Rhino Ramblings

As I often do, I bounced back and forth over the topic for this blog.  I want to write about loss. But I think I best save that for Jan. when one of those losses will be more relevant (how’s that for a teaser?).  As I set off on my first international travel since the before times, I thought I would focus on parts of my journey as they relate to the upcoming trip to Denmark and Scotland (first time I have been to either).  It is a professional trip as I will be in an all-day meeting in Copenhagen (my main focus in this blog) followed by a weeklong conference in Edinburgh.  There will be time on the weekend for some personal fun as I will be on a golf tour that includes a walk on St Andrews Old Course 18th hole followed by a game at the Torrance golf course.  Up until last week, there was an uncertainty of my ability to take the trip as my passport renewal was stuck at the State Dept.  While I personally am looking forward to the trip itself and the golf tour/game, what I was most concerned with missing is the meeting in Denmark.  I somehow convinced the Chief Technical Officer of a major IT company to have himself and several of his staff spend a day meeting with me and some of my staff.  The topic is essentially visual navigation of information rich websites, forms and applications.  It is a concept for which I have lots of thoughts and visions.  But that topic is not what this blog is about (maybe in the future…).  It is the journey that I am fascinated by.  How did I end up having a meeting with a CTO (a similar thought from a few years back when I met with the Japanese Space Agency Deputy Administrator and sat down for a 15 minute chat with the Japanese Interior Minister).  One of the “loss” topics I will get back to relates to my mentor Mary desJardins.  In Dec 1977 I was led to a windowless, non-descript office and was introduced to Mary.  I knew nothing about computers, programming or meteorology – and I was expected to write programs for meteorologists to access satellite and other data. While my journey predates this, it was certainly a cosmic event (NASA  .. cosmic – you get the connection) that has informed my entire journey.  Since then I have had plenty of path clearing moments of success and affirmation and also an equal if not greater number of roadblocks, many of my own construction.  I keep chugging along and then find myself in positions way above my personal “pay scale” –like the Denmark or Japan meetings.  I often am confused as to why I deserve any affirmations when I consider all the roadblocks – including self-doubt, lack of determined focus (aah – a term I’d love to go off an write about as I think it fits me exactly), inability to communicate the jumble of my mind, an uncertainty that anything I do is really new, unique, or worth pursuing, etc, etc, etc  (Please do not send me notes about how none of that is true – it is but I also realize the balancing good points I have to offer.)  This is not a self-flagellation blog.  I do, however, wonder if these roadblocks are necessary to create detours (let’s see how long I can keep this analogy running its course, so to say) that have made the 45 years of professional life (and of course now 65 of personal) a journey of growth and self-understanding and also other-understanding.  Questioning why I should have the opportunity to spend a day sharing ideas with a CTO is only crippling if it keeps me from being in the meeting or being totally lost when it occurs.  Neither will happen and it is something I am really excited about.  I can leave my self-doubts on the roadside like excess baggage and can U-turn to pick them up again later.   This all relates to what I say when going to a meeting or presentation, or an interview, or writing a blog:  “I have no clue what I am going to say, but I, at least, am interested in finding out what it will be”.  Perhaps part of the reason for the successes I have had in life is that I can carry along the doubt while pursuing whatever endpoint is ahead of me. Thank you for following me through this blog’s journey.