daverea.com

Ten years ago, I sat in a conference room with a group of ambulance officers and paramedics. My clearance papers were on the table – a collection of training data that, taken together, was the basis for my being allowed to run the show in the back of an ambulance, alone. After I received my clearance that day, the brass left me with a parting thought: Remember: You’re never alone out there. A paramedic unit is just a radio call away. Medical control is on the other end of the phone. Your driver can help you. Ask the dispatcher, and you can even have a helicopter in fifteen minutes. But you’re never alone.

A year ago, I started a new chapter in life – pursuing a master’s degree in software engineering. My reason for returning to school: I could do a clean-sheet design for a piece of electronic hardware, but the same wasn’t so for software – and there was software in nearly everything I was creating. So, I left my cooshy job, turned in my comfy car and spent the year that followed studying my ass off.

As of yesterday, that chapter is over. My degree is finished, 64 credits and 12 months later. And I realize, in much the same way as I was never alone in my decade as a medic, that you never really start from nothing. In the software world – as in the engineering world in general – you build on the shoulders of the great people who came before you. Gauss, Tesla, Maxwell, Ohm and Shockley were all with me as I designed circuits, just as Gamma, Bass, Booch, Pressman and their cohorts have my back when it comes to creating software. Among other realizations, this past year has brought me the understanding that there’s no such thing as a clean-sheet design in the first place.

Next week, I’ll start a new job, working on new projects in the company of new friends and partners in innovation. It’s an exciting time, built not just on the foundation of intellect and creativity, but also on love and support: so my family and friends, and especially my Dad and Kelly, deserve the most thanks of all.

Recently, I ordered a new chair. After sitting in one in a customer’s newly-outfitted conference room, and noticing how run-down my current office-superstore-brand task chair was becoming, I decided to upgrade. This afternoon, my new coding throne arrived courtesy of UPS, and I eagerly unboxed and set it up. Two 13mm bolts later, I carried the chair into my office and gave it its maiden sit.

But something wasn’t right. My specimen of this particular chair didn’t feel quite the same as those ringing the conference room table. After 5 minutes, I realized the difference – the lumbar “support” piece – a D-shaped springy plastic affair upon which the chair’s poly-mesh back rested – felt like a yardstick pressed into my vertebrae. Far from the super-adjustable high-end version of the chair I’d first experienced, I realized I had purchased a much more basic model on which this lumbar support was fixed. And held in place by a T30 bolt.

Which is how I found myself at Sears an hour-or-so later, in search of a new set of Torx drivers. In order to remove the offending lumbar support piece, I’d need to remove the bolt through an opening too-small for my interchangeable-bit screwdriver. And as I surveyed the options in the “six-sided fastener-adjusting tools” section, I noticed a selection of various hex-key sets. Ever since my loose 5mm hex key – an essential tool for bicycle maintenance – went missing, I’d been meaning to remedy its absence. This is how men shop.

Hoping to avoid the loss of another loose 5mm key, I opted for a fold-up style set. I had two options: a SAE/metric pair from Allen brand (“The Original!” exclaimed the packaging) for $9.99, or the same array of sizes with Craftsman branding for $25.99. Both carried lifetime warranties. Both seemed durable enough. Both had ball-style ends. Both even had little accessory tabs that could be used to hang the tool from a pegboard. The difference? The former was made in China, and the later in Estes, Illinois.

I set down the set of Torx wrenches and picked up both of the hex-key contenders, realizing that this was fast becoming a “practice what you preach” moment. As far as “things we buy” go, there aren’t that many things sold that are still manufactured domestically. Our government has made it all-but-impossible to do business profitably in this country, and what roadblocks they haven’t put up, labor unions have. So when the issue of buying American-made goods comes up, I enthusiastically advocate for it – and even more so for “buying local” if one can. And now I had a simple choice: pay more or compromise.

I hung the Allen-brand wrench set back on its hook and headed to the checkout counter. The total bill for 10 American-made hand tools was $69.84. Just under $7 per tool, or under $3 each if you count each key on the folding sets individually. And while I realize that my purchase doesn’t affect much of anything on a global scale, it does amount to a single ballot in a very large game of vote-with-your-wallet.

And that new chair? Turns out it was made in Zeeland, Michigan.