Three Wishes

Scarecrow alone in his field

calls to the birdies, "it's my job

so please do not rob

all the corn from the cob."

Hey Mr. Scarecrow if you had a brain

to keep you sane,

could you explain

the eternal pain

of thinking past the dawn?

The lion roars an empty roar

"I'm so alone

out on my own.

Won't you throw me a bone?"

Oh Mr. Lion get rid of the fright

and face the dark night

with all your might

gain your insight

of your role in the jungle.

Tin man asks for a heart

for a brand new start

replacing the rusty part.

"Oh please let me feel."

Say Mr. Tin Man when will you learn?

a heart just burns

when the world turns.

It takes more to earn

your place among the feeling.

Tornado blowing in the distance

turning the earth with its persistence.

Uprooting a tree, and setting it free.

A window breaks, the house shakes,

shingles fly, branches in the sky.

Clicking the shoes, to the walking blues.

A wizard speaks while the facet leaks

its tears of sorrow will flow till tomorrow.

I just got back from an all day organizational retreat at the Oak Glen Country Club in Stillwater and to borrow the always effective line used by Mr. Wheeler last week- boy are my arms tired. And to borrow the credo we used when facing a retreat at the last organization I worked for- why are we retreating? Shouldn't we be going forward?

But if I can be serious for a moment, discussing the culture and future of your work isn't exactly the ideal way to spend a rare sunny Saturday summer morning. Don't get me wrong, I for the most part enjoy my job and have a great deal of loyalty and pride towards the organization that employes me, still there were some moments as I sat there in the very nice country club setting where I couldn't stop my mind from wandering, and my feet from tapping to that familiar refrain: "there's no place like home... there's no place like home." Unfortunately whenever I opened my eyes I remained far away from the place I usually like to spend my Saturday mornings.

We spent the day discussing the values of management and staff and how they shape the expectations people have of each other. We learned to appreciate our differences, celebrate our history and accomplishments and look to the future to begin the footwork to developing an even more effective way to serve our customers while becoming an even better organization for its staff. The discussion was impressive, open and honest. The effectiveness of retreats can be argued but this one seemed to accomplish its purpose.

We spent most of the day discussing areas that anyone who has ever attended a company retreat would be familiar: improving communication and finding ways to manage the growing workload with the same or fewer resources. Yet at the end of the day a pearl of wisdom emerged, and hopefully I wasn't among the minority that was still paying enough attention to let it slip behind their tired and wandering thoughts. Just as we were wrapping things up somebody mentioned that job satisfaction isn't accomplished solely by making external changes. Like just about anything else in life, what you get out of the experience depends on how much you are willing to put in, and how much you allow yourself to take out. In other words, job satisfaction has a lot to do with one's internal self as much as it does any change in policies, personnel, or procedures.

So as I headed back to my more familiar Saturday surroundings, my eyes followed that still elusive yellow brick road. Dorothy, Toto and Kansas and the rest of the plot intertwined with the other concepts from the day's events as the darkening skies and the reflections danced around my introspective mood. As a kid I always sort of related to the plight of the scarecrow more than the lion or the tin man. I used to think of what I could accomplish if damn, I only had a brain. These days I'm more of an amalgamation of the three searchers. I could quite possibly not only use a brain but also a heart transplant and perhaps a little more courage. Yet appearances aside this isn't a self esteem issue or a plea for pity. Quite the contrary- I'm quite proud of how far I've gotten and how much is still within reach and how much can be accomplished with a little effort, all with my self acknowledged deficiencies. Retreat? Not this time. I'm tired but it's a good kind of tired...