And so on it goes. And it goes as it goes. And it sometimes goes too fast or simply goes away. And often it does not go as you would have it to go but go it still does. And from all that going is left to you choices; even if they may be hard to see.

When it comes to ourselves and our families and loved ones we seem to be a bit blinded at times and often have a lot of difficulty finding a path out of the forest. We panic, we react; we get emotional and can longer seem to see the light of day. All is dark and all is lost. So it seems and so it goes. And goes…

But they say it is darkest before the dawn. Outside of my windows this morning the dawn is breaking and it is a new day, it is a new week. And with all of that unrealized promise come I; within all of that yet unborn living and opportunity there may yet spin hope for me and mine; hope for all of us. Heck, there may even be more than hope.

In sports there is an old adage- just keep the ball in play. You never know when things could start to change, when things might begin to go more your way. I know, I have managed more often than not to keep the ball in play but, now, I am getting older and the ball is a little farther away from my hand. These days it involves my family and not just me and that is where emotion enters and often takes over. We are human beings after all.

I have always been able to accept a challenge and also the results that came with it, good or bad. Not sure where I learned that, maybe just over time, but I have done okay. Sure, I am disappointed when things don’t go right, don’t go my way, but I want to share probably the most valuable lesson I ever learned from my training and my career in engineering.

So often when attempting to solve a problem in engineering, be it on a test or in actual design or evaluation, you will encounter failure, you will run into what seems to be a dead end. You have certain parameters you need to abide by- time on a test, design criteria, budget, product cycle time, customer response to a problem- and certain outcomes and goals that you are tasked to achieve. When something fails or a hypothesis or approach shows no promise you have to find another way. You struggle and you sweat and the only failure is when you run out of ideas. You consult the literature, you consult your associates, you bring it in front of the experts, you pray. Much more often than not you find a way, you find a new path to follow and you re-energize yourself and the effort to solve the problem, to overcome the challenge. It is amazing. Sometimes you just have to leave it alone for a while to cleanse your thoughts and wipe the slate clean. Inspiration so often visits when least expected. And you learn that it is indeed many times darkest before the dawn.

You also learn when to say when and you learn to live with “failure with honor.” With honor because you have tried your best and then even better. You have exhausted all possible solutions and then some. You have worked your butt off and consulted with others and simply refused to say when. Until it is finally time to say when.

You keep the ball in play; you still have one more out, one more strike; there is still enough time on the clock; the race is not yet over; you are just one shot or one pass or one catch away from victory. Or at least getting the darn thing into overtime.

I presently have too many issues to list but none is so insurmountable that I am willing to now say when. It is harder, as I mentioned, to accept issues brought upon your children or perhaps brought on by your children.

You try to help but fail. Often you fail because they simply refuse your help. And that hurts and aggravates but it is part of the plan.

You learn to live with it and let them go on to live their own lives that come, with no exception, replete with their own set of problems to solve.

You stand by willing and wanting and able to help but are quite often not called upon.

You sit on the bench just waiting to get into the game. But you are ready.

You are always ready.