10 Questions with Kathleen Marcin

http://www.lowellsun.com/local/ci_11798789

The link above will take you to a piece from yesterday's Sun: "10 Questions with Kathleen Marcin." Kathleen is the President of the Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association, an organization that brings together residents, businesses, police, bars, etc. in the Downtown area. (Quite handily linked just to your right). There are some great points in here about the upsides of Downtown -- for one, the very real sense of neighborliness, and two, the fact that you can drive in from work on a Friday, park your car, and not start it again until Monday morning.

Outside of the truly major cities, how many places can say that?

There's also a good plug for the Revolving Museum and a mention of the Gardens right between the Trolley Museum and Lowell Tae Kwon Do.

And, I've got to add, Kathleen has reminded me that not every work policy or "Office Space"-type subject I write about is unique to the public sector -- Honda Corp. has had a policy of paid holidays for employees' birthdays, too.

A Full-Bird Lieutenant

Tomorrow morning, I'll wake up obscenely early at my home-away-from-home (really, just a couple minutes' drive from home) at Mount Vernon and Bowers. I'll stumble down the stairs to the car, fire up the British-accented Economist podcasts, gun it to Worcester, grab some Awake Tea and a bagel at the Starbucks off Exit 16 on 290, and see the sun come up along 395 as the automatic lights come off somewhere near Norwich just after 6 a.m. I'll pass Mohegan, turn onto 12, flash an ID to an MA with woodland cammies, park, and hoof it to the gym. I'll PT, shower, change, and put on my uniform with the single, silver O-2 bars for the last time ever.

It's not because of anything special I've done, mind you. As they promised me back on 18FEB05 when I got to wear the neat Service Dress Blues with the single gold stripe, if I could still breathe on a mirror and see some fog on the first day of the first month four years after commissioning, I'd put on O-3. By the grace of God, I have. And I will. On Monday, an O-7 will put the bars you see at the top here on my collar, and I'll lose the "Junior Grade" from my title. Here's what it'll mean:

(1) More pay. I know it's not about the money, except when it's needed...and then it is. Or that money doesn't buy happiness, but it sure helps. Or something like that. All I know is that O-3 means a nice jump in pay (it's purposely designed that way, as O-3 is when officers have to make the bomb-or-get-off-the-pot decision about their careers, so the military entices them with a pay boost at that point). The dual whammy for me here is that I'm not renewing my lease down by the base. Yup, that's right -- for my last several months' active duty, I'm going to split my time between Market and Mt. Vernon, except when I'm too damn tired, on duty, or have too big of a brief to prep, in which case I can crash at the Lodge or the Q. Either way, I've done the math and it means a lot -- no more deficit spending, or dipping into the savings that, on paper at least, have taken a 50% dive in the past year. It also means I can start tithing at exactly the one year mark of joining my church (CCF, Princeton and Stevens just off Westford...check it out sometime). In a way I hate to make money the number 1 item, but if you can believe it, I've been living for the past year on what you might call an upside-down budget, which is obviously unsustainable. That all changes now.

(2) More respect. Now, my title doesn't *really* change until later this year, because I'm a phone Lieutenant in the same way an O-4 is a "Commander," an O-5 is a "Colonel" (yes, I'm nodding to Cliff Krieger, a real full bird, for whom I use the title of this piece in gest), or an O-7 is a "General." Still, the really big deal is the extra bar.

Here's why: Anytime someone sees an O-1 or an O-2, they can generally tell how long that person has been in the service, with only a year or so as a margin of error. O-3 is different. It's a rank that people hold for as long as 6 years, or more in some cases. So, you see an O-3, that could be a newly-minted guy or it could be someone just about to put on Major, or, for the sea services, Commander. No one will say "Why the eff is an O-2 wearing a Commendation Ribbon?" anymore (that's a sub community thing...I could write volumes about ribbons and medals, but I'll spare you the pain for now. Suffice it to say no other subject brings highly-animated debate that always starts with, "I don't care about awards, but..."

Anyway, O-1 is an Officer rank, so it's technically higher than even a Master Chief or Sergeant Major, but it's functionally not. In fact, in some ways, O-1 is one of the *lowest* ranks there is, because you take grief from all sides as a "butter bar." O-2 is only slightly better -- the same name for the ground/air services, or, for the Navy, Ensign Upper Half or "I can't believe it's not butter." (In reference to the bar now being silver).

At O-3, things start to change. You're still a JO, but now you can call a huge additional chunk of people by their first names and the overall respect you garner goes way up from every which way -- junior and senior enlisted, the officers below you, and your superiors.

(3) Less room for error. As you might guess, with Number Two comes the fact that a little more is expected. People are a little less surprised when you know the answer or come up with something that answers the mail for the boss. That, in turn, means less forgiveness for your screw-ups. Again, that applies to both the officers and enlisted around you...higher expectations and more of a chance that someone might be let down if you do something stupid (i.e. Can you believe that Captain screwed up so badly at the brief? What an ass clown!) The sort of magical "Get Out of Jail Free" card that O-1s and O-2s carry is now lost forever.

(4) A much cooler title, come the switch-over. I talked the folks in Millington, TN who control my fate yesterday. The exact date is still very much in question, but yes, they've confirmed that at some point this year (calendar, not necessarily fiscal, but we'll see) the magical DD-368 will be signed that will make me an Army O-3 vice a Navy O-3. So in a day I'll go from "Lieutenant" to "Captain." That's a really big deal. Because terms like "Ensign" and "Lieutenant" are often used pejoratively (hey, you can't spell 'LOST' without 'LT'), people are happy to shed them. Plus, Captain just sounds cooler. And it will confuse the hell out of my Navy friends who will think I somehow pulled a Stephen Decatur and jumped to O-6 before age 30. (That's because in the Navy, 'Captain' is an O-6...the highest rank below Admiral).

I'll be a little sad to see O-2 go, but I should have the next 5 or 6 years to embrace O-3. I purposely joined a Branch where you can still stay *active* (i.e. not just pushing paper) beyond O-3, so I won't cry about being relegated to desk jockey life as an O-4 or above in Civil Affairs...in fact, in CA higher rank/older age is considered a plus, because you're often dealing with foreign militaries and societies that are more rank/age conscious than our own.

In the meantime, I've got plenty of time to embrace and get comfortable with O-3.

I signed on for the $10k accession bonus with the Guard, which is like a marriage, only far more legally binding. In other words, who am I kidding, I love this stuff and can't let go, even if I'm opting for the stability-of-domicile that the Guard offers as opposed to active duty. I get giddy like a little kid when I think about the Bragg-Huachuca-Benning circuit that next year will bring before the real C-17 ride to wherever-the-heck-the-26th-MEB is headed. (Remember whose ears perk up when Pres. Obama talks about reducing *combat troops* from certain theaters).

In the meantime, every day is a chance to get a little bit better than my former self. Every qual, every brief, every PT run, and every DLPT flashcard session hopefully leads to that. Because the train towards the gold oak leaf is moving, albeit off in the far distance.

Time to start running.

Lowell Handmade

At tonight's Lowell Downtown Neighborhood Association, I had the good fortune of running into Alex and Anne Ruthmann, the proprietors of the Lowell Handmade website. Lowell Handmade (now linked just to your right) is a one-stop shop for information about Lowell's creative communities -- the arts, the theater, film groups, and, yes, blogs (they have a neat blogroll that includes a few local blogs that weren't previously on my proverbial radar). Lowell Handmade definitely has the possibility of morphing into something more tangible than a blog -- it could grow into a storefront or studio-type setup at some point down the road.

Anyway, I definitely recommend giving this site a look and a bookmark -- it's a great resource for information about what's going on around you.

Thanking the Messenger

The other day I got a call from an unknown number, area code 603 (southern New Hampshire). With the call coming on a day off from work, and me being in the middle of some Viet-Thai buffet, I figured I wouldn't pick up and risk whatever surprise might be lurking on the other end of the line. I waited to see if the caller would leave a message before responding, and sure enough, the message left was just a middle-aged woman's New England twang telling me she'd reached the wrong number, and sorry for the confusion.

I wanted to call her back and thank her.

But I didn't, for fear of sounding sarcastic or otherwise off-kilter.

But here was my reasoning: Every day, my job requires me to coordinate several meetings, briefings, and other events between people with paygrades several levels higher than my own. It also requires many other types of phone-based coordination, and here's the kicker: I'm usually not at my desk.

I work in several different offices/rooms (and sometimes different buildings entirely) to perform various functions, so chances are overwhelmingly high that if you call my extension, you won't get me. Everything works quite well when people follow the simple instructions on my voicemail -- leave a message and I'll get right back to you.

If only things could be simple.

Many times, people call, don't get the instant gratification of someone on the other end (and that comes with the "WTF" factor, because we might have just talked before I had to run, so naturally you wonder why-in-the-heck-is-he-not-there-he-just-said-to-call-this-number)? So of course, people hang up the phone in frustration. I don't get the voicemail, so I don't know why the person called or what needs to happen...and suffice to say, if they're calling on that line, it's not just to B.S. about the weather.

To use one of the many sports analogies I love, the chains haven't been moved 10 yards downfield, even though a simple message could have accomplished that quite painlessly.

Where it really gets over the top, however, is when people blame me for the not-being-there phenomenon.

Last week, I picked up the phone to hear from a Petty Officer who I'd never met/seen before. It went something like this:

Him: "Whoa!?! Lieutenant Page, is this really you? You're a hard man to reach...I've been trying and trying for days, I thought you might've been away or something."

Me: Uh...actually, I'm probably one of the easiest people to reach out there. Was my voicemail broken?

Him: No, I just don't always leave messages.

Me: Well if it was really that important, I just want you to know if the shoe were on the other foot I would've just left a message and given the person the benefit of the doubt that they would've gotten it and returned it."

Him: Well, it's funny you should say that, this was the time I had decided to actually leave one.

Me: Well, in the future, if you ever want to reach me, just leave a message...I check this line every hour or so, so you'll get a pretty prompt return. But if you just hang up on me, we're both [Shoot] Out-of-Luck."

As you can probably tell, some frustration and sarcasm were making their way through from my end, for sure.

And only then did we proceed to discuss an important and somewhat time-sensitive aspect of the movement of a bunch of files from one building to another for storage.

Personal calls are one thing -- I understand sometimes frivolous or timely things (hey, want to grab Subway for lunch?) don't require messages.

But for work-related business, I find it somewhat unprofessional for people to not leave messages. And I find it over-the-top ridiculous for non-message leavers to *blame* others when they can't get through.

And that's why I was so impressed by the anonymous lady from New Hampshire who was presumably looking for someone else with the 508 area code and 451 prefix.

She left a message. She stated what needed to be conveyed, even though she didn't have to, and then hung up.

If only everyone could catch the fever.

Birthdays as Paid Holidays for Philly Cops?

I was sort of casually thumbing through the latest version of The Economist while waiting to go grab lunch with a neighbor when I did a double-take at the end of an article about Philadelphia's fiscal woes:

"The mayor wants to eliminate birthdays as paid holidays for police officers."
http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13109707

Eliminate? I had no idea this policy existed in the first place. What a total joke.

I can still remember how childish it seemed to me when a peer of mine complained about having to do homework on his birthday...in the 3rd grade! Yes, even then, the teacher had to sit down with him the next day to explain that while your birthday may be oh-so-special to you, you also need to remember that no one else cares about it, and if no one ever had to do anything on their birthday, we'd have to do without a lot of vital services and products when we needed them.

Believe me, I'm not going to start railing against taxpayer dollars paying for leave days (I earn 2.5 a month and I'm unabashedly going to use them until the active duty days are done). I also realize that whoever negotiated for this could have probably just asked for another day of paid leave each year and it might not have sounded so frivolous.

But still, c'mon! Even military and other public employees who earn leave have to request the days off via the chain of command (this prevents people from taking leave during critical periods where they're needed...all leave chits still have to be routed at least through the Executive Officer, or XO).

Birthdays?!?!? For grown, armed men in uniforms?!?! I mean, I had to check and then re-check this article to make sure I'd read it right before posting, for fear that I might've somehow misinterpreted it.

I hope Mayor Nutter achieves his goal of reversing this.

Covering Municipal Politics

As this blog was "launched" almost exactly one year ago, I still haven't written much about Lowell's municipal political races, as they occur in the odd-numbered years only.

This being 2009, however, I'm definitely looking forward to soaking everything in -- the candidates, the issues, the races, the strategies, etc. and writing about it here. As a Political Science student who loves this stuff from a pure observer's angle, I can't wait to see it all up close -- trust me, I can say with no exaggeration that Richard Ben Cramer's "What It Takes" had me on the edge of my seat from front to back. Also, as someone who would love to jump into the fray at some point (though I'm not sure quite when, or how, or on what level), it'll be great to watch everything go by with the proverbial bat on my shoulder -- both for curiosity's sake and to help answer the could-I-ever-really-do-something-like-this question -- I'm still not sure whether I'd be better suited as a guy who tries to run for something, as a guy who advises the guy who tries to run for something, or as a guy who gets appointed to run something by the guy who successfully runs for something. All I know for sure is that I want to be involved -- I can't help it, I'm just way too interested in what goes on around me to stay on the sidelines forever.

Well, with proper kudos to Left in Lowell as the place I grabbed this from, I noticed today that a challenger had announced already: Ryan Berard. You can check out his website at this url: www.ryanberard.com. A lot of basic bio information is there -- suffice to say, he'll almost certainly be the youngest candidate on either the Council or School Board slates, as he'll turn 20 in April. There's not a ton of substantive policy stuff, but judging from his Left in Lowell post, the website is still a work in progress.

If You Build It, They Will Pay..

A lot of the local blogetariat (and now me, too) have written about the rise of new media (and the concomitant decline of the old). While the days of the printed newspaper as we've come to know and love it (or, come trash/recycling day, know and loathe it) may be numbered, I trust that entrepreneurial types 'round the world will find new ways to bring us the things we need, conveniently, and make a tidy dollar or two in the process.

I noticed this article in the Economist yesterday http://www.economist.com/business/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13109804 about Amazon's Kindle and other e-readers that are gaining steam with book-lovers. Good for them. They've found a clever way to market a legitimate product in an easy-to-use, handy format that doesn't clutter people's houses, burn down trees to produce, or weigh down peoples' cars when they move.

I love the fact that iTunes has been so successful, despite many predictions that people were too used to downloading free music to pay for a service like the one it offers. iTunes proves that people will do the right thing, provided it's convenient, user-friendly, and reliable (and the threat of going to jail or paying huge fines for illegal downloads doesn't hurt, either). Witness also the runaway success of Netflix, which offers the by-the-mail service as well as the instant-to-your-PC version of movies.

For me, the best thing going right now is the podcast. Because I spend a LOT of time driving, podcasts provide me with the perfect solution for being stuck in an enclosed space but wanting to be reading and/or learning. Now, many podcasts are free, but not all are. Some are pay-to-play, some are split content (some is given away, the rest you gotta pay for), and some are free assuming you already pay for something else (like the Economist's podcast, which is free for paying print edition subscribers). Without the podcast, I might've canceled my Economist subscription because I've noticed a few more stack up on the kitchen table than I've had time to read, but I keep it going just because it hooks me up to the podcast. With Learning Indonesian (www.learningindonesian.com) I found a great free service that inspired me to pay for a subscription to all the content (which I've found, by the way, to be well worth it).

I'm sure there are many people out there with long commutes, who walk on the treadmill every day, or who just enjoy listening to the spoken word, and want to use things like podcasts to keep them informed.

For every one of those people, there's a potential for some innovative marketer/entrepreneur to make a buck. All parties can be better for the transaction.

The same could be said for any form of media -- yes, it will morph, but no, the main ideas behind it won't die. Things will change shape, but the changes will provide opportunities for those who can see them coming from down the road, and seize upon them.

Consumers, by and large, will benefit.