Mindful: Attentive, Aware, Conscious, Thoughtful, Alert.
Miscellany: A collection of various items, parts, or ingredients, especially one composed of diverse literary works.
Looking down on Omaha beach
Welcome to the thirteenth edition of A Mindful Miscellany. Tomorrow is the 79th anniversary of the allied landings at Normandy, France. I took the above picture when I had the chance to visit that hallowed ground in 2018. This is my favorite essay about D-day, and just how close to a retreat the Omaha landings was. I give it to my Midshipmen every year to remind them of the importance of tactical level leadership. It’s also a good example of nonlinearity in action, and the power of disobedience in the service of the larger mission. Money quote from the essay:
“This was the pivotal watershed moment of D Day--three Navy officers and four Rangers, disobeyed orders and created the decisive acts of disobedience that saved the beach. As a major in Frederick the Great's German army admonished a lieutenant during a battle:
"The King gave you a commission because he assumed you knew when to disobey an order."
There is a lesson here. Flexibility exercised with good judgment is a pearl without price if it resides within the mind of the man on the spot.”
Great example of “less is more” in communication.
A friend of mine retired a few weeks ago after almost three decades in the Navy1 and I met one of his coworkers at the reception. Turned out to be a cool dude— Dan “Knuckles” Kuckel2. A former Naval Flight Officer turned family physician, Dan writes and performs songs. He wrote this one based on his time providing humanitarian assistance onboard the USNS Comfort. High Quality Signal. His website is here.
Matt Crawford is a renaissance man and a talented, insightful writer. This piece is free on his Substack. I talked about one of his books here, and I plan to read “Shop Class as Soul Craft” ASAP (I loaned it to one of my uncles, who is a shop class master himself. I get a similar vibe from Crawford that I get from Jonathan Haidt— a human dowsing rod pointing at some of the most pressing problems of the day.
Dolly. Interesting to see the Metacrisis/Polycrisis reflected in popular art. Here’s Dolly’s take on it— I view this as her turning her attention and formidable talents to the difficult task of calling us to our higher angels. If anyone can pull it off, she can!
That’s it for now — whatever you’re doing out there, do it well.
I got to be the Honors Boatswain’s Mate and pipe my friend and family ashore. This wasn’t the ceremony, but one I found on YouTube to give you the flavor of how it looked/sounded. The piping is at the two minute mark.
The Naval Aviation community has a tribal rite, wherein the group bestows upon each other a sacred name, such as “Donger”, or “Nighthawk”, which individuals are then oathbound to employ for the remainder of their career. Usually this name is based on an embarassing/humorous incident.