Believe it or not, I’m on the road again . Tonight I find myself in Rochester Minnesota..

Home of some of the hardest working and nicest people I’ve every had the pleasure  of working with.. It’s also the home of the least spicy food on the face of the planet. Here ketchup is a spice.. I’m sitting in the hotel lobby waiting for a bunch of my friends from Burlington to join me.. We’re going out for dinner ..  and I know I’m hoping I can score some hot sauce on the street.   Rochester is also the home of the Mayo Clinic.. one of the largest private hospital systems in the country. It’s strange for me to be among all these hospitals again.. It brings back so many memories. I saw a helicopter landing on the top of one of the hospitals. The image  hit me hard.. and I had to sit for a bit before I could drive on.

 

 

There’s a large IBM facility here.. In fact it was the site of my very first business trip almost exactly 26 years ago. I remember being so surprised that they’d let me rent a hotel room or rent a car for myself. I remember telling them that I was older than I was… Now that’s a change.   I also remember getting reported to IBM security for hitchhiking with an IBM badge on… (times have changed   I wouldn’t consider hitchhiking safe anymore ).. I also remember sneaking in to a Pinchus Zuckerman concert at Assisi Heights, a local convent.  The event had sold out… but one of the folks recording it for public TV told me to pretend I was with the video crew.. I did.. and they let me in.. more than that.. they put me to work. I actually saw the concert on PBS several months later and saw myself moving cables… That was a long…long time ago…

 

It feels very funny being away from home again. Max will be heading back to school in a few weeks… and I want to be with him as much as I can. Gabe also gave me a funny look when I told him I was leaving again. I almost canceled the trip.. but duty calls. I feel such a strong need to stay home with my family.. but I keep finding myself on airplanes.. It’s a hard habit to break.   I need to fix this. . 

 

 I just spoke with everyone at home. Gabe’s at a Friends of Sam meeting up at the Townsend’s this evening. The FoS got a really great write-up  in the Burlington Free Press on Saturday. I’m so proud of all of these kids ! They are really making a difference

 

Speaking of making a difference.. I’m still thinking about the seminar that Diane and I attended last weekend. One of the things that struck me most about Chopra’s message was the notion that we are all connected as a single soul. In his view, we spring up as different localizations of that soul when we’re in physical bodies.. then revert to the greater whole when we die. We’re then reborn into new lives when our collective soul feels it’s time.. Chopra spoke of the Buddhist meditation mantra ‘I am’ .. meaning I am part of the greater collective soul.. and ‘I am that’ .

meaning that things outside our selves like other people, trees,  animals, etc. are all projections of the same collective life force.. I’m not sure I’ve got my head all the way around that.. but the message still gave me great comfort somehow..  It makes me think of Sam

 

Another thing that struck me at the seminar is how optimistic Chopra is .. even in the face of all the war and injustice  in the world. In his opinion, society is evolving and is slowly improving . He sited social research that showed that the drive for social justice, better stewardship of the environment and for peace are gaining strength all over the world.. He sited He maintains that it will shortly ‘tip’ in the direction of a greater sense of world unity and collective good.. May it be so…  Chopra’s institute is making a movie about this coming tipping point. Check it out here

OK.. Speaking of tipping.. my head keeps rolling to the side a I fall asleep. Let me stop here and pick up tomorrow. 

Gnite all ! Gnite Sam

 
-me

 ps. Here are some more politically neutral bumper stickers I’ve seen over the last 2 days