Dinner with Dad...

OK so I am currently doing about 4 different things. I am trying to download some podcasts, I am copying some OLD CDs to my iPod I have meant to get in there as "gym music" (Christina Aguilera, if you were wondering), I'm sorting iPod entries and...........I am blogging! Oh, how ME.

So tonight, I went out with my Dad. He's great. At over 70, he's in the middle of "re-inventing" himself. He has been a doctor since he was in his 20s -- retired when medical insurance basically was eating him alive (did you realize of that $10 co-pay you pay, the doc doesn't even get THAT? Criminal!)...though he didn't really want to...and now he's trying to be an expert witness (on medical cases).

I love my dad, because whatever I do, he thinks it's great. I love my mom too -- but since she married dad (at what, 23?) she has kinda lead a charmed life (though of course she would not say that). She has always been "protected" by my pops...so she has built up a very VERY successful PR practice, but never had to "work for a living" in reality. (OK, she did, when she was a nurse back in New York, but hello, that was 50 years ago.)

Dad really "understands." He's totally had his hard knocks, and so you have to kinda talk about what you're doing obliquely....especially if (cough cough) you're really trying to give up a successful law practice to (cough cough cough) train Bond Grrls.

He loved it.

YIPPEE!!!!

So these are the things that Dad came up with, to "share back at" me:

1. My Last Job. At my last job, which started in 1999 (it was a dot.com job, so it "dot.bombed" in 2002 when my position was eliminated with about 200 others'), my dad reminded me of the "New Age test" that was given to all the high-level executives. There were about a dozen of us -- and during that test, they asked all sorts of questions (ah, the 90s). When the gal came to "interpret" the results, she singled me out particularly (HOW EMBARRASSING)! This was a company of "rock stars" -- a bunch of people who "really know what they were doing" -- bigtime entrepreneurs that envisioned themselves on the front of Newsweek and Inc magazine (and who might have gotten there, if they'd started the company about 1/2 year earlier, before The Crash). This gal had all these charts and graphs, based on some Very Expensive tests that she had administered to us. And this is what she said (as "reminded to me" by my dad)....

I was the only "Indian" of the group. What she told the whole gang of executives was that EVERY SINGLE ONE of them was a "Chief" personality -- that I was the only "Indian" of the gang. That I was the only one who would pick up all the balls that were being juggled (and dropped); that I would be the only one to "make things happen." She told them that if they didn't take care of me, that I was going to have a heart attack -- that they all had "grand ideas," but had to way of putting them into action. She told them that my personality was to want to "get those ideas to work" -- that I was the "perfect" "team player" and the one to "carry the ball to the goal line" (not to be the quarterback)...but (at that time) I was being forced simultaneously to "be like them" (e.g, "lead my team," etc.) but ALSO to do what came naturally -- e.g., pick up all the balls they were dropping and (to use the Dr Christmas Jones analogy) keep diving down in the cold, dark water to be sure I was there when they needed the submarine hatch door opened back up!

This company is still around (so I can't mention its name) -- and in fact, they are still my client (and my James works there -- that is where we met). But I think one of the big issues with the company is that there was this problem -- too many "Jameses" and not enough "Bond Grrls." I was fantastic at what I did (running the Legal Department) and I was fantastic at "supporting" all those chiefs. The problem is -- that you can really only have so many chiefs (at those expensive Chief Salaries), and you gotta have a LOT of "Indians." Dad reminded me of this -- said that the Bond Grrl analogy really reminded him of that time in my life. And how one of the most important things that I did at that job was to just keep making sure that people (like my James) had a cup of tea...had support...had Legal when they needed it...but definitely had an Audience for what they were doing. Was there, in short, to open that submarine door when they needed it, and dry them off.

Good analogy, Dad.

Another story that Dad told me was one that his favorite brother (who passed away from cancer when he was very very young -- in his 40s) told to him. It is sort of a "joke," but it goes like this:

A guy wanders into a Navy SEAL bar, and sits down at the bar next to a guy who is obviously One Of Them. After a bit of small talk, he finally gets up the "guts" to ask the guy what he does for the SEALs. The SEAL says "I'm the 6th Man." (In basketball, don't forget, it's a 5 man team....dad uses basketball analogies, just in case you're lost here (smile). The "6th man" is usually what the fans are called, the "integral person who's not really on the team but is still an important part of it"...hard to explain.) The other guy is puzzled, he says "What do you mean you're the 6th Man?" The SEAL says "Well, we have Dan, that's the crack sharpshooter of the outfit. He can shoot anything from so far away that you can't even see it. Then we have Jimmy, who is our bomb expert. He can just about smell a bomb from 50 yards, and is so fast that he can diffuse it before you even know what's going on. Then, we have Joe, who's our cyphers expert. He can crack any code that the enemy can throw at us. And Bob, he's our strategy expert. He can figure out what the enemy thought, almost before the enemy even thinks it. And Alan, he's our 'black ops' guy -- he does what needs to be done, we don't ask too many questions, but when Alan is done, it's done, say no more." The SEAL takes a sip of beer. The other guy says to him "Well, if you're the 6th man...well, what do you do then?" "Oh," says the SEAL, "I just drive the boat that gets them there, and pick them up when they're done."

As my dad pointed out (in telling this joke/story) -- though the guy in the boat is the "6th Man" -- he's not on the "Op," he doesn't have the "sexy job"...WHO is really the most important guy of the whole deal?

How Bond Grrl is that?

My Dad's so great. He said he knows a guy who knows Pierce Brosnan -- or, at least, brags about it all the time (the guy actually is the lawyer that got Patty Hearst off, when the first lawyer messed up -- I don't know much about that stuff, but I do know his name). Dad said he'd give him a ring tomorrow, to see if he just "brags on" Pierce, or whether he "really knows" him. I was mentioning what would be great is to get the book written, and then "self-publish" 20 or 30 copies, and get them to folks that could review and give me comments. He mentioned the Pierce connection. We'll see...how great would that be?

OK, back to listening to old, old CDs and copying them to my iPod (it's Elton John, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road now -- how old is THAT???)

Solitaire