Spring Break

Well, I’ve pretty much heard from everyone I know that I’ve been negligent about writing my blog. Truth be told, I’ve been reluctant because I think everybody’s bombarded with all this self-serving stuff from “experts” on every conceivable business topic. Sure, I have opinions on business and certainly on the business that relates to my work…you know…the Staffing business…and the myriad of related topics having to do with people hiring people…but I’ve decided you deserve a break. I mean, the sun’s shining. Spring is in the air. And I swear I can hear the whir of the motors starting up at the Dairy Queen just down the street. So, today…it’s about other stuff meant strictly to give you respite from the drudgery of your daily work day grind.

Let me begin with what’s been most on my mind of late. The Road by Cormac McCarthy. This is a beautifully written, devastating, monumental literary achievement. Before I had gotten half-way through, it had replaced Ayn Rand’s The Fountainhead as my favorite novel of all time. Here’s a couple of quick reasons to show you why:
“He could remember everything of her save her scent. Seated in a theatre with her beside him leaning forward listening to the music. Gold scrollwork and sconces and the tall columnar folds of the drapes at either side of the stage. She held his hand in her lap and he could feel the tops of her stockings through the thin stuff of her summer dress. Freeze this frame. Now call down your dark and your cold and be damned.”
I read this and thought, whoa. How straight, how simple and poignant a picture.

And how about this?
“It took two days to cross that ashen scabland. The road beyond fell away on every side. It's snowing, the boy said. He looked at the sky. A single gray flake sifting down. He caught it in his hand and watched it expire there like the last host of christendom.”
“Ashen scabland”? “Like the last host of Christendom”? C’mon, that’s amazing stuff, no? You feelin’ it yet?

Or this?
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes. So, he whispered to the sleeping boy. I have you.” Somebody find something more beautifully written for me…someplace…anyplace, please.

So, here’s the thing. I know we all get caught up with American Idol, or 24, or The Good Wife; and we need to get away in the aftermath of the beat-down we’re getting during our work day, especially lately. And there’s no getting around the whole “spring cleaning” thing that sits on so many calendars. But wouldn’t it be a great way to kick off Spring, with the sun staying awake longer each day, and the sights and sounds of a more pleasant time that we grab a box of pretzels, an extra bottle of cold water and commit to a book?

It seems the more I talk to my friends, family and associates…as well as the people I bump into at work, no one has time to read anymore. Our lives are moving so fast. And, no don’t talk to me about audio books or the new Ipad stuff…it’s the touch of the page…reading a great book the way a great author intended…it’s a great legacy to pass on to our kids…a generation starved for direction and unknowingly in search of a saner field of promise. For something real.

Oh, and yeah…grab one of those DQ’s for yourself and the family while you’re at it. Happy Spring everybody…it’s up to each of us to move it forward.