What One Lives For--Joseph Conrad

 From Joseph Conrad

"What one lives for may be uncertain; how one lives is not. Man should live nobly though he does not see any practical reason for it, simply because in the mysterious, inexplicable mixture of beauty and ugliness, (and) virtue and baseness in which he finds himself, he must want to be on the side of the virtuous and the beautiful."

I offer one caveat to this inspiring quotation-- an important one. Personally, I have found there are "practical reasons" for trying to live nobly. Doing so earns the respect and trust, not of everyone but of many including those whose trust and friendship we most value. And,  if nothing else, doing so let's us sleep better at night. 

Whither Ukraine?

 

Whither Ukraine?

This is such a maddening and perplexing issue to me.  

Here I am on the outside, having read a huge amount of Russian history and a fair amount of Ukrainian history, too. Having come to know and appreciate a good number of Russian men and women whom I respect.  

Here we are with lots of smart, “well-meaning” people around the table, trying to reach a peaceful solution that has  staying power, not a temporary Band-Aid, which is what we have had for at least the past seven years and which has not stopped the bleeding. 

My thoughts start with the people of Ukraine and the nation of Ukraine.  What is right for them?  How can this suffering be stopped?  The uncertainty reduced? My thoughts continue with asking what is in the interest of Russia, the Russian people, and the people in the West? You know what they all want more than anything? It is Peace ...Peace in their lives.

 

You ask yourself:  Who really needs Ukraine, other than Ukrainians?  Russia doesn't’t need it.  Yes, they need to be assured that there isn’t a competitive force like NATO there on their borders, threatening them.  They need to know that the relationship of Ukraine with Russia will be strong, economically, socially, as it has been for much of history.  But they don’t need the land; they don’t need the economic resources.  They need access to them, yes, just like they need access to resources in Germany and many other countries, but not in an exclusive sense. 

 

NATO doesn't’need Ukraine.  To the contrary, it’s the last thing it needs.  It can’t and wouldn't defend Ukraine.  Ukraine wouldn’t be ready for NATO even if it were right for them to join.  They have their own huge issues to deal with and they need support and not competition among contending nations to resolve them. 

The U.S. doesn't’ need Ukraine.  It’s thousands of miles from us.  We have virtually no dependency or relationship with it economically. And, heaven knows, we have an abundance of our own issues at this moment. 

 

The Russian people don’t want a war with Ukraine.  Yes, they are proud and patriotic and they want to see Russia be respected as a nation.  But the last thing the great majority of Russian people want is to see their soldiers mired in Ukraine, as they were for a decade in Afghanistan, and their economy, already challenged, torn further apart because of sanctions that would follow Russia’s incursion into Ukraine. 

 

There is a big issue, there is no hiding from it.  The majority of the people in the Donbas and Luhansk region have a strong and historically rooted cultural attachment to Russia.  If a plebiscite were held today,  they might well vote to join Russia.  But that doesn't’ have to happen to resolve the issue.  It isn't the right way to resolve it.

While not fully comparable, we have the example of French-speaking Quebec, where a different language and way of life is honored, including by providing certain identified decision-making rights and autonomy that accrue to that region.  Spain has lived, not comfortably admittedly, but without war with Catalonia which has its own language and cultural norms.

 

What has to happen for a solution to be reached?  I’m no diplomatic guru. What I suggest below is flawed and incomplete. But it seems to me, from everything I’ve learned, there are a few things to be considered.

 

Discussions to implement the Minsk II accord, this time with the participation of the U.S., need to resume. It seems to me the provisions of this accord include the key elements to achieve a lasting peaceful settlement. They need to provide for the right degree of autonomy for the Donbas and Luhansk regions. There  needs to be agreement that Ukraine will not be the site of armed forces for any nation other than Ukraine which pose or appear to pose a threat to a neighboring nation.  That is, NATO will not put weapons into Ukraine. At the same time, Russia will remove its troops and military equipment at its border with Ukraine and will not threaten its sovereignty in any other way. We resolved the Cuban Missile crisis in much this way and avoided what could have been WW III. The Soviet Union withdrew its missiles and troops. NATO withdrew its missiles from Turkey which the Soviet Union had seen as a dagger point at its heartland.

 

The attitude toward Ukraine should be:  “Live and let live.” 

 

Allow Ukraine to develop economic and diplomatic relationships with Russia and the West and whichever other countries they want to. 

 

To achieve an agreement of this type, there will need to be the creation of mutual trust and a commitment to achieve the common goal of a peaceful and independent Ukraine free of the impact of intervention by contending forces. This will not be easy. The last seven years of fruitless discussions show that. But the crisis in front of us demands we try. The alternatives are grossly unacceptable. 

 

I hope and pray this will be the outcome.  Anything else is crazy and counter to the interest of every party. 

 

There have been parallels drawn between our (the U.S.) being involved in Ukraine to our becoming involved in Vietnam.  The argument there is that what happens in Ukraine is not in our national interest any more than it was in our interest to embark on the ten-year war in Vietnam. I don’t agree with that analogy.  I think a peaceful resolution of this boiling issue is both in our interest and in the world’s interest.

 

In shades that make me shudder, however, I see in all this many elements which led up to World War I.  Conflagration in a small part of the world, in that case Serbia, leading to a catastrophic war which resulted in over 20 million deaths.  Countries went to war, one by one, which really didn’t want to go to war.  It all happened as dominoes fell. One thing followed another.

 

We dare not allow that to happen now. Especially in this nuclear age.

 

 "If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony is if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too." 

Somerset Maugham, 1941. As relevant and poignant today as 80 years ago.  

To which I would append,

Freedom means freedom and opportunity for all. And with freedom --indeed  making freedom possible--comes responsibility. 

A Trip of A Lifetime with My Son, John--As Recorded by Him--Too Precious Not to Share

 

Zen and the Art of Changing a Windshield Wiper

BY  JOHN PEPPER · PUBLISHED  JANUARY 6, 2022  · UPDATED  JANUARY 7, 2022

They tell us to enjoy the journey, not to focus solely on the destination. For too many years of my life, despite having heard that advice and even believing it, I wasn’t able to pull it off. I was always looking for more, for better, for what lay ahead. Unknowingly dismissing what was happening in the moment as not good enough or worthy of gratitude.

A few weeks ago, my 83-year old Dad and I took a 3-day road trip from Cincinnati to Vero Beach, Florida. Our tangible objective was to safely transport my mom’s 2000 VW Bug to its new home where my parents and our family gather at times during winter months. It wasn’t being used in Cincinnati, and instead of selling it or giving it away, we decided to make a journey out of it.

OK – so attempting to compare our trek in a red bug to Robert Pirsig’s epic Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance might be a stretch. However, in the days leading up to our departure we nearly canceled our plans not less than three times. Who has time to sit in a car for 3 days? What about work, kids, commitments, and wouldn’t we see each other on the beach a few days later anyway? I knew I would end up doing all the driving… and also figured Dad would be asleep within minutes. But somehow we kept it on the books. Too often, when we face something that isn’t productive in the eyes of today’s fast-moving, success-at-all-costs society, it’s easy to fall into the trap of moving such distractions aside. This one would have been an easy discard; hire a guy to drive the bug to Florida, we all fly down a few days later, as originally scheduled, and voila, vacation begins. 

That’s not what happened.

On Sunday morning I woke early to catch the Dartmouth Coach from Hanover, NH to Boston. The bus plowed through fresh snow on I-89 and arrived at Logan airport on time. It takes a lot of weather to stop those buses from running. A few inches of snow and sleet and ice put a few cars off the side of the road but not the Dartmouth Coach.

The flight to Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky airport was smooth until we landed just before 1pm and had to wait 40 minutes for the understaffed ground crew to get us parked at the gate. Another 30 minutes for the bags to get to the carousel.  And we were off.

Since I’m not Robert Pirsig, I should probably stop here. In fact, our in-the-moment pictures tell the story more eloquently than I ever could… pictures really are worth 1,000 words and often more. I’ll give it a shot anyway.

Our first stop was a Starbucks in Walton, KY. Our next stop was a Starbucks in London, KY. The only reason these are noteworthy is because there are Starbucks in towns most of us have never even heard of. It seems like yesterday that I would drive up to Burlington, VT – 80 miles from our old home in Norwich – to get a cup of Starbucks brew. Getting to a Starbucks on a road trip meant deviating from your normal route. Today, it’s almost like McDonalds. All drivethrus. And even though the lines are devastatingly long and slow, people seem to keep sitting in them for 20 minutes or more to get their special blended beverage.

I grew up on Frisch’s Big Boys, so that was our first real stop. It didn’t disappoint. It was exactly as I remembered – that was also in London, KY.

Soon after we crossed into Tennessee. I rowed at Oak Ridge while on the Crew team in high school. I don’t think I’ve been to Tennessee since. It was dark so we didn’t see much. As we passed by Knoxville and night had settled in, we both agreed were it not for our goal of making it to my sister’s home about an hour outside of Ashville, NC, we would have stopped for the night at that point. Finally around 9pm we pulled into their small farm in the small town of Cullowhee, NC – home of Western Carolina University. 

After a good night’s sleep, Dad getting to catch up with 2 of the youngest of his 10 grandchildren (who went to school late to spend time with him), we were on our way again. Today we decided to avoid the interstates (and the Starbucks) and take the scenic route. We were in no hurry after all. Nobody was waiting for us on the other end.

Our first stop was in Cashiers, NC where we found a cozy little coffee shop called, ironically, Bucks. We continued on into South Carolina and made our way towards Augusta, Georgia where we thought we’d do a quick drop-in on the Augusta National Golf Club, home of the Masters. Going from beautiful rural scenery to a sea of fast food chains on an endless slab of concrete was disconcerting on its own, but seeing that the golf course was completely shut off from viewing let alone entry was another eye opener. We did a quick tour around the edges hoping to find a break in the vinyl that covered the perimeter fences before giving up and moving on. We won’t try that again.

We skirted the border of SC and GA for the next few hours, stopping in Estill, SC for gas. For the evening we stopped at a beautiful hotel in Savannah called Perry Lane. 

We were defaulting to the fancier restaurant in the hotel until Dad spied a dive bar across the street and wanted to check it out. The signs on the entry door made me almost certain that Dad would not want to continue on, but he opened the door undeterred. I took off my button-down shirt leaving my t-shirt to make sure we didn’t stand out too much. The food was good, the service super friendly, and I’m not sure they would have allowed us to wear masks if we had wanted to. Neither of us got Covid (we tested every few days in Florida) – I can imagine it would be in just such a place one would catch Covid. (In the weeks that have passed since, of course, it turns out everyone can get Covid anywhere, anytime, masked or unmasked.)

The final stretch on Tuesday started in heavy rain before sunrise. That’s when we figured out the hard way that the proving-to-be trusty 2000 VW bug did not have working windshield wipers. They went back and forth just fine, but nothing really happened to the water and streaks on the windshield.

I stopped at a Love’s Truck Stop just outside of Savannah, measured the wipers we had, and went in and purchased slightly smaller ones so that the slapping sound we were never going to get used to might lessen just a bit. Changing a windshield wiper is pretty straightforward, but you still need to know just a little bit about it to not look like a complete incompetent. So I pulled up a quick YouTube video while waiting in line to purchase the blades.

When I got back to the car it was still raining, but I was able to fairly quickly install the new wipers. I was quietly impressed with myself, and I realize how pathetic that sounds to many. But better than that, my Dad was there staring at me from the passenger seat literally blown away at my automotive maintenance and repair expertise. Not only did he take a picture, but he proceeded to bring it up with other family members on many occasions in the days that followed, perhaps to provide evidence that he had raised a good son. Who knew that changing windshield wipers at a Truck Stop in Georgia could help my personal stock increase so fast and quickly?!

We did resume our Starbucks stops for the 6 hours that remained of our drive. And we caved and I got Dad to try Chick-Fil-A for the first time. 

Sidebar: Ironically today – literally – Chick-Fil-A opened their first location in the city of Boston in our old Copley Square Boloco location… bittersweet. There’s nothing wrong with the Chick-Fil-A chicken sandwich, but there’s nothing super special about it either. It’s always good. It’s always the same. It never makes me feel like shit, and I guess that’s a big win for fast food. The Chick-Fil-A founding family’s anti-gay marriage stance really upset Mayor Menino ten years ago and he essentially blocked them from opening in the city… but in the end, it’s not morals or politics that wins. It’s a decent chicken sandwich with a pickle on top and a lot of marketing to offset the controversies that have been relegated to many years ago (like way back in 2019).

We arrived in Vero Beach with another 24 hours to ourselves before Mom and her sister helen showed up and a few days later my brothers and their families. It was a wonderful time to be with family over the holidays, but the time in the car with my Dad from Cinci to Vero will never be forgotten.  We talked about everything and nothing, we laughed, we solved problems the world over, we got a little tense on some past Boloco challenges where he and I disagreed, we laughed more. I don’t think he ever slept while we drove, and that’s a first. And I never got tired. We tried to listen to a few podcasts and music, but realized quickly we were better off just the two of us either in silence or speaking or listening. It was perfect.

Knowing the chances were slim we’d do something like that again, I came up with a great idea the other day and ran it by him. “Dad, I’ve got to do something with this Airstream. I’ll drive to Cinci, pick you up, and let’s do it all over again.” He was busy doing something and had to go. My 1981 Airstream Excella – the RV type, not the trailer type – is getting destroyed up here in New England. At least if it was in Florida I would have thousands of buyers if I chose to sell it. No brainer, right? Life is short. Or maybe not.

When I asked him about it this morning, he said “that might be problematic. Why would we drive that thing down there when we could just fly?”  I smiled. We don’t change easily. 

But maybe after he reads this he’ll agree that we have another trip in us. Maybe.

Ethical Leadership Based on Principled Pluralism

 In a searing column by Thomas Friedman titled Have We Reshaped Middle East Politics or Started to Mimic It?,  Friedman asserts that we in America are displaying the sort of political tribalism that we once tried to quell.  Middle Easterners may call their big tribes “Shiites” and “Sunnis”, More and more, Americans call theirs “Democrats” and “Republicans.”  Or "vaccers" or "anti-vaccers". I hardly need to extend the schisms which separate us. 

Tellingly, Friedman identifies an exception to this divisive tribalism--the military.  There is no institution in American life that has worked harder than the military, though admittedly imperfectly and often belatedly,  to inoculate America from the virus of tribalism, while enriching and exemplifying an ethic of pluralism.  Friedman has observed this on his trips to the Middle East.  Colin Powell observed the same thing decades ago.  Men and women, different in their ethnicities and race, committed to achieve a common worthy goal  which they view as. bigger than themselves.

 

Friedman goes on to observe  “Leadership matters; the American population has diversity similar to the U.S.’ military but the ethic of pluralism and teamwork shown by many of our men and women in uniform reduces the tribal divisions within the armed forces.  It’s not perfect, but it’s real.  Ethical leadership based on principled pluralism matters.  That is why our military is our last great carrier of pluralism at a time when more and more civilian politicians are opting for cheap tribalism.”

 

This brings me to a broader observation on the importance of leadership and an organizational Purpose viewed by its members as deserving and requiring their very best efforts.   Procter & Gamble and a few other organizations like it --organizations pursuing shared, Purposeful goals --can be and for the most part are repositories and exemplars of ethical leadership based on principled pluralism. 

Reminder Thoughts for 2022

 I just finished reading a mind-opening book, Think Again by Adam Grant.  It got me thinking again on many subjects. Here I will highlight a few:

 

1.     Choose “task conflict”; not "relationship conflict".  To avoid that it’s essential we develop trust-based relationships.  We have to know one another.   Find common bonds.  That’s the place to start.  I haven’t done that as well as I should have, looking back, in some instances.  This doesn’t mean we just surround ourselves with “agreeable people.” 

 

 It is vital to avoid defend-attack spirals.  Need to focus on the substance of the disagreement. 

 

2.     The most likely person to change your point of view is you.  That’s most likely to happen when you’re asking questions, raising things you would like to jointly consider with another person. 

 

It’s important to view argument not as a war but as a choreograph, a dance. 

 

It’s vital to have these conversations in person.

 

3.  The importance of influential listening.  Approaching the other person with a confident humility and appropriate sense of doubt. 

 

 I like what E.M. Forster wrote, “How can I tell what I think till I see what I say.”  As one of his biographers wrote:  “To speak with him was to be seduced by an inverse charisma, a sense of being listened to with such intensity that you had to be your most honest, sharpest and best self.”

 

4.     We need to avoid the binary bias.  On almost every issue, we act like there are just two sides:  believers and non-believers.  This applies to abortion, gun regulations, immigration.  We should come to recognize complexity as a sign of credibility.

 

5.     One of the best ways to learn is to teach.

 

6.     There is no way of overestimating the importance of revising our drafts and skills to achieve deep learning.

 

7.     In a study distinguishing high performance teams, the most important differentiator wasn’t who was on the team or even how meaningful their work was.  What mattered most was psychological safety.  That’s not a matter of relaxing standards or making people comfortable or being nice and agreeable or giving unconditional praise.  It grew from a climate of respect, trust and openness in which people can raise concerns and make suggestions without fear of reprisal.  It’s the foundation of a learning culture.  

These are the same characteristics I’ve always attached to having a positive “smell of the place.” 

 Creating psychological safety starts with modeling the values we want to promote, identifying and praising others who exemplify them, and building a coalition of colleagues who are committed to making the change.

 

8.     Admitting one’s own imperfections out loud normalizes vulnerability and makes teams more comfortable opening up about their own struggles.  It takes confident humility to admit that we are a work in progress.

 

9.     We have to be wary of falling victim to what psychologists call identity foreclosure.  I have had that for better and, yes, in some ways for worse throughout my life.  I probably still do now.

 

10.  Pursuing happiness for its own sake is a blind alley.  As John Stuart Mill wrote, “Those only are happy who have their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness; on the happiness of the others, on the improvement of mankind, even on some art or pursuit, followed not as a means, but as itself an ideal end.  Aiming thus at something else, they find happiness along the way.”  

 I have lived my life in accord with this counsel:  “At work and in life, the best we can do is plan for what we want to learn and contribute over the next year or two and stay open to what might come next.”  Adapting an analogy from E.L. Doctorow, writing out a plan for your life “is like driving at night in a fog.  You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.”