Lee Geiger

Never judge someone by the way he looks or a book by the way it’s covered; for inside those tattered pages, there’s a lot to be discovered.

Stephen Cosgrove

I like to think that fifty-nine years of circling the Sun has made me a half-decent judge of character. Especially when it comes to sizing up me. I’m more than willing to admit that my disproportionate amount of character flaws stand out like a rash of zits on a Brazilian supermodel.

So, when it comes to relating to people, I’m attracted to those I either, A) like to spend time, and/or B) respect. I added the qualifier “and/or” because there are people who I don’t like but with whom I greatly respect. Conversely, I find it nearly impossible to reach level “A” with someone if there’s an unhealthy absence of “B.” That’s just a me thing, and that person will know it when I greet them and subsequently stare at their shoelaces trying to avoid eye contact.

I do my best to judge people based on their character instead of pedigree, job title or net worth. It goes a long way to explain why I gab incessantly with waitresses and golf caddies, and why I don’t get invited to parties thrown by former colleagues from my days mining financial security at Montgomery Securities. I can be a difficult guy to impress, and it’s a personality trait I’m not particularly proud of. Nonetheless, my life experience has taught me to give people I like a mountain of respect, or cut some jerk a tsunami of slack, if their life’s journey has compelled them to confront three of life’s highest and most torturous hurdles (ranked in order of magnitude); meeting a payroll, experiencing combat, or losing a child.

What do they all have in common? I’ve never walked a mile in any of those shoes. And I don’t want to.

Meeting a payroll is something I’ve always admired. For a person to have the guts to venture out on their own, to hang a shingle that says, “Please do business with me,” is honorable and noble. But hiring a person, or a staff, to help accomplish your entrepreneurial ambitions involves a pressure cooker level of risk I frankly don’t have the smarts or stomach for. The success of one’s business may depend on their employees, but in many cases an employee’s ability to make their rent payment may depend on them. I can’t imagine the strain a business owner must face when the 15^th and 30^th of the month rolls around and there’s not enough cash in the till to buy a decent bag of cat food.

Being born in 1959 meant I missed the dreaded days of the military draft during the Vietnam War, and I’ve always carried a submarine full of excuses as to why I never volunteered to serve, though admitting I am a major league wimp just never seems to surface. And while I clap loud and hard whenever I get the chance to salute our troops, I have a special room of reverence for those who actually had someone on the other side of the line trying to kill them. As far as I’m concerned, it’s one thing to sit in a control room pushing buttons to fire a missile; it’s quite another to get down and dirty in the field of battle, or to be on a ship and be told to immediately man your battle stations, i.e. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. I’ve seen and read plenty of wartime montages, from Saving Private Ryan to The Killing Zone, and they all lead me to draw the same conclusion; war, and what it does to a person, is hell.

Then there’s losing a child, which trumps meeting a payroll by a factor of infinity, and experiencing combat by a factor of I have no clue. I honestly don’t know how any parent moves on with their life, how they even find it in themselves to continue living, much less get out of bed. It’s the greatest personal tragedy I can think of. And I don’t want to think about it anymore.

By now you’re probably asking why I brought all this up. The answer is simple: George Herbert Walker Bush.

I spent a big chunk of Wednesday morning watching his funeral. The specter of gravitas and grief, of military tradition and political protocol, of eloquence, humor and grace, was absolutely spellbinding. I was moved by the enormity of the spectacle, the display of shared respect, the grandeur and pathos of the solemn service. They don’t do this just for anyone, I kept thinking, and I guess in some weird way a state funeral, with all the bells and whistles and twenty-one-gun salutes, is one of the macabre perks of the job. But after listening to war heroism and ambition from historian Jon Meacham (who I hope will stick around long enough to deliver MY eulogy), the personal diplomacy from former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, the friendship and wit from former California Senator Alan Simpson (who must have been hilarious on open-mic night in the Senate Dining Room) and the personal reflections from a presidential son, I came to the realization that President George Herbert Walker Bush, a World War II fighter pilot shot down in flames over the Pacific, the founder of the Bush-Overbey Oil Development Company,  and the father of a three year-old daughter who died of leukemia, had experienced ALL THREE of the life defining events I mentioned earlier. Incredible. Just incredible.

And to think that AFTER experiencing and surviving all of that, he soldered on and became a Congressman. A U.N. Ambassador. Director of the CIA. Vice-President of the United State. President of the United State. Yet through it all, the highs, the lows, the pain and the glory, most everyone agrees that Bush 41 was a nice, hardworking, self-effacing, relatable, polite, decent and honorable man. He was also a husband, father, grandfather, and great-grandfather. He was human as well, which by definition means he wasn’t perfect. But no matter what tool you use to measure, G.H.W. Bush was a class act.

Sympathy is when you share the feelings of another; empathy is when you understand their feelings. Though I never met the man, my instincts tell me Bush earned people’s respect because he treated them as he himself wanted to be treated, that he had seen the most difficult and trying times a person can imagine, and that he set out to never take anything or anyone for granted. He certainly earned my respect, and I have no qualms calling him a hero. If there’s one thing I took from Bush’s funeral, the single life lesson we should all aspire to, it’s that when it comes to expressing empathy, he led an example we all would do well to follow.

All that being said, though I would never try to compare myself to him, Bush 41 and I do have a few things in common. We both can’t dance, our shot games are terrible, and we can’t remember a punchline.