"One man's trash, is everyone's treasure."

I can hardly believe how long it's been since I've added to my column. Even though I somehow missed the uproar of cries for more writings from my loyal readers, I have not been idle during the pause. I have followed my call (it was actually a "collect" call) to write a book about Leadership and Business. It's titled Get out of your own way: How High Impact Leaders take the wheel and drive the HI Way to wherever they want to get to. It's been quite a revealing ride, and now that I am writing the last chapter and conclusion I thought I'd scratch my itch for reconnecting with you. I've missed you, sniff sniff, really I have.

But my catalyst to write today has nothing to do with a new business book. It has everything to do with my flood of emotions over the last few weeks.

If you are not aware of the recent flood in Nashville you 1) are living under a large rock, 2) have joined the Tea Party, 3) ran out of your meds or 4) are so distracted by what will happen to Jack Bauer in Sunday's final episode of 24 that you have disconnected from reality.

The flood's devastation is staggering, beyond anything I can write and capture on camera. I came face-to-face with the real impact of a catastrophe (like I had only experienced on newscasts about Katrina) last week when Lynn, Spencer and his friend Anthony, Bentley and I joined the hundreds of people who unselfishly appeared in a Bordeaux neighborhood. This classic Nashville residential community was one of the city's most water-ravaged; some homes were submerged to their roof.

The assignment we were given was clear: "We are going to walk up to homes and tell people that we are here to do whatever we can do to help them save their possessions, remove sheet-rock, tear out floors, remove debris and anything else to help them to move toward reclaiming their lives.

By the end of the day the streets were lined with furniture, carpets, floorboards, appliances, light fixtures; the stuff of their lives that was now just garbage for a landfill. But all surrounding the molding debris were the torrent of people streaming in from every direction and washing over strangers' lives with the kind of sacrificial love that busts through the dams of disdain and indifference, spilling hope-filled colors palette of compassion.

The stuff of their lives and homes, now reduced to mold-covered refuse and stud-bared skeletons, were being replaced with the furnishings from strangers who were there to help fill the emptiness...just because. Our faces were masked and our eyes goggled, but our hearts fully exposed.

There was little dialogue. Everything needing to be said was exchanged in narratives; the ink of sweat, soil, nods of acknowledgment and passing hugs.

And then our day came to an end. We loaded the tools into the back of the car. We drove slowly out of the neighborhood and headed home. Filthy. Sore. Tired.

There was no conversation.


Just before reaching the highway, off to our left were huge piles of garbage, the debris from the surrounding community. Lynn reached for her camera as we raced past, craning our heads back to catch one more glimpse before the reality of our experience was reduced to the ongoing newscasts.

Our junk is still amidst the heaps of trash we left behind, for the treasures we brought home.

(b)