Writing Boots

On communication, professional and otherwise.

“We can all take a knee … but if we don’t get up and move out, we’re likely going to die or fall to pieces in that place”

03.04.2020 by David Murray // Leave a Comment

People appreciated my rare post yesterday about taking a knee. "Thank you for writing this," was the median comment. "I've been feeling the same way."

And just like you, this week  I went back to work.

Already this week with the help of my colleagues I:

Created a webinar to help my customers deal with the coronavirus.

Got up at 6:00 and read Scout 30 pages of The Great Gatsby, because God knows I can't help her with chem.

Went for a four-mile run while playing the Star Wars theme on my headphones, which was a very good move. Try it sometime.

While I was on the run, received a text from my colleague Benjamine, who lives in Arizona. Green shoots! (Great colleague!)

Screen Shot 2020-03-03 at 5.58.20 PM

A cousin sent me a poem called "Good Bones," because he said my post reminded him of it.

A speechwriter pal wrote to ask if I was OK.

I'm OK.

The funeral is Friday, in Cleveland.

I'll be on my way tomorrow—to be with people who I love, who are terribly sad. Wise people, who know well what Maggie Smith knew, when she wrote in "Good Bones," that "The world is at least fifty percent terrible, and that’s a conservative estimate, though I keep this from my children."

Several years ago I helped an army officer who was dying of cancer write a book, for his three children.

"When someone on the team got tired, we stopped and we took a knee to rest," said the late Lieutenant Colonel Mark Weber in Tell My Sons. "When someone on the team got tired, we stopped and we took a knee to rest. But we always got back up, and we never quit . . . never. Just like those young soldiers, we can all take a knee too, but if we don’t get back up and move out, we’re likely going to die or fall to pieces in that place."

We'll take a knee.

And we'll get back up.

And we'll move out.

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