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The Trials and Tribulations of Travel

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I had to cancel a lunch meeting due to flying out earlier than scheduled today, but I was able to schedule a breakfast for a much overdue meeting, so I did (@ 8am). Also, in an effort to save the company some money, I opted to take the Metro as far as I could towards BWI and then take a cab from there. So far, so good. My scheduled flights have me going through Denver to San Jose and I was supposed to get home at 4pm. The flight is smooth and all is going fine, despite my itching to be home with my family… they are all gathered already and I’m not there. So, we’re getting close to Denver and the pilot comes on the PA to say that he has some “bad news”… There is some weather we need to avoid and they have closed the runway we were supposed to come in on, so we’re going to have to loop around. At this point, he’s still not projecting us to be “too late” (mind you, I have 25-minutes to get my connection). And we just keep flying and flying. Next thing you know he tells us that we are now short fuel and we’re going to have to make a pit-stop in Colorado Springs to fuel-up. By the time we get to Denver, I’ve missed my connection by 1.5 hours and the flight they re-booked me on doesn’t leave for 5 hours! And, to add insult to injury, I got a B number (slumming it for us A-Listers). My phone rings about an hour before I’m supposed to leave and it’s SWA letting me know what? Oh, yes, we’re delayed! By the time I get to my parent’s house I will have been traveling for roughly 18 hours. NOT the way I wanted to spend this time by any stretch.

Planes, trains, and automobiles is a great movie, but I sure don’t want to live it. And, although I’m not looking forward to tomorrow, I sure am looking forward to seeing my family – this week was successful for me in DC, but it’s a bit of a blur. It was hard… but tomorrow will be harder.

Cut to 9pm last night and the terrible…

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I got a voice mail from my Mom and I could tell she had really bad news… And I had my suspicion what it was. It’s the call I’ve been anticipating, but I just didn’t know when it would happen. You see, having 8 siblings brings with it a down-side. My whole life people have said to me “Wow, the youngest of 9 kids? How was that growing up?” My answer is always that I didn’t know any different. I got to grow up in a crazy, fun, screwy, nutty environment… And as the years go on, people change and situations change. Not every sibling will have the life you expect and what seemed like “normal” within the family dynamic won’t always stay normal. 

My brother Terry had more musical and artistic talent in his pinky than most of my siblings and myself put together. For the first half of his life he was able to channel this in ways that were amazing – I always enjoyed going to see his bands play (or staying in when Mom let them practice in her living room). He wrote great songs and he played the guitar amazingly. I truly thought at one point that one (or more) of his songs would be on the radio one day. He was also a tremendous painter and drawer – his work was awesome. But at some point along his life journey, he lost his way. He never really did well in an environment with a “boss”, which is even more why he should have pursued his art more vigorously. But something took over him. He became stuck and had some personal issues with another family member that exacerbated his already tenuous situation… And he drank. And he drank and drank. And then he spent a lot of time at Santa Clara Valley Med and he was in a tremendous amount of pain. They kept sending him away, over and over, thinking it was really nothing. Until they finally realized he had pancreatitis and that they needed to help him. 

He reached his tipping point and his body gave up. My middle sibling, and brother number five, Terence Gerard Powers passed away this weekend and I don’t think I’ve seen him for three or four years. I’m wracked with guilt. But what could I have done? There were several occasions that we hoped would be his tipping point for the positive – that he would realize he needed to help himself and get into a program – but that never happened. I never visited him in the hospital because I couldn’t take it. I was so mad that he had done this to himself and there was nothing I could do to fix him, so I cowardly stayed away. My poor parents. They eventually took the tough love route after he had stayed living at home for far too many years and sent him out on his own. They had to. Before too long, my Dad began helping him again financially, gave him his cell phone… then took him to the hospital, picked up meds for him. No parent should have to bury their children… I sure hope they give themselves a break. I don’t know that any of us who truly cared about him could have “fixed” him or his situation. But I’m sure we’re all questioning what else we could have done.
So, the downside, you see, is that I have many more family members who I care about and I’ll have to deal with loss more times than most. Rest in peace, brother Terry. Keep on drawing and keep on playing.

Sometimes Terrible Life Events Follow Uplifting Ones

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I’ll start with the uplifting part. Yesterday I participated in my 5th American Cancer Society’s Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk and my total money raised in those five years is at almost $15,000. The walk is always so inspiring – tons of survivors and more than 20,000 people participating, all in an effort to increase awareness of the issue of breast cancer and to raise money for the American Cancer Society to continue their research to prevent and eventually CURE this disease that has affected all of us. I’m motivated by the desire to raise as much money as I can because I really believe we are making a difference and after having my Mom, her Mom, three of her sisters, and a first cousin all go through it, I feel like it just might be on the horizon for me and my sisters, so I’m hoping the treatments will continue to get better and even more successful than the 98% survival rate we have right now when it’s caught early. I’m also a little competitive and striving to have my numbers be up there with the highest in all of San Diego helps to stoke the fire of my efforts! My numbers have gone down right along with the economy, but I am extremely inspired by a local San Diego woman named Stacy Matseas who is the #1 fundraiser in the NATION who raises her money for this walk. In 10 years she has raised close to (if not more now) $800K. If she can set a goal of $125K for ONE year, I surely can keep trudging on to get as close as possible to my $4,000 goal. The walk happens and is over in a matter of hours, but we have to continue to raise awareness and help this awesome organization… And I’m honored to do so. Still taking donations, by the way: http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR/MakingStridesAgainstBreastCancer/MSABCFY11California?px=1547233&pg=personal&fr_id=27984
I think I’ll put the terrible life event in another post later today so this uplifting one can stand alone.

BIGGEST EVENT OF THE YEAR… AND in my company’s history!!

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ORACLE     My most recent work event (http://www.avconcepts.com/) was the crazy large Oracle OpenWorld, JavaOne, and Oracle Develop conferences that all run concurrently in San Francisco each fall. JavaOne was a new add since their acquisition of Sun and it grew the event by 20% over last year. More than 41K people attended more than 2,300 sessions that we provided the A/V equipment and labor for on TEN properties throughout the city. For any of you who have worked with union labor (Local 16 in this case), you know that is no easy task — now imagine managing 247 union workers on setup day and 179 on the peak session day? NO small feat, my friends! Downtown SF becomes a crazy, RED, techie-full, Oracle land during this time of year and it’s an awesome thing to be a part of! When I secured this account in May of 2009, I had no idea the crazy ride I was in for. And now here we are, two OpenWorld’s later and I still have the account… We’re talking about next year already and it’s an amazing, crazy, scarey, exciting, frustrating process that I feel privilidged to be a part of.
PARTY           Along with all of the hard work comes some serious fun! Each year Oracle has an Appreciation Party where there’s a killer concert (or 6), midway games, carnival rides, and food and drinks for 22K people on Treasure Island! Last year it was Aerosmith, Roger Daltry, 3 Dog Night and The Whalers. This year? Black Eyed Peas, Don Henley, Berlin, English Beat, Steve Miller Band, and Montgomery Gentry! It really was more fun than should be legal.
GRATITUDE   I try very hard to show every person who works on my shows how *very* much I appreciate them and how hard they work. With Wayne Hensley as my lead project manager, this team ROCKED the show once again and I really can’t thank them enough for doing such an awesome job!