Commentary: Catman's mantra should pave our path to normalcy

There's a great philosopher who lives in Key West, Fla. His name is Dominique LeFort. I and millions of others know him simply as the Catman. The overriding mantra of his philosophy is Hurry up; take your time.

Dominique the Catman performs regularly at Sunset Celebration at the Hilton Pier in Mallory Square in downtown Key West. I heard the message Catman preaches in person and was captivated. Now it's time to become an apostle.

Catman, though seemingly just another street performer, has captured one of the secrets to enduring tough times. Everyone within reading distance of me is experiencing tough times and should pay attention to Catman. I willingly deliver his message to all that have never heard it for themselves.

Catman trains house cats. His cats do all the tricks that other trained animals do - nothing really extraordinary except for the fact they are cats. Like so many of us have tried to do metaphorically, he literally herds cats.

Catman moves his cats from platform to platform, from trick to trick with his admonition. Over and over he simply says hurry up; take your time. And over and over his cats do what he says. The cats follow his lead because they trust him. I'm sure his cats are just like all other cats, independent to the core, but they've learned that following his commands and his dogma make their lives a little better.

As we in the New Orleans region begin in earnest to put our lives back together, I suggest we all take the Catman sermon and practice what he preaches.

There is so much to do. There is chaos. There are heartbreaking stories. Lives need to be put back together. Some businesses will fail and some businesses will prosper. There is no playbook to follow. We all have to develop the rules as we just try to get by.

The first column I wrote after Hurricane Katrina the home- wrecker hit us was about how our plans, though seemingly well thought out, changed from day to day. No matter how much time went into our modeling efforts, the plan needed to change as we started implementation.

The routine, though understandable, was and is frustrating. We found out quickly that our best planning would include a variable for the emotional resettling that needs to take place when friends, family members and co-workers reunite after a tragedy.

That emotional resettling is the cat herding that Catman Dominique speaks to every night. I flew to Baltimore during the storm. I quickly settled in and tried to begin work Tuesday, Aug. 30. I couldn't get a thing done.I blamed my inefficiencies on logistics, improper data files and lots of other things that weren't really to blame. With lots of help from co-workers and friends, all the frustrations began to fall away as soon as I was emotionally settled in to my new surroundings. After that emotional settling in, I suddenly became productive.

My workday was so frenzied and productive that time flew by. I didn't have time to dwell on my problems - I was working. Things seemed normal.Our interim operations were set up to move employees in and out of new locations, taking advantage of their access to airports and communications systems. We looked for wireless signals at coffee shops and airports. We configured Virtual Private Networks in hotel rooms and cousins' houses. Some employees, editors Mike and Autumn Giusti first, then art director Lisa Finnan and editor Jodi Cararas, flew to Baltimore to work from our temporary offices there. Others, like CityBusiness Editor-in-Chief Terry O'Connor, got online with laptops in hotel rooms. We sent them laptops or asked them to borrow a desktop computer from friends.

We had a plan.But the plan did not anticipate the adjustment time it took for all of us to settle in. The time wasn't much but it was amazingly noticeable. Without exception, it took the same 24 hours for every single employee to settle in. Then remarkably, every single person who was asked or volunteered to get involved became incredibly productive. Ideas flowed, stories were written, Web sites were updated and we had a small sense of normalcy in our lives.

Normalcy is what we crave. Having our families safe and a job to do is the path to normalcy for so many of us. As we travel along the path to normalcy, I ask that we all remember the inspirational words of Dominique the Catman, Hurry up; take your time.

Copyright 2005 Dolan Media Newswires
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