It Has Been A While …
The world has evolved, podcasts have come, podcast has been recorded, and they are a blast, but I was ready to write again. It’s been a while.
I wrote a ton to get the two books completed, both deepKnowledge and deeperKnowledge. But after taking a keyboard break following the release of the first one, and hosting the Straight Outta Crumpton podcast only for a while, I am back on the keyboard … It feels right, now.
Words Matter, Actions Matter More
1990 or so … I know that seems like an eternity ago, if in fact you even remember it, from not being around or just from the blaze and blur since then. But I remember several things around that time in my life, one of them I will expose upon here.
As young late twenties-something HVAC technician I drove an incredible number of miles in and around my hometown, Atlanta, GA. I-20, I-75, I-85, I-285, and many more routes that were just part of my normal coursing throughout the city. Driving was a privilege for me. I realized that for a brief time when the Dept of Motor Vehicles decided I didn’t have the right to drive due to some poor choices, but I had recovered from that snafu and was working on my driving talents to ensure I wouldn’t be without a license, ever again.
Having this bit of information now in your head you can understand my total shock when I received a letter from our office manager, Ms. Susie Matthews, letting me know that someone had called into the office and reported my driving … IN A GOOD WAY.
That’s right.
A lady, that chose to stay anonymous, had reported following me for the better part of a 45-minute commute early one morning and was actually calling to say that “It was nice to see a company vehicle with logo, numbers, the company name, and all the details listed, driving so courteously”.
The letter went on to say that “they,” meaning the office folks, were pleased to receive the call, and they were saying “Thank You” and giving me a $25.00 check for the nice effort. OK, that was cool and no, I am not taking you on this little journey to brag on my driving skills. I am strapping you into the passenger seat of that service truck I drove so you can understand that ACTION wins. I am still talking and now writing about this damn near 30 years after it happened.
OK, so what happened?
Several things had to line up that morning to make this worth telling. None of them special … Well, maybe one at the end. OK, first, I drove like a decent human. Perhaps I used my turn signals, stayed somewhere around the speed limit, and obviously didn’t cut off anyone, at least not our special lady that made the call anyway. Then the lady took her time to note that I wasn’t a complete moron behind the wheel, she made a note of the company name, the phone number, and no, there was no website then, and then walked into her office or home after she parked ger car. After that she phoned the company, asked for the manager of the person driving the truck with tag # xxx-xxxx, waited on hold, I would imagine, and then actually told Susie the story.
Susie then had to decipher all that, look up the tag number, talk to her boss about it, write a letter, mail it to my house, and all that after having to call the payroll folks and get them to cut me a $25.00 “Bonus” check. Imagine, all that for simply driving as I should have … BUT THEY DID IT.
They Acted. They Moved. They followed through with a thought. We all can do more.
That is my point, we all know we should do stuff … Lots of stuff, but we are too complacent, in many cases, to act upon our intentions or things we know that we should do.
Until next time, stay gesticulative in all your works.
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