I used to imagine myself sitting on my deck and taking in an amazing view of the “Rocky F$@%ing Mountains.”

It was just a joke. I had no intention of making it happen. Looking back, I did go to Denver for a job interview in my early days (“salad days???”), but that played no role in my imagination.

Fast forward many years, and we’ve moved to Tacoma, WA, for my new job with Tacoma Power. We’re house-hunting again. We made a last-minute offer for a house we liked but lost out to higher bidders. So now we had to get serious about this house-hunting thing.

We finally identified a house that worked for us (not too big, nice neighborhood, good value, etc., etc., etc., yadda yadda yadda, blah blah blah). Before making an offer, I suggested my wife look at the other homes on our list, just in case.

I’m in the office when my iPhone buzzes. “Can you come right now to see this house?” “I’m working right now. Can I come later today or tomorrow?” There was a sense of urgency in her voice, so I said, “I’m on my way.”

GPS is fantastic, by the way, and I made it to the correct address. I drove up the driveway and parked. I went up the front stairs (which are actually in the back?), and my wife started showing me around. She took me out on the deck, and there it was. Mount Rainier was out, in all her splendor. We could see some other mountains in the Cascade range, but “The Mountain” was, well, splendiferous!

We weren’t looking for a “view home,” but the house was perfect for us in so many ways. We put in an offer, closed in a few weeks, and moved in after some renovations. It’s been a great place to live for the last 9+ years.

Fast forward to yesterday. We drove to The Mountain for the first time. Great seeing it up close and personal, not just through zooming in with my camera.

There it is. Not the “Rocky _F$@%ing Mountains,” but superb in other respects. My wife has always loved living near the water, at least within driving distance of an ocean. The Rockies wouldn’t have been suitable for us, but we have a view of Commencement Bay and can drive to the Pacific Ocean whenever we want. Maybe that’ll be our next day trip?

Takeaways

1. Sometimes what we imagine comes true in another form. It’s all good!
2. The Mountain is hiding behind the haze today, presenting perhaps the #1 lesson of living in the Great PNW: Take advantage of the excellent weather now because you never know when it’ll be good again!
3. The same idea applies in other realms. For example, go to that jam session because you never know when the next opportunity to play music with others will come around again. #lessonlearned and #workingonit!!!

Ossie Davis reads Frederick Douglass’s 1852 speech, “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?”

His diagnosis of this nation’s ills remains on point. His fiery final words always resonate for me at this time. I wonder if they resonate with others this year?

“Good morning!!! Today’s going to be a good day!!” That’s a message an esteemed colleague sent me this morning, and I’m happy to say it’s true!

Today is my last working for Tacoma Power and the City of Tacoma. Finishing up some odds and ends this morning, then lunch with my team members. We haven’t been in the same room in over two years, although we see each other every day. We’ve grown closer through the pandemic even though we were further apart.

Later today, we’ll have an event I’ve been calling “Bill Berry’s Very Excellent Virtual Retirement Soirée and Jamboree.” I started this resignation/retirement process thinking I didn’t need a retirement party. My team convinced me that they and others in our organization wanted the opportunity to send me off in the right way, and they weren’t alone.

Now I’ve turned 180º and need this more than anyone else. I’ve been hearing and will hear very nice things said about me. There’ll be some stories, maybe even a tall tale or two. Hopefully, we won’t spill too many tears.

However, this will be an opportunity for me to say, “Thank You!” We accomplish almost nothing by ourselves. I’ve generated a boatload of ideas (once upon a time, I was known unofficially as a “Random Thought Generator”). But even the most valuable ideas fall flat without help and support from those around me. I want to thank and offer my best wishes to everyone who helped, offered support, provided feedback along the way!

Yes, today’s going to be a perfect day!

My first day at Tacoma Power and TPU was January 9, 2012.

I didn’t apply at first. The headhunter called me a second or third time and told me there was more to the job than the way it had been described. I thought for sure I’d blown the interview by speaking my truth instead of giving the answer they wanted to hear. It took a few weeks before they contacted me, but I got the job. Flew to SeaTac. Started the job.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but January 9 is Static Electricity Day. Looking back, it’s clear that I’ve been causing static at the electric company for ten whole years. I’ve got some stories to tell. Stories about:

• Success
• Failures
• Lessons learned
• Books read
• Books and ideas shared
• Presentations given
• Training taken and shared
• Workshops facilitated
• Relationships developed and deepened
• Wonderful 1on1 conversations (I like those the best!)

I really needed the job, and it came along at just the right time. But it wasn’t just about the money.

In the last ten years, we’ve saved millions for our customers. We’ve worked hard at innovating, maybe more than the organization could take advantage of. And building a strong, cohesive, and caring team. The work has been challenging, but I like challenges. It’s been gratifying.

My first boss, the one who hired me, asked me a question as he was about to retire, a trick question: “Can you thrive here?” I really wish I’d answered with a question. Sometimes a question is a suggestion, in this case, that maybe I’m in the wrong place. Alas, I answered instead of asking.

Thriving takes work, and I’ve really worked at it. There have been a lot of ups and some seriously down downs. And I’m still standing. Still causing static.

You know, #workingonit!!!

Wherein, I can’t stand the rain…

Hugh Masekela introduced me to jazz. Their November 2015 concert at the Triple Door was the last time I got to see him and Larry Willis. #tears…

I really miss this truck and the great vittles found therein!

I became a food truck guy in the Bay Area, but not so much here in the Great Pacific Northwest.

I had a chance to play some music last Saturday at Jazz Night School’s Jazz About Town.” First time in a loooong time, hopefully with more to come!

”Science doesn’t really care about your beliefs. And no amount of belief makes something a fact.“ 🧠
– Prof. Richard Feynman

More Science:

If you don’t make mistakes, you’re doing it wrong.

If you don’t correct those mistakes, you’re doing it really wrong.

If you can’t accept that you’re mistaken, you’re not doing it at all.
– Prof. Richard Feynman

What do you do if you grew up in the black church, attended Sunday School every Sunday until you were almost through high school, and then something happened? I can’t put my finger on it exactly. It was a loooooong time ago.

A few things happened. I didn’t care for Martin Luther King, Jr. because he wasn’t militant enough for me. But then he was assassinated. I don’t know. Maybe I had already started pulling away. Five years earlier, my church didn’t participate in the 1963 March on Washington. I didn’t understand anything at that age, especially why.

As I became old enough to think for myself, I moved away from the church. Years later, there was a time when we were thinking about going back. We attended services at a few black churches in the Palo Alto area, but none really appealed to me.

We attended one service featuring a visiting pastor from New York. His name was Preston Washington. I first met Preston as a student at Williams College, and I revered him! Curtis Manns, a former Assistant Dean at the college, let me know he would be visiting. It was great seeing Preston again after so many years, and his sermon was awe-inspiring. I would have loved going to his church. Alas, that was not to be. There was the distance and then time. Preston was taken away from us way too soon.

When I visited a local church from my childhood denomination, the Church of God in Christ, it just didn’t feel the same. When I went to a local baptist church, the service felt too sterile.

That’s the thing. Style of worship is very particular and important. I was looking for what I had, what I walked away from, and couldn’t find it, probably because it didn’t exist any longer. Maybe it exists only in my head?

There’s one thing from church that is still with me, though: It’s the music, especially songs like “Let Us Go to the House of the Lord” (this recording was how I began the first episode of #JazzChurch last year - replay here). Listening again just now, I hear that I was emotional then too. Good emotions!

#StillSearching…

Amidst the national conversation on racial justice and police reform, this collective of Black artists created this powerful performance based on Frederick Douglass’ “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”

She’ll be coming round The Mountain when she comes!

Great quotes on writing from James Baldwin.

“Write a Sentence as Clean as a Bone” and Other Advice From James Baldwin

Travel.

The story of what can happen to an American Negro writer in Europe simply illustrates, in some relief, what can happen to any American writer there. It is not meant, of course, to imply that it happens to them all, for Europe can be very crippling, too; and, anyway, a writer, when he has made his first breakthrough, has simply won a crucial skirmish in a dangerous, unending and unpredictable battle. Still, the breakthrough is important, and the point is that an American writer, in order to achieve it, very often has to leave this country.

-from “The Discovery of What It Means To Be an American”

Don’t be too ironic.

You are speaking to an old rat. I find much of so‐called avant‐garde writing utterly trivial. If there is no moral question, there is no reason to write. I’m an old‐fashioned writer and, despite the odds, I want to change the world. What I hope to convey? Well, joy, love, the passion to feel how our choices affect the world … that’s all.

-from a 1979 interview published in The New York Times

Remember why you write.

The bottom line is this: You write in order to change the world, knowing perfectly well that you probably can’t, but also knowing that literature is indispensable to the world. In some way, your aspirations and concern for a single man in fact do begin to change the world. The world changes according to the way people see it, and if you alter, even by a millimeter, the way a person looks or people look at reality, then you can change it.

-from a 1979 interview published in The New York Times

Yes, I know. I shouldn’t be reading this. Dilly-dallying. Lollygagging. I should be writing!

I came across this article with great public speaking advice – Why Introverts Can Be the Best Public Speakers:

“It turns out that a public speaker’s most important asset isn’t their theatricality, their story, or how extroverted and boisterous they are.

“It’s their capacity to help their audience to believe that change is possible.”

Not that I’m an expert or anything, but I believe better public speaking comes down to thinking about the audience and what they need. That’s hard to do if I’m nervously thinking about myself, what I need to get from this presentation, or even how I’m doing right now delivering this talk.

How do I stop worrying about myself and how I’m doing? Take a deep breath, ahhhh, and think about the audience!

Nice article!

Today’s vaccination event was right across the street from Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley, one of my favorite music venues, and a place I haven’t visited in over a year! I’m looking forward to COVID-19’s demise and being able to experience live music once again.

I first encountered Chick Corea in 1975. I had moved to Albany, NY, for a job in the State Assembly. I’m not sure how I first heard it, but “Vulcan Worlds” from the “Where Have I Known You Before” album by Return To Forever featuring Chick Corea became my song. Written by the band’s bassist, Stanley Clarke, it makes sense I would love it!

My wife and I went to see RTF at Russell Sage College in Troy. We arrived a bit early and walked to a store to get some soda (obviously Coke in my case). The concert started just as we were walking toward the auditorium through fog and mist. I loved hearing the first notes of Vulcan Worlds as we approached and settled into our seats! It was magic, and the concert did not disappoint!

We went to see Chick Corea perform duets with Herbie Hancock at Saratoga Performing Arts Center (or SPAC). Herbie introduced a song by saying they were going to make their pianos talk to each other. It was thrilling. We couldn’t hear the precise words, but it was a conversation in every way.

The next morning, I took a flight to NYC, and guess who was on the plane? Herbie Hancock and Chick Corea!! I got to tell them how much I enjoyed the concert the night before, especially the conversation between the pianos. I’ll always carry the smile on Chick’s face with me!

There was also a duet concert at SPAC featuring Chick and Gary Burton. When they came back out after a standing ovation following the set, Chick said something like, “Encore? What should we play?” My friend Reggie and I, without prompting or coordination, both stood up in our second-row seats, cupped our hands over our mouths, and shouted, “SPAIN“ at the top of our lungs! Maybe we weren’t the only ones (we were first!!), and perhaps that was the obvious choice, but our very loud wishes came true.

We saw different RTF incarnations when we lived in NYC and saw Chick in San Francisco and twice here in Seattle. I subscribed to his online instruction channel for awhile.

Even though I saw Chick Corea perform live on many occasions, it’s his recorded music that reverberates through my being after years of incessant listening. I loved and will continue to love his many recordings, including new music I’m just discovering.

It has been wonderful to read all the thoughtful reflections on his life as a musician, friend, and person. There are a lot of lessons there. He lived a great life, one that can inspire all of us to live our lives to the fullest and to help others along the way. I love that idea.

Thanks for the music and your life of inspiration, Armando Anthony “Chick” Corea. RIP as you return to forever.

Note: #JazzChurch 42 episode (2/14/2021) featured some of Chick Corea’s music and performances that have resonated with me over the years.

(a work in progress)

i hate the phrase “hold people accountable”

because it almost always means

hold other people accountable

when we should focus on
being accountable ourselves.

also

when employees ask/talk about accountability
they’re mostly reflecting on the

poor managers
poor supervisors
poor individual contributors

and

poor “leaders”

who stay in place

doing a poor job

year
after
year
after
year

and

who clearly aren’t being held
accountable.

when we don’t hold
people accountable,
we’re not being
accountable
ourselves.

and if we’re not accountable

we give others permission

we invite them

we encourage them

to not be accountable.

saying accountability starts with us

is actually wrong.

accountability starts with the person
in the mirror.

accountability starts with me.

if i have to hold people accountable,

that means

i don’t have accountable people

and should.

develop accountable people

starting with the person

in

the

mirror

etc., etc., etc., yadda yadda yadda, blah. blah. blah.

While testing microphone and music levels for Sunday’s edition of #JazzChurch, I found myself sauntering down memory lane…

I spent part of my Saturday morning listening to this full-length live Pastorius concert (audio-only). I still miss Jaco, and know I’m not alone.

Tracklist:

1. Mr P.C.
2. Poly Wanna Rhythm
3. Dolphin Dance
4. Passion Dance
5. Naima
6. So What
7. If You Could See Me Now
8. Amerika / Purple Haze / La Marseillaise
9. Hard Night Blues
10. Fannie Mae

Personnel:

Jaco Pastorius - electric bass
Azar Lawrence - tenor sax
Paul Mousavizadeh - guitar
Jon Davis - piano
Brian Melvin - drums

Enjoy! I certainly did!!

Happy Birthday, Langston Hughes (born in Joplin, Missouri on February 1, 1902)

I love this bit about humor:

“Humor is laughing at what you haven’t got when you ought to have it… what you wish in your secret heart were not funny, but it is, and you must laugh. Humor is your own unconscious therapy. Like a welcome summer rain, humor may suddenly cleanse and cool the earth, the air, and you.”.
– Langston Hughes

Also see 10 Poems By Langston Hughes You Should Know - Kentake Page

One thing I learned last year is people love hearing music at the beginning and end of Zoom calls. I usually play some jazz, and sometimes hear the commenter say they wish we could delay the start of the meeting until the song ends.

Today my team got together to start unpacking the latest Employee Satisfaction Survey, and a colleague suggested this song. Quite a different take on satisfaction!

News For the Hard of Hearing

Now we could use a way to communicate with the _hard of understanding_…

I’ve watched Soul two times all the way through and have skipped through another three or four times looking for clues. I’m always seeing something I didn’t see before and also coming away with questions. I think it’s a deep, deep movie!

I’m still struggling with the difference between purpose and spark. What did that seed mean? What IS soul??? And… And also… And?

Rewatching Soul is like analyzing a poem. Last night this bit registered for the first time:

Joe: By the way, why do you sound like a middle-aged white lady?
22: I don’t. This is all an illusion.
Joe: Huh?
22: This whole place is a hypothetical._

A hypothetical??? That’s deep! Is Joe (or his soul) really zipping around the universe, or is he just having a conversation with himself?

Here’s a six-years-ago-today post I shared on Facebook.

I’m a Niner fan living in Seahawks country. And actually, I started out as a Jet fan. I root for the Seahawks to beat everyone except those two teams. And for the last few years, I’ve been rooting for the Hawks to play (and lose to) the Niners in the NFC championship game. Well, not this year, to be sure.

I’ve been thinking of the NFC Championship as the real Superbowl and saw a sign to that effect in Century Link today.

This is the first place I’ve lived where there’s only one NFL team, and it’s really cool to see how everyone, well, almost EVERYONE here, is behind this one team. The 12th Man is no joke!!

Today’s game was simply amazing. With the Niners, I’m already in wait til next year territory. And it was looking like my Seahawk-loving friends might join me. But what an unfrakkinbelievable ending to that game. I can’t think of a game that comes close, not even Superbowl III!

One reason I like this team so much is Pete Carroll’s leadership. His use of team psychology to get the players playing not for themselves but the team. I think those ideas have great relevance at work, but most of the time, they’re just ideas. So it’s really cool to see true team success, in NFL football. Seahawks football!

So that’s it. GoHawks!

Notes: I love the insight about teams, both on the field and at work. Of course, the Seahawks went on to lose the Super Bowl to the dreaded New England Patriots. Moral of the story? Build a great team and run the damn ball! (aka, “execute like crazy”)!

It’s 2:30 AM on May 26, 2020. I can’t sleep. Despite having been in bed for less than four hours, I’m wide awake—mind racing. I get up and grab my journal. Maybe capturing my thoughts will help me get back to sleep. Ten pages later I’m worried about Marshall Law and Civil War…

So now I’m afraid and see it so clearly
Donald creates distraction
The governors keep things shut down
so DJT foments the crowds
Demonstrations
Break all the f-ing rules
& now governors have no choice
more chaos

So, where does it end?
With DJT, it doesn’t end.

I see threats and intimidation coming from his base as we move forward

The masked vs. the unmasked
Worse inequality as essential workers stay black, brown, and poor
Anti-democratic (small “d”)
Roving bands discourage “voter fraud “to help DJT win
Insurrection/chaos so DJT can impose martial law

The courts can’t save us
The Republican judges won’t save us
The Repubs stay silently complicit

It’ll be more chaos, a lot more.

Donald wins reelection, and it continues
Donald loses reelection, challenges it
He’s out and he challenges

His base, his movement continues to support him, making him the biggest celebrity apprentice of all time

To what end?

Destroy his “enemies“ Make it impossible for Biden to govern

Civil War
Military coup
Race riots

My God, where does it end?

It ends when the 65 percent say no to the 35 percent, i.e.
Trump base
Birthers
White supremacists
Anti-vaxers (I didn’t know anything about QAnon at that point)

Plus, COVID-19 ain’t going away - Science is overwhelmed - The rich get richer - Middle-class shrinks

Unemployment stays staggeringly high - Economy in deep recession (42% of lost jobs not coming back)

So DJ T needs all the distraction he can get _ AND that’s his modus operandi anyway!

DJT needs enemies

Black people
Obama
Hillary
James
Byron
Media
Evil people
Liberals
Governors
There’s always a new one

Paranoid? –> Maybe!
Flights of fancy? Not implausible

This threat is existential! - To COVID-19 victims - Medical profession (we get DJ T doctors versus deep state doctors) - Yamiche and the tribe of reporters - Twitter enemies - Brown people at the border

Totalitarianism – not just run amok!
*Run over our f-ing heads!

And I was just gonna play my bass!

Think of birtherism as a form of cursing
“I don’t have to really believe Obama was born in Kenya”

Just saying it is incendiary, bomb-throwing
shouting “fire” in a crowded theater

• And it distracts –> us
• and gathers allies
• “dog-whistle” out loud for all to hear

Meanwhile, Chuck Todd and the media stay safely in the middle

If it’s war
Just Voting (& counting on institutions we don’t trust)
is unilateral dis/un/armament

Q. How will the Civil War happen?
I’m not the first person to think like this!

RevisitingLostRoadsigns…

I hadn’t heard of QAnon at the time. I also didn’t know about the murder of George Floyd the previous night.