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Helicopters and vending machines

For our senior show invitation, each of us got a card to design with our favorite design-related quote. One of the quotes sort of stuck with me over time, although it's evolved a bit in my memory. Wanting to give credit where credit is due, I dug up one of the decks we sent out as an invitation and took a picture of the quote. Here's what it actually says:

Basically, there are two kinds of designers. Helicopters and vending machines. The helicopters fly around the landscape, zooming in to investigate, backing off to get a better panoramic view. Vending machines tend to be inert until someone shoves money in the slot. They then produce a lot of buzzing, whirring, and clanking until out pops a product. It is invariably the same, the same, the same, the same as the previous one, and will be the same as the same as the same as the next. The only difference is the next is usually staler.

- Jay Doblin

Being a designer wasn't the easy path for me. I'm good at a lot of things, but they didn't challenge me. Design challenged me. Hell, it was hard for me. That's why I picked it. When I got it right, the reward was that much sweeter. Hot damn!

I've spent my entire adult life trying to avoid being a vending machine. In the process, I came to resent the vending machine -- and anyone who asked me to be one. I don't mean just being asked to produce the same thing over and over. It's more than that. It's the idea that I exist at the pleasure of someone else to come and tell me what they want as if I'm supposed to spit it out without even thinking about it. I'm worth more than that.

I've spent a long time learning what I know, and it has value. Come to me with a problem or a challenge and let me meet it. There is far more satisfaction in that than just spitting out what someone else wants.

You had to be there: My sister and Mr. Possum

I don't remember our ages, but we were living in the house in Rolling Fields, so I was at least 9yo. Our house was built on a hill, so the front was one story and the back two. There was a second driveway in the back below the deck, and one afternoon, my sister and I found a possum standing there.

As an older sibling, I have always tried to protect my sister, but I think it's genetic with older siblings to occasionally torture their younger counterparts. My sister's naivety left her open to this a few times. The possum was an opening I couldn't resist.

Standing there staring at the possum, who was clearly hoping we wouldn't notice him, my sister asks me if she can pet it. I said yes, and when she wanted reassurance that said possum would not bite her, I responded, "Of course not, possums don't even have teeth."

I was the athletic one in our family. My sister was a bit of a priss. She was not quick by any means, but when she moved toward that possum and it showed her a mouth full of sharp teeth while hissing, my sister broke several laws of physics in the way she flew up the back steps of the deck and into the house.

The possum ran off, and I spent several minutes rolling on the ground laughing. I still laugh at the memory. As an older sibling, it's one of my proudest moments, but ...

Maybe you had to be there.

The more I run the more reasons I have to run.

My first race was my way of dealing with a great deal of loss in a short period of time. It was cathartic. I ran it with a group of friends back in Tennessee to remember and celebrate one of my oldest friends, Mark King. I just finished my second race, and this one was more about fighting back. It seemed too serendipitous that the Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend was so close to Mark's birthday, and he worked for Disney for so long. I signed up and hit the trails.

This season, I found more reasons to run. Enough that I have at least one person for every mile of my race. I've made a point to remember survivors, too, just to remind myself that some do survive.

Mile1: Emma Rae Perkins who has many more miles to go thankfully!

Mile 2: Dennis Sweat who I never met, but whose daughter helped me keep going when I started thinking this whole running thing might not have been so smart.

Mile 3: Gino H. and Jim Matthews who are beating the odds!

Mile 4: Mark King. This is my hardest mile mentally, and he is why I never stop.

Mile 5: Jim Galloway. Little girls should not have to lose their daddies.

Mile 6: Nate Tutt. Far too young to be gone.

Mile 7: Don Harmon. For the little girl in me who can't remember a time I didn't know Mr. Harmon.

Mile 8: Glen Weatherly. This is my hardest mile physically, and I will never forget the way he fought.

Mile 9: Marshall Ramsey whose story of survival is a source of power. He never gives up and neither will I!

Mile 10: Fred and Betty White. Two of the best people I've ever known. I'm glad he has someone to lay his clothes out for him in heaven.

Mile 11: Aunt Deloris who may not have much of her race left.

Mile 12: Karen Young who is cancer free!

Mile 13: Ted Duning. May we all finish our races with such grace.

And that last tenth of a mile? That little bit when I cross the finish line is mine. It's my moment to celebrate love being greater than loss, and will being stronger than all the pain.

Next up, Nike Women's Half Marathon in DC on April 28.