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Thursday, Jun 15, 2000
June 8, 2000
Mr. Toad's Wild Ride
I just read an obscure, old book called "The Wind in the Willows". Okay, it's not that obscure, but it is a little old.
I identified with Mole, who leaves a comfortable, settled life for the adventure of the river. Work has been my burrow for the last 6 years. Eventually, though, I identified with each of the four major characters. Although not too much Toad please!
What inspired me to read the book is the expression "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride". This is sometimes used in the world of motorsports, especially in Britain, to describe particularly dramatic excursions off the race track.
Speaking of wild rides, I was at the race track this week for a two day school. Formula cars are tricky little beasts. They are so responsive that every little driving error is magnified. I think I need to do more of this.
While I was in Vegas for the driving school, a trade show was in town. I ran into 9 different coworkers at the hotel and airport. I heard the concerns of many about the turmoil of the merger. Stepping back from the fray feels so unfamiliar. My primary concern was getting a better run through turn 5 onto the main straight.
Perhaps a short explanation. Racing often looks like a "mash the gas and hang on" sort of affair. Done well, it requires a level of physical performance, balance, finesse and mind-body connection on par with a downhill skier or a salsero. Racing performance is what occupied my imagination in Vegas, not the state of the IT department post-merger, or the confusion of living with disparate ERP systems.
Something I need to work on more is this: living in the moment, seizing the moment. I tend to be deliberative, which is not a bad thing, but sometimes I need more focus on the moment of existence, and more impulse to decide and act at critical moments.
There's a specific set of reason I cite living in the moment. In racing, my budding career as a novice salsero, engineering leadership, and striking up conversation with strangers I need to act more impulsively. To have any hope for improvement in each of these endeavors, I have to make bigger decisions, and make those decisions more rapidly. Greater risks combined with more impulsiveness. Mon dieu!