One of the positives of our new building is the route I take to get to work. I am privileged to walk through the Bicentennial Mall. I am grateful for Governor McWherters vision (or the vision of his staff..) to be able to see the potential of a hodgepodge of decaying businesses and empty lots over what had once been a landfill. Nashville at the time was purshing downtown southward. Germantown was already becoming what we know today, but there was an ugly urban gap between downtown and what is now my neighborhood. I ma grateful for the vision of that governor who pushed the other way. The Mall is well-designed, columnated with pillars designated timelines of our history, and sidewalks dappled with sun filtering through the Japanese maples planted in military rows. There are long straight sidewalks angling to an horizon that is crowned by the state capital, for those kinds of people who like to walk the straight and narrow. There are twisting turning sidewalks by the craggy rocks for those who prefer a more meandering path. There are trestles and fountains and lots to read. When I walk across the Mall in the morning, I enter a quiet zone..I see Yoga-Man, a few head-phoned joggers, some always pleasant dog-walkers, and I feel grateful to be in such a place. The quiet is quite the contrast to the white noise that greets me when I enter my office space. The walk home becomes even better, with shadows and light and blessed quiet. Back in the year the mall was being completed, the state announced they were running short of funds to complete all the features they had designed for the mall. This announement coincided with April 1st. This was big bonus for me. I snitched some official letterhead and managed to distribute an official looking memo stating that all able-bodied state employees were going to have to devote one annual leave day a month for the entire summer to working on the mall. If you were a gardener, you could help with the plantings. If you were a mason, you could help lay bricks for the sidewalks. I told everyone there would be free t-shirts (I May Not Be a Shriner, but I was a Mason on the Mall). I was sure that people would realize that this could not possibly be serious. My April Fools dream, back in the days when I came up with such things*, was to fool at least one person each year. I loved it when people got upset about these things. I am here to say, that even though she may remember this differently, one of my favorite HSA directors ever got snookered by this email. Once somebody told her to look at the date on the email, she came into my cubicle and punched me hard on the shoulder. Did I look at this as battery...oh, heck no...That was my crowning achievement! *my April Fools prankery came to an unfortunate end with the TennCare Incident of 2004. I am happy to still have a job. You can ask me about it sometime..
Posted on: Thu, 07 Nov 2013 16:08:04 +0000
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