We had \u201can event\u201d at the house next door around 3:00 this morning; rescue, fire truck, and six or seven police cars. At one point there were guns drawn by all the officers and with spotlights and red and blue strobes it created a truly surreal scene. Eventually someone was led away in cuffs and soon thereafter all was quiet and dark once again. I have no idea what happened, but I do have a guess: the way it unfolded makes me think that someone called 911 during a domestic issue and then when the police arrived, the instigator \u201cdeclined\u201d to cooperate \u2013 at first anyway. After those tense moments with weapons drawn and stern words, he acquiesced and was removed from the premises. I don\u2019t know the person, he\u2019s a renter who will likely be moving along soon enough. But he isn\u2019t the point of this \u2013 in fact, most all of what happened is merely the doorway into what I want to talk about today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After fire and rescue departed, one by\none most of the police cars left: first was the one with the person arrested,\nthen a couple more, followed shortly after by the watch commander, leaving a\ncouple of cars there. And those officers were still there because they were in\nthe apartment next to the center of action, taking statements. And they spent a\nfair amount of time in there, not because it a complicated situation, but likely\nmore because getting a statement from every person who saw or heard something\nis critical. And that, dear reader, is what got me thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The officers spent all that time\ngetting statements from all those people because each one of them brought their\npersonal and unique perspective to the situation. I\u2019ve written of perspective\nendlessly; prepare for the absurd but I believe it the power and force of\nperspective that I almost wish it to be one of the immutable laws of physics! I\nfind it that powerful. Perspective is the color, the hue, the tint, and the texture\nto all we see. But beyond that, it also influences smell and hearing and even\nmemory. I\u2019ve lived it, I know this to be true. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In my past life, as a working man, part\nof my responsibilities was to convene and chair critiques, which are\nessentially mandatory meetings with all the pertinent personnel involved inn\nwhichever occurrence or incident we were investigating. And the investigation itself\nwas to formally determine the cause of the issue in order to: 1) prevent reoccurrence,\n2) understand why it happened \u2013 the root cause \u2013 at the most basic and primary\nlevel possible, 3) to understand the extent of the repercussions of the issue\nand to bound them, and 4) to develop and implement robust corrective actions to\ncorrect or repair anything noncompliant due to the issue as well as to enhance\nor modify the weakness in our policies or procedures or training that\ncontributed to the problem. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Invariably, as we\u2019d convene a critique,\nthe personnel involved \u2013 the welders and mechanics \u2013 would feel like they were\non trial. Despite our best efforts to convince them that the meeting was not disciplinary\nbut constructive, they would always remain guarded and closed in their\ncomments, to the extent that often a 6\u2019 crowbar would not be adequate to pry the\nfull answer from them. But eventually, provided the responsible members of\nmanagement maintained the meeting with dignity and respect and created an open atmosphere\nof nonconfrontational dialogue, people would begin to relax and the true story\nwould emerge; at least a good part of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But what I quickly learned was that\neach person had their own version on what they saw, what they heard, and what\nthey think happened. And for a long time, I attributed that to them being in\ndifferent places and having a different vantage point. But I came to realize\nthat while that was partially true, it did not explain away all the differences\nand inconsistencies. But what did explain it was the idea that each person had walked\na separate and unique life\u2019s trail giving each of them their own unique\nperspective. And that unique perspective can change the details of a moment in\ntime. Sometimes the change can be imperceptible and other times glaring. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a case such as this morning\u2019s, due\nto a hard childhood, one person may have no tolerance for raised voices and\narguing; therefore, their version of what they heard would include details focused\nupon how loudly he was yelling \u2013 \u201cI thought he was killing her\u201d \u2013 while another\nmight describe it in lesser terms \u2013 \u201cThey were having words, like they always do\u2026I\ndidn\u2019t think anything of it.\u201d (Note: my comments are not factual and do not\npertain to the actual event; they are presented as an example only.) Or in a\ncase of witnessed physical contact, one person may describe it as \u201che pushed\nher so hard I thought she was going to go through the wall\u201d, while another\nmight say \u201cI don\u2019t know, he might have bumped into her.\u201d What\u2019s the truth? <\/p>\n\n\n\n
As it often turns out, the truth is a\npaint-by-numbers picture created by with as many people\u2019s perspective of the\nmoment as possible. Sometimes, that picture will come together crisply and\nclearly; other times it is more like a Monet painting: a chaotic cadre of color\nuntil you step back and the true picture finally comes into focus. That is why investigating\nofficials take as many statements as they possibly can; because it is often\nthat hard to remove the personalized tints and hues from what the witnesses\nclaim they saw, so the more you have, the better your chance to see the true\npicture. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is (sadly) also true with news lately. It is almost as if you have to choose the Red channel or the Blue channel because the video clips, the sound bites, and the quotes are all carefully juxtaposed to alter the context to align with their perspective of who is right and who is the villain; orchestrated to fit their view, their perspective. To that end, I don\u2019t always watch or read the news, but when I do \u2013 I use multiple sources to provide me as many and varied perspectives as possible. So the next time you want to know the truth, don\u2019t sole source it \u2013 get a second opinion because it is rarely black and white.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
We had \u201can event\u201d at the house next door around 3:00 this morning; rescue, fire truck, and six or seven police cars. At one point there were guns drawn by all the officers and with spotlights and red and blue strobes it created a truly surreal scene. Eventually someone was led away in cuffs and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2142,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"ocean_front_end_style_editor":"no","ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"0","ocean_second_sidebar":"0","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"0","ocean_custom_header_template":"0","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"0","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"0","_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"off","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2141","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-perspective","entry","has-media"],"yoast_head":"\n