With the passing of Tim Russert, we are all made critically aware of the fragile nature of life and our need to embrace every moment as a gift.  Obviously, within a split second, every aspect of our lives can change, and, as in Mr. Russert’s case, can end.  This is not a blog about instant death, and it is not just about recognizing our mortality.  It is about preparing for our passing carefully.

Liz Szabo, a writer with USA Today described in a recent article the cancer patient experience by saying, “Patients with advanced cancer often don’t know how long they have to live or how chemotherapy will affect their lives.”  According to a study by the Journal of the American Medical Association, many physicians either don’t give patients that type of information or the patients only “hear what they choose to hear, or very often misunderstand what is said to them.”

This situation often leads to patients requesting incredibly disruptive and sometimes painful therapies that have no hope of succeeding.  According to the study, more than 20% of Medicare patients who have advanced cancer begin a new chemo regimen two weeks before they die.  Many times patients are admitted to hospice days or hours before they die.

What has been observed in cases like this was that the patient often misses the opportunity to repair relationships, get their spiritual house in order or even prepare the necessary documents such as advanced directives.

Where is this going?  Sarah Harrington, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University School of Medicine in Richmond, co-author of the quoted article, indicated that “in the last few weeks or months of life, a lot of good work can be done.”

One of the points brought up in the article was that only about 37% of physicians told patients how long they had to live. This fact was not surprising to us because we have seen dozens of patients who were admitted to hospice over the years return home and live several more months or years. This particular prediction is not always dependable. The other fact quoted in the article, however, was that many patients learned more about their cases from other patients than from their physicians.

The article concluded with the suggestion that “patients and their families may have to take the initiative in finding answers to important questions.”  Thomas Smith, co-author and Chairman of Hematology and Oncology at VCU’s Massey Cancer Center suggested that the following questions should be asked by any patient in this situation:   What are my options?  Can I be cured?  Will I live longer with Chemo?  Should I consider Hospice or Palliative Care?  Who could help me cope?  What do I want to pass on to my family to tell them about my life?

Palliative care is not limited to cancer.  All end-of-of life diagnoses qualify patients for hospice and palliative care.  Tim didn’t need or have this opportunity, but for those who do, embrace it. The primary thing that can be delivered to the patient and their family is the comfort of having caregivers dedicated to helping you move through your transition.  It is what they do.  These amazing people, volunteers, employees and physicians are dedicated to “paying it forward.”

So, as we eventually face our own mortality, as we evaluate what it is that we want to share with our families, as we consider the legacy that we wish to leave, having a clear mind and looking to those professionals who can help us is not only necessary, it is imperative. This transition can come in the blink of an eye.

From the age of about eight until 20 years ago, my entire life was immersed in music, education, the arts and, in a very pure way, people in general.  It was a complex world that required a deep, intuitive understanding of the human condition on multiple levels.  In a very general way, that life, (pre-health care management) was all about systems.  

Obviously, it was never just about one or two individuals, and it was not about life and death, but it was magnificently complex in its own way. It involved working with  people to do something that was extremely challenging, that required incredible hand/eye co-ordination, and an ensemble mindset of co-operativeness that was paramount to success.  Most importantly, it required them to listen intently to each other so as to find the perfect balance, blend and intonation. 

The nuances of taking a systemic approach to the creation of music through the efforts of an ensemble in many ways have escaped our world of healing, at least until now. 

At a recent visit to my dentist, he and his hygienist were talking about the fact that the doc had just taken a continuing medical education course.  When he was asked if anything new had evolved from his class, he smiled and said, "Well, for the first time in 28 years of practice, they admitted that the mouth is connected to the body."  He went on to elaborate about the fact that each and every day he sees the destruction caused by inflammatory disease of the gums, and then told me about his attempts to communicate that information to a physician friend several years ago.  "It just didn't register," he said. 

What little we know about inflammatory disease has us dutifully brushing our dog's teeth to prevent a heart condition, yet we still do not have direct lines of communication between our primary or cardiac physicians and the the dentists who see these problems as they manifest themselves in our body.  

Someone once told me that Descartes' Treatise of Man played a major role in the imposed medical and emotional separation of the brain from the body, as it clearly took the stand that "Hospitals and physicians should take care of the body while the church takes care of the mind and the soul."

One of our scientific collaborators, Dr. Lee Hood, is famous for his work in Systems Biology.  Another collaborator, Georgetown University, is involved in the creation of a medical school program revolving around Systems Medicine, and finally, our Optimal Healing Environment collaborator, the Samueli Institute, is focused on Systems Wellness.  In spite of these wonderful leaps into what would have to be considered common sense approaches to health and life, we still sometimes miss the ensemble approach.

My recommendation? 

Maybe it would help our healers to take their place on the podium, look at every one of the 30 plus lines of music on the score, raise the baton and begin to direct their way through every nuance, inflection, and harmonious signature present in a score of music with the appropriate rhythm, intonation and accents just to remind themselves that; we human beings are basically all made up of systems as well, and those systems will not function smoothly if one is completely out of sync with the other." 

This is something that we all know intuitively.  Maybe immersing ourselves in that world for a while will help bring that concept totally back into focus.  It's all about harmony, balance and nature's perfection, and a disjointed approach to health is as potentially harmful as a disjointed approach to life.   

“Money doesn’t make you happy.  I now have $50 million, but I was just as happy when I had $48 million.”
–Arnold Schwarzenegger

According to an article in Internal Medicine News by Mary Ellen Schneider, spending on health care in these United States is projected to reach 20% of the gross domestic product on the one hundredth anniversary of my father’s birth, 2017.  Of course that projection is only an estimate made by CMS, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.  That estimate is, of course, based upon a continued escalation of nearly 7% each year for the next nine years.  In lay terms, that escalation would mean that the total dollars spent on health care would hit $4.3 trillion…Whatever a trillion is? I still can’t fathom a billion of anything.)

We all should realize by now that this spending in the public sector, Medicare and Medicaid, will increase due to the first wave of Baby Boomers entering the Medicare system in 2011.  My 78 million peers, like the lemmings, are working their way toward the proverbial wall, and for those of you who will have to carry the load until we are wearing our wings, that is not a pretty financial picture.

The same economists from CMS are predicting a decrease in reimbursements to physicians over the next several years while Home Health will likely grow faster than most other sectors except perhaps prescription drugs.

What does it all mean?  We are spending more on health care in the United States than any industrialized country in the world and, truthfully, our overall age of death is significantly surpassed by many of those “spending less” countries.  How can that be?  Well, for one thing, we have 47 million uninsured citizens in this country and no one really knows how many illegal aliens. Why so many uninsured?  They don’t vote.  The vast majority are young, single mothers with small children, and this does not take into consideration the illegal aliens who are also not insured.

Back to the answer. . . prenatal care is inadequate and infant mortality in the United States is still an embarrassment. A few of the countries that do better than us in the world in infant deaths per thousand are:  Australia, Austria, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Japan, South Korea, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden Switzerland and the United Kingdom.  Hmmmmmm?  Could it be because we spend 30% of our annual health care dollars on the last thirty days of life, and less than 4% of our monies on preventative and wellness care?

Of course, Hospice would be a tremendous help.  We could reduce expenditures on end of life care, properly care for our babies with the excess funds, and ensure that our uninsured are properly covered as well, but what politician is willing to touch that electric third rail of the electorial subway tracks?

We could begin by putting in a network of sidewalks, bike trails, and walking trails.  We could actually walk once in a while and treat our bodies like a true temple, not the “Temple of Doom.”

One of the least often heard issues revolving around these expenditures is the continuation of our archaic hospital system.  It is based on the acute care model, and the vast majority of our diseases are chronic.  We rush the victim to the hospital, patch them up, send them home and then rush them back again without any commitment to behavioral modification.  I have seen individuals reverse their heart disease from diet, exercise, and stress management.  Why can’t we embrace this concept, reward these activities, and change our society?  The millions of bicycles in Europe are no accident.

So, as I’ve quoted in some other blogs, “Change or Die,” or just spend ourselves into oblivion as we attempt to prop up a system that should have gone out with the Industrial Revolution.  Good luck kids, your ole man needs you to keep working to cover my health insurance.

Kenneth Cloke and Joan Goldsmith wrote a very interesting book entitled The End of Management. In this book, they assert that managers are the dinosaurs of our modern organizational ecology. They go on to assert that the “‘Age of Management’ is finally coming to a close.”  Their treatise is that “the need for overseers, surrogate parents, scolds, monitors, functionaries, disciplinarians, bureaucrats, and lone implementers is over. . . ”

If, by now, you managers are wondering what comes next, our authors assert that the new need, the true need in modern day business is for “visionaries, leaders, coordinator coaches, mentors, facilitators, and conflict resolvers.”

In a recent conversation with an “old school” manager/friend, I reached out to explain to him why he was alienating his subordinate.  I explained very carefully that management as a self-contained system fails to open the heart or free the spirit.  This approach has truly taken our organization to new heights.  Of course, one can only work within one’s comfort zones, and many managers, especially, old school managers, only know one approach, and that is, the industrial revolution way.

Let me suggest that you analyze the quality of the individuals with whom you work.  Then, step back and realize just how amazing those individuals are with “butterfly” qualities.

Do not penalize your charges because of your insecurities.  Build a team that “has your back” by empowering them to be all that they can be.

The revolution quoted by Cloke and Goldsmith is one of “turning the inflexible, autocratic, static, coercive bureaucracies into agile, evolving, democratic, collaborative, self-managing webs of association.”  From our perspective, the object is to allow those butterflies the freedom to fly.

How do you manage a butterfly?  Work together on the goals and then get out of its way.  Provide it with just the very basic, fundamental needs and goals of your organization, and then trust it, love it, empower it, and encourage it.

If I could possibly find one example that would clearly embrace our success as an organization, it is that of doing everything possible to kill “parent to child management.”  It is not enough to move into the 21st century with our thinking; it is most important to identify those individuals who get it and then give them the space “to do it.”

Are they traditional?  Do they do everything the way you were taught in the “dark ages of the industrialized style of management?”  Nope.  Will it drive you crazy when you look for them, and discover that they are not on the flower where you expected to find them?  Sometimes.  Will they accomplish more than you have ever dreamed if you treat them with dignity, respect, love and freedom?  Oh, yeah.

You see, it is not about control.  Control is only necessary for those who are not trustworthy.  Better than trying to control a non trustworthy individual, simply help them find work somewhere else.  If they don’t get the mission, don’t understand the philosophy, and don’t work to their capacity, they shouldn’t be there.

On the other hand, if they are loyal, trustworthy, committed, and caring, back off and allow them to soar, and you will never see results of the kind they that they will deliver to you or your organization.

If they look at it as a job, if they are only comfortable with myriad rules, time clocks and books of policies, they are stuck in the past.

Leadership means trust.

The End of Management, Kenneth Cloke & Joan Goldsmith

As very small children, the funniest jokes that kids can come up with always seem to be "poopy talk" jokes.  As we age, it is interesting that we remain shy about our natural functions.  In fact, some people are so shy that they would rather die than say, do, or even think about anything related to their colons. 

The E-mail that I received this week was a challenge to "Take the Test," and, although it was an advertisement, there were enough good points made in that E-mail that I decided to dedicate this week’s blog to Katie Couric.  In 2000, Katie submitted herself to a public colonoscopy on national television.  Why?  Because she had lost her husband at the relatively young age of 42 to colon cancer. 

After Katie’s big adventure, among the 400 gastroenterologists surveyed, the number of colonoscopies performed each month rose from an average of 15 before the Couric exam to 18.1 after.  It was so successful that it is still referred to as the Couric Effect.

As indicated in the correspondence, over 150,000 people are diagnosed with colon cancer each year and at least 1/3 of them die.  Unlike ovarian and numerous other cancers, there are several screening tests available to determine the presence of colon cancer. 

At a meeting last year our Chief of Medicine stated that "There is no longer a reason why anyone should die from colon cancer."

Even though it was part of my suggested battery of tests the year before, my colonoscopy was completed a few months ago.  Except for the fact that I woke up with a few children’s tattoos on my body from our playful employees and a threat that there would be a video at 11, all went well. 

Okay, I will admit that the preparation for the test was somewhat of a drag, but it wasn’t as bad as being a long term patient.

The goal of their E-mail was for us to persuade everyone to use their diagnostics. The quoted website was: www.DoYouHaveTheGuts.com 

The goal of this blog is to get you to think about taking care of yourself.  It is to convince you to love yourself and your family enough to ensure that you all have a future.  It is to get you to be saved by having a colon test, some test, any test. 

If you’re still embarrassed by colon jokes, GET OVER IT.

It could truly be a matter of life or death.

Make sure you know the question before you give the answer.

My kids taught me a lot about this job. At age seven, my son said, "Dad, where did I come from?" I knew that question was coming, but I had not expected it that soon. "Son," I said, "Let me explain about life" As I began my meticulously rehearsed tale of the birds and the bees, I slowly explained the nuances of life, love and more bees.

I was perspiring profusely as I stumbled over these sensitive descriptions. After about ten minutes of squirming, stuttering and stammering I said, "Do you understand, son?" To which he turned to me and said, "Heck, Dad, I knew all that stuff. I just wanted to know what hospital I came from, Mercy or Windber?"

Learn to share.

Hospitals deal every day in life and death issues. They are extremely complex and multifarious places. Emotions can run very high as well as we deal with the challenges and mysteries of life. Helping people to share has been a very large part of my life. Helping them to share resources, time, space and all aspects of life is a very important contributor to our success as both care givers and human beings. When I was eight, my Aunt Mildred gave me three pieces of bubble gum. As I was walking home with all three pieces stuffed into my jaw, a group of kids jumped me, pinned me down, took my gum right out of my mouth and divided it up between them. It would have been a lot easier on me if I had just kept a few pieces out to share.

Finally, don’t repeat it if you don’t understand it.

In any organization there always seems to be someone who takes great pleasure in telling the story when they aren't really sure of its meaning. After standing near Jack, a 15 year old sixth grader at school one day, my vocabulary expanded exponentially. He talked about mysterious things that made no sense to me, but he was big and I was small. In my world, that meant that Jack knew all. That night when my mom told me, the little third grader, to get ready for bed, I looked up at her standing beside my grandmother, aunt and dad and said, "I don’t have to go to bed, you @$#%&*$@!"

My limp cleared up right before I had to walk across the stage to pick up my college diploma thirteen years later.

Learn from your mistakes.

Due to my personal fund raising commitments this year, the staff here at my organization probably feels like hiding under their desks when they see me coming. You see, this is the year that we did a feasibility study to decide if we will have enough community support to raise needed funds to construct expanded emergency and obstetrics facilities and to provide WMC with a reserve for the future. That effort will be made public in a very few weeks.

The reason for their angst, has been that, for whatever reason, this is the year that their boss, me, has been solicited to solicit contributions for numerous other organizations in the area. As a board member for the Keystone Chapter of the American Red Cross, we worked with a tremendous group of local leaders, including our Congressman Jack Murtha, who helped us conduct a successful $300+K campaign that literally gave that organization new life.

Then we were approached by the Boy Scouts of America for their annual dinner to help generate enough cash to support their efforts as well. Over $110,000 was raised for that effort, the results of which will ensure the continued growth of the Penns Woods Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

Next, came the Girl Scouts of Talus Rock; that project is currently underway and hopefully, will produce the needed funds for expansion and growth. Oh, yeah, and the Winter Jazz Concert is coming up, too. Finally, this is the tenth anniversary of the Arcadia Performing Arts Theater, and that place surely needs to be endowed with a reserve fund that will ensure its continued success.

Several years ago one of our employees explained philanthropy to me in this way. Each one of us have several pockets, and each pocket can represent our varied fund raising interests. In the spirit of giving, it is clear to us that, if you like the organization, believe in the mission or, for whatever reason, care about the vision provided by the board or the leadership involved, you make your decision to give or not to give.

When my own mother passed away, we discovered that, although her pensions amounted to less than half of the average salary in our area —which is about $10,000 less than the average U.S. salary, she was donating at least 50% of that money to organizations in which she believed. So, here’s one more worthy cause.

A few years ago, a wonderful, caring, local physician approached us regarding children at risk. During the numerous meetings that we held, we discovered the incredible healing qualities that equestrian therapies can provide. Yesterday, this topic was reintroduced by a dedicated, committed physician, Dr. Deb Baceski. She met with me to discuss the Somerset Therapeutic Association for Riders, S.T.A.R. located on the web at STA4R.org. According to their website, “Established in 1995, STAR has been providing safe, closely supervised riding lessons to physically and/or mentally challenged children.” It goes on to explain that; “In a typical training session, a handicapped child is helped to mount a carefully trained horse, and is then escorted on a ride for twenty minutes by three volunteers . . . ”

One of the challenges that STAR is facing right now is that of the sometimes brutal winter weather that residents of this area have grown to know and “?” love. Dr. Baceski approached us for assistance in a program that she calls, The HORSE POWER Project. This project involves constructing an indoor riding arena so that the free therapy provided through this program is not interrupted by frost bite.

Although my organization is also quietly involved in soliciting assistance in our own expansion needs, this horse power project is not financially overpowering. The volunteer Physical Therapists, Physician Assistants, Teachers and Physicians who enable this empowering, socializing, learning program to go on for those individuals isolated by their disabilities, can’t do it alone.

So, take a look at sta4r.org, and, if you personally believe in this volunteer effort, or if you know of someone who could help them network their way to an enclosed arena, we invite you to show your support. Their address is 305 Highpoint Drive Somerset, PA 814-445-4909. Give if you want, but at least talk to someone who might.

“The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched. They must be felt with the heart.”
—Helen Keller

The other day a very compelling story appeared on America Online (AOL).  I’m sorry that the name didn’t catch my attention, but, in fact, Tony Chen pointed it out to us on his Hospitalimpact.org blog.  Glenn Beck, a correspondent for CNN, had a bad experience in a hospital and then shared that experience. 

What Tony had pointed out was that my recent post on Hospital Impact was also about empathy.  Two of the quotes from that post were:  Maya Angelou who said, "I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel."  And: As we move about in our world every day . . . remember that warmth, concern, compassion, and empathy are NOT bad things.

Glenn had a hospital experience that very nearly put him over the edge, and, in fact, due to the pain cocktail that he had received, he admits that he was even contemplating suicide.  Here are some quotes from his article Put the ‘care’ back in health care, featured on CNN.com/health:

"At the hospital I was often treated more like a number than a patient.  At times, staff members literally turned their back on my cries of pain and pleas for help."

He went on to say, "I’ve now seen our system at its very best and I’ve also experienced it at its very worst.  But in each case, the difference had nothing to do with whether the hospital had the latest equipment or whether it looked like the Taj Mahal.  It had to do with compassion.  It had to do with respect.  It had to do with treating people the way you’d want to be treated going through something unfamiliar and frightening."

From the website: ReligiousTolerance.org we find 21 different religious and six different philosophical interpretations of the Christian phrase, "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you."  Just a few of those are listed below:

Confucianism:  "Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you."
-Analects 15:23

Buddhism:  "…a state that is not pleasing or delightful to me, how could I inflict that upon another:" 
-Samyutta Nlkaya v. 353

Hinduism:  "This is the sum of duty: do not do to others what would cause pain if done to you. 
-Mahabharata 5:1517

Islam:  "None of you (truly) believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself." 
-Number 13 of Imam "Al-Nawawi’s Forty Hadiths."

Unitarian:  "The Inherent worth and dignity of every person:’  "Justice, equity and compassion in human relations…"

Native American Spirituality:  "All things are our relatives; what we do to everything, we do to ourselves."

Shinto:  "the heart of the person before you is a mirror.  See there your own form"

Judiasm:  "thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." 
-Leviticus 19:18

If these were not convincing enough, there are nearly 20 more included from other religions and philosophies like Yoruba, Zoroastrianism, Ancient Egyptian, Brahmanism, and the Baha’i Faith.

How is it that the world embraces this philosophy, that the "Golden Rule" is our guide, yet we permit environments in health care that tolerate the intolerable?  This, my friends, is a leadership issue.  Do not blame the employees.  Do not blame the physicians.  Do not blame the environment.  BLAME THE LEADERSHIP.  Hold the leadership accountable.  Every department manager, vice president, or president who allows this should be challenged, should be confronted, and, if it is not corrected, SHOULD BE REMOVED.

It is not a matter of choice. It is not business. It is human dignity.  Transparency provides the information needed to correct these indignities, and if they are not corrected via change, you have not exerted your God given rights as a human being, and this is one time when compassion should be trumped by accountability!

Well, I bought two new FAT suits on sale last week, and today one of them wouldn’t fit me.  Yep, after ten years of stable, no weight gain, my middle started to inflate; five, ten then 15 pounds.  I’ve spent more on having my pants let out than I have on gasoline this month.  Pinching an inch would be a dream.  Pinching a Michelin is more like it. 

Don’t get me wrong, I know what I did to cause this, really I do.  It is also clear what I will need to do to reverse it, but it is the holidays, after all, and, for the first time since 1998, I am not limited to eating only the garnishes at all of the parties.  Free at last.  I’m free at last!

The rules had always been the same: Eat breakfast each and every day.  Drink tea for the antioxidants.  Brush your teeth. Don’t miss your Omega 3 fish oil. Get enough sleep.  Make sure you have at least one hobby; exercise and join something where you can socialize at least once a week.  Use sun screen, drink plenty of water and cut out saturated fats.  So, what went wrong? 

I moved from my Ornish Heart Disease Reversal diet to the modified Mediterranean diet; went from working out three days a week to working out two days a week; and, after ten years of abstinence, started eating chocolate and drinking one 200 calorie chai tea a day.  Do the math.  That’s 200 new calories a day, seven days a week, four weeks a month. Add that to the lack of exercise, and it represents a caloric train wreck.  The chocolate?  Well, that easily accounted for at least five pounds of extra me.  Ten years of make-up work in twelve short months.

The problem with having all of this knowledge is that, periodically, it’s important to feel like you are alive, and living can be defined in hundreds of ways.  The more conservative you are, the fewer things you will probably have to do to make things feel a little more wild.  I can’t get away with most of the things that I’ve day dreamed about, but this departure from my diet was major for me.

One of my most vivid memories from my former life was the trip that I made from Pittsburgh to San Diego.  I know I mentioned this a hundred or so blogs ago, but it was almost a primal moment.  As the plane took off, I looked down and saw an M&M between my shoes.  I stared at it for what seemed like hours and then actually reached a point of temptation and desperation that was so intense, I almost bent down to pick it up and eat it. Then I kicked it as far away as I could and realized how pathetic my life had become. 

So, even if my pants don’t fit this year, I have to say that it was an amazing year, a year of personal caloric freedom. 

It’s time, however, to get back into my suits. 

So, I’ll see you at the gym…with my big sweat pants and a pocket full of Hershey kisses!   

Happy Holidays everyone, and thanks for a great year.

Last week, during a meeting with one of our planning teams, I couldn’t help but overhear an employee say, “Yep, I saw her trying to walk through the snow and slush with no boots, no hat, and a light weight coat, and I stopped and picked her up.”

Instead of a resounding congratulatory round of recognition, we, each and every one of us who were gathered around the conference table said things like, “Are you nuts? She could have killed you.” To which our employee laughed and said, “Actually, when I invited her to get in, I said, “I’ll give you a ride as long as you’re not planning to stab me or anything?”

“Instead,” she said, “the young woman smiled and with tears in her eyes said, “I’m just so thankful that you would offer me a ride.”

As the story unfolded, our Good Samaritan was told that this young woman had recently moved back here to be with her mother who had passed away a few months earlier. She, her husband and new baby were now trying to survive in a new town, a new apartment and an area where jobs are not significantly abundant for those without specific education acquired skills. The only work that her husband could find was in a low paying, home-based job. They did not have a car, and, in fact, as the conversation went on, she admitted that they did not have the proper furnishings for their baby either.

Our storyteller then proceeded to explain that she had decided that this woman would be her Christmas, and that, somehow, someway, she would get her the furniture that she needed for their baby.

At first we looked at her in wonderment of her perceived naïveté, but then we realized that what we were witnessing was truly the work of the Christmas Spirit.

Yes, she had taken a risk, a risk that, years ago would not even have resulted in anyone thinking about her decision. Yes, it seemed naïve to open herself to someone who could possibly rob her or attach herself to her in ways that would not be welcome, but, that was not what happened either. The woman was walking from the shopping center to the bank in the snow and wind and slush to make her rent payment, then back to catch a bus to her apartment where her husband was watching their sleeping baby and working at his telephone based job.

It was then that we all decided that, if she would permit us, we would all pitch in to welcome our new neighbor; this stranger, her husband and baby into our town. We would share in this spirit of giving by helping to make their world just a little better this Christmas.

It seems like a long long time ago when this would have just been what was expected. We have become so cautious, so skeptical and so cynical in a cold, fearful way. It sometimes feels like we are all enveloped in a crust of practicality that forbids us to reach out.

I’m glad our employee did what she did.

When I asked her why, she replied, “I’ve had Angels reach out to help me in my life, and I just want to give back a little.”

I’m also glad that she shared her Christmas story with us because it truly was a means to capture that spirit that might otherwise have just remained a memory.
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