Fifty

Old age is the most unexpected of things that can happen to a man.     

        - Leon Trotsky

 

The wit in Trotsky’s quote is, of course, in the irony. Old age should be among the least unexpected of things that can happen to a person. We all know (or, dare I say, hope) that we will someday get old and yet, we’re never quite ready when it begins to happen to us.  Age has a way of sneaking up on us, slowly and stealthily. We go about the business of living our lives. The days turn into weeks, the weeks into months, the months into years until, one day, we wake up to find that we’re fifty years old, and we wonder “When did that happen?”

 

This week, that happens to me. I’m turning fifty and, though I’m not overly traumatized by the fact, I do find myself wondering “When did that happen?” Wasn’t it just the other week that I graduated from college? How long have I been married now? Twenty-three years? Impossible! Where did my little five-year-old daughter get to and who’s this young university student in her room? Did we get a new babysitter?

 

When I turned forty (just last year, wasn’t it?) my wife threw a big party,  inviting all my friends and family. There were lots of gifts and lots of cards. I remember one of the cards reminded me, in case I was feeling blue about turning forty, that it could be worse; in ten years I'd be turning fifty. Well, here we are. How did ten years slip by so fast?

 

I like to think of myself as an overgrown kid (I know that my mother would agree with me on that point, but for different reasons than my own), yet my body tells me differently. A friend of mine, who’s very close to my age, once noted that, as soon as we hit forty, our bodies seem to start giving out on us. Suddenly we can’t see quite as well. We tire more quickly and need to rest more often and for longer periods, and things start to ache for no apparent reason. Now that I’m fifty, I’m starting to notice that more and more of the people I know, people who are my age or maybe just a little older, are suffering heart attacks and being diagnosed with cancer. Time and circumstances keep reminding me of my own mortality.

 

I look in the mirror, examine my protruding belly and say to myself, “Man, I have got to start taking better care of myself; seriously!” When we’re younger, we can get away with abusing our bodies. We can eat junk food, smoke cigarettes, drink, stay up all hours and the our only punishment for these sins is the occasional headache or cough. Our bodies shake it off. At fifty, our bodies aren’t quite so forgiving anymore. Calories burn more slowly. Muscles tire more quickly. Facial lines come to stay. Everything about us contrives to remind us of the undeniable truth that we’re getting older.

 

I’ve always had this idea that I’d like to live to be a hundred. If I can manage that, then I’m only half-way through my life. That's an encouraging thought.  Hopefully, I've still lots of time left, and a lot more to do.  Pierre Trudeau was about my age when he became Prime Minister of Canada.  Coincidentally, his birthday was the day after mine. 

 

And yet, I realize that I can't live the next fifty years of my life in the same way that I lived the first fifty.  I realize that I need to treat my body with more care. I need to eat healthier food, and less of it, and I need to exercise more regularly.

 

This also seems like a good time to reflect on my life; where I’ve been, where I am and where I hope to go from here. So far, it seems that I’ve spent most of my adult life working to improve my own standard of living, and that of my family.  This seems to have translated mostly into accumulating “stuff”; a house, cars, clothes and entertaining distractions such as computer games and DVDs. 

 

My wife and I recently helped her sister to move. Compared with us, my wife’s sister has relatively few belongings, yet she had to get rid of an awful lot of things that she just doesn’t need or have room for anymore. I look around myself and realize the monumental task that I’d be faced with if I had to move my family and all of our belongings for whatever reason. Maybe it’s time to stop accumulating and learn to enjoy the things that I have more, or even begin to discard some of the extra detritus in my life. 

 

I also find that my attitude toward my career has changed over the years. When I was younger, I wanted to change the world. Now, I’m content just to put in my time and go home at the end of each day. This is not to say that I’ve become apathetic, but my career no longer defines me as it once did. When I lost my job a couple of years back, it occurred to me for the first time that I might not always do what I've been doing for a living.  In fact, I’m at that age now when I need to start thinking about a not-so-distant future when I'll no longer be going to work each day. And yet, I’ll still need some kind of income to live on. Now is the time to plan for that. In fact, the financial gurus say that those who wait until they get to my age to start (I didn’t) have already left it too long.

 

Turning fifty is not something that I dread. Life has been reasonably good to me so far, and I look forward to transitioning from school, career and building a life to grandchildren, retirement and enjoying the life that I’ve built. In a sense, this is the perfect age. My daughter’s generation sees me as something of a codger, yet my mother’s crowd still sees me as a kid. I can play either role as I choose. What’s not to like about that?

Nice Work If You Can Get It

Roger Ebert has one of the coolest jobs in the world.  Imagine getting paid to watch movies and then either diss them or praise them or some combination of the two.  Where do you apply for that job?  How come I never see anything like that in the classifieds?

WANTED - Discriminating person to watch and critique movies.  You are a self-starter (meaning that you can drop a DVD into a player and press the "Play" button) with the ability to work under minimum supervision (although you can bring along a friend if you like) and have demonstrated excellent written communication skills (you have to be able to spell "masterpiece" and "travesty" and use both in sentences appropriately).  You are adept at multi-tasking (you may have to submit reviews for two or even three movies in the space of a single week) and can work quickly to meet deadlines.  If you agree that Francis Ford Coppola should have quit while he was ahead and retired after "The Godfather II" and can fathom the plot behind "The Fountain", please respond in writing to...

As sweet as it may sound, I'm sure there are some downsides to a movie critic's job.  For every "Shawshank Redemption" that you get to enjoy there are, no doubt, countless "Son of the Masks" that you have to endure and then attempt to critique with some degree of seriousness.  I suppose that a certain amount of hate mail from fan boys whose "all-time favourite most awesome and misunderstood movie ever" you had the poor sense to publicly shred is also an occupational hazard.  But, still, as cushy jobs go, this one has to rank up there.

There are other occupations which sound like pretty nice deals for those who are lucky enough to land them.  In the same vein as "Movie Critic", I always thought that working on the Quality Assurance team for a computer games developer would likely be a fun way to make a living.  I mean, you get to play computer games all day long!  What's not to like?  On the other hand, those games are, by definition, works in progress, so you're bound to find lots of bugs and things.  If you're an impatient gamer who gets upset the moment things don't work properly, this may not be your cup of tea.  Also, companies that develop games software are notorious task masters, often requiring their staff to work long hours in order to get those games finished and shipped in time for the Christmas market or some other sales deadline.  As with anything else, it's always possible to get too much of a good thing.

I speak from personal experience in this regard.  My very first job after graduating from college was with a software company that created educational games for younger children.  True, we`re not exactly talking about `World of Warcraft`here but I was still programming games of sorts for a living and I really did enjoy the work.  At least for a while, I couldn`t believe that I was actually getting paid to do this.  A few all-nighters spent trying to meet overly-ambitious sales deadlines soon cured me of my euphoria. 

Another appealing career, at least at first glace, would be "Male Porno Star".  Imagine making a living having sex with porno actresses!  It would be like being Charlie Sheen, only getting paid for it, and you could probably pick up extra cash on the side promoting penis enlargement products.  Where do you sign up for that job? 

I wonder if it ever gets old?  It would probably make maintaining any normal relationships somewhat problematic.  I don't know of too many women who are OK with the idea of their mates doing porno stars for a living unless, of course, your girlfriend was in the business as well, in which case you'd have to be just as open-minded about her doing it with other guys - in some cases at the same time that she's doing it with you!  Even if you reached an understanding about that stuff, would you ever have sex off camera just for the fun of it, or would it feel too much like bringing your work home with you?  Or what happens if you have to do a scene with an actress that you don't particularly like or that has annoying habits ("Oh, God, not Jenna Jameson again!  She uses her teeth!")

I`m afraid the sad truth probably is that even the best-sounding jobs can become something of a grind (no pun intended).  Except maybe for that dream Caretaker job that everybody was talking about around 3 years ago where you had to live on an Australian island for six months and blog about the experience.  I`m hard-pressed to think of too many `cons` for that one.  Unless it`s the box jellyfish.

Slipping On The Noose

About six months ago, I was unceremoniously introduced to the world of the unemployed. I blogged about it at the time, as I do regarding most significant life-changing events. Last week's post contained a less-than-subtle hint that I've since managed to find new employment. Allow me to make it official and announce, formally, that I am indeed working again. Hooray for me!

My new employer requires that all male employees wear neckties. It's a technology company that services external customers, some of whom occasionally visit our offices, so the owners want everyone looking professional. Fair 'nuff.

I once read a quote (whose source I, unfortunately, don't know) which declared that neckties are for "compulsive neurotics who were prematurely toilet-trained" (and who) "carefully line up pencils on otherwise clear desks." Is that the image that we want to project to our clientele, gentlemen? Do we want to look like a bunch of wieners? Hmmm?

I haven't had to wear a necktie at work for over fifteen years. My very first job was with a very small startup venture whose offices were inconspicuously located in a tiny little rural town above a Stedman's store. Most of the employees were kids fresh out of college like myself. It was a very informal environment and we didn't get a lot of outside customers visiting us so we dressed casually.

My next job was with a medium-sized appliance manufacturer. It was a much more formal environment infested with V.P.s, managers and human resource wonks who all apparently placed a fair degree of importance on employee attire, so the men were expected to wear collared, button-down shirts, creased pants and, of course, the ubiquitous necktie.

My next two or three jobs also required me to wear a tie ... at first. Around the mid nineteen-nineties, however, business attitudes in general began to relax somewhat. More and more companies began to abandon the archaic insistence on the necktie in favor of a new standard of attire that became known as "business casual". Men were still required to wear shirts with buttons and collars, but the necktie was no longer mandatory and the pants need not be creased (although blue jeans were still considered "pantalones non grata"). The nicest thing, to me, about losing the necktie was that I could now wear short-sleeved shirts on warm days. You just can't wear a necktie with a short-sleeved shirt, unless you want to walk around looking like NYPD Blue's Andy Sipowicz.

Trends tend to be prone to a slippery slope effect and so, for the next few years, office dress codes continued to relax even more. By the time I returned to the aforementioned appliance manufacturer for my second tour of duty in 1999, office staff were wearing jeans and T-shirts to work. I'll concede that the workplace dress code pendulum may have swung a little too far in the opposite direction. The main problem here is that there will always be that small contingent of people with no sense of style or taste. You know what I'm talking about. The Wal-Mart crowd. They cause offense or embarrassment (for the human race in general), co-workers complain to management and management responds in the same way that they always do; with knee-jerk overreactions. Rather than dealing with the small handful of offenders individually, they pass sweeping policies and, before you know it, everybody's wearing neckties again. I've noticed a gradual shift back toward more formal office attire policies over the past five years or so among companies in general, not just my former employer.

What's the deal with neckties anyway? What, exactly, is the appeal of this decorative bit of silk (or polyester for the budget-minded) hanging from a man's throat? They have no practical purpose. They're not wide enough to be effective bibs or, if they are, you shouldn't be wearing them. They make you hot in the summertime, yet they really don't warm you up in the winter; not like an ascot, which is practically a scarf!

I did a little research on the history of the necktie. Seems that men have found it necessary to wear some form of ornamental decoration around their necks since ancient times. The ancient Egyptians, the Chinese and the Romans all wore ornamental neckwear that resembled ancestors of the modern contemporary necktie. These generally indicated social status in some manner, which explains why, even today, the higher one ranks on the corporate ladder, the more likely one is to be seen wearing a tie.

Since it's been so long since I've had to wear neckties on a regular basis, many of the ties that I still had were showing their age, so I bought some new ones. The other day, during an idle moment at the office, I took a moment to examine the tie that I was wearing a little more closely. "Montebello", read the label, "100% silk". Ooh! Italian silk! Classy! Then, underneath that, "Made in China". Ah! Apparently, this is a product of those well-known Chinese silk traders, the Montebellos, not to be confused with the notorious Sicilian Yuang family.

I once had a debate with a former work colleague about not just neckties, but office attire in general. The company for which we both worked at the time still required men to wear neckties. I, being always a bit of a rebel, had expressed a desire to dress more casually, especially since we never had external customers in our offices at the time. "Who were we impressing?" I challenged, "Each other?"

My workmate countered with the premise that one's attire affects one's work ethic. He seemed to be suggesting that, if we were to dress casually, our work habits would likewise become increasingly lax. What nonsense! I pointed out that, if he truly believed that, then he would be obliged to dress up when he had to come in to the office on the occasional weekend, as sometimes happened, or even if he were to work out of his home. He conceded that he wouldn't likely take the philosophy quite that far.

On the other hand, another gentleman whose acquaintance I recently made expressed the opinion that our attire affects the attitudes and demeanors of those with whom we come in contact. The example he gave was that of walking into an everyday coffee shop and, here, I'm talking about a real coffee shop; a Tim Horton's, not some pretentious Starbucks or William's. If you walk in wearing jeans, a T-shirt and a ball cap, you'll likely be greeted with something akin to "Yeah, what'll ya have?" Walk in wearing a dress shirt, pressed pants and a tie, on the other hand, and you're much more likely to hear "Good morning, sir, how can I help you today?" Here, I'm inclined to agree. Our appearance has a decided impact on how people regard us.

Being a little older and, hopefully, a little wiser than I was when I had that debate about office attire with my old colleague, my rebellious attitude toward neckties has mellowed somewhat. I no longer detest them quite as much as I used to. Heck, I even have a little fun with them. This past week, I walked into the office one day sporting a plain but very bright canary-yellow tie against a dark mauve shirt. An exercise in contrast. The following day, I wore a tie whose color matched that of the shirt that I wore so closely that, at first glance, you almost couldn't tell that I was wearing one (a tie, I mean, not the shirt). Yes, I've learned to accept the necktie, although I'm still no Bryan Ferry.

A Place Where We Used To Work

Former Dire Straits front man Mark Knopfler once wrote a song entitled "A Place Where We Used To Live". It's about a man apparently wandering through an empty house or apartment that used to be his home. The lyrics lament that everything has changed.

Here in the dust

There's not a trace of us

Everything's gone

Those who read this blog regularly will be aware that the company for which I worked went bankrupt and closed down last November. By a strange twist of fate, I still work for that same company indirectly. They used to build product under license for Whirlpool corporation. Now that they're gone, Whirlpool has purchased the assets of the Ohio plant and continues to run it as a manufacturing facility, at least temporarily.

After being laid off, my old boss started up a small computer consulting company of his own and one of his first clients is Whirlpool corporation. It only made sense. After all, he knew the old company's computer system inside-out, and Whirlpool needed someone with the expertise to support it. Trouble is, he's not a programmer. That's where I come in. He's sub-contracted me to do development and support work. So I find myself working with the exact same system that I have been for the past ten years.

Of course, there are some changes. One of my first tasks was to clear the old company's data out of the computer files. Last week, I erased all transactional data prior to the start of this year. There was a lot of data to erase. One of the files was relieved of over 53 million records! That represented about six years worth of transactions. Six years of doing business. Had that data been erased while the former company was still a going concern, it would have been considered a disaster of almost biblical proportions. Now, it just didn't matter anymore.

I also turned off a lot of custom programs and reports that Whirlpool doesn't need. Reports that were considered crucial to the business's decision makers are suddenly obsolete and of no importance.

As I busied myself erasing data and turning off programs, I couldn't help but feel a little bit like Knopfler's mournful tenant. Everything's gone. Soon there will be no trace of the former enterprise. I thought of all the business meetings, the spirited debates, the hustle and bustle; shippers rushing product off the docks; Accountants poring over spreadsheets and financial statements; salesmen and service reps talking to customers over the telephone; it all seemed important at the time. What would we have thought if we'd known it would all come to this?

It's just a place where we used to work.

Christmas Bonus

While I was still employed, I was a member of the company social club. The social club was the group that arranged employee social functions throughout the year; mainly the annual company picnic and the two annual Christmas parties (one for adults only and one for the employees' kids). The social club booked the halls and provided the gifts and refreshments for these functions. Since these things cost money, the social club was funded via payroll deduction; three dollars was deducted from each paycheck of each employee belonging to the social club.

At Christmas time, each employee would receive a free turkey courtesy of the company. This was the annual Christmas bonus, and it was provided not by the social club but by the company's owners. As the company is now being liquidated, there is, of course, no staff Christmas party (adult or childrens') this year, nor are there any free turkeys.

Since the social club had been collecting its membership dues for most of the year and didn't pay for any staff Christmas functions, it found itself with a surplus of cash on its hands when the company shut down. To their credit, the social club executive decided that the only fair thing to do was to distribute the remaining monies evenly among the remaining membership (those who were still in the company's employ when it finally failed). And so it was that I received in the mail earlier this week a check from the social club in the amount of just over five hundred dollars.

Ironically, it appears that the best Christmas bonus that I ever received came after the company had shut down. God bless us every one!

The Human Cost

A couple of posts ago, I mentioned that I've recently joined the ranks of the unemployed. This only happened to me one other time, near the beginning of my career. Back then, I had a new job within about a month. Even this time around, I already have a couple of prospects, one of them quite promising. Even if those don't pan out, my status as a long-tenured worker qualifies me to receive employment insurance benefits for almost a year, my wife still contributes her small, minimum-wage income to our budget, and I've had some financial help from my extended family as well. I'm not too concerned about my family's financial well-being ... not yet, anyway.

There's a psychological side to this as well. I've heard the loss of one's job compared to the loss of a loved one. I agree that there are some similarities (and I should know, having experienced both). The full impact of the loss doesn't sink in right away. It takes some time to come to grips with the new reality. The first week or two spent at home feels something like a regular vacation. It's not until the third or fourth week that you begin to understand that you're not going back to the place where you've become accustomed to spending the better part of your waking hours, in some cases for most of your adult life, ever again. You begin to feel lost; to wonder, "What's next? Where do I go from here?"

Then a sense of futility begins to take hold. You think about all of the things that you did while employed; the projects, the meetings, the routine operations, and you realize that, now, it's all gone. In the long run, none of it mattered, and your best efforts weren't enough to save the organization. Suddenly, all those years begin to seem like so much wasted time.

I'd like to share a sad story that was told to me by a former fellow employee just yesterday, because it really crystallized for me the human cost that's so often overlooked by the unfeeling financiers who make the decisions that so profoundly impact the lives of real people, based only on dollars and cents. After the news broke that the organization was in receivership, she walked into the office of one of the plant managers and found him gathering up his personal belongings. Having finished packing everything into a cardboard box, he took one last look around his office and, seeming satisfied that he'd forgotten nothing, he prepared to take the box out to his car. His visitor noticed that his gold quarter-century service pin (he had been with the company for over twenty-five years) was still on his desk, and warned him that he'd forgotten it.

"No, I'm leaving it," he replied, "it doesn't mean anything anymore."

Kudos

Years ago, shortly after I joined the company where I've worked for the past ten years, I fixed a problem with the program that processed outgoing invoices. It was a particularly obscure and vexing problem. Several programmers had looked into it without success. Perhaps, being relatively new at the time, I approached the problem without any assumptions or preconceptions or perhaps I was simply able to focus better because I was not yet bogged down with other work. Whatever the reason, I eventually found and fixed the problem.

After the next batch or two of invoices had been processed correctly and it became apparent that the problem was, indeed, a thing of the past, I received an e-mail that a co-worker had addressed to the entire I.T. staff, including my boss, which read:

GOOD NEWS FOR TODAY

Andy found and fixed the program that was fouling up WCUD01 for much of last week and the beginning of this week. On drop ship orders with substitutions and multiple invoices, any invoice after the first would pick up the account values for previous invoices and, of course, not balance.

NO MORE ----- Andy has fixed this and our mornings should run much smoother for 2000 and beyond.

ANDY --- YOU ARE MY HERO!

I smiled and moved my mouse pointer over the DELETE MESSAGE button and was about to left-click when I suddenly paused and decided instead, for no particular reason, to leave the message in my In Box for a little while longer.

Some time later, I helped out the CEO's wife with a simple printer connectivity problem. Normally, PC and network-related problems were not my area of responsibility, but it was during the Christmas shutdown, with almost no-one in the office and I was on duty, covering the Help Desk phone, so I investigated and, again, fixed the problem. I thought nothing of it until the following week, when I was copied on another e-mail which the CEO's wife had sent to my boss:

Sandy, just a brief note to let you know of the assistance provided to me by Andy this morning. I came to work to print some letters and year end documents. Unfortunately, I had no luck as there appeared to be something wrong with my connection to the printer in HR. My contact in MIS was Andy. He came right away and stayed with me to fix the problem. He was successful and I felt that you should know of his wonderful co-operation. Thanks to MIS and especially Andy. Hope that you and your family enjoy good health and happiness in 2000.

Again I smiled and then, remembering that I had never deleted the e-mail about the invoice problem, I created a new e-mail folder, named it "Kudos" and moved both of the e-mails into it.

As time passed, I helped with other issues and, every once in a while, someone would be impressed or thankful enough to send me an e-mail saying so. Each time it happened, I would add the e-mail to my Kudos folder. Last week, I counted the messages in the folder. There are 33 of them. That's an average of 3.3 things I've done right for each year that I've been with the company. Not bad!

You're probably thinking, "Well, aren't we full of ourselves?" Not really. Well, okay, yes, but that's not the point.

Times are harder now. The economic downturn has brutalized the company. Just yesterday, I learned that management's last-ditch effort to find a buyer who might save the organization as a going concern fell through. The company is to be liquidated, and I'll soon be out of work.

I knew that the company's prospects were bleak even as I browsed the messages in my Kudos folder last week. Still, the digital pats on the back brought a smile and helped me to forget the dire realities of the present for just a few moments.

From Harve:
I'm impressed! Great job in getting the payroll running again so fast.

From Cindy:
Thank-you - thank-you - thank-you so much ! What a relief after all this time not to have to print the OPLs manually ! I owe you one!

From Debbie:
THANKS FOR MAKING MY JOB SO MUCH EASIER. XXXOOO

From Sylvia:
Where have you been all these years?

From Bob:
I understand how stressful a situation it was for all of us, and I appreciate the extra hours everyone stayed, and Andy taking time away from his holidays to lend a hand, to ensure the system was operating properly and we were able to complete the shipment.

From Jo-Anne:
Your programs are awesome!

There's more, but I'm starting to blush. My point is that, after re-reading some of these, any fears that I had over my uncertain future largely subsided. It's as though all those people were standing over me, whispering "Hey, don't worry. You're good. You'll be fine."

In her famous 1997 Chicago Tribune article entitled "Advice, Like Youth, Probably Just Wasted On The Young" (More widely known simply as "Sunscreen"), Mary Schmich wrote:

Remember compliments you receive.
Forget the insults. If you succeed in doing this, tell me how.

I think I've found a way, Mary. It's quite simple. Simply record the compliments. If they come in the form of e-mail or a printed or hand-written hard copy, file them away somewhere for safe keeping. If they're merely spoken, write them down yourself. Don't record the derogatory remarks. Just let them go.

People won't always go out of their way to pat us on the back when we do well. When they do, there's value in keeping some sort of memento so that we can bring it out to cheer us when we need a lift, like a trophy or a photograph of an old friend or a loved one.

The other thing that I hope you take away from this, Dear Reader, is the importance of acknowledging those who impress us and letting them know that they are appreciated. It's a small thing, but it makes a big difference.

Myers-Briggs

Some years ago, I participated in a Team Building seminar hosted by a former employer.  For those who have never had the dubious pleasure of participating in one, a Team Building seminar is a sort of sabbatical from the normal office routine, usually lasting between three and five days, during which fellow office workers commune to express their loathing of each other in a free and open forum.  No, I'm just kidding!  It's really sort of a group therapy session for co-workers so that they can better understand each others' needs, priorities and motivations.  It strives to dig a bit deeper into the psyches of people than is normal in a regular working environment.  I must admit, though, that certain frustrations and resentments were expressed during the exercise, and tears were shed before it was over.  Let me also state, for the record, that the organization in question didn't become a "former" employer because I was just a little too "open and honest" about my pent-up frustrations and resentment of the boss, if you take my meaning.

A few days before the seminar officially started, the participants were handed a multi-page questionnaire and a mark sense form.  The questionnaire consisted of questions such as:

Which would you most enjoy doing?

a) Building a bridge
b) Balancing a budget
c) Caring for a roomful of children
d) Solving a puzzle
e) Drinking margaritas on a Mexican beach

Well, okay, the choices were rarely as cut-and-dried as option "e".  The point is, the participants had to color in the appropriate letters on the mark sense forms which, I presume, were then put through some kind of computer program which in turn compiled the results into a detailed analysis of each respondent's personality traits; analytical, micro-manager, den mother, flaming homosexual, probable axe-murderer and so on.

In fact, the goal of the questionnaire was to work out each person's Myers-Briggs Type Indicator or "MBTI".  Until then, I had never heard of the MBTI.  For those of you who still haven't heard of it, the MBTI is a four-letter classification system that seeks to profile a person's natural proclivities.  For example, a person's MTBI may be INTP, ESTJ, ISFP or WIMP (well, okay, I don't think WIMP is a possible outcome ... unfortunately).

Each of the four letters indicates a specific personality trait.  The first identifies whether an individual is an Introvert ("I") or an Extrovert ("E").  The second identifies whether a person is iNtuitive ("N" - hey, "I" had already been taken) or Sensing ("S").  The third letter identifies whether a person is Thinking ("T") or Feeling "F") and the last identifies whether a person is perceptive ("P") or judging ("J").  Each of these four characteristics should be thought of as a scale, rather than a black-and-white, one-or-the-other type attribute.  For example, a person need not be completely introverted or extroverted.  One might lean toward extroversion with occasional introverted tendencies, or one might sit smack dab between the two extremes.

So why do we call this collection of four letters the "Myers-Briggs Type Indicator", you may well ask?  Well, basically, because the whole system was conceived of by Katherine Cook Briggs and her daughter, Isabel Briggs Myers during the second world war.  Apparently, each lady could only handle a maximum of two letters.  Putting together four required a joint effort.  But seriously, I found the Myers-Briggs concept interestingly enough that it has stayed with me over the years that have since passed and I've decided to record what I learned here, in the hopes that you, my readers, might share my fascination.  I'll warn you in advance that this post is going to be one of my longer ones and, even then, it will only give a cursory explanation of what Myers-Briggs is all about.  If you're pressed for time or looking for something a bit briefer and less involved, you can always skip to one of my shorter, less in-depth posts, like the one about the Dick Test.  For the rest of us, let's begin by looking at each of the four categories profiled by the MBTI and what each tells us about a person.

Introversion vs. Extroversion
Most of you probably think you know the difference between an introvert and an extrovert.  Introverts are generally perceived as insecure mama's boy, Norman Bates types who shut themselves away from the world until one day they show up at work wielding a double-barreled shotgun and a hatchet, whereas extroverts are seen as outgoing, loudmouthed used car salesman types who crush every hand that they shake and like to talk about themselves a lot. 

Actually, Myers-Briggs defines introversion vs. extroversion more in terms of where a person gets his or her energy or how a person "recharges his or her batteries".  Extroverts, according to Myers-Briggs, get energized by social interaction.  They crave surroundings with lots of other people and they frequently enjoy being the center of attention.  Solitude and silence saps their energy.  Introverts, on the other hand, crave solitude, quiet and reflection.  Social interaction wears them down.

To illustrate, our seminar instructor told us a story about a group of people that was asked to describe their perfect weekend getaway. The extroverts in the group spoke of parties, road trips, night clubs, hedonistic orgies and general merrymaking involving the company of others. The introverts, of course, described quiet, peaceful activities, either alone or with just one or two very close friends.

One particularly introverted woman described her perfect getaway as spending a quiet weekend alone with her husband at their cottage. In the mornings, they would share a light breakfast and a cup of coffee on the patio whilst taking in the soothing sound of the birds and the surf from the nearby lake. In the afternoons they might enjoy a bicycle ride through a nearby nature trail or perhaps some time on the lake in their sail boat. In the evenings they would have supper and share a bottle of wine with soft music playing in the background. Finally, on Sunday afternoon, they would return to their city home early enough so that there would be time to relax and recover from their "hectic" weekend.

Intuition vs. Sensing
The second letter in the MBTI tells us about how a person perceives the world around themselves.  On one end of the scale, we have intuition.  Intuitive people think in the abstract.  When they look at a scene or scenario, they don't always see what there is but, rather, what could be.  Intuitive people are all about possibilities.

Sensing people, on the other hand, are like Dragnet's Joe Friday.  They want the facts, ma'am, just the facts.  They are sticklers for detail.  They're concerned with what is, not with what might be. 

To illustrate, our group was shown a picture of a room full of chairs, arranged in rows and columns, all facing the same way and each person was asked to describe what they saw.  The intuitive people talked about concepts.  The room might be a live theatre or perhaps an auditorium where some public figure or acknowledged expert was about to give a speech.  They tended to miss details like the time indicated on a clock that was in the picture or whether the floor was hardwood or parquet or even the fact that the room happened to be on fire.  Okay, okay, the room wasn't really on fire.  If it had been, the intuitives might have commented that the room had a cozy atmosphere and might be pleasant on winter evenings.

The sensing people, on the other hand, did note the time shown on the clock.  They also described precisely how many rows and columns of chairs there were.  Many of them did the math and gave the exact total number of chairs.  Some of them noted that it was unclear as to whether there might be more chairs outside of the field of view, and that it was therefore impossible to determine the exact number of chairs in the room.  None of them worried about why the chairs were all empty or what the room's purpose was.  They reminded me of Spock from the old Star Trek series and the way in which he used to read out in exacting detail the size, mass, composition, closure speed and estimated time of impact, to the second, of the meteorite that was heading for the Enterprise's main bridge.  What might happen when the impact occurred seemed of secondary importance.

Thinking vs. Feeling
The next characteristic that Myers-Briggs looks at has to do with how a person makes decisions; either based on fact and observation (thinking) or by "gut feel" (feeling).  Thinkers are objective and detached.  They look at the facts.  They may refer to precedent.  They rely on logic.  Feelers often base their decisions on empathy.  They look for the intangible.  They put themselves in the shoes of the people that might be affected by a decision.  They rely more on their emotions.  They can often give no justification for their decisions other than "it felt like the right thing to do".  Thinkers hate when Feelers are right.

Consider the following scenario:  You have been tasked with hiring a computer security specialist for your organization.  One of the applicants that you interview is obviously extremely knowledgeable about networks, data encryption, firewalls and computer security concepts in general.  While being interviewed, he readily admits that his wealth of knowledge and experience comes from having been a hacker who managed to access the credit card data of a major bank's customers and defrauded the bank of hundreds of thousands of dollars before he was caught.  The jail time that he served convinced him to mend his ways and he now seeks to use his knowledge of computer security systems to prevent others like himself from circumventing them.  Do you hire him, or not?

A Feeler might empathize with the applicant.  He certainly has the credentials to do the job, and knowing the methods of the criminal world might prove an additional asset.  His free and open admission about his past and his prison record might be taken as evidence that this person has truly been reformed.  The Feeler's gut may well tell him to trust this applicant and give him a second chance.  The Feeler's gut may feel somewhat knotted the following month, however, when the new security specialist fails to report in one morning and it is discovered that the organization's bank accounts have been drained and closed, and the Feeler's boss wants to know what idiot decided to hire the crook.

A Thinker might look at the applicant's track record to date.  He's shown himself to be untrustworthy.  He is, in fact, a convicted felon.  This makes it all the more likely that his desire to reform is just a ruse and that his true goal is to gain access to the computer system so that he can defraud your organization too.  A Thinker might well send the applicant on his way and hire the next applicant, who appears equally competent but has no criminal record.  A Thinker might later learn that his reservations about the convicted felon were quite justified when the applicant whom he did hire turns out to be the felon's partner who also applied for the position, just in case it turned out that honesty wasn't the best policy after all.

Judgement vs. Perception
The last characteristic profiled by Myers-Briggs indicates a person's decision-making style.  Judging people prefer things settled and finished.  Perceptive people prefer to keep decisions open which, I suppose, is another way of saying that they're wishy-washy and indecisive, but "perceptive" sounds so much nicer, doesn't it?  Judging people, on the other hand, will tell you that it's much better to rush to a quick decision and then to doggedly follow through, never changing one's mind, no matter how the situation might change nor what new information may present itself.  "My mind is made up, don't confuse me with the facts!" is their motto.

It's important to note that Myers-Briggs deals with proclivities and tendancies as opposed to actions. Each person has natural tendencies in the four areas concerned, but those tendancies can be overridden by conscious effort. A person may be naturally introverted, yet make a concerted effort to network and schmooze. An introvert can still act like an extrovert. Myers-Briggs concerns itself with what comes naturally to a person rather than how that person actually behaves.

There's a simple, yet effective demonstration of this concept that you can try right now, if you'll humor me for a moment. Take your hands from the keyboard, let go of your mouse and fold your arms across your chest. Go ahead. Do it.

Did you fold your arms? Good. Now fold them the other way; that is to say, if you folded your arms with the left forearm in front of the right forearm, this time fold them with the right forarm in front of the left one.

You probably managed that too, but it was a lot more awkward, wasn't it? You can fold your arms either way, but only one way comes natrually. The other requires concentration and effort and, even then, it still feels wrong.

Would you like to know your own Myers-Briggs type? You can find out by taking the test on-line here, where you'll not only learn your Myers-Briggs type but you can also get a detailed description of your profile and some examples of famous people who are also your type (yes, gentlemen, I'm sure you're all hoping that you turn out to be Heidi Klum's type). The test probably works best if you take it without any preconceptions. Having read this far, it will be obvious what some of the questions are trying to establish. Obviously, you'll get more accurate results by answering each question as honestly as possible.

After the Team Building seminar ended, one of my co-workers wondered aloud what the point of the Myers-Briggs test was.  "Why would I care whether Tom is an ESTJ or an ISFP?"  He was obviously in ISTJ, or possibly an ESTJ.  And therein lies the answer to his question.  Once one understands the Myers-Briggs profile, one can learn to recognize specific personality types.  This recognition, coupled with an understanding of the Myers-Briggs profile, enables us to understand what motivates the person, how that person thinks, how they arrive at decisions, indeed to predict what they will do in various situations.  This understanding, then, enables us to play them like a Stradivarius; to pull their puppet strings and make them dance to our tune; to manipulate and subjugate every person we encounter and, ultimately, to bend other puny mortals to our wills and ultimately rule the world!  MUHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!

Two Minute Project Management Seminar

A particularly insightful manager of mine once explained that every project has three basic goals: The end result, whatever the project's purpose, should be of a high quality, it should be completed quickly and at minimum expense. More succinctly, it should be good, fast and cheap.

Pretty self-evident, yes? He then added something that's perhaps not quite as obvious. "Pick any two," he said, "but you won't get the third."

If you want it to be done fast and done right, it won't be cheap. If you want it to be done right without spending a lot of money, it will take some time. If you insist on having it done both cheaply and quickly, you can bet the end result won't be good. Sadly, it's been my experience that this third option is the one that many organizations often end up choosing.

What my discerning manager didn't add is that sacrificing any one of the three doesn't necessarily guarantee that you'll get the other two, although I'm sure he understood that too.

Gallows Humor

My place of employment has fallen on hard times. The company has had to seek protection from its creditors. Many people confuse this with filing for bankruptcy. I want to state, unequivocally and for the record, that the company has not filed for bankruptcy. It's one step away from filing for bankruptcy.

I see this type of "gallows humor" among those few of us who remain employed there an awful lot these days. For example, Scott Adams recently published this Dilbert comic (which I have linked to on Dilbert.com rather than pasting here for you to read, because the last thing I need now is to be sued by a millionaire cartoonist) whose chief humor comes from how eerily close the depicted scenario is to the situation at my office. There have, in fact, been massive layoffs over the past year. The last round came right after the company filed for protection from its creditors. Needless to say, those employees who remain are just a little paranoid about things like managers who abruptly fall silent when they (the paranoid employees) appear.

In fact, one of my co-workers had been away on long term disability (or so I thought) since just before the axe fell most recently. The similarity to the Dilbert comic ends there, though. In our case, the guy who was away got layed off anyway. Seems he wasn't technically on long term disability at all, no doubt a clever maneuver on the part of the Human Resources department, who already knew that he was in their sights.

Dilbert comics are a particularly popular source of gallows humor during times of corporate stress. Here's another one that was very popular with our accounting staff, because it was just a little too close to the truth.

http://dilbert.com/strips/comic/2009-05-01/

Recently, somebody (whose identity I'm withholding to protect the guilty) circulated the following through our inter-office e-mail:

For all you Working People and anyone else needing it...

There are times when additional support is necessary to get through a grueling day at work. Here's one suggestion.

A Master Reference binder has been created for all who may need to reference it. Inside this binder you will find solutions to everyday problems. If you are having problems with the photocopier, having difficulty dealing with co-workers , having computer problems...please come and get the red binder and it will help you through your issue. You may refer to the red binder as often as you wish.

Use the red binder for all issues...it is guaranteed to make you stress-free and relaxed.

We don't just rely on outside sources for our dark humor. One day last week, everyone was working away as usual, when all the lights suddenly went off. One of our accountants immediately shouted "Uh, Barb, could you pay that invoice now, please?"

Our Network Administrator, Randy, was one of those who were recently layed off. All of the most recent layoffs are technically temporary 13-week layoffs, another wily maneuver by our Human Resources department, designed to postpone the company's obligation to pay severance to those affected, which it would be obligated to pay if the layoffs were permanent, although everyone knows that none of these people are coming back.

I recently sent an e-mail about a red binder (oops - did I type that out loud?) to an inter-office mailing list which still included Randy. A short while later, I received an automatic Out of Office notification from Randy, informing me that he is out of the office and will be returning on August 31 - exactly 13 weeks from the day that he was "temporarily" layed off. Now, Randy isn't naiive enough to actually believe that he will be recalled at the end of August. He's just that witty (not to mention sarcastic).

Speaking of automatic Out of Office notifications, some things that make me laugh aren't necessarily intended to be funny. My boss told me recently that our CEO (a new guy, who replaced the previous CEO right after the company filed for creditor protection) complained about our inter-company e-mail system. We don't use Microsoft Outlook. When you set up an automatic Out of Office notification on our system, it is necessary to manually turn it back off again upon returning to the office, else anyone e-mailing you continues to be told that you are out of the office, even after you've returned. This annoyed the new Head Honcho, who was used to using Outlook which, apparently, turns off its Out of Office notifications automatically on the appointed return date.

Now, this guy is at the helm of a company which is under government protection from its creditors and may be a heartbeat away from insolvency, and his biggest concern is that he has to manually disable his Out of Office notification??? I'm sorry, but I can't help but find that hilarious.

Okay, maybe I'm being unduly pessimistic, but I've been through this situation before with another company some years ago, and it did not end well. Incidentally, I do not work for General Motors, unfortunately, otherwise I'd be much more optimistic of my prospects. In fact, I'd be laughing all the way to the bank, and screw you other taxpayers anyway. I didn't pay into my pension fund, and somebody has to, so it may as well be you.

On a more serious note, the real tragedy, in my humble opinion, when a going concern does fail, is that the last few employees remaining when the ship finally sinks are the brightest, the hardest-working, the most dedicated and the most indispensable people that the company had in its employ, and I'm not just saying that because I seem to be one of them. Let's face it; those people are still there after everyone else has been cut because they truly make a contribution that the organization cannot afford to do without. Unfortunately, if the company ultimately declares bankruptcy, they're also the ones who get screwed, being sent to the unemployment lines with no severance and, in some cases, without even the full pay still owed to them. The secured creditors come first. Sucks to be you.

This is not meant to reflect negatively on those who have been laid off. Many good people have been let go and I believe that many organizations, during troubled times, fall into the trap of cutting too deeply. But those who were laid off earlier were at least given severance packages to help cushion the blow. The most recent victims, as well as those who remain, may not be so lucky.

Those fellow employees of mine who remain with the company are the salt of the earth. I have nothing but the deepest respect and admiration for every one of them. There's Harve, the Pay Master, who has over 30 years with the company and has already been given notice that he's to be layed off this summer because payroll is being outsourced. I could understand if he were bitter and resentful. I could certainly understand if he stopped giving a damn and just coasted through his remaining time doing as little as possible. Yet he still carries out his duties in a competent and professional manner. More than that, he's been patiently passing along his knowledge and experience to the Human Resources department, which will be assuming some of his duties.

There's Jo-Anne, one of my fellows in the MIS department, whose organizational skills, understanding of the business and its needs and calm, patient manner with users calling the Help Desk, leaves me feeling envious of her more often than I'd care to admit. During a recent MIS department meeting with the Restructuring Officer, Jo-Anne sincerely and selflessly asked him to consider her if there were to be any more cuts in MIS, because she'd prefer unemployment over having to work with even fewer of her remaining colleagues.

There's Tina, our feisty, petite credit manager who spends her days on the phone with delinquent customers, many of whom don't always address her exactly cordially, and yet retains a healthy sense of humor and a peppy demeanor.

There's Craig, a relatively recent addition to our Finance department who ... well, what doesn't Craig do? People are in and out of his office all day long looking for information, advice, the solution to some problem, or all of the above. He's so rarely wrong about anything that the our International Controller actually noted the date and time on her white board on one of the rare occasions that he was mistaken. "Craig was Wrong", read the notice, "June 8, 2009 - 3:12 pm".

There's Erin, our Sales Controller, who just recently returned from maternity leave, was immediately promoted and fills the thankless role of liaison between upper management, the Sales department and MIS.

The list goes on and on. I've chosen to mention only a very few examples because this is a blog, not a novel. However, if you're a co-worker of mine and are reading this (as I know that some of my co-workers do - outside of office hours, of course!) know that you're aces in my book, whether or not I've mentioned you by name. If the worst should eventually come to pass, I will miss you all dearly.

Contentment

"Nobody ever got anywhere in the world by simply being content."

This quote is attributed to Louis L'Amour, a writer best known for his frontier adventure stories. From what I've read of Mr. L'Amour, he knew his share of hard times and adversity, and he certainly managed to rise above it and make a name for himself.

Mr. L'Amour is certainly worthy of admiration, and I think that most would agree with his philosophy. It suggests that we must constantly strive to improve our lives and ourselves. It warns against complacency and stagnation. We've heard the same sentiment expressed many times in other ways. "A rolling stone gathers no moss," as the saying goes.

The trouble with this philosophy, as I see it, is that it sets up its adherents for perpetual dissatisfaction. We can never be satisfied that our accomplishments are "good enough". The moment we do so, we are seen as quitters; lazy and lacking in ambition. No matter how much we have, no matter what we achieve, no matter how high we ascend the ladder, we must always reach for that next rung.

Is contentment really such a vice? Is it so wrong to be happy with our lives as they are, and not to want more? When do we relax, and just enjoy the fruits of our labors?

Recently, my brother-in-law suggested that I consider upgrading to a larger house. I live in an older three-bedroom bungalow, in a quiet suburban neighborhood. I like my house. There's plenty of room for my wife, my daughter and me. We have a small, one-car garage which suffices because we only have one car. There are things that I'd like to renovate or improve (we desperately need new kitchen cabinets) but I have absolutely no desire for a larger, more modern house. I'm happy here. This is good enough. I'm content. Should I feel guilty?

I'm a computer programmer/analyst by profession. I'm reasonably happy with my job. I enjoy my work, but I'm no workaholic. I put in my 40 hours a week and then I go home. I don't work a lot of extra hours unless it's absolutely necessary. I'm not working on any revolutionary inventions, I'll never be recognized as one of Canada's great writers (or even bloggers), I'll never find a cure for cancer and I'll never win nor even be nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. I'm just another cog in the wheel and, for the most part, I'm content to be so.

I believe that we can't all be great. The world needs its garbage collectors, its janitors, it's pizza delivery men and its insurance salesmen just as much as it needs its leaders, its rocket scientists and its visionaries. The wheel needs its cogs as much as it needs the engine that turns it.

I once heard a comedian (I forget which one) make the following observation. Did you ever notice that those people who claim to have lived before were always somebody famous? Everybody was once Caesar or Napoleon or Cleopatra. Nobody was ever the guy who used to clean the horse droppings off the streets in a previous life.

There's nothing wrong with striving to better ourselves, our lives or the world in which we live. I humbly suggest, though, that there's nothing wrong with being content with what we have either.

The Opposite Of Selfishness

Next month, my wife, Judy, and I will celebrate our 20th wedding anniversary. That feels like an accomplishment. Most of my daughter's friends seem to come from single-parent families, foster homes or homes that include either a step-parent or a live-in boyfriend or girlfriend. Teenagers who live with the same two, lawfully-wedded people who conceived them definitely seem to be a minority these days.

To those of my friends who read this blog whose first attempts at marriage were not as successful (and you know who you are), I'm not gloating. The fact is, a successful marriage takes the complete commitment of both partners. It takes understanding, compromise and, of course, love. No one partner can ever make a marriage work single-handedly, no matter how hard they work at it.

That having been said, I give Judy most of the credit for the success of our marriage. I have my share of personal foibles and she learned to accept a number of shortcomings on my part early on in our relationship. I like to think that I've matured over the years and overcome some of them, but I demanded a lot of patience from her during our time together, and I've not yet attained perfection.

If I'm making marriage sound like a lot of work, it is, and yet it isn't. A successful marriage is founded on love and, when you love someone, you don't mind going that extra mile for them. Sacrifices don't feel so much like sacrifices. You do things, not out of a sense of responsibility, but out of a simple desire to make your partner happy. Let me give you a couple of personal examples.

Practically since the day we were married, Judy has arisen with me early each morning, and fixed my breakfast and lunch before seeing me off to work. For many years, she didn't work outside of the home. The special needs of our son, Christopher, demanded a full-time, stay-at-home parent, and Judy shouldered that responsibility. That meant that she didn't need to be up at any particular hour and, during Christopher's infancy, she was often up with him in the middle of the night. She accepted most of the midnight parenting because I had to get up for work the next day, and she didn't. This, of course, made her even more tired when our alarm woke me for work the next morning, yet she still got up with me, made my breakfast and lunch while I showered and shaved, joined me for a cup of coffee, and then retired back to bed (if Christopher wasn't already awake) only after I left. She did the same after our daughter, Jessica, came along as well.

Most of her friends were aghast upon learning that she did this. Most swore that they would never, ever do that for their husbands. Judy didn't have to do it either. I didn't demand it of her. She did it for me because she wanted to. Making me happy made her happy. To her, it didn't feel like a sacrifice at all.

I try to reciprocate. Judy never learned to drive so, whenever she needs to go anywhere, I generally drive her. She likes to have her mother, sister and best friend over to visit on Saturday evenings. As it happens, none of them drive either, and they would often choose not to visit us if it meant having to take a bus or pay for a cab. So, every Saturday evening, I pick them all up after supper and then take them all back home again at the end of the evening, sometimes in the middle of the night. I don't do it for them. I do it for Judy, because I know that she enjoys their company and might be deprived of it if I didn't help out.

These days, Judy does work outside of our home, and starts work about half an hour earlier than me, so I get up just a bit earlier than I would otherwise have to so that there's time for me to drop her off at work before going to work myself. While I shower and shave, she still makes my breakfast and my lunch, even after all these years.

Thinking about this recently gave me a new insight regarding the nature of love. It seems to me that love is the opposite of selfishness. Selfishness means putting one's own needs and interests first. When you love somebody, you put that person's needs and interests ahead of your own. And here's the key; you don't do it because you have to. You do it because you want to.

Toy Story

The fair-haired, pouty little man in the picture to your left is me, at the age of three. The apprehensive-looking imp next to me is my little sister, Klaudia.

This past Christmas, I bought my mother one of those digital picture frames; you know, the kind that displays a continuous slide show of digitized photos. Mom doesn't own a computer, so she handed me a bunch of her favorite old photographs and asked me to scan them to the picture frame's memory chip. It was in the process of doing this that I came upon the picture that you see here.

See that big, beautiful jet airplane that I'm clutching? I remember that jet plane. It's a battery-operated toy, made by the Louis Marx company back in the fifties (although this picture was taken in 1965) and it was beautiful!

I only had it for about two weeks, yet it stands out in my memory as one of my favorite toys ever. When you turned it on and set it on the floor, the jet engines would flash on and off with red light. The airplane would emit a high-pitched whine, as though the turbines were spooling up. Then the wheels would turn and the jet would roll across the floor. After a short distance, it would stop, the jet engines would flash, engine pitch would change and the nose would swing around, changing the jet's direction. Then the wheels would engage again, the jet would taxi off on its new trajectory, and the whole sequence would repeat.

This airplane was a Christmas present. To maximize the impact on my wondering eyes, my father wisely chose not to wrap the box and put it under the tree. Rather, he unpacked the airplane, put in some batteries and, just before I entered the room to open my presents, he turned it on and set it on the floor. The first thing that I saw was this big, beautiful jet plane trundling toward me, eager to greet its new owner.

Perhaps you wondered, Dear Reader, why I only had this wondrous toy for a scant two weeks, and whatever happened to it. Sadly, the high-pitched noise that it emitted when activated proved to be its undoing ... literally! The shriek of the engines frightened my younger sister, who ran from the room whenever the airplane was active. But Klaudia was always, by nature, a strong-willed girl. Not one to shrink, cowering, from her tormentor, she kept a safe distance, bided her time, and waited...

The first moment that she saw the jet plane alone, powered down and unable to defend itself, and without big brother to protect it, she boldly picked it up and tore all four engines off of their mountings, effectively silencing the beast forever. Even my father, a man of no small mechanical aptitude, was unable to repair the damage. I don't recall how long after that we kept the derelict aircraft before finally relegating it to the dustbin of history but, for obvious reasons, the fun had gone out of it, and soon we laid it to its final rest in some city landfill.

I couldn't have told you until very recently when this jet plane was manufactured, or by what company. I didn't take note of such things at the tender age of three, and the images of the airplane and its box had faded in my memory over the ensuing forty-three years. All that changed when I came upon the old photograph at the beginning of this post. Notice that the box in which the airplane came is partially visible behind me. A quick Google search using some of the text on the box as keywords, cross-referenced with a Google image search, soon led me to a web page bearing the image that you see to your right, along with information as to the toy's origin and nature. No doubt about it, this was my long-lost airplane!

In a seemingly serendipitous twist, the web site in question happened to be eBay.com, and this very toy was being auctioned just then. What's more, it appeared to be in very good condition. I placed a few bids on it, but the price soon exceeded what I was willing to pay for sentimentality. In the end, the prize eluded me.

I told several friends and family members of my discovery, and all were very supportive and encouraging with regard to my attempts to obtain it after all these years. Even my mother, a normally frugal woman who tends to take a dim view of monetary expenditures for frivolous wants, agreed that an investment of up to $100 would not be unwarranted in the interest of reviving this particular childhood memory. My sister, who I suspect has always felt a certain pang of guilt over having destroyed one of her older brother's most cherished toys, devoutly hoped that I would prevail in my pursuit, and unabashedly asked to "play with" the airplane, should I prove successful.

I told some of my closer co-workers at the office of my discovery. Other less intimate acquaintances there inevitably overheard me. I was amazed at the interest shown by all. Various people would ask about the status of my quest several times per day.

One particular co-worker, a Vietnamese chap named Duc, related the story of one of his most cherished childhood toys after hearing my story. His was a tank, which he owned while still a small boy living in Vietnam. Like my long-lost jet plane, Duc's tank was battery operated, rolled along the ground and featured flashing lights and, I think, sounds. Duc's toy made him the envy of all the neighborhood children, as this sort of possession was practically unheard of in Vietnam during the 1960's. Duc's father only managed to acquire it by a sheer stroke of luck. Someone he knew, perhaps a friend or family member, had travelled to Europe, and had brought the tank back with him.

The chief revelation that I take away from all this is the surprising effect that toys have over our emotions. I suppose this is because, being childhood possessions, they remain a link to our inner children, even after childhood has long since passed. More than that, they are a conduit to the people, places and feelings that we associated with their presence in our lives.

Is there a favorite toy in your past? Why not leave a comment, and tell me and my other readers about it?

Family Day Poll

If you read the comments attached to my previous post ("Family Day"), you'll note that Martin and I had a mini discussion on the subject, part of which centered around the question of whether or not most Ontarians are able to enjoy the holiday.

I had originally suspected that more people than not had to work that day, although I readily admitted that I had no stats to back that up. Based on Martin's observation regarding the number of people out snowboarding in Thunder Bay that day, I may have been wrong.

So let's take an unscientific poll. If you're an Ontarian, leave a comment indicating whether you had to work on Family Day, without extra compensation, or whether it was a holiday for you. Working for extra pay counts as it being a holiday.

Incidentally, Martin, who is a teacher, pointed out that, although he did get the day off, he'll have to teach one extra day before the summer break in order to make up for it. In fact, I also had the day off, but I had to "buy" it by cashing in hours that my employer owed me for overtime previously worked. I said that I had to work that day (yes, I lied) because I didn't want to cloud the argument. My point is that Family Day does not count as a holiday if you were given the day off, but had to make it up in some other way, either like Martin or I did, or by giving up an alternate holiday; a practice which some employers also used.

Go!

Family Day

Today Ontario celebrates its second annual Family Day. For the benefit of any non-Canadians, or even non-Ontarians, for that matter, I should explain that Family Day is a civic holiday, introduced by Ontario's provincial government, just last year. It's observed on the third Monday of February and, as the name implies, its purpose is to give families a day's respite from work in order that they may spend time together. Family Day was introduced in order to make good on a campaign promise, made by Premier Dalton McGuinty before his government was elected, to introduce a new civic holiday.

True to his word, Mr. McGuinty wasted no time in announcing the new civic holiday shortly after his election. Too bad he screwed it up as only a true politician can. Family Day was introduced as a civic holiday, rather than as a statutory holiday. Statutory holidays, such as Christmas, Easter, New Year's Day and such, are mandatory. Employers have no choice but to either allow their employees to stay home with pay on those holidays, or offer extra compensation to those who are asked to work. Not necessarily so in the case of civic holidays.

Ontario's Employment Standards Act mandates that employers must grant their employees a minimum of 13 paid holidays per year. Any more than that can be either granted or withheld at the employer's discretion. Government institutions, schools and organizations with strong unions tend to be fairly generous about granting paid holidays of this type. Most other organizations (the ones that are actually dependent upon profits for their continued existence) are not. That's how we get what the English like to call "Bank holidays"; holidays that tend to be observed by banks, schools, postal workers and civil servants, but not by the majority of working people.

So Family Day has, in effect, become yet another "bank holiday" and, as such, not all employers honour it. Some of us get it, some of us don't. In fact, I suspect that most of us don't, although I admit to having no statistics to support that theory. As a result, very few families actually get to observe Family Day together. Stop and absorb that, for a moment. Family Day has accomplished very little in terms of actually promoting family togetherness.

Beyond simply creating a ridiculous situation in principal, Family Day has actually caused a few practical problems. For example, since schools do observe this new holiday, many parents with younger school-aged children whose employers don't observe the holiday are now left with the burden of finding and paying for an extra day of child care on that day.

Further, on Feb. 18th, 2008, the first day that Family Day was observed, several traffic offenders were scheduled to appear in court since it was uncertain at the time if or when the new civic holiday would, in fact, be introduced. Any offenders whose court date had to be postponed because of the holiday could, in theory, have argued to have their charges dismissed due to the "undue delay". In a worst-case scenario, a person charged with driving under the influence could have walked away scot free, as they say.

Snow removal has also become an issue. Should there be a heavy snowfall on Family Day or the night before, which is not at all unlikely in February, Ontario being, after all, a part of the Great White North and all, municipalities would have no choice but to send out the plows since, as I've noted, most people still need to get to work on that day. Those plow drivers, being municipal employees, would then have to be paid extra for working that day, thus costing municipalities, and ultimately taxpayers, more money.

So then, let's review, shall we? Family Day has become an extra paid holiday for civil servants. It has cost both governments and working parents more money. It has not promoted family togetherness. Good job, Mr. McGuinty! You're really batting a thousand on this one!

The question in my mind is whether all this is the result of Premier McGuinty's failure to think the issue through before implementing Family Day or did he, as my more cynical, conspiracy-minded self is inclined to suspect, implement it as is with the full awareness of the loophole that he was leaving for employers to exploit, creating the perception that he tried to keep his campaign promise in good faith, whilst laying the blame for any negative side effects at the feet of the "greedy, heartless corporations"? Hanlon's Razor advises us to "Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity" so I suppose I it would be most charitable of me to assume Mr. McGuinty to be a fool.

I do like to leave off on a positive note where possible, so here's wishing all the best to those who have been able to take advantage of this day in order to strengthen their family bonds and spend some well-deserved time away from work and in each others' company. That goes for the both of you.

The Relish Tray

My first student job was at a local Holiday Inn where I worked as a porter. Porters, at least at the hotel for which I worked, do much more than just "port". Aside from helping people with their baggage, I also used to deliver room service orders, set up meeting rooms and halls, clean up after meetings and sometimes even help out busing tables, washing dishes and doing other things that weren't strictly in my job description. It was a good job for a young teenager because, being a bit of an introvert, it helped to bring me out of my shell and develop my social skills. The work was varied which, in my opinion, is better than performing the same monotonous task day after day, and my student wage was supplemented with tips, which is always a good thing.

The nature of hotel work, or any customer service oriented work, I suppose, is such that one soon collects some interesting stories to tell. Take, for example, the time that I delivered a room service order and saw a camera on a tripod pointed at a bed which I couldn't see except for the foot, because most of it happened to be around the corner that was formed where the room and entrance met. Now, I'm not the type to jump to lascivious conclusions. There are many reasons why someone might want to photograph a bed. Perhaps the occupant was a photographer hired to take photographs for a Holiday Inn brochure, or perhaps he was particularly impressed with how neatly the bed was made ("Hot diggity, ah've gotta git a pitcher o' this! They'll nevuh buhlieve me back home in Clanton Alabama!") Conversely, perhaps there was a nasty stain on the sheets or the bed was infested with bed bugs and the occupant was getting photographic evidence to strengthen his case for a refund, or at least a discount on the room. My point is that, during my tenure at the Holiday Inn, I saw a lot of things that gave me pause or caused me to do a double-take.

I also saw some people do some really dumb things. By "some people", I am referring to the hotel's patrons, my fellow staff and, of course, myself. Take, for example, the time that the Assistant Innkeeper asked me to deliver a relish tray to a group of people in one of the meeting rooms.

Being young and somewhat unworldly, I had never heard of a relish tray. Fortunately, I've always had a knack for inferring the meanings of unfamiliar words and phrases based on their usage, or by gleaning the familiar from the unfamiliar. For example, the first time I ever heard the term "wanderlust", I reasoned that it must be a fusion of the words "wander" and "lust", both of whose meanings I understood all too well from my childhood days, when my parents would send me wandering after I surprised them during one of their lustful encounters and so I was able to infer the meaning of the term without having to actually look it up.


And so it was in the case of the mysterious relish tray which I'd been instructed to deliver. I immediately located a stainless steel serving tray, covered it in paper doilies, neatly arranged, and then pulled a large box of individually packaged condiments from the walk-in refrigerator that was located in the hotel kitchen. I next proceeded to carefully and artfully arrange relish packets in an ovular pattern around the outside of the tray. Always the conscientious one and wanting to go that extra mile to please the customer, I also added some mustard and ketchup packets as well, reasoning that some of the guests in the meeting room might appreciate an alternative choice to relish. Finally, for the "coup de grace" (French for "superfluous gimmick"), I added a centerpiece; a small vase containing a simple yet decorative floral arrangement in the center of the tray. This, I proudly wheeled down to the meeting room.

I knocked on the door and proudly announced "Your relish tray, sir!" when it was answered by a smartly-dressed gent in business attire. He watched in dumbfounded silence as I wheeled in my creation. Deftly placing the "relish tray" on a counter next to a tray of half-eaten sandwiches, I paused for only a moment and, when my greeter gave no visible sign of producing a tip, I diplomatically took my trolley and left the room, closing the door silently behind myself. "He was probably anxious to get back to the meeting," I reasoned. Surely they would take care of me later on.

When I returned to the lobby, the Assistant Innkeeper motioned to me to approach him with a beckoning finger. "What the hell did you just take down to Room 101?" he muttered under his breath as I dutifully approached.

"The relish tray that you told me to bring them, sir!" I replied. By this time, though, I could tell from his manner that all was not well. I'm quite good at reading people, you know.

It took some time to convince my boss that the whole thing was not, in fact, my idea of a smart-alec prank and that I truly didn't know what a relish tray was. It all ended well enough. I was escorted to the walk-in refrigerator and shown the relish tray which had, in fact, already been prepared earlier by the kitchen staff and which was, ironically, located on a shelf not far from the condiment box. This I delivered to Room 101. I even offered to let them keep the tray of condiments, but they declined, sending it back to the kitchen with me. I didn't lose my job over the matter although, oddly enough, I never received a tip for that particular service. Ah well. You win some, you lose some.