LrAu

Unexpectedly I get a phone call, the person on the other end is crying. They can hardly get out their first few sentences, but after a minute or so they are able to start. The go through their current situation and in the end say, ‘I don’t know what to do.’  

This has happened a few times in my life, and I am glad. The conversation continued for a while, with just me trying to get details, as if I am to help, I need to know more. I want to make sure the person first is ok, but it is the understanding of the situation that is key. I asked a few questions and replied with some links to information. I needed to balance two things, first to calm the person down and second to try to find a way to help in this situation. 

Now the problem was not resolved in a single call, in fact it is going to lead need some more information gathering on my friend’s side but as the conversation was closing, I mentioned please keep my updated as you know things, as in tomorrow and the next day. The response was ‘I don’t want to bother you.’ I had to stop them right away. My response was how can you deny me of being there for you, in fact I added on top, how can you deny any of your friends from being there when you need them.  

I think of anything this shocked them. We had a few minutes discussion about friendship. I have been thinking about this for a while. Even at my age, I am still learning the ins and outs of how to be a friend. I am sure I have failed or made mistakes, but I am only human. One thing I do know, and I told my children there is no greater gift than the one of friendship. Long before I heard that line in the movie Polar Express, it was something I believed. 

Friendship is not just being there for the good times; it is being there when they need you most. That also means often being there when they do not ask for it. It is calling them unexpectedly, it is saying yes to something you would not do, just to spend some time together. It is being the side kick, wingman or just company. But, when there is a tragedy, like when my wife passed, it was wonderful to have people around. And even more so many years later, many are still around helping in ways they might not think about. 

Then there is the Ben Frankin Effect. This is when you like someone better after doing something for them. Now of course this could be considered a part of cognitive dissonance, where even if you do not like a person, and help them you end up liking them. Let us put it in context, that helping a person you are already friends with allows you to like them more. The notion of helping someone brings you closer to them. I did not think about it this way, but people I have mentored over the years have become friends, I wonder if I ended up liking them due to the fact I was helping them?

This call, like many things that happen in my life, made me reflect again. How do I make friends? How do you have hard conversations with them? If there is something that does bother you about the friendship, can you bring it up? If so, how? As you get older why is it so hard to make friends?  And it also made me think, why didn’t I call some of my friends when some of the worst things happened to me? Why did I not ask to have someone just to talk to? Why did I deny some of my friends the pleasure of helping others? If one of the greatest things you can do is help other people, denying a friend to help you is denying them that feeling. 

In previous posts I talked about saying yes to things and making moments, that wonderful stories can come from adventures.  I am now realizing that those adventures may be great, but also helping others, and letting others help you is another fantastic way to build bonds between friends.  So do not be afraid to ask for help, and be happy when someone asks you for it.

By Larry Gold – LrAu

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

I am sitting at work and wanting to be able to demonstrate an idea that is rattling around in my head. The logic in my brain drives me to aggregate data and let the data tell the story. I create all different views of the data, and my idea does have empirical information behind it. I am working up slides and just putting tables of data there does not energize me like the idea in my head. I debate whether I should ask a GPT could it show what I want it to show but realize it will not understand what I am talking about. I now start to question myself, am I going about this the right way? 

There is a famous quote attributed to Stalin, one death is a tragedy, one million deaths are a statistic. Just throwing statistics on a PowerPoint does not have the impact I would like. The impact of say a great movie, the one when you leave the theatre you and you can recount great scenes. More recently, it is a meme that you share over and over and make people crack up. What makes a difference between jamming facts and the movie or the meme?  

Over the week there is a document released from Mr. Beast about how he runs his company, it is a fantastic read. He wrote about different statistics he looks at. I decided to look at my blog statistics. The posts that have the most views, the most engagement are ones that personal stories. Stories that make you say ‘I have done that’ or ‘I can relate’ have more of an impact than just regurgitating a thought. The last two posts are stories, first I explained that I had an ADHD breakdown and the most recent one learning a lesson from taking my dog for a poop got people to talk to me about them. If I just posted, people with ADHD need tools, or any failure is mostly a chain of events instead of a single point to blame.  

The question I now asked was why is a story more impactful and memorable than just statistics? Why are a few lines meme more interesting than deep details? I started thinking is this why the bible is a list of stories? Is this why Aesop fables were so popular? Is this the reason that when Apple advertising they show people doing something with their hardware instead of just listing the specifications?  

According to research, stories are remembered twenty-two times more than facts alone. I am not sure how you measure that, nor do I know if it is a proven fact, but the use of stories is embedded within humanity.  Greek and Roman Mythology were used to teach lessons, it would be faster to just state the lesson but not as memorable. We still read Mythology, and study it and one of the top five reasons is to learn life lessons through entertainment. By just instructing students on what you want them to learn it would be faster, but it may not stick.  

Bruce Lee before he passed away was working on a movie the Game of Death. Bruce wanted the movie to be a lesson about life, the inability to adapt would end in destruction. The ability to learn lessons allows you to ascend. Bruce, like others before and after chose to use story telling as a way of teaching a lesson. It was mostly lost as he died before the movie was completed, and what was release was more exploitation than his script.  The Image below is a drawing by him describing the ascent.  

So here I am writing this week’s post, and my desire to get better every day and to document my journey. It is the stories of my life that teach me, and mostly the failures where I need to learn a lesson, many times learn a lesson more than once. The stories are more memorable, lead to great laughs with friends and make us think. It is more reason to have experiences and have delightful stories to tell so you can pass on wisdom to others. And no, I never finished that presentation, I scrapped the idea until I could produce a relevant story. It has taught me that I need a story to get my point across, and I will work on that this week. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed. 

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

It is always strange where lessons pop into my life. The other day I went to walk my dog, I grabbed the leash, my dog got over excited, I clicked it into her harness and off we went. Belle is getting a little older, so we do many short walks, and occasionally I take her on long hikes. This walk was around the block to get her outside and get me outside for a few minutes.  

A few minutes into the walk Belle had to go poop. I went to get a bag to pick it up, and there was none left. This is another first world problem, those of you who know me know I use this expression often. But my first reaction was anger, who used the last bag? Which one of my kids did not refill? Why didn’t I look to see if there were no empty bags before I left on the walk? Redirecting the anger from others to myself, also not a good thing. 

While walking back to the house I started thinking a bit more rationally. There is a classic saying that two wrongs do not make a right. This situation had a new definition of two wrongs. In this case, yes whoever used the last bag should have reloaded the leash. I also should have looked at it. I started thinking about other situations where there is a chain of failures, and we often look for a sole source of blame.  

Why do we want a sole source of blame? And why do we not want the sole source of blame not to be us? Our brains are as complex as they are like simple, they like shortcuts. When there is noise or unnecessary information our brains do their best to ignore it. If there is missing information in our brains, try to fill it in to make sense of what we are seeing and hearing. The classic story of why Lucille Ball could get Russian signals in her teeth, as the story goes was to dispel the myth of how powerful they could be. Having a single spot to blame is used by marketers to sell you things, as well as politicians to sell you on voting for them. Just as I wanted to blame one of my daughters than thinking there were two reasons for the failure, hearing someone I already dislike is the cause of my problems.  

I challenge myself to get past my first reaction and dig deeper. Solving problems is where I want my brain to be spending its energy. In the case of the situation, I thought of a few things: 

• Putting a second bag holder, yes, I could run into the same situation with two 
• Wrapping a bag around the handle, as a reminder if you use one on the handle to replace the bag, or if you pick it up without one on the handle you need to replace the bags. 
• I could put a note on the door, do not forget bags 
• Etc. 

In any situation understanding anger that comes from problems is a chance to redirect that anger to problem solving. I need to remind myself of that lesson and think about my dog. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

I blew up on a Sunday.  It was completely uncalled for. The person I was angry with was myself. For those who think I am perfect, news flash, I am not. I do have bad days, and lucky for me the good days outweigh the bad by more than tenfold. Let me give you the backstory so you can understand why I got so upset with myself, and why it was uncalled for. 

To explain how we got there a need to start with how I got angry, which started on Saturday night. I needed to go shopping to get some ingredients to make Buffalo Chicken Dip.  One of my daughters and I headed to the Market with that and a few other things to get. So, we get a few items, put it in the cart, checkout, and drive home. We get home, I am setting up to cook Sunday and I realized we forgot one key ingredient. For a dish that has only 5 ingredients it was a bit ridiculous to forget one. Not only that, my daughter needed one thing, and guess what, she forgot that also.  

We went back in the car, and this time we got the one item I needed, as well as the item she needed. We kept asking if there was something else, we missed. Agreed that we got it all, we checked out again and drove home. All seemed good and I got to bed ready to wake up early, do a bit of the home chores and cook for the BBQ.  

Around eleven in the morning it came time to cook, and I started. Guess what, I forgot another item!  How can I go shopping two times for five ingredients and only get four items? This is basically when I lost it. The negative talk came out and I could not believe I messed this up. I do know it is wrong to talk negative about yourself, I try to teach myself not to do it, but as most people know it is a process, sometimes you fail at it.  

What did I do wrong? I broke one of my key coping mechanisms of getting something done. When I go shopping, I make a list, and I check off as I get each item guaranteeing that I always get exactly what is on the list. In cases where the store does not have it, I am ok, and it is not checked off the list. It is technically foolproof but has one simple flaw. I need to make a list! I was so confident that I could remember five items with all the distractions of the store and having my daughter with me. But here is the problem, with ADHD that is not a plan for success. The plan should have been made the list and checked it.  

I was not mad that I forgot two items twice. I was mad at myself for not using what is an extraordinarily successful tool to get something done. Of course, after getting angry for a few minutes, I remembered to breathe and remind myself this is a first world problem. And yes, the dish came out fantastic as people devoured it at the BBQ, and I should have known better than getting upset with myself and thinking negatively of my ability to function.  

Over the years to manage my ADHD I have compiled a tool chest of coping strategies so that I can succeed. There is a challenge that I need to use those tools daily, and in cases like this scenario when I choose to skip it, occasionally I will make mistakes. It was not my ADHD that caused me to make the mistakes, it was me not picking the right tool from my chest to ensure success. Owning the problem is key, and it will be a constant learning process of success and failures to remind myself to not take shortcuts. The lessons I constantly learn. 

• I need to own when I fail  
• I need to do a quick check to understand what tool I should have used and promise myself to leverage it. 
• If I am not sure what would help, I ask for help from others, my therapist or anyone I trust.  
• I need to move quicker from anger to calm and reduce the negative talk to myself. 

It is a constant life of learning, and I hope this helps others who make mistakes. And I really should remember what Bruce Lee said about anger, “A quick temper will make a fool of you soon enough.” 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

As I child as I was a big race car fan. On TV watching the Wild World of Sports for the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat. For years on end, I would have my parents get me AFX/Aurora Slot cars and would get stock cars and open wheel cars. Being a car buff was another one of my hobbies. In the 70’s in the race that seemed insane, the 24 Hours of Le Mans, I remember the Lowenbrau Porsche 962. Without the internet to learn everything I was stuck to books at the library. 

Porsche came into dominance after the Ford versus Ferrari wars of the late 1960’s. The car that was dominant was the 917. It was beautiful and nothing like anyone had ever seen, and for 3 years it dominated.  

It was built from an idea to twenty-five working cars in under ten months, surprising Ferrari who really had no time to reply.  

When these cars first came to the track, the drivers hated driving it. In fact, the Porsche drivers refused to drive it, and most preferred the earlier 908. They would drive the 908’s, which were refined and in their final form to win championships. The 917 cars were perfect in a wind tunnel, had incredibly low drag, but on the racetrack was impossible to drive. 

 With no Porsche drivers willing to race it, the leveraged a British driver, Jo Sieffert. After the race, the engineers decided something needed to be done. The story goes that the car had gnats all over its front and midsection, but none on the tail. This led them to believe there is a problem with downforce on the rear of the car.  

The Porsche engineers got sheets of aluminum, tap and self-tapping screws and went to work. They iterated over a series of changes and tested it out on the track. The engineers would get feedback from the drivers and make changes, till finally at one point the lap time was down over 5 seconds, and the drivers said, ‘Now this is a race car.’ 

Why do I tell this story? Every so often I find myself learning or sitting at my desk at home with ideas. I sit and design them, or even play the guitar. The only way to know if it works in real life, it to try it in real life. The only way to get better is to get feedback from others and adjust. Just like the engineers at Porsche as I wrote more in this blog, I got feedback from friends and random people which allowed me to find a style that was me. Following that pattern, I put some of my proof-of-concept software into a playground at work to get feedback from other developers and team members. It allowed me to iterate and build something useful. The Porsche engineers needed to push drivers to get feedback, or more they needed to be willing to ask for feedback to improve the car.  

The Porsche 917 went on to dominate for three years and started the Porsche vs Ferrari wars now that Ford had pulled back. The fact that the engineers were willing to get out of the lab and test it in real life, and were willing to take the feedback and make changes is the key. So, be a Porsche Engineer, no need to hide, get feedback in the real world, it is one way to get better. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

Two weeks ago, I got back on the ice after being off for four and a half months. It was great to be back on the ice and reminded me that I need to keep working on my skating.  When I skate regularly it improves, and the more days a week I do it, the quicker it comes back. I am not the best skater, and with lots of younger guys playing will never be, but I just want to enjoy myself in a fun competitive environment. 

When a much better skater has the puck and someone like me is trying to defend them, their ability to change direction quickly, and multiple times allows them to get passed. As I was trying my best to position myself so I could try to defend them, get a poke check, a stick in the way or somehow disrupt them my brain started thinking about some parallels. 

There is this notion that being agile allows you to adapt to situations. There is a project management practice called agile, in which the key principle is that change is going to happen, and the programming process should not only assume it but be able to react to it efficiently. For those not familiar with it, development for years was done in a method called waterfall.  This is spending months or years gathering requirements for what needs to be built, and then building it and delivering the project in one cycle.  It was akin to building a house, where someone makes a blueprint and then the builders build it. This of course is good, until between the time you get the requirements and get a product that things have changed.  

Along came agile, and said let us build stuff in smaller increments, and get feedback and change as needed. It was a drastic change. The parallel to hockey is think of a good offensive skater constantly stopping and changing direction based on what the defender is doing and making as many moves as needed to finally get past. The ability to change and adapt helps both situations and is an interesting way to relate the two. But there is something that few people talk about. 

For a hockey player to get that good at a prominent level takes years of practice.  The practice is not during game time. In many cases someone to get that good works at drills, gets skating lessons, goes to the gym, does off ice training and more all so that they can be a better player on the ice. The way we think about development or even business management is to give people some training, tell them to read or do online courses and implement it in a production. It is not years of practice, coaching and training. And doing the work outside of the day job really does not exist. There could be assumption that the person should be doing it themselves, but for a professional hockey player the practice, training etc. Is part of the job. 

I wonder if those who think about any change think about practice. Malcom Gladwell did say to be an expert takes ten thousand hours, but that is any skill including changing how you do something.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them. 

Our family has a few house rules, and over the years they went from being kid friendly to adult. The rules are Simple:  

• If you make a mess, clean it 
• Do not be Stupid, and if you are do not get caught 
• Do not be an asshole 
• Leave your Sanity at the Door 

Now those rules may bring some laughter, but for my kids and I we regularly repeat them, and I know that giving hugs, laughing etc. are missing. But these were rules more to get us through some tough times. Every so often I think about them when meditating, or my mind is wandering and the other day found myself wondering if I break one of them. 

Driving home from work I go from one highway to another, and the exit is on the right. During some busy times, the traffic can back up a half mile or more. Some people know this and get into the right lane, some people do not realize this and try to squeeze in, and of course there are the people who try to jam their way at the last second. There are a lot of reactions to the people who have been in line. Some are angry, some honk, some let them in nicely, some try to block the person cutting in. 

In one of the many management classes I took, we were taught the notion of empathy. Putting on the empathy hat you can say ‘Maybe the guy is racing to the hospital and has an emergency’ or other fable to make the action explainable. But when you see the same car do it day in and day out, that idea seems to vanish. If your reaction is to block them and hope the other cars in front and behind you do the same thing, you can successfully piss the driver off. Does this act break the do not be an asshole rule? I remember driving someone home one night, and a driver was zig zagging to get ahead and cut us off to get one car ahead. I said to the person next to me, I guess he does not like spending time with whoever else is in that car.  

When I look at this situation what it comes down to is the value of time. We are getting upset that someone does not value our time versus their time. When it is someone, you do not know imposing on your time it is one thing, but what happens when it is someone you do know? Or someone you work with? 

How many times at work do you say the following? 

• That is an hour I will never get back. 
• That is another meeting that could have been an email 
• Why am I on this email? 
• Why do I get so many emails? 

By overloading your coworkers with emails and meetings you are not respecting their time. How many emails do you get that have dozens of people or groups attached? Every person on the email now needs to look to see if that email means anything to them. And of course, if you reply and reply to all (instead of just the two people who need the reply) you are making the whole list of people look at your reply. While many people are taught how to use email, many are not taught what good etiquette is. This could be for many reasons, but when email started there was no need for it, and as it exploded the unintended consequences of very inexpensive communication.  

As I sat in traffic wondering about the guy cutting in front, I started wondering where do I waste people who I likes time? Coworkers, friends, family all get a text, email, or other forms of communication from me, and by interrupting their flow is my time more important than theirs? One thing we should get out of the way, I have been taught that sending someone a message or a meme means that I am thinking of them. That they are important to me, and I want to connect. One of the first posts I wrote is my thoughts on communication where I explain the difference between synchronous and asynchronous communication. What I did not think about in that post was the impact on time.  

So, what do I do now? I think with many friends I will continue to send some means. I may think about timing and overload. At work, I started to think before replying to all of it. In many cases removing all groups and trying to identify the people who need to read it. Thus, respecting their time. The people who are left out may never know I saved them a second or two, but it is not about them, this is about me not being an asshole. Thanks to this one jerk in the Acura who every day on my way home from work cuts in to get on the parkway, I had to rethink how I communicate. And as an act of service to my friends, family, and coworkers I have become less of an asshole. 

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them.

My parents bought a time share in Lee Massachusetts so they would go away at least two weeks a year. One week was in the summer and one in the winter. The summer week was a perfect week, the last week of August where at Tanglewood the Boston Pops and the Boston Symphony would practice. It was a wonderful week of culture. The other week was early in March, and they would often trade it for another location. One year they exchanged it for a place in New Hampshire for skiing. 

That winter we packed the car up and took the long drive up. Our family is not big skiers, but we thought it might be fun. We were in a town in the middle of nowhere, and this was in the early 80s, so not much was built up at the time. Unfortunately, the weather was unseasonably warm, and there was extraordinarily little snow on the montains. To put it simply, they were all closed for skiing. 

We were up there for a week, and within a day we were bored out of our minds. My parents decided we should go into town and see if there was anything going on. It is a quaint small town with few shops. After going into a couple of shops we stumbled into a local hardware store. This was before the days of Home Depot, Lowes etc. With no superstore to get lost in we wandered up and down the aisles of the shop.  

My brother, sister and I saw this giant tray of dirt. Well for young kids it was big, it was four feet square. We were clueless, what was a tray of dirt doing inside a store? Eventually we found a sign that said, “whoever spots the first spud wins five dollars.” We just started laughing as we thought that was an expression. People in this small town are watching ‘grass grow.’ Not only are they watching, but they could also win a prize for watching grass grow.  

If you are reading this and are wondering why I would recant a story of something so dull? First, I told this story to a friend and told her that I wanted to one day use it in my blog, but more importantly, it is over thirty years ago, and I am still talking about something which seems insignificant but cannot be if I am talking about it. It was an experience that my parents attempted to give our family that failed. It turned into one of the most memorable vacations due to this one story.  

One can look at this and say, well the lesson learned is to make the best of a situation. I would say, yes, that is just part of it. To me the bigger lesson is to spend time with the people you love and enjoy experiences. From the travel hockey with my one daughter, to Miami to an F1 grand prix, to going to Disney dozens of times before my late wife and I had kids were all going to an experience where we could be in a moment together. When you pick a destination, make sure you are there in the moment, pretend it is days before being connected and find that small hardware store with a tray of dirt. The stories that will come about will be better than the meme you just forwarded. After Sheila passed, I found a new saying ‘No good story starts with I was home watching Netflix.’ Making sure I continue to follow it is a challenge. 

Is there scientific proof? Of course there is. In fact, there are a plethora of studies that not only show it but compare it to physical items. Logically my brain had always said an experience is fleeting that a physical good I use often. What happens is that something you have becomes ‘normalized’ it is no longer special. The experience gives you stories and thinking back at them still gives you pleasure. This is something I still stuggle, sometimes I try to combine the two. I bought myself a new pair of Hockey Skates, not to say I have them, but to enjoy playing. It is the fun and experience playing with a good group of guys is what I will tell stories about.  

As I said in the F1 trip story and a few others, take advantage of a good day and enjoy an experience.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them.

At the age of twelve I was having terrible headaches. After my parents struggling to figure out what was wrong, I was transferred to the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital where I was put into an MRI. This is 1979, and the MRI just invented a few years before, the local hospital in New Jersey did not have one. It showed a Subdermal Hematoma and was rushed into surgery. Thanks to Dr. Arnold Gold (not related) and surgeon Dr. Carmel I was lucky enough to survive.  

Eleven years earlier my late wife Sheila was born with a tracheoesophageal fistula and raced to the same hospital. At the time it was known as the baby’s hospital. Doctors performed complex surgery and were able to save her life. Fast forward to the early 1980s my sister was diagnosed with cancer, and again it was the same hospital that came to the rescue. While I could spend a good amount of time talking about these two, but my point is that the impact that the Columbia Presbyterian Hospital made on my family and me directly is incredible.  

Over the last two posts I described the impact my dad had on me and the success he achieved. Not to be left out of the discussion, my mom founded, and ran an adoption agency for handicapped and hard-to-place children. For her work, she was awarded by Bill Bradley Woman of the year. Looking back, living up to both, or even just one, would be rather difficult. My aptitude did not lean towards following them, so I chose something different.  

I was fortunate in my career to have a few mentors early in my career who gave me some good advice. One piece of advice that stuck was while working at a company make sure you take advantage of as many of the benefits that are available to you. Most people know about health benefits, retirement etc. But there are some that are less leveraged, the notion of companies matching donations and the ability to take time off to volunteer. I am not sure that is what he wanted to point out, but it was something I found. 

Understanding this I produced a simple thought. The best way to help a charity is to find a single charity that you are connected to and focus on that. Instead of donating insignificant amounts all over the place, it is to find a single charity and donate to it. Where I currently work each year, they ask for donations once a year, and give some matching percentage. I took full advantage of it. We also have ‘volunteer’ month where the firm wants you to take part in your community. Mentioned earlier this year, after a 5-year absence we were able return to the Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital and spend an afternoon doing arts and crafts. I have run a bunch of these, donating the supplies and rounding up people to help. I cannot thank the team enough at the Morgan Stanley Children’s hospital for working with me.  

The formula I found is one way you can make a difference. First find a charity that is close to you, and leverage what is available around you to enhance your impact. The notion of one allows you to understand the needs, build a relationship with the charity and meet a lot of great people. This is quite different from the path my parents chose. I still hope to make an impact. While editing this and rewriting this I kept thinking the ideas I wanted to surface may not be what I learned while writing it. Throwing that out, while reading this you should not walk away thinking these are the only ways to go. What you should take away is that you can find your own way to make an impact. That is what I did, I took lessons from my parents and others to discover who I am.  

Much of this blog is about lessons I learned over my life, the stories behind them and things I think about. In this case I learned while writing to get out my story. Wait, did I say the Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital and not the Columbian Presbyterian Hospital a few paragraphs ago? Yes, I did. Morgan Stanley donated more than $55 million to build the MSCH and donates ongoing to ensure all administrative costs are met. But it is the institution that saved my late wife, my sister and me.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them.

It is now two weeks after my father’s passing and I continue to look back at the lessons my dad taught me, as well as what we want to pass down to my children. In some podcasts I listen to, they talk about building ‘Generational Wealth.’ The goal, to build up enough assets to pass them down to your children. Building up an investment portfolio, real estate or business and leaving it to your heirs this gift is something that helps define success. There is a dopamine hit when you realize you can take care of someone once you are gone. Let us ignore the people who leave everything to their dogs. 

My dad and I discussed his will at length many times. He wanted to make sure certain people were taking care of after his death. Now that he has gone, I have noticed a few things that were not in his will that were more important than items in it. Now I get to reflect and see what he really passed down. 

In the hours after he passed there were a lot of decisions to be made, and with some of them they are no perfect answer. My sister and I were together and trying to figure it all out. She often said some of her thoughts aloud, and often I would agree or just give some other options and ideas. As we worked through decisions, I realized one of the best gifts he gave Heidi and me was the ability to discuss.  

We would talk things out without worrying about upsetting each other. We could bounce alternatives around and come to some options that we could execute. My sister and I have our share of differences, but we were able to just focus on the end goal. We both were thinking of what would be best for our mom, who was the most important person in my dad’s life. He would do anything for her, and she would for him. 

Another lesson I learned from my dad, and really both my parents, is watching a wonderful relationship until the end. I was fortunate to have some great relationships and it is because of the role models I had in them. My parents loved each other. Not to say they agreed all the time, but that was not the norm.  My dad did not want my mom to have to do anything. Even as ill as he was, he brought her breakfast in bed until he was no longer able. In wanting to do everything for each other, they also did not want to inconvenience the other.  

My mom had no patience in the ER, so my dad would let her stay at home and luckily my sister was around to take him. He really did not want my sister to be there also, but knew he needed help. It is something I took into my relationships also, caring about them is going beyond for them. In a good relationship giving effort is well effortless, and expecting nothing in return, in a great one your partner does the same for you. 

The other key thing that I inherited from my dad was the family name. As discussed heavily in last week’s post he had changed a lot and impacted many people. Most people who knew him or knew of him thought of him in a positive light. It is our duty to continue in that and try to leave this place just a little better than we found it.  

Generational Wealth in my family is more in the wealth of knowledge. It is knowing how to use your gifts you can impact people who may never know who you are, and the secret to a great relationship. These are things that no person, government, or entity can ever take from you. My dad has passed on the ability to have a great relationship with my siblings, my partner, and others. I hope I can pass these on to my children and it be treated as the best inheritance they could get.  

This opinion is mine, and mine only, my current or former employers have nothing to do with it. I do not write for any financial gain; I do not take advertising and any product company listed was not done for payment. But if you do like what I write you can donate to the charity I support (with my wife who passed away in 2017) Morgan Stanley’s Children’s Hospital or donate to your favorite charity. The fundraising site had to be restarted and NYP Hospital made changes to their donation sites. I pay to host my site out of my own pocket, my intention is to keep it free.  You are welcome to comment, but note it is moderated and all spam will be removed.

This Blog is a labor of love and was originally going to be a book. With the advent of being able to publish yourself on the web I chose this path. I will write many of these and not worry too much about grammar or spelling (I will try to come back later and fix it) but focus on content. I apologize in advance for my ADD as often topics may flip. I hope one day to turn this into a book and or a podcast, but for now it will remain a blog.  AI is not used in this writing other than using the web to find information. Images without notes are created using an AI tool that allows me to reuse them.