Shipyard Conflict, Part I

I'm a coupla days overdue for a post. And this post is going to serve double duty as the beginnings of a paper for class. Such a slacker! I'll even be asking for help from the audience on this post: Uncle Heathen and Aunt Jan B, if you could assist with your conflict resolution knowledge; and Frank and Greg (or any other KISKA crew from that summer!), any comments or insights on interactions with the contractors would be much appreciated.

My negotiation of choice, which of course has already been completed, will be the circumstances regarding KISKA's shaft alignment problem at the end of the 2009 drydock availability. My most impressioned memory from that experience is attending a meeting 'long about day three or four of sitting at the pier with a broken ship (over the weekend, I'm pretty sure) where we sat down with the contractors and tried figuring out the way ahead. The company President, VP and Project Manager were there for the shipyard; the Contracting Officer (KO), Port Engineer (PE), myself, my XO and my MKC were all there for the Coast Guard. The KO got the meeting going but the President quickly took over the discussion (note: I distinctly remember him using the two words in quotations), contending that the shafts weren't too badly out of alignment, there was generally some "slop" built into the design of the shafts and bearings, and "hopefully" we'd be fine to go ahead and run the ship the way it was. I nearly came across the table at him. Was he KIDDING? I think my exact words were something like, "'HOPEFULLY?!?' Hopefully is not good enough when you're talking about something that spins at 1500 rpms. This ship is not like your old tug boats and fishing boats; this is a high performance machine, more like a Corvette than a tractor. 'Hopefully' isn't good enough!" The KO, PE and Project Manager all kind of stared at me slack-jawed while MKC and XO sat there smirking. Not my finest moment, but I was *furious!*

So I think there are some good lessons for me to learn from looking at this conflict more closely. The obligatory disclaimers: this is my perspective as I try to use the example as a useful learning tool to explore the negotiation framework and meet the objectives of my class. I will do my best not to cast unwarranted aspersions on any of the parties involved. The beauty of this exercise is that I can look back with the benefit of hindsight. I will do my best to "step back from the conflict," but do reserve the right to make snide asides...wait, that doesn't sound very productive. Will try to limit the partisan commentary. Now, onward ho!

From the syllabus for Managing Conflict, the paper we're supposed to write is described as follows: "Students are to demonstrate mastery of interest-based (principled) negotiation by completing an analysis of a two-party conflict. The paper must use all nine elements and detail the type(s) of conflict strategies present. The paper must demonstrate the capacity to step back from the conflict, analyze the situation from all perspectives and then draw some conclusions. A justification for one’s point of view is not an acceptable analysis. The topic may be a negotiation that has already been completed or one that is still in progress." I'm using Getting to Yes, and Getting Past No as primary references.

The nine elements referenced in the syllabus are: framing the issue, parties and interests, significant issues, options, standards of legitimacy, communication, commitment, alternatives, relationship. There are various tools we've learned to get into each of these elements more thoroughly. Unfortunately I haven't figured out a coherent way to move through the tools so I think I'll just have to bounce around and try to explain as I go.

"Framing the Issue: What is this Negotiation about, both as I see it and as others see it?" I'm going to start by using the Circle Chart (there's a diagram about halfway down this page), which used in an integrative manner (as opposed to a partisan manner) helps to develop a "richness of options," as the professor, Dr Field says. The lower left quadrant of the Circle Chart asks, What is the problem? What are the symptoms? What is the preferred state, or long term vision? In this case, the problem was that, back in August, 2009, KISKA was not operational, despite nearly five months in drydock and close to $2 million spent on repairs. The symptoms were mis-aligned shafts. The preferred state was to have an operational cutter. I think that all the parties would have agreed with those statements, but *only* with those statements because any further interpretation of them is rife with disagreement.

"Parties and Interests: includes all significant parties who are at the table or are not, but will affect the outcome/implementation." Because this paper is about a two-party conflict, the simple list of the parties is KISKA and the contractor. But of course there were other parties involved, including KISKA's crew, Sector Honolulu and their other surface assets, MLCPAC/SFLC-PBPL (because this happened right as the Product Line was being stood up...not that that added to the confusion at all. Nope, not at all.), and the KO I think that's a good enough list to get the point. Now for their interests.

KISKA and her crew: I make the distinction because I think we, the crew as individuals, had many overlapping interests with KISKA, the operational unit, but there were also some interests that were divergent. Operationally, our interest was in getting the ship back to a working status as soon as possible in order to be able to contribute to mission execution and relieve the operational burden on Sector Honolulu's other surface assets. The crew (me included) wanted the ship back together so we could go home. There were concerns about crew fatigue, both with the extra work associated with fixing the shafts, but also the work that was still yet to come because we had a double generator change-out planned immediately following the drydock. KISKA was interested in getting the repairs done correctly to prevent any future problems with the shafts that might affect operational readiness later.

Sector Honolulu and their other surface assets: their major interest was in getting all their surface assets back to an operational status so they could meet their mission requirements...and not have to send anymore messages that put them on the spot for not being able to do certain escorts because they simply didn't have the assets available. But I think they also had a longer-term interest in documenting the paucity of assets to bolster their argument for faster delivery of new assets as the assets come available. Sector Honolulu also shared KISKA's concerns for crew fatigue and personnel tempo (PERSTEMPO) issues. Our Days Away from Homeport (DAFHP) that year were out of control, and required Sector Honolulu to submit a waiver...more paperwork and effort.

MLCPAC/SFLC-PBPL: They're responsible for the long-term functionality and cost of maintenance for the patrol boats, so they had a significant financial interest in the proceedings. But they also answer to the operational commander, so they knew they needed to get the boat back to an operational status as quickly as possible. But they also needed to maintain a good working relationship with the contractor because the chances of them having to work with the contractor again was pretty high...being that there's only two shipyards in Hawaii that work on CG ships. And they had their own internal thing going on with the aforementioned stand up of the Patrol Boat Product Line.

The KO: his interest was in getting the best value for the government's dollar, which balances cost with contractor performance. He wanted good performance at a low cost, as much as possible. But he also needed to be concerned about getting the ship fixed quickly. He was definitely interested in maintaining a good working relationship with the contractor in order to not jeopardize future interactions.

So that's it for the parties whose positions I actually have some insights into. But there's still the contractor's interests left to explore. That's where Choice Charts come in. The Currently Perceived Choice Chart asks a particular question to which the party is saying definitively "NO" and asks what are the pros and cons of that decision. The question I formulated for the contractor was, "shall we make alignment repairs to KISKA under the current scope of work?" If they say "yes" to this question, the negative consequences outweigh the positive consequences for them; if they say "no," the positive consequences outweigh the negative consequences for them.

Currently Perceived Choice Sheet
If they say "yes":
(-) They will lose money, both in terms of paying their employees for the work, the space the ship took up in the yard, and the opportunity costs that preclude them from working on other ships if they're working on KISKA.
(-) They will set a bad precedent for expanding the scope of work
(-) It may appear that they are admitting poor workmanship and (related to the next item)...
(-) It may impugn their reputation as a quality shipyard (snarky comment deleted)
(+) Improves their potential to get more government contracts in the future
(+) It gets KISKA (and by extension, me!) out of their shipyard faster (shoots, I would have thought that would have outweighed *any* other consideration!)

If they say "no":
(+) It allows them to explore more opportunities for gain under continued contract negotiations
(+) There is not precedent set and the original contracted scope of work is preserved
(+) They won't lose as much money
(+) It does not require them to admit any responsibility for poor quality workmanship
(-) They may jeopardize the potential for future government contracts
(-) The ship (and by extension, me!) will be in their shipyard for longer

The second part of the Choice Chart is the Target Balance Sheet, which lists the consequences the party might face if they are offered an alternative plan, Plan X, that is as-yet undetermined but offers terms for which their positive consequences for saying yes outweigh the negative ones. If they say "yes" to this proposal, the positive consequences outweigh the negative consequences; if they say "no", the negative consequences outweigh the positive consequences.

Target Balance Sheet
If they say "yes":
(+) They will be fairly compensated for their work, time and space
(+) They maintain their reputation as a quality shipyard (snarky comment #2 deleted)
(+) They preserve the potential for future government contracts
(+) They maintain the integrity of contract law
(-) They may not get as much money as possible
(-) They may have to admit some culpability for the alignment problems

If they say "no":
(-) They may be sued by the government
(-) They will lose money
(-) They may lose future government contracts
(-) They may be perceived as petulant and uncooperative by other future customers
(+) The may be able to hold out for more money

So based on all this, I'll summarize the contractor's interests as maximizing profit, preserving their reputation as a quality shipyard (snarky comment deleted, again), and maintaining customer relations with the government and other potential customers.

"Significant Issues that must be addressed in this negotiation:" The second quadrant (upper left) of the Circle Chart helps to identify the theoretical underlying causes of the problem, in essence, diagnosing the symptoms. The causes I identified were:
--KISKA was an old ship with lots of deferred maintenance
--There were poor communications between the Coast Guard and the shipyard
--There was a significant amount of distrust towards the contractor by the ship (or maybe that was just me)
--The contract specifications were not specific to the ship's situation (non-MEP'd ship with lots of metal fatigue issues)
--There was disagreement on the cause of the mis-alignment (the shipyard said the shafts weren't aligned when we got there; the CG said all the metal cropped out and replaced caused the ship to settle differently while on the blocks)
--There was disagreement about the scope of the mis-alignment (the shipyard said it wasn't that bad; the CG said it was out of tolerance)
--There were scare CG resources including time (scarcity of other Sector Hono surface assets) and funding (it was the end of the fiscal year...we already had a coupla scares that something or another wasn't getting funded because MLCPAC/SFLC-PBPL was out of money)
--There may also have been resource issues at the shipyard, in terms of space and time
--The crew was *tired* of being in the shipyard, of being away from home, of a two hour commute back to the hotel, of eating meals out in Waikiki restaurants, of having a beautiful ship that didn't work

The Circle Chart third quadrant (upper right) asks for more specific goals and objectives to be assigned to each of the issues; it is a refinement of the preferred vision. Dr Field had us briefly work through the Circle Chart in class as he taught us about it. We worked on our own for a few minutes and then shared what we had with a classmate for feedback and coaching. I was good with the first two quadrants, no problems getting those things verbalized. But somehow moving on to the third quadrant...I just couldn't figure out how to get there. My ship was BROKEN, I wanted it FIXED! How much more *refined* can you get?!? I could refine the statement with a few choice expletives, but I didn't think that was quite the point.

Dr Field then suggested that I break away from the contractor/ship conflict, and use the Circle Chart to explore my own conflict. Quadrant 1 (Q1): problem - I was stuck; symptom - I couldn't figure out how to wrap my head around moving past diagnosing the issue; long-term vision - I wanted to be unstuck. Q2: diagnosis - I have a huge emotional investment in my position as CO; my own frustrations with having a broken ship made it impossible to step far enough away from the issue to be objective. Q3: refined objective - find the emotional detachment necessary to make an unbiased assessment of the situation. Q4 (sorry to jump ahead...I will come back to explain Q4 more fully, but basically it lists options to meet the Q3-specified goals): recognize that the emotional investment exists and acknowledge it for the value it provides me (the ability to be passionate about being a CO, the commitment necessary to do my job through tough times and difficult challenges); admit that that commitment can precipitate blind spots in my world view; allow myself to be mad about the whole damn thing, but then GET *OVER* IT!! and get on with business.

As self-aware as I like to think I am, going through this secondary Circle Chart proved to be what I needed to make sense of my mental block.

The funny thing is, the breakthrough I needed wasn't a substance issue, it was a procedural issue. Q3 asks for an objective to be specified for each issue. I was lumping them all together still, but they have to be broken out individually and "re-goaled." Issue: Specific goal
--Old ship: Make her work again
--Poor comms: Improved comms between the CG and contractor
--Distrust: Improved working relationship between the ship and contractor
--Poorly written specs (actually, I think this really contributed to the poor comms and distrust issues): Better guidance provided to contractor
--Cause of mis-alignment: Determine responsibility for mis-alignment
--Scope of the mis-alignment: Determine scope of the mis-alignment
--Scare resources (both CG and shipyard): Determine best value of contract, both in terms of time and money
--Crew fatigue: Get the ship working quickly

I think I'm going to stop here for now. The paper's not due til mid-November, and I've got some other projects I need to work on. Will try to finish this up within the week.

Expanded Views

You ever have that experience where, when your brain keys on something, you keep seeing that thing, running into it all over town? That's what's been happening to me this week with systems.

The subject of all the readings in my Federal Acquisitions class this week were on Systems Engineering, including an excellent look at the Coast Guard's Deepwater program as a case study for a system of systems approach to acquisition.

I went to a forum on campus where DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano and MD Governor Martin O'Malley spoke about homeland security issues spanning federal, state, local and other partner agency initiatives, like the START  (Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism) program at the University of Maryland. Governor O'Malley said that where his generation was told to specialize, ("go into plastics, young man...plastics," was his quote), today we need people who are more generalists, able to look at things and see how they function as a system. Secretary Napolitano used the word "holistic" regarding the approach needed to address homeland security concerns.

I had an energy audit done on my house last week. It's a leaky ol' buggah. My windows leak; there are holes in the drywall that leak; the crawlspace leaks; the attic leaks...but with a systematic approach I can get all those leaks sealed up and improve the energy efficiency of my house. I guess what makes this a systems issue for me was Pascale's description of the current state of my crawlspace. It isn't included OR excluded from the house...it's just kinda haphazardly there. To include it within the house, I could seal it along the outer perimeter; to exclude it from the house, I could seal under the floor and all the "through-hull fittings" (sorry, couldn't help to default to my comfort zone) like the gas, water and sewage pipes. So, I need to make a decision one way or the other, instead of just letting it hang out in undecided limbo.

But, in true system fashion, the crawlspace does not exist in a vacuum (how *could* it, being so leaky?). There's a sump-pump down there, installed well before my tenure in the house, which leads me to believe that there have been water intrusion issues. I may have influenced the amount of water reaching the crawlspace with the installation of rain barrels at each of my downspouts, but I've been reluctant to actually visit the crawlspace to see if there are damp spots. Damn it, it's raining today...would be the perfect opportunity to check it out. Ugh, creepy crawlies, spider webs, dirty paws and knees, here I come. Back in a sec...Ayup, it's wet down there all right. The sump pump is sitting in a low spot in about four inches of water. I don't know what the power source is for the pump, so it will stay idle until I can get an electrician to check it out--some of the wiring looks decidedly suspect. And here's the irony: in the middle of all these grand revelations about systems and systems thinking, I just wish sometimes that things were *simpler!* That it didn't take a weatherizer, general contractor *and* an electrician, never mind a brick mason and a painter to get my house in order. I guess that's not really irony, but just reality about all systems.

I've had two sort of insights with all these systems issues in my face lately. First, I think I may have finally found the usefulness to my current career of my background in agriculture. It's easy to see linkages and relationships, dynamic complexities (in Senge's parlance), in living ecosystems. While I got a great education at Berea College, there were some short-comings in the agriculture curriculum when I was there (that have since been so well corrected that I hesitate to bring up skeletons from 20 years ago). I distinctly remember sitting in one of my classes, probably Plant Science, and being completely horrified at the professor's recommendation that to rectify an over-application of nie-ter-gin (that's nitrogen (N) to the rest of us), all ya had to do was irrigate more...that would send all that extra N on out of your field because N is water-soluble. I think I got asked to leave the class for being disruptive when I asked what about the neighbors' fields down-stream, or the water table that got contaminated with N and produced a bulge of methemoglobinemia (I had to look up the technical name), aka blue baby syndrome, in the local population. Never did think too much of that professor. But even then I understood the interconnectedness of ecosystems. It's fairly comfortable for me too look for the relationships between things and what externalities affect those relationships.

Second, I really like the idea of expanding my view of an issue to see the entire picture. In my Managing Conflict class, one of the barriers to "inventing an abundance of options" is the idea of a fixed pie. More money for you means less for me. I love the example in Getting to Yes:

"Chess looks like a zero-sum game; if one loses, the other wins--until a dog trots by and knocks over the table, spills the beer, and leaves you both worse off than before.

Even apart from a shared interest in averting joint loss, there almost always exists the possibility of joint gain. This may take the form of developing a mutually advantageous relationship, or of satisfying the interests of each side with a creative solution."

 But in either case, it requires looking at more than just one's own side of things. You *have* to broaden the scope of the negotiation to include the other side's interests. This expansion often reveals that a) there is much more common ground than originally perceived, and b) creative problem-solving can sometimes help resolve the remaining disparities.

Somehow for me this also dovetails with Senge's feedback concept. "...in systems thinking, feedback is...any reciprocal flow of influence...it is an axiom that every influence is both cause and effect. Nothing is ever influenced in just one direction." Maybe it's an expansion of being able to mentally include more than just linear relationships, of being able to see inter-relations or structures separate from behaviors. "This distinction is important because seeing only individual actions and missing the structure underlying the actions...lies at the root of our powerlessness in complex situations." Guh, there's *something* there, but I'm just not making the connection yet.

Ok, I've beat this drum enough today.

Dis-Articulated Brain Waves

I'm in my last semester of school, and somehow it seems like the classes I'm taking really support and contribute significantly to the others. And I seem to finally have gotten enough into "school" mode that the workload doesn't feel completely overwhelming. Which means I have time to process what's going on in the readings, make sense of what's said in class, and basically cogitate on how it all fits into the big picture. I even have time to read some of the stuff *I* want to read. I kinda wish it hadn't taken until my last semester to get to that point, but heck, I'm grateful that I've gotten to that point *at all.*

This post feels like it's going to be nebulous until I work through exactly what I want to say...I know there's something there, but I haven't quite figured out what it is yet.

The classes I'm taking this semester are Managing Differences: Resolving Conflict and Negotiating Agreements; Performance Management; and Federal Acquisition: Concept and Management. They all seem to relate to each other. Federal Acquisition requires an understanding of useful performance management measures, especially as more and more government services are provided by contractors. Negotiation/Conflict Resolution is all about making relationships work--finding the best solutions for both sides, which is important in structuring contracts. And Performance Management can provide useful tools to determine if negotiated agreements are functional within the context of today's governance structure.

If I'm not entirely paying attention to the syllabus for a particular week, I find myself struggling to remember which readings are for which class because they overlap so much.

And then I started reading The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization, by Peter Senge. It was mentioned in one of my classes last semester, and I took note that it might be worthwhile reading. My uncle saw it written on a list on my fridge and brought me his copy, warning me that he thought it was boring. I've read about four chapters of it so far, and think it's kind of funny how perspective makes all the difference in how we approach things. Uncle Heathen is very much an individualist...he owns his own business, and I think, pretty much always has. He *would* think a treatise on organizational psychology would be dry because he's not had much need or cause to cogitate on how large organizations function (I'm sorry if I'm putting words in your mouth here, Uncle H). I think the book is fascinating. And I see *a lot* of Coast Guard culture articulated in the book: mental models, life-long learning/personal mastery, shared vision...any of that sound familiar to Coastie-readers? I'm actually kinda surprised the book isn't on the Commandant's Recommended Reading List...maybe it is, and I just missed it.

One of the major themes of Performance Management is how the "wicked issues" government faces require a network approach, instead of the traditional bureaucratic/hierarchical approach. There's a great quote from The Fifth Discipline, "the basic meaning of a "learning organization" [is] an organization that is continually expanding its capacity to create its future." I just realized that those two sentences make more sense put together in my head than they come across just plunked down next to each other like they are here.

I guess the connection that I see is that we need networks of "learning organizations" to address the wicked problems that plague government and society today. It isn't enough just to have one or two highly functioning pieces and expect the rest of the network to run smoothly based on their contribution. It *could* work that way, I suppose, but it would be a struggle...kind of like when everyone relies on one or two team members to do all the heavy lifting, instead of everyone contributing simultaneously.

Oh, side note: I read an article from Harvard Business Review, "The Discipline of Teams," by Jon R. Katzenbach and Douglas K. Smith (it was for Federal Acquisitions). One portion of the article is about the differences between "teams" and "working groups." I took a little umbrage with their distinction between the two. Working groups have: "a strong, clearly focused leader; individual accountability; the group's purpose is the same as the broader organizational mission; individual work products; runs efficient meetings; measures its effectiveness by its influence on others (such as financial performance of the business); discusses, decides and delegates." Teams, on the other hand, have: "shared leadership roles; individual and mutual accountability; specific team purpose that the team itself delivers; collective work products; encourages open-ended discussion and active problem-solving meetings; measures performance directly by assessing collective work products; discusses, decides and does real work together." Jeesh, from that description, I wonder if I *ever* worked with a team...which, of course, I know I have--on MAUI and KISKA if no other places. But some parts of the working group definitely appeal to me more than the chaos of working with their definition of a team.

But back to the learning organization/wicked problem thing--it would just be better if more organizations *were* learning organizations. And maybe that's where the performance management aspect comes in. One of the first articles we read for that class, "Why Measure Performance? Different Purposes Require Different Measures," by Robert Behn, breaks the reasons for doing performance measurement into eight categories: evaluate, budget, control, motivate, promote, celebrate, learn and improve. But Behn emphasizes that the overarching reason is to improve...improve the services, improve the organization, improve well, performance.

I had an absolute brain wave in class just now. The professor had a very simplistic graphic that depicted the way that government currently functions as a network, with federal, state, local, contractors, sub-contractors, non-profits, citizens/clients all interconnected. Somehow that made me flash on the graphic from The Fifth Discipline of systems thinking. So the question that comes to my mind is are "learning organizations" more effective at accomplishing their goals in the new governance network? I'd have to say they are, based on their inherent ability to adapt to changing environments.

A lot of this may seem elementary and obvious to many folks, and I *know* it didn't come out at all coherently. But it's important to me to make sense of it in my own mind, kind of self-discovery, dis-articulation of the wheel, if you will. And boy, is it good to get it all out of my head. There's definitely more there...how performance measures can meaningfully contribute to learning organizations, how learning organizations can help to make sense of governance networks.

I was whining to my sister a couple of days ago that while I really like the Performance Management class, I always walk out of there feeling like an absolute stupidiot. Everybody else seems to be able to take far-flung references and make them make sense during the class discussion. It feels like anything that I contribute is depressingly two-dimensional, with no added analysis or connections. It's my goal for this semester to work on that. To approach readings more analytically, to tie non-obviously related concepts together in a meaningful and insightful way, to maybe even...think original thoughts. I don't think I'm quite there, especially with this post, which is discouragingly scattered. But the seeds are there. Just need me a big bucket of man-u-re, some water and plenny sunlight.

The Planning Fallacy

We were assigned to read the article, "Intuitive Prediction: Biases and Corrective Procedures," by Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky for my Federal Acquisitions class this week (one of seven!! articles, each about 45 pages long...woe is me! Thank goodness for 10 pages of endnotes/references.). Their premise is that forecasting is most often fallacious in two predictable manners: an over-reliance on intuition, rather than regressive analysis; and overconfidence with precision of estimates. Quotes from the article are in italics.

"Our  view of  forecasting rests on  the  following  notions. First,  that  most  predictions and  forecasts  contain  an irreducible  intuitive  component.  Second,  that  the  intuitive predictions of  knowledgeable  individuals contain much  useful information.  Third,  that  these  intuitive  judgments  are  often biased  in  a  predictable manner.  Hence,  the  problem is  not whether  to  accept  intuitive  predictions at  face  value or  to reject  them, but  rather  how  they can  be  debiased and  improved."

Usually as I read stuff, especially conceptual stuff, I try to relate it to something with which I am familiar. The article did a good job of providing understandable examples, but for me, what resonated was trying to predict how long something, particularly engineering-related, will take to repair. When something breaks--and it's inevitable that something *will,* every operational planner knows that there's "real estimate" and "engineering estimate" for repairs.

Real time is what it actually takes to fix whatever is broken, and is never actually known until the piece of equipment is fixed. Engineering time is the EO/EPOs best estimate for how long it's going to take.

"...the  element of  uncertainty  is  typically  underestimated in  risky decisions.  The  elimination of  overconfidence  is therefore an  important  objective  in  an attempt  to  improve  the quality of  the  intuitive  judgments  that  serve decision making."

Under extreme duress and lots of nagging on my part, a first-rate, highly skilled, extremely talented EO shared with me his engineering time algorithm: 2*estimated repair time + 20 percent. So if he thought it would actually take an hour to say, fix the fuel leak on the small boat, he'd tell me that the small boat would be FMC in about two and a half hours, give or take. That way he and his engineers looked like rock stars when it was done in an hour and a half, and they still had plenty of time to thwart the annoying gremlin trickery that is inherent to engineering repairs.

Of course, I always tried to reverse engineer his engineering time to get the real time...usually only ended up annoying the hell out of both of us.

"A probability distribution  that  is  conditioned on  restrictive  assumptions  reflects  only  part of  the  existing uncertainty regarding  the  quantity,  and  is  therefore  likely to  yield too many  surprises."

Somehow, though, I was never able to effectively apply the same theory to predicting how long it would take to launch the small boat. Like, *never.* I would always underestimate it, and we'd be late (guaranteed to aggravate me), or overestimate it, and the boat crew would have to haul a mile, usually upswell, to get to the boarding target, arriving thoroughly soaked and more tired than they needed to be (and I always knew it was my fault). I think my "restrictive assumption" was that it would either take 15 minutes to launch the small boat, or 30 minutes (mostly because my brain thinks most easily in quarter-hour increments), when actually it takes, on average, 22 minutes to get the boat in the water and boat crew and boarding team loaded. It's really hard to take the Plan of the Day seriously when it says, "0938 - Set Boat Lowering Detail," for a 1000 arrival time.

"In many  problems of prediction  and estimation, available  information  is  limited, incomplete,  and  unreliable.  If  people  derive almost  as much confidence  from poor  data  as  from good  data, they  are  likely to produce overly narrow confidence  intervals  when  their information  is  of  inferior quality."

I guess my point is that I like what the authors did with the article in trying to break down the nature of uncertainty in planning. I'm poking gentle fun at it because they take it so seriously, and turn it all scientific and statistical. But, in the end, they're right...the important thing about predictions is honestly recognizing where they are weak, and trying, despite ourselves, to compensate for those weaknesses.

Reflection Paper #1

BACKGROUND: I'm taking a class titled "Managing Differences: Resolving Conflict & Negotiating Agreements." We met for the first time this past Monday, and went through an oil pricing exercise. The class was divided into small groups, and then paired up with another group. Each small group represented an oil-exporting country in direct competition with our partner group for exporting oil to a (third) neighboring country. We had to decide how to price our exported oil based on a given matrix for profits, with the goal of maximizing our country's profits. We couldn't talk with the other group initially, but then after a couple rounds, we were able to attend a "summit" with them.

The first couple of rounds, we were able to maintain prices at their, relatively profitable initial level. When we attended the summit, we negotiated a price increase with the other country that would benefit both of us. 

We got *totally* ** PUNKED!** The other group undercut us and made a huge profit for themselves, but *completely* destroyed the future potential for continued friendly relations between the group. 

Our homework assignment from the exercise was to write a short paper, reflecting on our reaction to the events. Here's mine:

PAPER: I tend to think that most everyone shares my perspective that the world would be a better place if we could all at least consider others’ needs along with our own. Unfortunately, my experience in the oil pricing exercise definitively illustrated that this is not the case. Our Alban (the other country) counterparts went into the negotiations with a clearly stated objective of luring us into a trusting relationship solely to take eventual advantage of the situation. I was also disappointed that they saw the exercise as a win-lose environment instead of one in which both parties could fully optimize their circumstances. The situation made me feel naïve and upset that my trust was used against my pursuit of a potentially mutually beneficial goal. 

For the last 12 years, my professional (and a great deal of my personal) life has been dedicated to being underway on Coast Guard cutters. It has been a very team-oriented existence. Not much happens on a ship that involves a single person; nearly everything requires the significant effort of many people working together. Trust is quickly built…or nothing gets done. The bridge watch has to trust the engine watch to keep machinery running within parameters, and the rest of the crew has to trust the bridge watch to, well, not run into anything and to navigate the ship safely. With this background, trust comes easily to me.

As the Commanding Officer, I worked hard to diligently and conscientiously build trust and camaraderie among my crews through shared missions, clearly communicated expectations and sincere respect of individuals’ talents and abilities. It is a source of personal pride to me that those crews--my guys--trusted me to be their Captain and lead them during difficult and dangerous situations. So, while trust comes easily to me, I also take it very personally. 

During the exercise, when our Alban counterparts nefariously lured us into believing that they would also raise their price to $30/barrel in the fourth month, I took it personally that they blatantly lied to us. It meant that I hadn’t done as good a job as I could have communicating the benefits of a long-term commitment to increased prices. It meant that they were only hearing what they wanted to hear, rather than what we were saying. It meant that we didn’t have common goals. It meant that our trust in them was unfounded. It might even have meant that they were bad people.

The major insight I gleaned from this exercise is that other people’s motivations are not my personal burden. As long as I make my best effort to clearly state relevant concerns and opinions, I am not responsible for their independent actions. If their goals are different, it does not make them bad people. Even if they are deceitful, I have no place to either judge them or take on their "salvation" on as my own cause.

There is a balance required between getting so personally involved that I lose my objectivity and am emotionally hurt by people with less honorable intentions and being so detached to not care one way or the other about the outcome. The balance point will likely change with each circumstance. But maintaining an awareness of my tendency towards emotional involvement may help to find that point at which I can be passionately committed to achieving my own objectives, which usually include some consideration of the Other’s situation with the ultimate goal of making the world a better place.

ON ANOTHER NOTE: I got a call from my Assignment Officer today, which is not an insignificant occurrence, especially when I'm waiting (somewhat breathlessly) to find out what office I'll be working in for the next few years. He had a "short-fused" assignment opportunity he wanted to talk to me about. 

We talked yesterday; I tried to reiterate to him exactly which office I want to work in (which just happens to be open, and wanting an off-season transfer). He didn't commit to anything, but definitely indicated I was in the running for my top two choices.

This morning he told me he had reviewed my record again last night and thought that I would be a good candidate for a *VERY* high profile, like ridiculously prestigious, assignment within the Executive Branch. Would I consider applying for it?

Um...WOW!! Holy crap!! Lil' ole' me?!? Hunh-uh, you're joking, right? Ok, deep breath, calm down, and...say no.

I thanked him first for deciding that my record of performance indicated that I might be competitive for this particular assignment; it's a huge honor to even be briefly considered for it. He asked me why I said no.

I told him I didn't think I'd be a good fit for it, that there is likely someone much better suited to that kind of highly visible job, and that, truthfully, I just don't have the social skills necessary to be good at a job like that. He thanked me for my honesty, and told me I was still in the running for the jobs I had asked for. We quickly finished our conversation.

I stood at the dining room window for a moment, looking out into my yard, breathing a little shallowly, at the thought that I had just turned down the opportunity probably of a lifetime. I'm still a bit shaken by it. I *know* I wouldn't be good at it. I'm awkward in social situations, prone to saying stupid things, don't think especially quickly on my feet. But...did I really turn it down just because I'm scared of all those things? Or am I scared of being potentially successful and influential far beyond my wildest dreams? Or am I using that as an excuse (lack of advanced social skills) to avoid something I don't want to do?

I like to think that I'm pretty good at taking on challenges, stretching my capabilities, testing myself. But this...I'm just not sure that I *want* to be good at the things I think this job would require. I don't want to be able to know at a glance who is the most powerful person in the room, and the entire pecking order on the way down from there. I don't want to be good at politics. I like the fact that I'm oblivious to a lot of that stuff. I like the fact that I say what's on my mind, with very little self-preservationist-censorship. I like the fact that I'm kinda rough around the edges and not always fit for polite company. 

In the end, I think I made the right choice. Someone else *wants* that job, would be better at it, and wouldn't embarrass the Coast Guard just by being called for an interview (as I likely would). 

But it's pretty freaking cool that the AO thought, even for a small second, that I might be the right person for that job!

An Indelible Commitment

I started writing this while I was still officially taking a break from blogging, so it's a little out of order. But still relevant.

9 Aug

I’m getting more artwork done on my right arm today. The plan is to finish out my lower arm so I’ll have a full sleeve. Jimmy McMahon at Jimmy Mack Designs in Haleiwa started the sleeve the summer of 2009, a few weeks after I got back home from Bahrain. I gave him a general idea of what I wanted…something with magnolia blossoms, irises and snap dragons. He filled in the rest, and I’ve gotten endless compliments on how beautiful the tattoo is.

So now I’m going back in and he’s gonna draw down to my wrist. This time I asked him to use the same design concept as the upper arm, but instead of wind lines, I want waves, with some fish and birds peeking out. I have no doubt that it’s going to be gorgeous. (9 Sep update: it's about 80 percent done. I tapped out after four hours on the day I left (fourth sitting). Still have a large stripe of teal/turquoise water to fill in; probably another four or five hours, including touch-ups. Jimmy left it so that it doesn't look totally weird, and you can get a sense of how it will look completed. I'll get it finished when I head back to Hawaii in December after graduation. Pictures to follow upon completion.)

I got my first tattoo when I was 21, a cute little chain of daisies around my upper left arm. Bodean, a big-bellied, bearded biker in Richmond, KY gave it to me. I thought I was pretty bad ass. I think I got it right around the time I graduated from college. It took me two years before my mother saw it. She didn’t approve. After that, I got the thistle on my right foot (quote from the guy in Raleigh, NC who drew it, “that’s the weirdest f'king tattoo I’ve ever given.” I think he might have been exaggerating a little). I got that one after attending a strategic planning conference at my alma mater, Berea College…the small stipend they paid me as a guest speaker covered the cost of the tattoo. And then I got the weird black lines around my daisies just before going to OCS at some random shop in Cherry Point, NC. There’s something about doing something responsible that makes me get tattoos, I guess.

After that I went on about a six year hiatus from getting tattoos…and was able to give blood again on a regular basis.

But then I found myself in another position of responsibility and not a little bit of stress, and I went back to my tattooing ways. One of the warrant officers onboard HAMILTON found an artist in Vasco de Nunez, Panama that we all ended up going to. Jimmy (don’t know what it is about tattoo artists named Jimmy) had been tattooing since he was 14 years old, and by the time we all met him, he had over 40 years’ experience. I started with the slightly absurd skull and trident on the back of my upper right arm, just before going to two months of Tactical Action Officer (TAO) school in Newport, RI. Then I got the first two swallows on my belly, and the last tattoo I got from Panama Jimmy was the Leo sign on my right wrist…figured it was fair warning to anyone who met me.

Being in Bahrain didn’t stop the tattoo plans. MAUI had a tattoo party. We kept three tattoo artists busy for more than eight hours, giving eleven crewmembers tattoos. I got my third swallow…in desert camo colors this time. I’ve got a master plan for all those swallows, but can’t really go forward with it until I’m done with getting underway.

When I got back to the states, KISKA was in drydock…I've told that story here before. But it was a hard time for me, coming home, but not having a home; dealing with the ship and the shipyard; readjusting to stateside operations. I wanted something good going on. And that’s when I met Jimmy Mack. I wanted magnolia blossoms, irises and sweet peas because my grandparents had them in their yard when I was a kid. My grandfather had a *huge* garden, and did some hobby-breeding of roses and irises. And in their front yard was a big, beautiful magnolia tree that I always loved. Being a half-sleeve, that one took quite a while and got me through a good part of my 14-month tour on KISKA, what with healing time and touch ups and such.

Right before my change of command I got another swallow, this time from Jess at Habitat Tattoo in Hilo. A couple of the guys on the boat had gotten work from her that I liked. And I knew I wanted a swallow from the Big Island. Her bird is cheeky and flirty and colorful…right over my heart (so very, very cheesy, I know). But it was tough leaving Hilo. And KISKA.

Now, this summer, I’m back in Waialua, taking care of my terminally ill mom. I love Hawaii, and one of the hardest parts of this whole experience for me is wishing I wasn’t here, having to deal with my mom’s cancer…her incremental decline, the narrowing of her world, her discomfort and inability to do much physically for herself.  Let’s just say it sucks, and leave it at that for now. But looking back over my history of tattoos, I realize that I get them when I need something good and quintessentially *me* in my life. I think the thought actually crossed my mind recently, if I get my full sleeve this summer, at least something good will have come out of the time…which is a little more grim and grumpy that my usual attitude. I must have been having a bad day.

Somehow I find myself a little nervous about getting this one done though. It’s kinda a huge commitment and a very visible statement of individuality. The commitment part doesn’t bother me so much. I’ve pretty much gotten used to having tattoos to the point that I don’t even really notice them on my skin anymore. Most people I’ve talked to that have extensive bodywork recognize that level of commitment I’m talking about. It’s a little different than the decision to get that nice, but small piece of artwork that can be easily covered by a t-shirt or long pants…you know, the one on the shoulder, or the tramp stamp, or the ankle tattoo. There’s a time commitment to getting it done, a definite financial commitment, but also, I think a commitment to knowing yourself well enough to go through the process and then live with that decision.

But I’ve also gotten used to being judged by other people because of them. I think the worst experience was at the airport in Bahrain one evening. I had gone to pick up someone probably coming back from Kuwait. But as I was standing there at the gathering spot, an older gentleman in a traditional headscarf took notice of me. He would look at my foot, look at my face, look at my foot and then stare daggers off into the distance. In retrospect, I appreciate his restraint for not being more aggressive or vocal with his denunciation of me. I kinda got the point regardless.

Maybe the commitment I’m nervous about making is the commitment to long-sleeved uniforms. Every day. Year round. Even in summer. I’ve done some preliminary math. I’m good from November 1 to March 31 with the Winter Dress Blue uniform. So it’s really only seven months of the year I have to worry about. And of that seven months, I should be able to wear ODUs (with the sleeves rolled down, of course) about 90 percent of the time, depending on what HQ office I go to. And for that other ten percent, SDBs might be appropriate about five out of ten occasions. If I’m in a meeting in the HQ building where trops are required, there’s always the woolly-pully. In the end, there might be two times a year that I have to wear plain ol’ trops. Umm, personnel inspections, in trops—yeah, kinda nervous about those. Maybe I'll just take leave those days...and make sure I ask for feedback from my supervisor on my professional appearance to ensure s/he is satisfied with my uniform presentation.

Now, all of my tattoos are well within the written Coast Guard regulations on what is allowable…nothing below the wrist, nothing explicit or offensive. I did my homework. I looked at COMDTINST M1020.6F (Uniform Regulations Manual) which says in section 2.A.1, “Appearance in uniform is a key element for how the public perceives the men and women of the Coast Guard, and how the Coast Guard men and women honor their country and the service. Coast Guard personnel are responsible for maintaining their personal appearance and their uniforms to reflect the long and proud history and traditions of the Coast Guard.” If there’s anything that positively influences my decision, it’s that little quote, “long and proud history and traditions of the Coast Guard.” I mean, really, what’s more traditional than sailors getting tattoos?!? 

I looked at COMDTINST 1000.1B (Tattoo, Body Marking, Body Piercing and Mutilation Policy), which says in paragraph 4,  “The ultimate goal of this instruction is to ensure our workforce presents a sharp, professional military appearance to the public we serve while also allowing individual expression through authorized body art that is consistent with the Coast Guard’s core values.” Check. 

And I even reread the Commandant’s Guidance to PY12 Officer Selection Boards and Panels, you know, just to be sure that I wasn’t doing anything to blatantly disregard a focus on professional appearance for officers. It really doesn’t go into appearance much at all; it’s much more focused on performance.

So, am I safe? Do I really think there will be no professional repercussions for having a tattoo that is visible in trops? How much do I care? I guess I care only as much as the tattoo impacts one thing: my ability to be effective at my job. Now in my mind, I’ll do the same job if I’ve got my entire face covered with tattoos or nary a speck of ink on me. I'll give my best effort at any job because that's what I believe in. It's not like the tattoo ink physiologically interacts with my body chemistry to negatively impact my brain capacity. Jimmy and I joked about this...he said, oh wait, I'm using this new ink, it's called Moron Ink (and then we went on to talk about how he mixes his own inks, using a natural preservative as a base so that the inks will last longer if he doesn't use that particular color for a while).

The one thing about tattoos that may impact my ability to do my job is how other people react to them. Hence the long-sleeved uniforms, long-sleeved shirts to and from the office, and long-sleeved shirts during unit-sponsored events including workouts. I don't think that will completely make the tattoo invisible and totally keep coworkers, supervisors and other professional acquaintances from seeing it, but it is a recognition of how tattoos can distract from whatever might be the actual task-at-hand. 

Life is...a daring adventure or nothing.

The Hardest Thing

When My Mother Died

When my mother died,
She was in a little house with doors open
To the sounds of children burbling, and windchimes,
With sunshine colored walls and a bed with leaf-green sheets
That smelled of trade winds.
There were growing things,
And -- really -- a rainbow.

She had homemade tomato soup, and...a popsicle?
Sure, why not a popsicle.
There was a little autumn cat who snored amiably from the closet,
And, it seemed like, not too much pain until the last day.

There were daughters who gave hugs
When they handed her something she wanted.
Sisters together
Until it was done.

There were neighbors, who came right away.

If I could have all this, I think I'd feel like
It would not matter if dying was too slow
Or too fast.

I could live with it.
--Victoria Mundy Bhavsar


My last post was a celebration of and a memorial to my Mom's life. This post is a reflection on the process of her dying. My sister and I agreed that we were not particularly traumatized by Mom's actual passing. We had years to prepare ourselves for it mentally and emotionally. But that passing was not a singular event...it was a long series of events.

And more than most posts, this one is written entirely for me. It's long, boring, has a sad ending with not many points of cheeriness along the way. But somehow, I get the sense that I've got to tell this part of the story. Whether anybody reads it (especially all the way through)...well, that's less important once it's been told.

I came out to Hawaii this summer to help out my Mom. I didn't really explain the situation here at the time because she was such a private person that I knew she'd be royally pissed at me if I publicly announced her condition in this forum. But I'm kinda getting ahead of the story, I think. It really started, for me, on Friday, 13 January, 2006.

That winter had already been a winter of changes. I had sold my house and moved into a new house on Oahu's North Shore, just been back to the East Coast for a whirl-wind visit with family, high school and college friends, and submitted my e-resume asking to short tour from the D14 Command Center to go to any one of three ships (CO on KISKA or ASSATEAGUE (forgetting it was changing homeport to Guam), and for some wild-hair reason, OPS on HAMILTON). The changes weren't over.

Mom called that Friday morning. I think I had just gotten off the night shift at the Command Center that morning, so I must have napped for a little while before the phone rang. She had been to the doctor, and had confirmation that she had cancer. She told me the type of cancer, and I still, to this day, after an entire summer of living with it, can't remember the technical name for it. Some intimidating and evil sounding name that basically translated into a cancer of the fatty and connective tissues in her torso. A type of lipo-sarcoma. She was going in for surgery the following week. After the surgery, the doctors would reevaluate and determine the best course of action, chemo or radiation or both. She asked me not to tell anyone in the family before she got to talk to them, meaning her brother and sister. She had already told my sister, and was calling my brother next. We made arrangements for me to fly out to Virginia the week after her surgery, once she was back home from the hospital to help with her recovery.

Ok, very calm on the phone, able to ask the right questions (even if I choked up a little on some of them), able to think about future plans and what needed to be done next and most immediately. Once we hung up, though, I lost it for a few minutes. My boyfriend Rickey, had overheard enough of my end of the conversation to know that something momentous had happened, but I had to much repeat most of the details, probably more for myself than to actually tell him what was going on. He let me blather on for a few minutes, then cry and be upset for another minute or two, before he got tired of the histrionics, and told me to calm down, just because she had cancer didn't mean she was going to die right away, that she could beat it, that there was nothing I could do right then, that being upset about it wasn't going to help...all that pacifying bullshit that bounced right off the shock of the intrusion of the big C into our lives.

Mom had her surgery. The doctors removed a nine pound tumor from her belly. Let me say that again...a NINE POUND TUMOR!! Jeez, the woman wasn't any bigger than I am. Where the hell did she fit nine pounds of cancer in her gut? I mean, my sister and I each only weight seven pounds and some odd ounces at birth. The growth had swallowed one of her kidneys and had been wrapped so tightly around her spinal cord that the doctors damaged the nerves to her left leg a little bit trying to scrape it all off. Their initial evaluation was that she would have to drink a lot more water with only one kidney left, and she might walk with a limp in her left leg. A few weeks later the more detailed results came back from the CT scan. They hadn't gotten all of the cancerous cells out. Some of the little buggers were still taking refuge in the tissue around her spine.

The chemo wasn't too bad for her. Mom had the constitution of an iron horse, but it did weaken her, made her feel kinda dragged out, and she lost her hair. She must have done the chemo sometime while I was OPS on HAMILTON. I remember going to see her on leave, shopping for a wig with her, and then going to the salon to whack off all my hair (which had been almost down to my hips) to send to Locks of Love in solidarity. When I got back to the ship, more than one person did a double-take at my open stateroom door to see who was using OPS's computer before realizing it was me.

Radiation followed the chemo. She made lots of trips between Blacksburg, where she lived, and Charlottesville, where the doctors at University of Virginia were treating her. But the treatment seemed to work. The cancer wasn't growing anymore...just a few cells sitting there in stasis. She was getting frequent CT scans so the doctors could track any growth. In the meantime, she had learned that the cancer was most likely not hereditary. She was frantic at the thought that it was something she might pass down to us. She also tried to modify her diet to help her body slow the cancer's growth, eliminating meats, caffeine, sugars, alcohol and other highly processed foods. *Tried* being the key-word there...Mom had a powerful sweet tooth.

I'm a little fuzzy on the next sequence of events...She moved to Hawaii in December 2007, retiring from a job that wasn't what she wanted at Virginia Tech, becoming my dependent with plans to care-take my house while I was in Bahrain. Somewhere along in there, I think the cancer started growing again. She became part of a study at City of Hope Hospital, in Los Angeles for an experimental drug. Her participation in the study required occasional trips back to the mainland, which was ok because my sister and her husband lived close by and she could stay with them for those visits. She participated in the study for maybe eight or nine months before she was disqualified because the tumor started growing again, though slowly. That was early 2010.

Mom consulted her doctors, who gave the chemo-radiation combo less than a 20 percent chance of slowing the cancer's growth rate this time. Mom declined further treatment at that point. She didn't want to go through the nastiness of the treatment with such a poor chance of any positive effect. We all (her kids and siblings) supported her decision. There wasn't any other option for us.

Gradually, very gradually, her capabilities declined. When I left the islands late last summer, she was still able to travel by plane, though she was slowing down around the house. When I came back in December, it was getting harder and harder for her to walk. The nerve damage in her left leg was causing problems for her mobility. I remember watching her try to get up from her chair on Christmas morning. I had been nervous for her for a couple of days, thinking she was unsteady on her feet because she couldn't straighten her left leg all the way. She walked hunched over so that both feet would touch the floor. I had been surreptitiously looking at canes on line, thinking if I could find her a nice one, she'd be more likely to use it. But Christmas morning, it all kind of came to a head, and she almost fell. I panicked. Holy shit, it was *CHRISTMAS DAY*...where the HELL was I supposed to get a cane for her so that she could safely walk around her house, to the bathroom, the kitchen, her bedroom?!?

Thank goodness for awesome and handy neighbors. Ash, who lived next door, fashioned her a lovely cane from some scrap wood he had laying around his shop. It wasn't hard for me to ask for his help...but I know it was desperately hard for Mom to acknowledge that she needed the help.

'Long about that time, I started to get really nervous about Mom living by herself. The last few weeks I was in Hawaii, my sister and I talked constantly about what to do. I planned to come back for Spring Break, which would cover two weeks. We reached out to other family members, and with their help, were able to have someone stay with her once I left in January, with very short periods, like two or three days, of her being alone in the house.

And thank goodness, also, for the loving generosity of family. Mom's cousin Carol came and stayed with her for a month before I was able to return in March. Which ended up being perfect timing, because three days before my flight out, Mom fell and broke her leg. Carol was there to help her. What a blessing!

Mom stayed in Tripler Army Medical Center for nearly a month. And then went to a rehab facility for another three weeks. My sister came out soon after I did and was able to stay through until Mom came home. Jay, my brother, flew in from Nairobi to stay for three weeks before Vicki came back. And she stayed until I got here at the end of May. My Aunt Linda, Mom's older sister, came out for a couple of weeks at the end of June, then Vicki came back. We pretty much patchworked our way through the summer. It was stressful, making sure that we always had someone here to help Mom. It got much worse as the summer started to come to an end. I had to leave to go back to school, Vicki was running out of family leave, male relatives were no longer appropriate options for caretakers. Mom would *NOT* entertain the idea of a care facility. Her own parents died after spending 17 years in a nursing home, and I think that significantly influenced her view of care facilities.

When Mom returned home after rehab, she allowed her doctor to engage with a hospice organization. Her doctors had recommended hospice in December, but she was reluctant to call them yet. Hospice is usually prescribed when the doctors think a patient has six months or less to live. Gawd, talk about a harsh reality to have to face about your own mortality, "Yes, please, call in hospice...let's start counting the days." But my sister and I finally convinced her that hospice was more for us, to help us help her than any commentary on how long she had to live. Hospice, once engaged, will stay for as long as the person lives; they don't go away just because someone lives longer than six months. And thank goodness for Islands Hospice. Amazing people, amazing organization, amazing services. In so many ways.

They helped us with getting in-home care givers so that we, her family, could get out of the house. They provided medical supplies. They answered uncomfortable questions about what to expect. They supported us as family-members/care-givers by just being there, knowing they were available to call if we needed help with something. Heather and Olivia were Mom's primary Nurse and CNA, respectively, and they are so very good at what they do. Both so cheerful, bright, capable, caring and fun!

But regardless of how awesome Hospice was, the bold, ugly truth is that the summer sucked; the situation sucked; watching my mother die...sucked. My aunt told me during one of our many deep conversations while she was here that this was likely to be the hardest thing I have to do during my life. My back got up a little when she said that. What did she mean *this* was supposed to be the hardest thing? I've commanded warships, for gawd's sake! How could *this* be harder than that?!

Silly Girl. Of course Aunt Linda was right. Or I hope she's right. I'm not sure I could do anything much harder than taking care of my mother during the last three months of her life. It wasn't that any of the things I had to do were physically demanding, or mentally challenging. But I was emotionally exhausted by having to do the same tedious (and sometimes slightly gross) tasks over and over again, day after day, without knowing when I would not have to watch this person that I loved suffer anymore. Mom didn't like not being able to move around her house without a wheelchair. She didn't like that she couldn't make her own meals. She didn't like that a trip to the commissary turned into a major production. She didn't like that she had to wake us up in the middle of the night if she had to go to the bathroom. Linda (who was absolutely chock full of great words of wisdom) said, you can stand on your left ear if you know how long you have to do it for. That not knowing, that uncertainty of how long the situation would draw out, was one of the things that drained my energy. I'm a planner...how do you plan for something when you don't know how long it's going to last?

One of the lessons I'm pretty sure I'm supposed to learn from this summer is to live in the present. Don't look back too often, dwelling on the past, and don't anticipate the future too much and miss what's going on right now. It was really difficult this summer, though, because well, what do you do when the present is shitty? My default reaction is to change it...do something different. Take positive action to alter the situation so it's not so shitty. I couldn't do that this summer. No going someplace different, no arguing with cancer, no walking out on Mom. I had to recognize that the present is temporary. Good or bad, the present will not be around for long. So enjoy the hell out of it when it's good, and learn to recognize the bad for what it is...not permanent.

I learned plenny about myself this summer too. I don't know why it should be a surprise to me, after grinding my teeth through innumerable small boat details that I thought were taking too long, but I'm impatient. I don't like to not be doing something. It annoyed *the hell* out of me when Mom took five minutes in front of the commissary's tea selection to find something that "would taste good." Or when I asked her a question, a simple question...do you want butter on your toast? and she would take a few moments to answer. Or when it took her an *hour* in the bathroom to get ready for bed.

I also default to cold professionalism when faced with uncomfortable emotional situations. One night my sister went out for the evening. I hadn't helped Mom get ready for bed for a couple of weeks, and told her to just tell me what she needed me to do and I'd do it. She was used to Vicki's seamless assistance and got frustrated at having to tell me how to do everything. Then she started to apologize for having to tell me to redo stuff because it wasn't done correctly. Then I got frustrated at her apologizing, and lost any semblance of personality or bedside manner. Vicki and I talked about it the next day...she told me I was scary then. They didn't want to piss me off because I went all icy. Eek. Mom and I straightened it out. It was a simple lack of clarity on each other's expectations. I was following my training on how to take directions, which I thought I had made clear by my initial "just tell me what to do;" she made it too personal when she started apologizing. She expected me to know what to do.

Which brings up another aspect of this summer that my therapist helped me to recognize. Death doesn't come all at once. There are small deaths along the way before that final breath. And it's not just physical capabilities that are lost. Long before my Mom actually passed away, our ability to meaningfully converse with one another died. Her ability to make important decisions about her care went away before she did. The physical losses were almost easier to deal with--I was still there to make her cocoa for her each morning; but the relationship and control losses were more insidious and difficult to recognize for the tiny deaths they were.

And yes, I sought professional mental help this summer. I'm a little reluctant to broadcast that, but my EAP-referred counselor helped me make it through an extremely difficult time with more grace and less self-inflicted emotional damage than I would have been able to muster without her. I'm not embarrassed to admit that I needed guidance to deal with a situation I'd never faced before. EAP provided a tool...I used it.

I needed a lot of help this summer. And I got it--for which I will always be completely grateful; I don't think I can express how grateful. For Islands Hospice. For neighbors, for friends and boyfriends (exes included), for Mom's church. For the Coast Guard...in many ways. For family. For my sister. And for Mom.

In her life, Mom taught me the strength and confidence that comes from being independent, slightly stubborn and doing as much as I possibly can for myself. In her death, she taught me the absolute necessity of being able to recognize when I need help and the strength and confidence in being able to ask for it.