Some say the world will end with fire.

Others say with ice.

From what I've tasted of desire

I hold with those that favor fire.

But if I had to perish twice,

I think I know enough of hate,

To say that for destruction ice,

Is also great and would suffice.

Robert Frost



"YOU CAN'T FIX STUPID" - Ron White



"Good things come to those who wait, but, only the things LEFT by those who hustle." - Unknown (at least by me)



"Life is wonderful, without it you are dead." - Hy "Pete" Peterson - Park City and Kenecott Miner



"Don't worry about those people in your past---there is a reason they are not in your present." - Unknown



"Life's tough - it's even tougher if you're stupid." - John Wayne



"The only place success comes before work is in the dictionary!" - Vince Lombardi



"If you aren’t living on the edge, you’re probably taking up too much space.” ~ Attributed to Jim Whittaker by Doug ‘Swani’ Swantner, Alaska Smokejumper and Air Attack Base Manager (Ret.)

About Me

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I am married and have seven children and twenty grandchildren. I retired January 1, 2010 after working 39+ years for the Forest Service...NEW CHAPTER IN MY LIFE HAS BEGUN!

Wednesday, May 27, 2009

SOMETIMES CHICKEN....

SOMETIMES FEATHERS!!!

It has been a while since I heard that statement but it used to be one of the things we said all the time when I worked on a District to the south a short ways. It meant that sometimes we won - other times we lost. I will tell you for sure that we worked hard not to get the feathers - sometimes really, really hard - sometimes way late into the night - sometimes when we should have been home doing more important things.

Through that time we developed some really strong bonds with the other members of the team and we made it tough on anyone not on the team to come in and work with us. For sure everyone that came in had to earn their way - and I do mean earn it. There was no free lunch and if they weren't willing to do their best to win they didn't really get to play. Some of them got to work with us for a long time but when the chips were down we didn't rely on them and usually didn't even let them know things were going down until afterwards - then they got to help clean up the mess if they were willing to help---if they weren't we just did it without them. It really didn't make a lot of difference how much extra work that might entail since we were just doing it anyway - and weren't getting paid for the extra time required either.

Did all of that make any difference - YUP - there are lots of people over there that still wonder how we got everything done and wondered how we could be everywhere. Ask any of the families involved and they will tell you the same thing - we did all of those accomplishments at the expense of our families.

Some of our families are still together but more than half have split up and went different ways. Just saying there may be more to the break ups of all those families than meets the eye. For sure there is a price to be paid for any accomplishment - many times if we studied it out instead of just doing it we would find out that the cost is to dear.

If I learned anything out of that experience it is that hind sight is always 20/20 - ALWAYS - but it never helps your fore sight.
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