stay there for an hour and then to meet him in the maintenance office.  Chuck didn't think he could be fired for it... he was union, and in the regulated power industry a Pronouncement from God would still require a two year investigation... and everyone would get bored and drop it.  But he was worried.  He might lose a raise. 

Cap'n took me down to the heat exchanger area.  A couple of the gauges were going bananas.  They would peg and drop and peg again.  Chuck had been down here cleaning, and he thought he had leaned on something.  I was wondering if we were going to have to call engineering and there was going to be a shut-down or something.  The gauges were flipping.  Red lights were flashing.  Cap'n pulled up a stool and sat down. 

Then he told me that every month or so, some of the barnacles that get in the exchanger break free because of the heat cool cycle.  We try to get in and drain the unit and clean the lines before-hand, but that we hadn't because of other projects.  Basically, the problem would mostly self correct over the next couple of hours.  But, he didn't want Chuck to know that.  Chuck was ready to give up on his demands (not working some types of duties, and trying to spend a lot of time near the infirmary) and Cap'n was perfectly willing to make it look like he heroically saved the day for Chuck. 

I was then told a truism.  When junk is screwing up, people want you to do something.  A lot of the time, nothing you can do is going to fix anything, but it makes those people fell better that something is getting done.   And from this, I learned that appearing to fix a problem that is fixing itself is almost as valuable a skill as fixing problems... that aren't fixing themselves.  But Cap'n told me that the MOST valuable skill was knowing which problems needed a kick in the butt and which ones just needed you to sit on your butt. 

About a month later, Cap'n and I were enjoying the view and the buzzer went off.  We sprung into action, and when the elevator opened it was the Plant Manager.  He told us to stop play-acting and grabbed the bag of moon-pies and Grape NeHis he had hiding in the elevator.  He also knew that Cap'n was a pretty smart guy.  He was asking him how to deal with his wild child daughter...  Cap'n pointed to me and told the Manager to give me her number... then she wouldn't be his problem anymore.  He was kidding... I think.