During our lunch meeting at work, Kevin our supervisor asked me what I have learned during my long career. We had gotten takeout and most of the staff members were gathered around the conference table eating our salads, pizza or sandwiches. The question made me think back to something we talked about at our UU church yesterday: write a letter of apology to yourself for something you did to someone else. At the time, I could not think of anything I was sorry of.
So, what wisdom could I impart to this group of colleagues and friends now I am a month from retiring? I could not leave them hanging, like I did in church, or really haven’t learned anything in life.
After a few seconds it dawned on me: mellow out, compromise. I have mellowed out over time. As I described to the gang, I have always devoted 100% the company, organization, and colleagues I worked for and with. This devotion was sometimes to a fault. The fault was that I would not compromise. I used two examples that I told to my colleagues, which I’ll recount here.
I entered required military draft in 1976. When my wife graduated in the US in 1977, she moved to the Netherlands to be with me; however, to be allowed to live there we had to get married. In addition, marriage allowed me to live off base and tripled my salary. We were able to rent a mobile home near the barracks and we moved in. The guys in the group I was working in (mostly career soldiers) started making fun of me before we got married and making crude jokes like: “Don’t come knocking, when the trailer is rocking,” and this was a mild one. Instead of taking this in jest, I got pissed and after extensive teasing I blew up. This got so bad that the Army asked me to file for Section 8 (or insanity). I refused, partially because I knew I wasn’t insane and because I wasn’t looking for a compromise. I threated to kill them. Eventually the solution was to make me the base photographer for my remaining time. I was the only private first class with a private office and free to roam the base to take photographs. It helped that I was the leader in the photography hobby club. Compromise might have been OK and gotten me out early.
The other example I used took me back to Uganda. My first job out of the Army. If you are a regular reader, you would know I worked there as a farm manager for a leprosy center in 1978 and 79. This was at the end of the reign of one of the most ruthless dictators Idi Amin. We stayed in the country during the civil war that ousted him. Right after our liberation one of my friends and top assistant, a local young Ugandan man went crazy and tried to attack all the white (European) staff at the center except me and my wife. The rumor went around the entire hospital that I sent him. It was known that I had quarrels with the European medical superintendent and the European hospital administrator because they were funneling profits from the farm to pay for the hospital expenses. I understood that this was one of the reasons the farm was there; however, in my mind they were taking too much. It seemed that everyone in the hospital knew of the issue and when the guy stated running around with a machete trying to kill all the white folks, rumors started flying. This made it impossible for me to maintain my position at the center and I had to return home. Of course, I did not send him, and had I taken a less public, less strong stand, the rumor might not have started, and I would have been allowed to stay.
These two examples are among a few where a harsh or hard stand had some interesting results. I can mention many more. Finally, in 2002 after two quick consecutive layoffs and a minor bout of depression I decided to go for a few counseling sessions and it was there, by talking with a complete stranger, that I finally became to understand that a strong, hardline opinion might not always be the best, especially if you express it and put your foot down. Lessons learned.
When Kevin asked me, it took me a few seconds to figure out what I had learned in the course of my career. The day before my wife and I were listening to a radio show where they were talking about the term: “That’s a great question.” My wife commented that it was such an overused meaningless sentence. But I had to contradict her, I told her that as an instructor it gives me just enough time to consider the question and come up with an answer. Then came the answer over the radio and they answered it the same way as I told my wife. The question from Kevin was such a good question that needed a few milliseconds of thought to come up with the answer. That was a great question, Kevin!
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