This entire subject of globalization constantly redefines my personal world. When the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, I was happy, but frankly, didn't pay much attention. I knew nobody that was personally affected. Conversely, the first person I heard on 9/11 was a friend being interviewed by Peter Jennings immediately after she evacuated the first tower. That instantly personal injection into a worldwide tragedy has been the backbone of my interest in larger-scale issues.

Frankly, it's hard for me to focus on personal priorities [soaking up sunshine] when every day I feel the crush of gross consumption, race + place-based discrimination, or our oil-based national values.

I lost my sense of scale. Or did I ever have it?

One of the odd factors of my background is that I seem to know people on both sides. A friend smuggling refugees across the Afghani border. A different friend flying his F-16 on missions in Iraq. That same friend volunteering in the base medic camp and assisting in surgeries to save both insurgents and Americans. I'm not the only one flipping between the two sides.

One of the more frustrating things about the book is that Friedman seems able to maintain a "normal" American lifestyle while experiencing first-hand parts of the world that were first under the flattening steamroller. How does he do it?

I find some solace in the humor and abstraction of another entity dealing with two-dimensions in Abbot's "Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions, by a Square" accessible here: http://books.google.com/books?id=HKackp-vG-YC&dq=flatland&pg=PP1&ots=UqsD3tvJtq&sig=51nZ1MGdfpqf5wCO3vtmjJfJzDg&hl=en&prev=http://www.google.com/search?q=flatland&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&sa=X&oi=print&ct=title&cad=one-book-with-thumbnail#PPA17,M1

Also, this class provides other readings that help with the approach to flattening. Language about authorities, or accessibility to power structures is promising. Sharing this information on the reinvention of cultural and professional mores and organizational systems is critical. We live in a world where young children take responsibility for drug-addicted parents. Where mothers raise not only their children, but their children's children. We are each responsible for redefining what we value [as a person, as a society], and what we evaluate others on [skills, appearance, actions]. I'm sure that every one of us has experienced some measure of discrimination, whether it's the glass ceiling killing a career or a belittling comment in passing.

Friedman's accounting of the untouchables and their new opportunities for success is heartfelt. But I want much much more from him. It still seems too economically based for me. His ending notes that "We Americans will have to work harder, run faster, and become smarter to make sure we get our share." [p469 in the 2005 edition]

Let's lead the reinvention. Let's support these new models of leadership, not only with our words on blog entries, but what we offer as advice to others. How we tell our stories, and what stories we find important to tell.

Tell me that we're making a difference. Tell me that, as much as I get fired up by the hope embedded within the words of Amartya Sen, Arundhati Roy, and the other eloquent speakers from India that they know we're here on the other side. Tell me that there are those of us that don't think about getting our share, but think about sharing what we have with those that have nothing. Tell me that, so I can smile in the sunshine, as I head to my next battle. And while we're at it, tell me that working out a design detail for the infrastructural institution that I'm designing for an academic exercise is not a waste of my time. I missed putting all this on my last list for Santa Claus twenty years ago...