"Are You That Low on The Totem Pole?"

That was a question from a personal experience etched in my memory from way back when, during my career at the "corporatory".  I made up that term and Google can redline it all day long but I will not let it auto-correct that word. The question in the title, though asked in jest, has a special place in my memory and I recall the anecdote related to it with fondness and reflection.

It was in the late eighties, I can't recall exactly when but it was in that decade.  My boss and I traveled to New York to discuss  details on leasing a large fuel oil storage tank in the Caribbean at a terminal owned and operated by Amerada Hess. Our appointment was with one of the VPs and his staff of three high level managers.   Visitors were directed to  the middle floor where a male receptionist in a blue blazer checked us in. He asked us to wait in the seating area in the hallway.

A couple of minutes later, the main door opened.  Expecting a secretary to come out, we were shockingly surprised to see an elderly gentleman who called out and addressed us in our first names, while waving us in.  It was no other than Leon Hess himself,  CEO of Amerada Hess.  We did not expect, first of all, that Leon Hess would be in the meeting, and least of all for him to come out and greet us himself.

After  the pleasantries he led us to a room next to his office through a huge padded door, likely soundproof from the outer office area. It was his private dining room.  Again, although we did expect to have lunch with them, we didn't realize we were dining in. The table was already set. As if by choreography, as Leon Hess was directing us to our seats, the VP and three managers came in to join us.  There were more choreographic instances later. 

Two tuxedoed waiters came in.  One to take our drink orders while the other filled tall glasses with iced water.  The menu was set, which started with soup. Then, as if by choreography again, the waiter came in to collect the bowls, followed by salad in small platters and warm bread strategically placed within easy reach of each diner.  Each time, after each chore the waiters disappeared, shutting the door behind them.  I was curious how the waiters knew when to come in. Then I found out by observing Mr. Hess.

Before the waiters came in to collect the salad plates, I noticed Mr. Hess pressing a button just below at the table's edge on his right.  He observed when everybody was done with each dish and pressed the button to summon the waiters outside.  But that was not all.

After dessert and as we were having coffee, Mr. Hess excused himself.  As he stood up, the door opened and his son, John Hess, came in and sat at the chair just vacated by Mr. Hess. Conversation went on but as soon as Mr. Hess came back in, after a few minutes, John Hess stood up, literally in mid sentence to make his exit.  Mr. Leon Hess reclaimed his seat.  I realized then that, apparently, there should always be a Hess present in conversations like the one we were having.

After lunch we exited the dining area and we proceeded via another door to a conference room.  There the managers did a "show and tell" on their Caribbean storage facilities with slides and other "fun facts".

At the conclusion of our meeting, my boss said that although in principle we agreed to take the lease, the agreement will be signed by our superior in Houston because leases longer than three months were above my boss's "paygrade".

Mr. Leon Hess then asked, smiling, "Are you two that low on the totem pole?"  He said it was fine - he was just teasing us.  Was he?

Well, my boss and I represented a major oil company but our small group was just a  part of the entire supply and distribution department.  In fact, fuel oil and asphalt which we handled was, aside from being the bottom of the barrel in the oil refining business, it had less importance and popularity when compared to gasoline, diesel, aviation and other "cleaner and lighter" products in the overall scheme of what oil companies were noted for.

Mr. Hess started his business in the heating oil business and turned it into what became a  Leading Independent Energy Company by acquiring Amerada Petroleum, involved in refining and exploration.  He was succeeded by his son, John.

Apparently, Mr. Hess had a special affinity with our company because in the sixties when he started, he distributed heating oil products that were produced by our company that had its headquarters based in New York before moving "lock stock and barrel" to Houston, Texas in 1971.  Today, Amerada Hess too has a huge storage facility in Houston.

Yes, indeed, as big corporatories go (that word again), my boss and I,  particularly me at that time then, were way low on the totem pole.

But then, as totem poles go, those at the top depend on those from below. The bottom and the middle are what support those at the top.  We notice the top of the pyramid, the pinnacle of that massive structure, but we must realize that  if not for its base and middle structure, there will be no top.

Empires have come and gone throughout history. Each one that crumbled almost always began from when society disintegrated first at near the bottom, for myriad reasons, but once the very foundation is weakened, the top is easily toppled over.

Totem poles can only stand erect but only for so long and for as long as there is the structure beneath it to support it.

Yes, my boss and I were indeed low on the totem pole and the product line we managed was hardly what people associated with big oil, known for gasoline and lighter products like propane and butane and all the chemicals that a host of other products depend on.

Later in my corporatory life I was involved in trading the very same bottom of the barrel. It was still hardly paid attention to by those who traded in the lighter and cleaner products and neither did it have the glamor that made others  dream or aspire for such a job.  But, little is known that if I failed to move the bottom of the barrel -  black oil and asphalt - the whole refining process could very well get "constipated" (pardon the word), once storage is clogged with unmoved inventory.  The refining process is constantly a stream in motion.  If there is no place for black oil to go to, the whole process would stop. What's lowest at the totem pole of refining - the bottom of the barrel, so to speak -  must keep moving for the process to keep flowing.

Now, I hope the reader has a different perspective on what keeps totem poles to remain upright and tall.

Note: I made up the word, "corporatory", as a portmanteau of, you guessed it, corporation and purgatory. That is the place where everyone who toils in it will spend his or her time until one is directed to go one way or the other.

The Baker's Son

I was about to park in front of the local grocery store I regularly go to when I noticed a new place of business two doors down to its left that must have opened only recently because that was my first time to see the sign that says, "The Baker's Son".  I hesitated to even look in because what need did I have from a baker's supply store as I imagined it to be such a place. But I went in anyhow.

As I opened the door I was greeted with a distinctly unmistakable aroma of freshly baked bread and the sweet smell of pastries and muffins wafting through the room. It was just a room indeed. For a place of business it looked that way because it was just a small section of what used to be a bigger place  called "Tuesday Morning", which was a national chain that had since closed.  The rest of the building had been sectioned off to other businesses, one of which was the grocery store I originally wanted to go to.

Well, I wasn't able to resist the freshly baked bread and two kinds of pastries. As I was paying I asked the cashier, in a joking manner, "So, where's the baker's son?"  She pointed at a young man in a baker's hat talking to a customer.  I approached as he turned around. He could not have been twenty five years old who had a light mustache and some indiscernible tattoo on his left forearm. I said, "If you don't mind, I'd like shake the hand of the baker's son".  He offered his hand and politely thanked me for coming in. He was very polite with his words and a willing smile on his face as he spoke.

This brought me back to just a few days ago. I was chatting with the electrician whom I hired to do some rewiring and to install additional outlets around the house. Conversation led to his sons (three) and about the kind of future young people faced these days. His eldest is in college for a future in accounting. He wondered about his son's prospect at accounting. He worried that such a career, like similar others these days, will succumb to AI or AI aided jobs.

He lamented that the  business owner he works for is having a hard time  hiring qualified, let alone experienced, electricians. He remembered years ago when he applied to this company about "rounding off' his then eight years of experience to ten because he would not have gotten the job.  Today the company owner hires people with just a year of experience.  Otherwise, he will not be able to hire anyone due to the scarcity of experienced people and the competition in hiring. This electrician told me about how often he had to re-work certain jobs done by  inexperienced co-workers who inevitably, and often, quit the grueling work, especially when it involved going to the attic or tight crawl spaces.

He added, "Don't get me wrong. We earn good money. I pay for my son's college, after all". He sighed and went on about his job as I excused myself.

Many decades ago, as a freshman in engineering school, I had a classmate who struggled with academics early on who made it through the first semester with minimum passing grades. By the second semester and towards the end he was failing in math and physics. He told me that switching majors the following year was one option he was considering. The following year I didn't see him anywhere at the university.

It was by my fourth year when I saw him again.  It was at the bike shop I brought my bike for some repairs. And there he was. He told me what happened. He decided not to re-enroll and told his dad that he wanted to work at the bike repair shop his dad owned.  His dad was at first disappointed but relented. 

He started making one-wheeled sidecars attached to 2-wheeled motorcycles as that new passenger conveyance was taking over the foot-pedaled tricycles; the latter actually replaced the horse drawn "carretillas" that were slowly fading away as a relic of pre-1940's era. He made the shop a more successful and lucrative business.  There was no question, he was making money while my classmates and I were still in school, trying to complete a five-year course in engineering.

That was not an argument for or against a college education.  It was an eye opener for the argument that a college education is not for everyone.  In fact, it is an argument for those with visions to veer away from something dictated mainly by convention that a college degree is the only pathway to success.  Michael Dell, Zuckerberg and Steve Jobs never finished college when they ventured into going into business.  {Zuckerberg did get his degree but only after twelve years since he dropped out}.

Before the industrial revolution in England, last names like Smith, Miller, Mason, and yes, Baker, were plentiful and to this day, of course. In fact, Smith was merely a generalized name to dedicated ones like Goldsmith, Blacksmith, etc. just as Mason was short for stone mason. We can surmise that villages would have identified craftsmen as John, the grain miller, or Tom the blacksmith, and so on and on. Later, their families merely took up their parent's "title" as their last names.

The bottom line is that young people are not to be pressured into a college degree if it is not for them.  There is always the issue of aptitude for academics, whereas a good academic foundation is something that often is predicated by the young person's interest early on in life, a supportive family, friends and the school system.  Today, particularly in the developed countries, there is a shortage of young people in the craft and service industry.  Plumbers and electricians,  mechanics, construction workers and those in farming and animal husbandry are in short supply even as wages have gone up considerably.

More importantly, these are jobs unlikely to be taken over by automation, AI or by robots.

Here is one other thing.  Apparently, it is notable that protesters at universities and public venues are for the most part made up of young people - students from the humanities departments - history and art majors, etc.  who apparently have in their agenda political and social causes that propel them to protest and engage in disruptions that sometimes lead to destruction of property.  These students pay high tuition money to enroll in these prestigious universities only to waste them in extracurricular activities that will not be worth much in their resumes in the future.  As a  matter of fact, they can be more detrimental than beneficial if future employers are made aware of those activities.

This is not an indictment against art, history and poli sci majors.  Graduates from these majors do have a place in society but the value of protests and demonstrations that lead to destruction of property is zero when all is said and done.  The value of a college education is likely wasted once these protesters who have in their record these kinds of activities come to the attention of future employers.

This brings me back to the baker's son.  I do not have information about his story but his place of business and the career he picked cannot be underestimated.  It is young men like him who early on decided to make something of their lives outside of academics but through a direct path outside of the corporate culture - that of the individual craft direct to the consumer.  That is because when we come to think about it, it is always about consumption by those willing to pay for goods and services provided by others.

We can look at it another way.  Everyone is a consumer of goods and services. Anyone reading this is a consumer of information brought on by a series of steps such as those from the producers of electricity, maintainers of the web network, etc.  The baker is a consumer of energy, raw materials, and business infrastructure but he has a short gap to cover between what he produces and the consumer of the product.  The plumber, the electrician and craftspeople have the shortest path between the services they provide to those willing to pay for those services.  It is not a trivial concept to consider.

Once we've considered all of these, we realize that a college education, the price we pay in advance for it in the hope of a career that is not cast in stone, must be weighed carefully by one and by all.

The Baker's Son is one of the multitude of people who everyday finds  a way to shorten the distance between the producer and the consumer.   

Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered

It has come to this. The division in this country can no longer be cloaked nor denied.  The last November election results broke the last semblance of political  unity, although all the signs of cracking had been there since the last thirteen years or so.

It is a bewildering time at a place touted as the birthplace of modern democracy which the Greeks and the Romans tried but failed.  Here we are befuddled by what is going on. 

Is it true that The American College of Psychiatrists - an American association, based in Chicago, Illinois - is in the process of adding to its roll of modern mental ailments a new phenomenon first observed after November 5th, last year?  While they're considering it, the board outrightly rejected the one proposed earlier by one party group who wanted it to be "Trump derangement syndrome", or TDS for short. The likelihood is that the public will  get a general definition which will be EDS instead - for a more inclusive, "election derangement syndrome". 

Those proposing, even insisting, that TDS it should be, claim that the other side does indeed exhibit the quintessential confluence  of the  B's, that of being Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered, a Bedraggling case of Befuddlement. 

It would be tragic if we cannot make light of this phenomenon; inject some humor perhaps, because otherwise, we are in for a bleak four years of  Bedraggled politics.  So, let's see.

But first we need to go back to 1940. Rogers and Hart created the song "Bewitched", in a musical called, "Pal Joey". It quickly became part of the Great American Songbook, first introduced to American audiences by singer and Broadway actress, Vivienne Segal, on December 25, 1940 while WWII was still going on in Europe. It became a hit in 1950 and in the Broadway revival of it in 1952, as the world was starting to settle down from the calamity of the war.  Below are just the three lines out of a lengthy song that one side of the political divide cherry picked to describe the other.

"And wouldn't sleep

Until I could sleep where I shouldn't sleep.

Bewitched, bothered and bewildered am I!"

Let's face it. In a politically divided country that this nation had become, must we take everything so seriously?  As in most contests of any kind, there can only be one victor. One at a time, that is. The pendulum swung one way, and it is meant to swing the other direction, the losing side may say, and perhaps for a moment we are able to learn something from history.  We hope so because we have been poor learners of it.  If not, we are doomed to see it repeat all over.

One party felt bewildered by last year's election that certain sectors of the population they believed were on their side all along went the other way.  And Vanity Fair was so bothered that they just published an article, “Why Are Americans So Obsessed With Protein? Blame MAGA” by author Keziah Weir. Was it perhaps because after last year's campaign the MAGA crowd grew tired of word salad? 

One party accuses the other of being bewitched by wokeness. The latter accuses the other of worshipping the modern leader of the Third Reich. Then the other responds that if it is so, they should all be withdrawing their money from their banks and convert them to gold or move it outside of the country.  You see, they claim that during the old Fuhrer's time, the deutsche mark was so devalued as to have sunk in a hyperinflationary rate of 30,000 per cent by 1923.  Let's take a history glance at what happened.  

"In January 1923, a dollar cost 17,000 marks. Just three months later, in April, that figure reached 24,000. The numbers skyrocketed each month, reaching 353,000 in July, 4.6 million in August, 98.9 million in September, 25.3 billion in October and 2.2 trillion in November. The sorry climax arrived in December, when the exchange rate topped out at 4.2 trillion marks to the dollar".

That was what precipitated the rise of the Nazi Party. The rest is history.

The other option is to leave the country.  But it seems that this sentiment only affects those from Hollywood.  Matt Damon did move his family to New Zealand post the 2016 election but it didn't last.  He's back in the good old USA.  Apparently, the only one who seems to have a much stronger resolve is Rosie O' Donnell who recently moved to Ireland (for good, or so hopes one party).  There were many others who did talk about leaving but opted to say, "psych!" in the end - a weak attempt at face saving, the other party claimed.

It was Henry Higgins from "My Fair Lady" who proclaimed, "The French don't care what they do actually, for as long as they pronounce it properly". So, one party claimed that the other party doesn't care what it actually does for as long as they pronoun it properly.  And bewitched as to believe that biological men can play in women's sports and not be bothered that women's records are being broken literally in leaps and bounds. A bewildering shift but even the National Organization for Women (NOW) cannot be bothered to even show one iota of sympathy for young women in high school and college sports, one party says.

Instead one party is bewitched by taking up the case of a "Maryland dad" who was deported to El Salvador. One party accuses the other of hyper sympathy when a few of them (a senator and three congress persons) made a spectacle of a trip to the South American country, a bewildering case while ignoring visitations to Jewish American citizens held by Hamas, the other party said.  But it was a case of due process and Constitutional rights, one party says.  To which the other responded that the man in question actually chose to ignore due process when entering the country illegally - not once but twice, and supposedly engaged in helping several others in one case of alleged human trafficking, one party said.

Added to all that irritates the other party is the current President thinking of so many ways to bewitch and bother them.  The President must spend a good amount of his time at breakfast each morning thinking of one thing or another to bewitch and bother the opposing party.  One day it was buying Greenland, another to make Canada the 51st state, and the latest is to reopen Alcatraz.  All of these perhaps to get the opposing party to be in a constant state of bewilderment?

In the end, is the other party being played by the President into a constant state of befuddlement as to get them so riled up as to lose their temper and their ability to think of an original idea to best serve their party in 2028?

What, we're talking about 2028 now!  To quote John McEnroe, "You cannot be serious!"

Well, we shouldn't be Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered by all of these. Politics has a way of taking us all into a bedraggled state if we take it seriously. Instead, we should strive to understand, vote our conscience, and ask, as John F Kennedy urged the American people in his inaugural speech, "Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country." As everyone of our political leaders should do. 

Sense of Value

Hassanal Bolkiah, Sultan of Brunei since 1967, is considered one of the wealthiest men and longest reigning Asian monarch.  Although by today's standard of wealth compared to that of Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, or Elon Musk, the Sultan would rank at the lower rung of the ladder.  However, there is one huge and obvious difference. The three other men worked hard  during much of their adult life to amass their wealth, while Hassanal Bolkiah was simply born into it. He was the eldest son of the then reigning sultan - his father - who abdicated the  throne in 1966.

We can only list a few of where the sultan's abundant wealth is spent on but it is enough to give us a sense of value that is excessively over the top. While one Ferrari may indicate wealth he has 450 of them. A Rolls Royce is ritzy enough but what about a $400 million golden one. A Boeing 747 that is so opulently appointed inside with gold and Lalique crystals, dubbed a "Flying Palace", is his mode of transport for three hour trips or longer . A wealthy dad may indulge his daughter with a brand new car but what is appropriate if you're the sultan?  On his daughter's birthday he gifted her a personal Airbus A340 (the go-to-jet by the world's airlines - with less than 400 of them in commercial service). If you think that is too much, what about a $20,000 haircut? Every month.  The sultan's barber lives in London. When it's time to get a trim, his barber is flown in on a round trip first class flight from London to Brunei.  He also gets paid in cash and tip to cover his "lost business" while away from his shop at Dorchester Hotel in London Mayfair. 

That is all it would take to put our sense of perspective in a discombobulated state, if it is not utterly stupefying.

What the sultan spends for his monthly haircut will pay the annual salary of a senior executive in the  city of Kuala Lumpur - capital of the neighboring country of Malaysia. And where does the earning power of a sidewalk vendor in the streets of Manila, or Rio de Janeiro, or of the factory worker in Bangladesh or Cambodia compare?  

If we just compare the earning power of those living in middle class Paris, Geneva or San Francisco with  the wretched poor in third world countries  it will only further aggravate our natural sense of values.

Over the course  of human history 99.999 % of men who amassed 99.999 % of the wealth in the entire world ever accumulated, not generated, were born into it. What?! You may ask. First, keep in mind that wealth generated by folks like Ford, Rockefeller, Carnegie, Sam Walton, etc. are all modern phenomena.  Gates, Dell, Bezos, Musk, Zuckerberg, etc. worked for the wealth they generated.  Whereas for centuries before them, kings, despots, emperors, conquerors, accumulated wealth by and through all means which generations who followed (survivors, inheritors all) were born into.   Put another way, every royal dynasty we see today goes back innumerable generations ago. Every crown, every throne, that is worn or sat on today is inherited for as many generations it took from the original "royal blood". Every ruler who followed was born into it.

The sultanate of Brunei started in 1402. That is six centuries of generations of inheritors. I only pick Brunei because it is  much easier to follow its history. Let us not forget monarchies and royal institutions that to this day still exist - from the English throne, the house of Saud, royal houses in many parts of Europe, Japan's Emperors, etc.  

Lest we forget, the Chinese dynasties were already around before the B.C. era,

Years                       Dynasty (eras And Sub-eras)

c. 2100–1600 BC     Xia Dynasty

c.1600–1046 BC      Shang Dynasty

c. 1046–256 BC       Zhou Dynasty

c. 1046–771 BC       Western Zhou

More dynasties followed through the A.D. era until the last two - Ming from 1368 to 1644 and the Qin (1644-1912), that ended after the pivotal Boxer Rebellion.

Lest we forget also is the universal rule of, "You can't take it with you"; futile efforts of the Egyptian pharaohs, notwithstanding. Every  ruler  handed down wealth and power through the rule of inheritance to circumvent the inherent and deleterious effect of limited lifespans. Alexander the Great was rumored to have wept when there were no more empires to conquer but ironically died at the age of thirty.

Let us not forget that all the wealth ever created, lost or squandered were and still are only circulated here on this green earth, because until such time when humans can invest in equities or real estates on Mars or the moon, all the wealth remains here - distributed, divided, scattered, forcibly taken away, or passed on to generations of inheritors.

For most of our past history fortunes of royalty changed hands by force from one ruler to the next or when the majority of the ruled revolted against the rulers.

Fast forward to today and we see the shifting of fortunes through entrepreneurship. While it is looked upon as a better alternative to the rule of absolute rulership by monarchy, it is not without its faults.

"In 2022, it was estimated that the CEO-to-worker compensation ratio was 344.3 in the United States. This indicates that, on average, CEOs received more than 344 times the annual average salary of production and nonsupervisory workers in the key industry of their firm".

Two years ago I wrote, "The Other Side of Wealth" on Jan 15, 2023: 

Briefly, it was late in the 17th century when wealth started to transfer to ordinary people with extraordinary skills at running businesses and industries. That was right about after the Black Death that ravaged much of Europe. Monarchies began paying competitive wages to people to work the lands as workers/slaves were decimated by the deathly effects of the plague; soon followed by fiefdoms and royalties giving up much of their land for ordinary people to manage and develop.  Shortly after that the industrial revolution followed.

"The French Revolution was a period of major social upheaval that began in 1787 and ended in 1799. It sought to completely change the relationship between the rulers and those they governed and to redefine the nature of political power"

 

The Bolsheviks revolted against the tsarist regime in Russia that ended  the Romanov dynasty in 1917.

Some historians claim  it was the American Revolution that inspired  both the French and Russian revolutions.

Here we are today.  Are we in the midst of another disturbance in how we assess  sense of values as it applies to the predicament we find ourselves in? 

It is obviously a more complicated  task for any of us to arrive at an answer.  But why must we, in fact, try to find an answer? Our sense of value is best served by  asking this, "Is wealth the only source of happiness?"  If happiness is the ultimate goal, then we must first define what it is. And there lies the greatest quest but we find that in the end, wealth is not the answer.  

Our sense of happiness is in fact the beginning of our sense of value.  Children are happiest of all age groups because they do not yet know to want as much as what adults seek. 

I will close with what I wrote ten years ago, "Happiness Is.."

This much we know.  In any culture, from any region on earth, from the poorest to the wealthiest, from the most powerful to the ones barely able to defend their borders, the happiest from every population are the children.  Yoda had it right when he said, albeit in Yoda speak, “Truly wonderful the mind of a child is.” You see if laughter is the side effect of happiness, children seem to have an unlimited amount of it.  Not only that, children have the sincerest, most genuine form of laughter. I used to not pay attention until our grandchildren came to brighten our lives.  Reader’s Digest was right all along with their monthly, “Laughter is the best Medicine”.  If so, then children are the best portable carriers of it and they must be allowed to infect us all.