Sanuk D

I don't know what I'm doing here, I should be someplace else.

My Sweet Lady is Chairman of Family Sanuk, Ltd, and I am the Chief Executive Officer.  This means that decisions about strategic direction are ultimately her prerogative, while executing those strategies in my department.  Obviously, there is a lot of crossover between the two departments.  Some things are strategically sound but logistically possible.  Other things may be expedient, but this does not make them a good fit with our overall mission.  Up until recently, one area of disconnect between vision and implementation has been a ramping up of the proposed composting operation.

From a vision standpoint, we have been in full agreement about the need to extract value from our solid waste stream by repurposing as much of our surplus food as possible.  The choke point has been in putting together the capital necessary to invest in infrastructure improvements which would allow us to scale up a nutrient re-capturing operation.  Instead, we have had to grow incrementally.  Last year we realized Phase I: foodstuff growth matrix.  While not quite up to expectations, our results in Q2-3 2009 were positive enough to encourage us to continue with the overall initiative.

My Sweet Chairman identified an opportunity to leverage our existing liquid capital to make additional enhancements to out physical plant which would allow us to close the loop between consumption and production.  As she had calendared an off-site for herself during the sale window for this equipment, my Sweet Lady deployed Tallulah and myself to implement the purchase.  Knowing demand in this segment would be strong, I determined that we should enter the market early enough to secure our position.  Therefore, having risen early to complete Saturday’s training (a 19 miler +/-), I did not pause to consider hitting my personal nutrition target or adding value to the layers of Tallulah’s clothing.

When we arrived at the remote site, Tallulah and I quickly experienced negative growth patterns in our enthusiasm for the enterprise.  In addition to the increased incidences of “breeze” and “wind”, I was beginning to detect a rapid increase in gastrointestinal activity which would require me to provide some counterbalancing inputs if they were to not develop into a trend.  The surge of interest within the composting space beat analyst’s expectations, so we were looking at a fairly crowded marketplace.  Fortunately, the supply chain logistics had been well rationalized thereby reducing our wait time as much as possible.

Based on her lack of negative pressure on the process, Tallulah received a deferred compensation equal to a gumball, a raspberry lemonade, and 5 Mike-n-Ike’s.  I chose to receive the classic Cinnebon and coffee which are allowed under the “Run 2 Eat” rule.  Later that afternoon, my Sweet Lady oversaw the installation of our new capital investment, and we have begun implementation of our facilities usage plan.  We are highly optimistic about the long-term upside potential of this venture.

The fourth stalk of the butterfly bush was unwilling to be trimmed back in the way that the first three had.  The whole bush had stood through the winter, looking like a rattling skeleton of it’s summertime self.  We have cut it back in the fall before, and it failed to regenerate with the vigor we had hoped.  Last year we did not trim it much at all and it threatened to take out the rhododendron and azalea with it’s aggressive foliage.  We left it up through the winter this time, and as the fourth stalk finally succumbed, I trimmed it back substantially but not as far as it has been trimmed previously.  Hopefully we are finding some balance.

For the last month or so, Tallulah and I have spend a substantial part of Sunday afternoon together.  Sort of father-daughter bonding time.  Several weeks have involved swimming at the W, but with a tattoo healing the pool is not an option.  Today’s warmth and light probably would have kept us out of the pool anyway.  Instead we loaded up the Bucket with 8 bags of mulch and came home to spread out the blanket of decomposition across the flower beds and garden.

There is also a pumpkin from last fall’s Beltain celebration slowly melting into the dirt.  We should have a lot more decaying matter to add to this small plot of land, but I have not gotten it together to plunk down the cash for a composter.  It just comes hard to think about laying out a wad of dough for something that makes dirt, even if that dirt is very special.

What I want is the beautiful garden, but not the terrible process that will produce it.  The food scraps that go into a dark dispose-all or garbage bag don’t remind me of the greens I am not eating.  There’s no turning, and turning,

and turning,

and

turning, and waiting to see what the outcome will look like.  I don’t want to spread the humus and hope that the rain will come in the right amount and the sun will come in the right amount and everything will turn out.  When I see a beautiful garden, for some reason, it does not connect that the gardener as gone through all of these steps too.  Just because all I see is the beautiful does not mean that some ugly has not gone into getting it there.