The Tale of the Possum: It's not as slick as you think

The latest news out of Raleigh has all the makings of a Hollywood comedy.  Well, maybe not a Christmas release at a theater near you, but definitely a made for TV movie.  I can even see the potential for a catchy tune that people around the world could lip-sync to on YouTube.  We can take possums in so many directions.

grinnus alottus

We southerners love the ole possum.  He takes us back to our rural roots, waddling about with a perpetual smile that hints that a tree filled with plump persimmons is just around the corner.  True or not, we all grew up hearing the older folks talk about eating possums during the hard times.  I recall an instructor in my wildlife officer recruit class asking if any of us had ever broken the game laws.  Most of us reluctantly raised our hands.  He then asked how many had gotten caught.  One recruit raised his hand and admitted to being charged with hunting possums in the closed season.  He had instant credibility with the rest of the class.

www.clayscorner.com

I wrote in an earlier post about PETA’s attempt to alter the New Year's Eve festivities in the southern Appalachian community of Brasstown. NC.  A thing I love about mountain people is that they don’t like to be pushed around – I guess it is a carryover from our Scots/Irish roots.  So, in 2013 a mountain legislator introduced, and the General Assembly passed, the Opossum Right-to-Work Act (even Hollywood couldn’t make that up) to give the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC) the authority to issue a captivity license for the Clays Corner Possum Drop.  That will show PETA.

Then PETA decided to push back (again) and officials from the NCWRC have spent an exorbitant amount of time defending their legal issuance of that license.  NCWRC staff from across the state have been repeatedly subpoenaed to court.  Countless conservation dollars have been wasted in an attempt to appease a small number of people who are opposed by an equally small number of people.  Maybe it is time to call a truce. 

Truce???  No way.  Another thing I love about my people is that we will fight even if we know we will lose.  We ain’t scared of an ass whoopin.

So, let’s introduce another bill.  And this time, let’s get the NCWRC off the hook.  Let’s make Clay County exempt from the NCWRC’s opossum regulations for a week in late December to early January.  That will allow someone to catch a possum, hold it in captivity for that week, display it at the Possum Drop and then turn it loose before the week is up.  Oh yeah, we are winning now.

This news comes as North Carolina educators continue to offer complaints about teacher pay (among the lowest in the country) and as legislators introduce a bill that will make it illegal to reveal the chemicals used in fracking.  It causes one to wonder about our legislative priorities and how North Carolinians are viewed by others.

The scary thing is that there are always unintended consequences to legislation.  It is the whole "slippery slope" metaphor being played out in slow motion as our comedy takes a tragic turn.  If I only learned one thing from 29 years in the law enforcement profession, you can never “law” your way out of a problem.  Laws are part of the solution, but will rarely take us all the way to our desired outcome.  This is a another example of applying a technical fix (a law) to an adaptive problem (societal shifts).

It all strikes me as childish and downright embarrassing.  The social climate changes and just because it was acceptable fun to revel in the possum on New Year’s Eve for many years doesn’t mean we should continue.  On the other hand, it is one possum for one night - a family event – where is the harm?  We are now in an age where compromise is viewed as weak.  “We have to stand for something or we will fall for anything” or something like that.  I'm all for taking a stand, but with all the issues that desperately need to be addressed, I'm certain that that stand shouldn't be over a possum.

As for that possum smile.  I’ve now come to view it as a knowing smirk.

Restoration: What is worth saving?

About 18 months ago, Amy and I rescued a dining table from her grandmother’s old house.  The house has a leaky roof and rain was seeping through to the table.  It was only a matter of time before the table was ruined.

There is nothing especially noteworthy about the table – at least not to most observers.  It is a traditional farm table made of pine.  The legs and frame had a dark stain and the top was unfinished.  My guess is that it was locally made 75-100 years ago, and the top had been replaced somewhere along the way.  Five layers of vinyl tablecloths offered some protection from the rain dripping in though one leg had a bit of rot.  Its monetary value was minimal at best.

The actual value is twofold.  One, the table is functional and will look great in a mountain home.  Other tables could fill the space just as well, but this one has rugged character that goes a step beyond simple function and utility – it has a history of staying power.

Second, there is a strong emotional value to the piece.  For decades meals were eaten around this table, preceded by prayers of thanksgiving and supplication.  After school snacks were wolfed down before kids headed out for evening chores.  Amy's grandfather was a pastor so many of the community's problems were addressed at this very table. So, it is much more than a piece of furniture.

I started refinishing the table about a month ago.  I thought it would only be a matter of stripping away the old finish and replacing it with new.  A question from the beginning was how much to “clean up” and what imperfections to leave.  The boards on the top showed some water damage, and were loose and uneven.

So I removed the individual boards, glued them back together as a whole and then sanded the entire top surface.  The boards were resistant to bending from their previous shape so clamps and glue and screws were required to pull them back to where they needed to be.  Then, it took aggressive work with a belt sander to smooth out the uneven spots and to make the five separate boards one unified table top.

We opted for a walnut finish and three coats of polyurethane for protection.  I feel the character has been preserved and it is a functional piece that will last another 100 years.

As I worked on the table, I thought about how those in positions of authority are accountable for disciplining individuals in their organizations.  Human Resources departments have policies, churches have scripture, and parents draw from a variety of sources to aid them in applying discipline.  Most of us hear “punishment” when we hear someone talking of discipline.  While there may be a punitive aspect to discipline, true discipline goes beyond steps taken to punish behavior or actions.  At its root, discipline is training.

I considered how easy it would be to simply scrap the table and go buy a new one.  We sometimes do that with employees – look for a way to remove them from the organization and hire someone who is (hopefully) a better fit.  And Michael Cheshire writes in Why We Eat Our Own about how churches often “discard” members who struggle with sin.  We have a tendency to look for the easiest way out of a situation, especially those situations that make us uncomfortable.

We sometimes close our eyes and hope that a personnel problem will go away on its own.  Amy stored the table for over a year and its condition did not change.  Change took removing old nails, gluing the boards back together, and hours of sanding – all hard, dirty work.  It takes work and persistence to change behavior.  Most of all it takes a firm vision of our desired outcome.

As I look at the table in the dining area, I realize that this wasn’t a refinishing job after all.  Refinishing is just removing the old finish and replacing it with new - it is cosmetic at best.  This was a restoration project.  The goal was restoring the table to its original complex value.  That goal has been met.

I wonder how much stronger our organizations would be if we came view those who fall short of our expectations as restoration, instead of refinishing, projects?

Making the Complex Simple

It was always surprises me when someone tells me that they rarely (or never) read a book.  A 2007 NBC News survey found that roughly one American in four didn’t read a book in the preceding year.  Other surveys place the number even higher.  I would guess the true number would be shocking if the respondents were completely honest.

That whole thought baffles me.  As a kid at Bethware Elementary School, I loved going to the library.  That library contained a group of small biographies where I learned of the exploits of John Paul Jones (I have not yet begun to fight!) and Kit Carson.  At Central Junior High, teacher Betsy Wells allowed us to order paperbacks.  One of my all time favorites is Where the Red Fern Grows.  I dreamed of owning a pair of Redbone coonhounds like Old Dan and Little Ann, and following them up a creekbed while they poured it on a coon.  Reading took me from a small town in western North Carolina to the American Revolution, the Ozarks and on to the western frontier.

In high school I was keenly aware that it wasn’t very cool to read.  So, I tried to strike a balance by focusing on hunting and fishing books.  Thumbing through the old card catalog, searching for fishing books, I came across a novel by this Hemmingway guy and it doing so found myself immersed in the high literature of the Old Man and the Sea.  When I read about Santiago’s epic struggle with the great fish, as a high schooler, I couldn’t see past the fishing story (a story that is incredible).  Later, after the second or third reading, I came to realize it was more than just a story of an old man and a great fish, and I came to appreciate the writing of a story spun by a master.

These days I continue to read a variety of texts.  I bounce from non-fiction and fiction.  It is pretty rare that I don’t have a book nearby.  I read fiction for pure enjoyment and I greatly enjoy a well written tale.  I read nonfiction because I like learning new things or hearing different viewpoints.  Most of all I like to read something that inspires me to act or that expands my thoughts on the world. (Under the Overpass transformed my view of the homeless while Nickeled and Dimed opened my eyes to the plight of the working poor).

This past week at the conservation leadership academy, I led a short class on the power of storytelling in leadership.  It is a topic that fascinates me, and done well, it is one of the most effective ways leaders can connect with others.

I'm not opposed to statistics and logical reasoning.  But, we tend to throw numbers and facts at people, and then wonder why they aren’t inspired to act.  We show charts with numbers and graphs hoping to change behaviors.  We aim for the head, but vision should be cast to the heart.  Whether they are written, sung or spoken, stories connect on an emotional/relational level, helping the abstract become understandable - the complex become simple.  Simplicity makes action possible and action drives change.

It all begins with a story.