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    • Let Setbacks Deepen Your Resolve

      “When aiming for the top, your path requires an engaged, searching mind. You have to make obstacles spur you to creative new angles in the learning process. Let setbacks deepen your resolve. You should always come off an injury or a loss better than when you went down. Another angle on this is the unfortunate correlation for some between consistency and monotony. It is all too easy to get caught up in the routines of our lives and to lose creativity in the learning process.” – Josh Waitzkin, The Art Of Learning

      I have two college kids who are looking at the next few weeks of online learning, cancelled events at school and the real possibility that the semester will be spent remotely. That’s a tough hand to be dealt to a college Junior, and even tougher for a college Senior. But that’s the world we live in at the moment. There’s nothing routine about a pandemic. Perhaps that jolt to our collective routine will spur unparalleled creativity and advancement. Perhaps we’ll collectively all watch Netflix. I hope for the former.

      When Waitzkin points out the unfortunate correlation for some between consistency and monotony, he includes the important qualifier for some. He rose to be one of the best in the world in a couple of very different pursuits (chess and martial arts) because he embraced monotonous routine instead of becoming bored and moving on to some other pursuit. Don’t we owe it to ourselves to find the magic in our own routine? How else do you achieve mastery?

      Today is the first day of working from home for a lot of people. I’ve worked from home for years, but always sprinkled with travel and meetings. I love activity, and now I need to focus on a different kind of activity. But so does everyone else. Included in that are a couple of twenty-somethings who get to experience a completely different college experience. We’re all on a new learning routine, every one of us, with new obstacles highlighting the frailties of our old routines. Time to step up – ready?

    • RCA Studio B

      Elvis used to book his studio time from 6 PM until 7 AM Monday morning at RCA’s Studio B in Nashville and just crank out the songs. After one of these sessions he walked outside to a waiting Army Jeep to report for draft service. You walk into that studio today and it looks a lot like it did then. Same floor and walls, same light fixtures that Elvis requested (“mood lighting”), and same piano Elvis played. The room reverberates Elvis, and it’s fair to say he was the biggest of a long list of performers who have recorded in this studio for the last 6 decades since Roy Acuff built the studio in 1956. . When you walk in there’s a “Wall of Elvis” hits recorded in this studio. Young Elvis was prolific, working hard and building the legend. That wall shows some of his work.

      There’s a certain sound in this room that carries across everyone who’s recorded here. Its an echoing richness to the songs that is very distinctive in songs recorded in Studio B. That sound became known as the “Nashville Sound”. Listen to Jim Reeves (“Welcome To My World“), Dolly Patton’s “I Will Always Love You“, Floyd Cramer’s “Last Date“, The Everly Brothers’ “All I Have To Do Is Dream” and Roy Orbison’s “Only The Lonely (Know The Way I Feel)” are all examples of that sound, all recorded right there in that room.

      The best story I heard about the room was Elvis’ recording of “Are You Lonesome Tonight“. As with all recordings then, it was a single track – you either got it right or you didn’t. The song was recorded in the dark, with all the musicians playing and harmonizing by the glow of a single red light. Towards the very end of the recording Elvis bumped his head on the microphone stand. If you listen to the song you’ll hear the click right at the end of the song. They left it in then and it remains to this day.

      As a music lover it was a bit surreal to be in that room as they played a few of the songs recorded right in the very place. You feel like you’re in a time warp in a way, the walls embrace the sounds and you and in a way you are timeless with that song. Some of the instruments haven’t left that room since they were used in the recordings. I felt a bit like I did when I stood in The Cavern in Liverpool; this was where it all happened. I often write about the ghosts of history whispering in your ear when you visit a place of significance. RCA Studio B is surely a place of significance, but the whispers here are heard around the globe in that Nashville Sound, deep and rich with a little hiss from the recording tape. Magic.

      Elvis’s piano, still in Studio B and still being used today

    • A Mirror of Roughness and Honesty

      “The water of a pond is a mirror of roughness and honesty—it gives back not only my own gaze, but the nimbus of the world trailing into the picture on all sides…

      All things are meltable, and replaceable. Not at this moment, but soon enough, we are lambs and we are leaves, and we are stars, and the shining, mysterious pond water itself.” – Mary Oliver, Upstream

      We’re all connected, and that’s never been more apparent. If that pond is indeed a mirror of roughness and honesty it surely tells us a lot about ourselves right now. Political divisiveness, nationalism and now a pandemic all collectively dance around us, joining our “normal” complexities in life, and all a reflective nimbus as we stare at ourselves in that pond. What’s new to us isn’t new to humanity. It’s all been here before and returns once again to show we still have a ways to go.

      I have a lot to write about after this week’s trip to Nashville, but like London and Scotland last fall I’m stepping away for now with stories unwritten. The stories are still fresh but the mind is restless. Stories have their time: This isn’t the time for those I’d planned to write. The weight of the pandemic can weigh you down. Worry about what you can control, not what you can’t. Don’t get roped into the news cycle, but do educate yourself on what to do to get by. I’ve managed to be around way more people than I would have liked this month, but took what precautions I could save scrapping everything and living in isolation.

      “I remember once when I was walking with my teacher Ajahn Chah he pointed to a boulder in a field and asked, “Is that heavy?” I replied, “Yes, of course.” Ajahn Chah smiled and said “Not if you don’t pick it up.” – Jack Kornfield

      There were plenty of people being cavalier about this pandemic in Nashville and in memes on social media. It’s gallows humor on the one hand, but there’s also a bit of active denial going on. I saw many people not “picking it up” over the last few days. Hell, I could be accused of that myself given the travel. Don’t carry the weight of the world, but own your own behavior. All things are meltable and replaceable, and it appears that we’re entering a reckoning.

      So what to do now? Travel is done, hope you didn’t pick up COVID-19. Now continue good hygiene and increase level of social isolation in earnest until you’re sure A) you didn’t pick up the virus already and spread it to others and B) help flatten the curve. Carefully analyze every cough and sneeze. And dive right into the work that needs to be done at home, or find a way to move the chains forward while working from home. But just to keep a sense of optimism, I’m going to plant some basil tomorrow. Gardening brings normalcy back to life, even in rough times. Maybe take a long walk. Far from people of course. Two nice ways to shed some of the weight of the world.

    • The Honky-Tonk Line Between Order and Chaos

      If you like live music, Nashville is your place. If you believe right now mitigation and social distancing are in order, well, it’s not optimal. Every honky-tonk bar you walk by has the back of a drummer facing you and music playing. It must be a madhouse during a normal SEC tournament (cancelled this year), or a normal Spring Break (extended for most out of an abundance of caution), or a normal year for that matter. As everyone knows now, 2020 hasn’t been a normal year. But people here are determined to dance the news away. Broadway in New York has shut down. Walking down Broadway in Nashville the music and neon pulls you in, the sounds of celebration are still there. It turns out there are still people jamming into clubs despite the news. It’s just… tempered a bit. There aren’t as many people but the music is throbbing and people are jamming together dancing and flirting and drinking. There’s a spirit of celebration in this city that’s great to see and be a part of. Just not this particular week.

      I’m not oblivious to the threat, and wash my hands often. Hand sanitizer stations are everywhere and I’m using them. I’m practicing what can be considered social distancing in downtown Nashville, but know the risks are very high here in the clubs. We sat outside in a rooftop bar, but you still wade through humanity when you use the bathrooms or get a drink. Again, not optimal. I brought alcohol swabs to wipe down phones and such but I’m not naive, we’re swimming in the Petri dish being out. There are no surgical mask-wearing dancers bobbing on that dance floor. When I get home I’m self-quarantining myself just to be sure I’m not spreading anything I might have gotten to others.

      This trip was scheduled before the acceleration into madness but we knew what was about to happen. Two days earlier and we’d have thought less about it. Two days later and we would have cancelled. You dance along that line between order and chaos, hoping you don’t lose your balance. Americans love to debate, ignore the future for the present too much, and are resistant to change, but we rally when you punch us in the mouth. That punch hasn’t fully landed on the jaw but the gut punch that preceded it this week has taken the collective breath out of people. Out of an abundance of caution is a familiar phrase to everyone now, even if they aren’t showing it in the honky-tonks just yet.

      Tomorrow seems a long time away with the accelerating news of COVID-19. I left fully prepared for the shortages created as people snap up supplies and the supply chain that fills those shelves is impacted. Perhaps we should have shown an abundance of caution with more abundance, but time will be the jury on that now. We’ve lived deliberately, and tomorrow morning we’ll circle the wagons back at home for an extended and hopefully heathy stay. Today? Today we’ll celebrate life with as much social distancing as travel allows. Pass the soap?

    • Simplify, Now Seems A Good Time

      “In the midst of this chopping sea of civilized life, such are the clouds and storms and quicksands and thousand-and-one items to be allowed for, that a man has to live, if he would not founder and go to the bottom and not make his port at all, by dead reckoning, and he must be a great calculator indeed who succeeds.  Simplify, simplify.” – Henry David Thoreau, Walden

      Thoreau would be shocked at the busy-ness of 2020 versus compared to the thousand-and-one items in the middle of the 19th century. The world has other plans for us every year, but especially this year. The gods (or God if you will) laugh(s) at plans we make, no matter how well-intentioned, and we all learn to adjust on the fly. That’s life in a normal year, amplified by the madness that is 2020. With apologies to all the experts on Twitter and talking heads everywhere, in this madness, I look to poetry, to stoic philosophy, and to Thoreau for a level-set. Thoreau’s advice to simplify resonates. Granted, it’s a bit late in the game for a cabin in the woods, but to step back a bit and re-assess. Simplify. Now more than ever.

      “The overwhelming reality is: we live in a world where almost everything is worthless and a very few things are exceptionally valuable. As John Maxwell has written, “You cannot overestimate the unimportance of practically everything.” – Greg McKeown, Essentialism

    • An Abundance Of Caution

      I’m not an alarmist, I deliberately avoid watching the hand-wringing news and for the most part I’m not in a high risk category when it comes to coronavirus,or COVID-19. I’ve always been a “hand washer” and I can time the process of washing them with Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star just fine, thank you (instead of that mind worm I use the beginning of Fly Me To The Moon, which conveniently reaches 20 seconds right when you reach the word “hand”). But I’m taking coronavirus seriously.

      I’ve previously mocked people who hoard dust masks (which won’t work), Purell (which may work but won’t protect everyone that can’t get any because of the hoarders), and toilet paper (which is proven to work but how much do you really need anyway?) and will continue to do so. We don’t need self-absorbed behavior right now. We need self-aware behavior; Be prepared, be considerate, be scarce for awhile if necessary. I have enough food to camp at home for a couple of weeks if the same travel restrictions imposed on Italy are imposed on the United States. Contingency plans aren’t panicky or hoarding behavior, just as building a nest egg for retirement is expected one might expect people to have a bit of food ready if needed.

      One phrase, Legal and PR Department-approved, seems to be taking hold as the world reacts to the spread of COVID-19: “Out of an abundance of caution” [fill in with cancellation or new procedure here]. Out of an abundance of caution we’re postponing this trade show. Out of an abundance of caution we’ve temporarily switched from ceramic coffee mugs to disposable cups. Out of an abundance of caution we’ve cancelled all visitor meetings. Out of an abundance of caution we are extending college Spring Break by a week … or in some case, out of an abundance of caution all students will take online classes for the rest of the semester.

      Cancelling the rest of in-class participation for the rest of the semester is an extraordinary step, but logical when your student population consists of a high percentage of people from around the globe. I feel for those students having their very expensive college experience cut short, but I’m a student of history and recognize the devastation a pandemic or plague can cause. Humans have one major predator left in this world besides other humans, and that’s viruses. On the plus side we’ve never been more aware of how to fight this predator, but getting all spun up isn’t helping anything. The world and coronavirus doesn’t owe you anything: deal with it like an adult.

      There’s plenty of examples of taking an abundance of caution too far (I’m looking at you toilet paper hoarder), but it’s a reasonable request to take extra measures now to safeguard against an uncontainable pandemic later. So as we all look around at this strange new reality, make the most of it; work to contribute more to the positive direction of humanity with all that extra time at home instead of binge watching television or 24-hour news. Take walks outside away from the crowds. The world could use a little more sanity right about now. I believe that starts with you and me, kiddo. Ready?

    • That Which Is Around Us

      “I am what is around me.” – Wallace Stevens, Theory

      We build the world around us, surrounding ourselves with things and people that reinforce for us that image in our minds. Believe you’re a hiker? Go to the mountains and be one. Sailor? Get a boat or crew in someone else’s. Runner? Get some good running shoes and hit the pavement again and again until it becomes your identity. Writer? Write every day: immerse yourself in the Great Conversation, pull in all that is around you like a warm blanket on a cold night and share it with the world.

      I heard about the death of a friendly acquaintance last night. He was larger than life in some ways, but fragile from years of abusing his body. He would drink too much, love too many, drive too fast and talk even faster, but he had a good heart and it showed in how he treated those around him. He lived the work hard, play hard mantra more than anyone I’ve ever met. I learned not to keep up with him drinking, to drive separately when going to meetings, and to keep pace when it came to work. I was just in his town last week but decided not to call him, thinking I didn’t have the time. It turns out I only had that time.

      We are what is around us. Jimmy surrounded himself with a lifestyle that killed him young, but was as fully alive as anyone I’ve met. We don’t get to choose everything that happens in our lives, but in our daily habits we slowly build up and reinforce our image of ourselves and what we might become. Ultimately it’s all just a story in our mind, and like any story you can choose to send it in another direction at any time. But you can’t turn a tragic-comedy into an action-adventure or a romance novel easily. Sometimes you’ve got to scrap the entire first draft and start writing a new book.

      As a nod to Jimmy, I’ll work to be more alive in the moment, but with a lot less vodka. I’ll work hard in my career and play hard at healthier activities than he chose. Like Jimmy I’ll beam in pride at my kids, but will try to lead by example that the things you surround yourself with in this one precious life matter much more than you might think. Those things either hold you up or press you down, so choose wisely. Thanks for the reminder Jimmy.

    • Make No Small Plans

      “Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and our grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty.” – Daniel Burnham

      I sat in a line of cars waiting for a light to change to green to release the compliant flock to pastures beyond. The Jeep in front of me had a vanity plate with “YOLO” and what I’d guess was their age when they bought the Jeep. YOLO is a trendy acronym nowadays, and part of me is glad to see it. Not the self-absorbed Instagram look-at-me–selfie! YOLO, but the what will you do with this one precious life YOLO.

      What I like about the Burnham quote is that it gets to the heart of it; what is your contribution going to be? Will it inspire current and future generations or will it sink into the abyss of anonymous whispers? Look, a ripple is a ripple just the same, but what if you could make a real splash while you’re here? Seems like a nice way to cap a life.

      Daniel Burnham was a force of nature back in his time, with his architectural firm designing projects as diverse and continually fascinating as the Flatiron Building in New York and The White City for the Chicago World’s Fair. As a diabetic, he suffered health issues later in his life. He famously learned about the death of his friend Francis Millet when he attempted to reach him with a telegraph as Burnham was sailing east on the SS Olympic while Millet was sailing west on the Titanic. Burnham would also die that year, though less dramatically. By all accounts he lived a large life, filled with big projects that echo across the landscape and our imagination today. I’d guess Burnham, as in his own time, might shake his head at the transactional nature of many projects built designed today, but wonder in awe at the scope of others.

      So what of our own plans? Will their scope awe our grandchildren or will we be a curiosity, a relay runner who once passed the baton to another runner who passed it to them in the short sprint through life? Our sons and daughters and grandchildren will do things that would stagger us. Hell, they already are. That is as it should be. So what is your own magic that stirs the blood of those around you? Make no small plans.

    • Acorns and All

      The farm through the woods lets the horses loose to run, and I love being outside when it happens; seeing them flash through the trees as they gallop up the hill. This time of year, when the trees between us stand dormant and naked, it’s easy to see them as they run. When the leaves fill in the flash fades from view but I’ll often hear them whinnying to each other and I’m left imagining their joyful charge. When the horses run I’m reminded why I stay in this place.

      The snow is long gone in Southern New Hampshire. All that’s left now is the fallen branches and a million acorns from a bumper crop that fell relentlessly last November. March brings cleanup work and assessment of damage done. Raking those acorns up yesterday I watched the moon rising above the trees. The moon seemed in a hurry to get above it all, and her progress was better than my acorn cleanup. But eventually I got it done, feeling a bit better about the state of things outside. Other neighbors without oak trees don’t have to deal with acorns, but I’ll take the oak trees and live with the trade-off, thank you. It felt good to be outside doing something anyway. I just wish they would be a bit less giving in return.

      Woodpeckers duel for loudest drumbeat on trees out in the woods, and the Mourning Doves sing their sad songs to each other. Their population seems to be increasing at a pace similar to the wild turkeys that roam the woods and spill over into the yard now and then. A mild winter seems to have helped the local wildlife. I know that means the tick population will thrive as well. The human population of Southern New Hampshire grows as developers snap up open space. Maybe the wildlife is just being pushed closer because their natural habitat is shrinking. Hard for me to tell for sure, but it seems related. I know the woods will remain protected but I wonder about the horse farm. I’ll know it’ll be time to move when they develop it. I have no patience for encroachment but I’m a realist. Unchecked development will change this place too. I’m grateful for the good, put up with the bad and wonder about the world as we try to mold it to fit our needs. For my part I’ll keep the oak trees, acorns and all, and hope whoever settles here after me has the same sense of wonder about the world around us.

    • Five Mornings of Watching the World Go Mad

      “I live
      in the open mindedness
      of not knowing enough
      about anything.”
      – Mary Oliver, Luna

      I woke up early, restless and ready to move on from this place at 4:30 AM.  I get like this sometimes.  It’s the fifth morning I’ve woken up in a different place, this time I slept in Poughkeepsie, New York.  This town has meaning for me; I once slept in my car near the boathouse at Marist College back when it didn’t seem like a big thing to do such things.  I’d taken one look around the full boathouse we were all going to sleep in and opted for quiet over shared suffering.  Come to think of it, I still steer in that direction.

      In a week of accelerating news stories about Presidential campaigns and Coronavirus, I’ve been operating under the cloak of business travel.  I gave up on trying to find a bottle of hand sanitizer after the fourth store clerk shrugged and talked of orders pending.  A woman in Glens Falls told me “the virus is close now, with confirmed cases in New York City and Albany”.  It feels too much like a scene in a movie for me.  I just want to have my hands not smell like gasoline after I fill up the car, but I guess I’ll need to ration what I have left in my travel bottle.  The world goes mad sometimes, and Coronovirus has kicked the hoarder’s nest.

      I have more travel in the next couple of weeks, and candidly I thought about cancelling some of it.  Not because I’m an alarmist, but because I’m a pragmatist.  Who needs the drama of flights and edgy fellow travelers around you?  Who needs the potential lockdown of a city I happen to be in at the time?  I love the ocean but I’m just not hopping on a cruise ship right now, thank you.  I saw World War Z, I know what happens when the virus rips through a plane full of people.  I’m not Brad Pitt, there’s no way I’d survive that.

      All this comes up when you wake up at 4:30 on the fifth morning of business travel.  I didn’t feel this way Monday morning in Buffalo, or Tuesday in Rochester.  I had some trepidation in Syracuse on Wednesday but felt great about the world on Thursday in Saratoga Springs.  Then again, it’s hard not to feel like the world is a beautiful place when you spend a little time in Saratoga Springs.  Which brings me to Poughkeepsie, on the shores of the Hudson River.  I once jumped in the frigid Hudson right about this time in March back as a freshman in college too many years ago after we won a race.  At the time that seemed the logical thing to do.  Sort of like buying all the Purell at the local pharmacy just in case you need it when Coronavirus madness starts going down.  Sometimes we get inspired by the odd behavior of those around us.  And that’s why I don’t watch the news or hang out with large groups of angry people.

      Look, I don’t know enough about Coronavirus to know whether traveling the next two weeks is a good idea or not.  On the surface it seems better to just stay home and let things play out.  But I’m a traveler at heart, and if everyone else stays home I may just have a little more virus-free air to breath.  I do know I’ve really improved my hand-washing skills, and I try not to touch my face with my hands.  I don’t mind when someone doesn’t want to shake hands, but I don’t shrink back in horror when they offer their hand in greeting.  I mean, that’s what Purell is for…  if you can find any.

      This all seems a little smug, and I apologize for that.  I’m taking a potential pandemic very seriously, but I don’t watch the news and I don’t hoard dust masks, vodka and Purell (maybe a little rum).  I think the best thing we can do is be a little diligent with our personal hygiene, stay out of crowded indoor places, and give those who might be a little vulnerable a little distance in case you have the virus and don’t know it.  If things spiral into madness tap into your water heater for drinking water and carbo load on rice.  All that is unsolicited advice from someone figuring it out like you are.  The only thing I’m sure about is that you really should wash your hands better.