Cats
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On the way home from Oxford Saturday, Cam and his family stopped at a service station which led to him thinking about what NOT to put on his Christmas list. ----- For years I had my children convinced I was allergic to cats. I told them the reason we couldn’t have a cat as a pet was that my head would explode in a fiery ball. They wanted a cat. They asked regularly and finally accepted that I was allergic. I’m not allergic to cats. I’m not sure how they found out, but the cat-pet requests are back. Frankly, I want nothing more to do with anything that requires fuel or any sort of...
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Owls
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin It Real, Cam tells us about some early morning attacks that are happening in his part of town. You'd be surprised at who is doing the attacking. ----- On the top of the Tangles Hair Salon on Bit and Spur Road in Mobile sits a hat and a headlamp with its light on. The headlamp is the type that an early morning jogger wears before the sun comes up. How it got up there is a heck of a story. Dennison Crocker jogs before daylight nearly every morning. His headlamp lights the way. One dark morning near Bit and Spur Road, a giant thunk, thud, and whoosh caught Dennison off...
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Can I Transfer?
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin' It Real, Cam recalls a time when he was very much out of his element and was slightly afraid for his life. ----- About midway through the fourth quarter of Alabama’s loss to Vanderbilt, my son, who is a student at the University, sent me a text. It read, “Can I transfer?” I laughed. As a Tulane student we were fond of saying that on Saturdays in the fall, the New Orleans Superdome hosted a cocktail party for students to mix and mingle in the stands. Occasionally we would look up and notice that a football game was going on in front of us, but we never let it...
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FBI
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin It Real, Cam Marston tells us about a bomb maker he met who sends the bombs he makes to his friends. Oddly enough, you and I should be happy he's doing it. ----- There’s a man on the outskirts of Mobile who spends a good part of his days making bombs. He uses items he finds around town and buys from retail stores. He then sends his bombs to his buddies to see if they can disarm them. It’s a game and, believe me, it’s a game you and I should be grateful they’re playing. I’m participating in a seven-week course called the FBI Citizens Academy. For two hours each...
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Infantilized
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keeping It Real, Cam Marston reacts to a book review about society and how we're raising kids. It's not the kids fault, Cam says, it's definitely the parents. ----- The Economist magazine reviewed a book called Infantilised: How Our Culture Killed Adulthood. The author, Keith Hayward, argues that western society is keeping kids less mature than previous generations. He tells of a young lady who insisted on spelling the word hamster with a P. When corrected repeatedly, she called her mom and put her on speakerphone to tell her boss not to be so mean. That’s laughable, but...
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Lucy At The Vet
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin It Real, Cam's family dog heard what he said to the vet. And she has something to say about it. ----- When I walked through the back door our dog, Lucy, looked at me as if to say “you and I have some unfinished business.” Lucy had been feeling bad. She was lethargic and had thrown up in four or five places in the house. On the rugs, of course. I got to my hands and knees to try to clean them up. It was nasty. She definitely wasn’t herself and my wife, who Lucy seems to regard as The Kind One, took her to the vet. My wife texted that afternoon saying, “Please go...
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Questions
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin It Real, Cam Marston says he has a question for you. And he's curious if you have a question for him. ----- A story that lives in legend in my family is the day my mother interrupted a story about a boastful largemouth bass fisherman and my mother, in full innocence, asked “Who had the large mouth? The fish or the fisherman?” She had never heard of a largemouth bass. But, considering the context of the story, it was a legitimate question. The group fell silent and stared. Someone then explained to her about the species of fish. While the story gets repeated because of...
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Waxed
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On Keeping It Real this week, Cam reacts to Tuesday's presidential debate and shares something he's learned about himself in the recent years. ----- Trump got waxed Tuesday night. Wow, did he get waxed. I watched the debate not knowing what to expect but man, to me, he got crushed. Trump later proclaimed it his best debate performance ever. He was outgunned. In hindsight, he never stood a chance. The pundits downplayed his shellacking. They emphasized some of the points he made but largely overlooked how badly he performed. Fox News was doing cartwheels to find something to like about...
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Gettin' Lucky
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
Cam's back from his one month sabbatical and creating commentaries again. This one he simply calls Gettin' Lucky. ----- Dr Suchan Shenoy is one of the regulars at Restaurant Five in Tuscaloosa on Saturday mornings. I join the regulars when I’m in town visiting my son who is a sophomore at the University. Dr Shenoy is an OBGYN at the DCH Hospital there. He and I sat together and we made some small talk. I don’t know any of the regulars well, but I enjoy their company when I’m in town. Dr Shenoy could relate to my situation. I was a new guy sitting amongst a group of old friends in their...
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Really?
Keepin' It Real with Cam Marston
On this week's Keepin' it Real, Cam Marston wonders if we prefer entertainment to anything of substance. And frets over the consequences. ----- I hope everyone had a nice July Fourth holiday. On July 4th, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was officially adopted and signed. It has proven to be one of the most influential documents in world history, generating demands for independence and self-rule across the world. Eleven years later, in 1787, the US Constitution was created and was then ratified about a year later. The energy and enthusiasm and aspirations of these two documents propelled...
info_outlineRecap and thoughts from a client call a few week's ago. We were discussing a problem they're having that all of us had a hand in creating.
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“I didn’t realize it would be so hard.”
That’s from a conference call with the leaders of a mid-Atlantic hospital system a few weeks back. We were talking about their young, newly minted doctors. I was putting the finishing touches on a workshop for their spring leadership conference.
It seems that medical residency has gotten much easier. Less stress. Less sleepless nights. Less intensity. Less rigor. Once residency is over, the newly minted doctors are shocked at how hard the real work of being a doctor is. They’re demanding more money. More vacation. Fewer hours. When asked why, they say “I didn’t realize the work would be so hard. I need more.” The hospital is making major exceptions for the new doctors and it’s causing big problems. They told me of doctors leaving patients mid-procedure because their shift was over, assuming someone will show up and finish.
“What in the world is wrong with kids these days?” was my immediate response. But that’s misplaced blame.
A shoe box in my daughter’s bedroom is full of ribbons from her days as a young swimmer. They range from 6th to 11th place. She was never a good swimmer. She always got ribbons. Today she laughs at them. “Participant trophies,” she says, rolling her eyes. Let’s be clear: those ribbons are a parenting trend. Parents like you and me bought them and gave them out. We thought it was the right thing to do. Today, my kids are older and think participant trophies are silly. But the trophy’s impact remains with them today and it’s this: Any amount of effort, regardless of outcome, deserves recognition. That’s what a participant trophy is. The greater the effort, the more elite the participant, the more the recognition needed.
The young doctors in my client’s hospital system are no different. They’ve been taught by people just like you and me that since it’s hard and since they’ve put in a big effort they deserve more. Medical residency’s historically rough road has been flattened and paved for them.
“They’ve worked hard, let’s help them out,” some residency director, and likely a parent, said at some point. And incremental creep continually makes the road easier.
And it’s not just doctors, it’s everywhere. Add Covid money plus work from home and suddenly doing little and getting paid for it is possible.
I was clear with my hospital client: this problem is not solvable in a half day workshop. I can give them a new way of understanding the problem that will give them a start in changing their culture. The truth is, though, this is a societal problem that began long ago. The workplace solution is to model the behavior you want to see and make it the defining part of your workplace culture. It will take time. I told the doctors on the call, if you thought the final chapters of your career would be easier as the next generation steps in and takes the lead, it probably won’t. I’m sorry. But remember, it’s a problem that we – all of us – created.
I’m Cam Marston and I’m just trying to Keep It Real.