How long do you require to learn a new system?

At first, Committee leadership occupied a lot of my thought space and I questioned the value of giving up free thinking in order to manage a single planet.

Like the other occupations I decided to master as an amateur professional amateur, this “job” becomes easier to perform with time.

My programmers and spin doctors have grown accustomed to their new assignments.

The supercomputer and the Book of the Future are almost completely lined up with our species as superbrain.

I could say I worry that a lack of sufficient superlatives exist to describe the ease with which I herd our species.

But I won’t.

Instead, I watch, observe, report, nudge, encourage…

I thank people like Michelle, who is truly focused on mastering her job as a server at Bandito Burrito Cantina (don’t forget the “train special” if you stop by).  Joe and Dana and other couples at Kinesthetic Cue delight me with their continuous improvement process in action on the dance floor.  Paul and Bethany in Room 330 of Morton Hall reminded me, while they taught us the Charleston, that I’m no longer half my age – they are (and half my weight, too).

Without a vested interest in children of my own, my thoughts can and do wander at will.

I don’t have long to live.  I know that fact and accept it for what it is.

I have proven to myself that Committee leadership is enjoyable when one gives one’s species worthy megagoals to achieve.

It’s time for me to pass the baton to another Committee member.

I passed the test of not letting absolute power obsess my thoughts.

Soon, I, like every Committee member, will forget that I was once the leader, so when my turn comes around again, I’ll approach the possibility of serving my species with my usual reserve and respect.

We get one life to live and I have enjoyed many a/vocations, not nearly as many as some but enough for me.

I’ll still apply tweaks to the superbrain’s program when I see aberrations that produce inconsistent inefficiencies in data transfer rates.

Otherwise, back to my happy, ordinary role of “observe and report.”

In this moment, I know the leadership role is easy.

In the next moment, I’ll worry that I’m not worthy.

I have a bigger role to learn, however, one toward which I believe I am destined to channel the energy of my thought set from now on.

Nothing that concerns you.

Not grand or magnanimous.

A rather plain duty.

Part of what you see as the unexplainable.

I have been happily distracted too long by the groups of states of energy I call my species.

Back to being the invisible hermit, sharpening pencils and reading wood shavings, identifying natural remedies in woodland plants and animals, and maybe, just maybe, finding my lost Muse.

Which probably means giving up my seat on the Committee.

But that’s okay.

After I do, I’ll never know I was a member.

It’s easier than you think.