Magic in the Workplace

If wizards were real and magicians took day jobs I have a feeling they would look a lot like my co-worker Gary Grant.

You see, I’ve been observing Gary working on a passion project for the past few weeks and the amount of joy he brings, daring he exhibits and flexibility he retains can only be likened to magic.

He showed up at work one day with the separate pieces of a project that didn’t make a whole lot of sense on their own and he was kind enough to share with me his vision. I’ll admit, I couldn’t see it at first, but if you know Gary and that mischievous glint he gets in his eyes at times, you could tell that he could see it and that it was a very real thing, right in front of him, all he had to do was put it together. And he didn’t even mind that I wasn’t there yet, or that perhaps I’d never be, it was a reverse emperor-has-no-clothes situation. Before me soon there would be an emperor, and he was going to be wearing the finest suit in all the land, but only Gary could see it now and to help me along the way he’d let me see the craftsmanship as he put it together.

And what a delight it has been to watch because it hasn’t been all smooth sailing, but even better than watching Gary barrel forward with his vision, has been watching him adapt when obstacles have come up, because they never, ever seem to lessen his enthusiasm.

I told him that when I was younger I read storybooks that all seemed to have the message that it was ok to be different and that one day you’d be celebrated for your differences and that marching to the beat of your own drum would one-day be something everyone could dance to, which was very encouraging for a dreamer like me. Yet as I got older I realized it wasn’t necessarily true and even in some creative environments there seemed to be a limit to how much “outside of the box”, how much “off the beaten path” one could comfortably travel and gain acceptance. But then I met Gary, a true original, who told me that it’s a struggle every day to be different; and I see that he lives up to that challenge and I’m beginning to see the payoff in his project.

So it’s not some slight of hand, a dove in a top hat or the waving of a wand that I speak of, Gary and his creative verve are true magic.

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