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For Days 4-6 , I am giving thanks to some externalities that shape everything about me.  My family and I have extreme gratitude about the following: Day 4: Gratitude to be a citizen of the United States of America Day 5: Gratitude to be from the Great State of Texas Day 6: Gratitude for Amarillo   Day 4: Proud to be an American My parents came to the United States in the 1970s legally.   My father came as a Master Degree’s student and found a job.   My mother came as his spouse.   They embraced my parents, showed them what is possible and set them on a course of living the American Dream for decades.   Much of our belief and faith in the future comes from seeing the promise of America over and over again.   My parents lived the American Dream – many people have been employed by their businesses, many buildings have been built, thousands of corporate taxes submitted. My brother fought for America in Operation Enduring Freedom. My spo...

For Day 3 gratitude, I wanted to express gratitude for something abstract.  And that is for memories.  I have been blessed over and over again in my life, from my family to the great teachers previously written about to the friends and colleagues that I will write about it.  Last night, I had a chance to reminisce with two friends.   We relived memories about first meeting, surviving and thriving during Hurricane Sandy (we had it pretty easy by all comparisons), work, life, family, children, politics, history, books, television shows and much more.   The chance to remember, to recall great memories is like going through that experience a second time.   I am thankful for my memories. Alzheimer's disease , in my opinion, is the worst of all diseases.   It allows the memories to remain but without context or recognition of time – when the memory occurred versus right now versus other moments of time.   Every few years, we hear about medical bre...

In my second day of gratitude, I would like to stick with showing gratitude towards some of my high school teachers.   I have once again not included names for privacy purposes.   I loved my time at Amarillo High School – attribution goes to my fellow students and the wonderful teachers.   In the interest of space and time, I will list out only a few that I am especially grateful for: 11 th Grade American History Teacher : History came to life through brilliant lessons and deep discussions / knowledge.   Success measured by all students being engaged, and many many students passing the AP American History exam.   If you know me, I love American History and can trace it back to this specific class. 11 th Grade English Teacher : This teacher taught multiple classes.   And all the students in those classes would read typically 25-50 pages each night for 9 months.   Vivid discussions, use of multi-media – in the 1990s no less.   Created portfoli...

I have seen multiple social media advertisements about taking a ‘gratitude journey’ in December.   In this, you journal / write something that you have much appreciation and thanks for in your life.   I am accepting this journey.   For me, I feel very blessed for the family and friends that I have.   I will focus on the later – the friends, acquaintances, colleagues; past and present; that are in my life*.   Each day, I will select someone different and write about them.   I will use a pseudonym for the person to protect individual identity.   If you read something and it sounds like you, it may very well be you. *** The first person is actually two people.   I honored them both during a ceremony 30 years ago as a high school senior.   It was two teachers who taught me fundamental lessons and shaped my life in ways that seemed unimaginable when I was in 6 th grade.** The first teacher was a gym coach who always pushed me to work hard. ...

This is Thanksgiving week in the United States.  One of the most iconic Thanksgiving events occurs here in New York City – The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.  Every year, people line up hours ahead of the parade to watch giant balloons, student bands, performers walk down the street and celebrate all that is great and good in the world. As an extension, people can go to the Upper West Side the day before and watch these massive balloons fill up with air or attend VIP events that provide covered spaces with refreshments in which to watch the parade.   There are street hustlers selling various Thanksgiving and holiday merchandise.   This is the celebration of thanks as much as the initiation into the holiday season. As someone that is nearing 30 years in New York next year, it is always exciting to watch all the festivities.   And it is even more exciting to watch all the families that come to New York.   Some may have people participating in the parad...

Sorry for the rather large gap in posting.  I recently started a new career opportunity, and it has been a wonderful experience to start.  But also, hard since it has been over 20 years since I last started something new. *** My hometown amusement park is now up for sale .   Even though I do not live in Amarillo anymore, I am somewhat saddened thinking about the possibility of an Amarillo without Wonderland Park . Wonderland Park is the perfect amusement park.   It has roller coasters, a haunted mansion ride, children’s rides, water rides, arcades, and amusement park foods.   Families could come together. Their high school kids would run off to meet their friends to the Texas Tornado or the Big Splash Log Flume. Parents would take their toddlers to the merry-go-round or train.   Or if a family wanted to stay together, they could play a round of miniature golf.   For my generation, the annual visit to Wonderland Park was the highlight of the sum...

I am sorry for the delay in posting anything new.  It continues to be a crazy and wild world out there, but also one that is full of excitement, energy, and potential.  Underlying all of that are three fundamental rocks of our society: faith, family, and friendships. I wanted to briefly talk about the last one on this list - friendships .  I have been blessed and continue to blessed with great friends in life.  They constantly show up in ways that are beyond imagination and I think the world is a better place because of these individuals, I know my world is. There is a new show that opened on Broadway -  Art .  I have not seen this iteration of the show but I did see the late 1990s version that stared Alfred Molina, Victor Garba, and Alan Alda - legends.   It was fantastic and brilliant and the first non-musical Broadway production I saw.   The show centers around 3 friends and their conversations about life, friendships, and art after one of...

Earlier this month, I celebrated my birthday.  I am significantly closer to 50 than 40 and closer to 60 than 30, 70 than 20, etc.  I don't mind aging - both inevitable and not necessarily a factor in happiness. One of the things that I love about birthdays is the outreach done by acquaintances - friends from childhood, distant relatives, former co-workers, etc. - to wish you a happy birthday.  Many of those are done on social media given the birthday reminders.  Nonetheless, someone still takes a few seconds to wish you a happy birthday and, I think, are generally sincere.  I always pick a few that I will then call or email or message and re-acquaint with them. This year, as a little experiment, I removed my birthday from my social media accounts.  It did remain on LinkedIn by accident.  Just wanted to see who all were just using social media as reminders versus knew or had some other tracking mechanism for birthdays. The results were a significant , a...

I have spent the last few weeks visiting family in Kansas.  It is a bit of a different pace of life down there than New York City's midtown area.  Not bad, not better - just different.  It leads me to the point of this post - two things are not better or worse than the other one because they are different . Two people can view the world differently.  Does not mean one person is better than another.  Nor more accurate.  Nor less accurate.  Nor more optimistic.  Nor more pessimistic.  And if we were able to measure it, I bet the most accurate view would be somewhere in between.  If we were able to measure it... What about people.  Two people are inherently different.  If they seem the same, then we are not asking the right questions or acknowledging the uniqueness of each individual.  We should cherish what makes us unique, honor that what makes your fellow person standout.  Value differences.  We often need all ty...

This is a follow-up on an earlier post about Readers Digest .  One of the articles in the July issue was called The Story Behind the Story  (this is a link to the online article).   I have thought about this article often since reading it last month.  There are several things that I appreciate and value about the article. First, many media sources have taken an aggressive stance to defend their news-worthiness.  There are comments like 'we are professionals', 'we don't push opinions', 'we have fact finders', etc.  Instead of listening to concerns that people have, their tone and approach is to attack people for having those concerns.  The simple fact is that more and more people are questioning their news sources and thus feeds the saying 'perception is reality'. Instead of attacking, Readers Digest decided to dive into their process and what they do to present all sides of an article or news story.  They break it down into four sections - la...

Yesterday, I flew Southwest from New York to the Midwest.  Southwest Airlines is currently under a lot of scrutiny for making changes that aligns their operations and experiences to other airlines - seat selection and charging for bags. As an observation , it has been a while since Southwest has had low fare airlines.  It seems like on similar routes, they are almost always more expensive that American Airlines or United Airlines.  It is worth noting that the difference is often greater than the price of checking two bags.  However, the miles redemption is almost always lower on Southwest than other airlines.  And if you have a Companion Pass*, then it will definitely be cheaper than other airlines for two tickets.  This is my observation from looking at tickets over the past 3 years - I have not done research or seen statistics to support or counter this observation. One of the things which Southwest is undeniably better at is turning planes around at airp...

I recently received one of those offers to subscribe to a magazine for only $2 for a short period of time.  I like to use this as a chance to learn/see/understand an area or world different than my own.  For a couple of dollars and a short-time commitment, almost a no-brainer.  When I got the latest offer, I decided to subscribe to Readers Digest .  My family use to receive that when I was a child and would flip through it. I remember seeing the magazine in the mail and can picture them around the house, although I admit that I have little-to-no memories of reading the periodical. For those not familiar with Readers Digest, it is described on Wikipedia as a 'general interest family magazine'.  Each issue covers a variety of different topics and as short content sections as well that is standard in each issue.  While many people think of Readers Digest as being for an older generation, it is one of the most read periodicals in the United States year-after-ye...

Over the past weekend, I celebrated my birthday - my last year saying I am closer to 45 than to 50.  It was a blast with activities that don't happen that often.  Had yummy biscuits and gravy in the morning, followed by visiting the American Dream waterpark and then Medieval Times .  Yes, those activities are more likely targeted to people that are either 4 or 7, not 47.  But it is a birthday and time to celebrate and not worry about social norms. I continue to be blessed with a great family and friends.  Many kind wishes.  Intentionally, I removed my birthday from social media sources like Facebook and Instagram.  I somehow forgot to remove it from LinkedIn, so there were some nice messages there.  And then of course, text messages and phone calls and emails.   I am truly humbled by the outreach from folks and feel really blessed.  Life is tough and hard right now and for people to remember it and take time out of there day - mean...

Happy August 1st! This month, I am going to try some new things to help with physical and mental health .  Thought I would share a few of them with you all.  We can see how I did and what results were achieved over the course of the month.  Essentially, any reader of this blog (if there are any) are now my accountability partner . Social media is becoming vicious.  Even outside of politics, it is tough.  As an example...I posted on a DC Comics board about not wanting the James Gunn movies to go crazy with the multiverse.  There was only a couple of responses to my post but tons of DMs that told me I was wrong.  My political views are well known and I get equal amounts of love and hate for those.  So, I am going to limit social media to just a few times a day and only between 9am and 7pm .   Going to read and listen to more diverse news sources.  The goal is to listen to 10 new news sources at least for 5 days.   Let's see what ...

Yesterday evening, a deranged individual walked into an office building on Park Avenue in New York City with a weapon and killed multiple people and injured more.  I know there will be lots of diagnosis and research into what happened and what could have or should have happened. Here are a few preliminary thoughts from me.   I think CTE is real and scary.  I suspect that we will see the end of football in our lifetime.  Or at least a significant change to the game that reduces head injuries. I don't know what caused the person to do what he did.  Not sure we will ever know fully why.  But I suspect that there will have been signs of him reaching out for help.  We have to figure out how to better identify and support those asking for help.   That may be one of the most important things we need to figure out as a society. As a profession, law enforcement should be viewed in the eyes of the sacrifices made by individuals - including the person t...

Earlier this week and again yesterday, I had the opportunity to spend time at the Metropolitan Museum of Art .  It really is a remarkable place - beautifully designed and just impressive.   Every time I go through a museum, I wonder what will be remembered from our generation.  (Would then even have a physical museum or will it all be virtual - maybe even virtual reality?)  What everyday things in a household would people look at in a thousand years? What statues would continue to exist?   I hope the things that remain showcase our humanity and love for each other, not just instruments of weapons and dehumanization (e.g., furniture from corporate board rooms).  Lots of good literature to remain - not obvious of future generations that will decide what to preserve and what not to.   I have to admit though, as wonderful as it is inside, the tree-lined walkway in front of the museum may be equally impressive.  The trees provide shade a...

I took most of Wednesday and yesterday off from posting.  A young person tragically lost his life and the memorial service was yesterday.  It was and will continue to be sad for a while.  My heart goes to the family. I know these are cliches...   HUG YOUR LOVED ONES.   TELL THEM I LOVE YOU. Perhaps the only thing I know in life is that you can never do those two things enough.

Going to skip posting much today - lost a family member over the weekend and it is hitting everyone hard.   Hug your family, talk to your parents and children, and say I love you .

I was asked today about some of my past implementation experiences and some common struggles.  Many of the major, potential-stoppage-type issues came from one thing - communication .  Or more accurately, a lack of communication . In today's world, people know about transformations, programs, policy changes, and projects before they begin.  People are forming opinions - it will solve ALL my problems  or it will create endless problems for me .  In reality, neither are true and the truth lies in between those sentiments.   Communication programs start with the goal of building 'awareness'.  But people are already aware and with the limited information provided, already formed opinions.  My recommendation is simple - communicate as early as possible with as many details as possible.  People can handle it.  And it starts  to build 'accurate awareness' of the changes.   And if you can, let people have a mechanism to prov...

  Tuesday is a new day of the week.  Yesterday, I did a F45 workout (strongly recommend this for strength training and love the rapid pace), ate great meals and slept 8 hours.  A healthy start to the week. In my younger days, I would frequently meet up with friends on Monday night - kick off the week right and share in the pains of the " Monday ".  If the night got away from us and became a midnight, 1am, 2am, later night, you never caught up in your rest and sleep until the end of the week. Lesson: Secret of a good week starts with a good Monday.

Like many public service organizations and community centers, the New York Public Library  is continuously facing budget constraints.  (Although, the current proposed budget does have a funding increase for the NYPL to open on Sundays*.)  I have been visiting my local Hells Kitchen branch ( Columbus Library ) for over two years, and when I go during the day, I have noticed that the library goes into energy conservation mode.  They dim the lights in areas that are not used and even turn off the air conditioning.  I don't know if all branches do this or what the culminated savings are, but it is impressive that they are doing everything they can to maximize their dollars (plus be good environmental stewards).  Applaud their efforts and their attempts to control their own future.  #smallthingsmatter Separately, I would also call out that the NYPL have many many resources available that folks may not even think about.  A non-exhaustive list includes: ...

Good morning / afternoon / evening / night  to any and all followers.   THANK YOU for coming to by website. In the past, I have stated that I will begin to post more often only to stop after a few posts.  So this is my next attempt at posting my thoughts and experiences.  And will include links that may be helpful to you  as you navigate this amazingly beautiful, albeit crazy-at-times, world.  Some posts and links will be humorous, some intense, and some deeply personal.