Retired But Not From Life

“There's never enough time to do all the nothing you want.” ~ Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes

After nearly 35 years, my good friend and brother-in-law (and father-in-law, inside joke) is retiring from work at EMC Corporation. Roy Carter started his career back in 1968 with a “might-as-well join the Navy” as opposed to being drafted. It is in the military that he crafted his wit and humor and a few computer skills which would serve him well. It was upon leaving the Navy, even though you never really leave the Navy, he joined the Data General Corporation and the next thirty-five years.

His ability to troubleshoot, to teach and to temper a customer when things were broke became his hallmark. From upper Louisiana to the lower swamps of the Mississippi delta, reaching out into places west and places east, his reputation grew. From Nova minicomputers with a cycle time of 300 nanoseconds, making it the fastest minicomputer on the market for several years to the Eclipse and MV systems (the subject of Tracy Kidder’s Pulitzer prize winning book “The Soul of a New Machine” in 1981), his skills were widely known.

Computer geeks will enjoy this, the rest can remain bored for a moment or two.

There were reel-to-reel vacuum driven tape drives, 10MB removable-head disk drives, dot-matrix printers and even newer technologies to emerge during his time. The first laptop ever seen by the world technology community called the DG-One. While you needed a flashlight to read the screen and battery life that was measured in minutes, the DG-One defined the look and style of all future laptop computers.

The AViiON Unix-based computers became the mainstream “open system” of choice and a new and innovative disk storage device called a CLARiiON emerged. And Roy’s talents preceded him as he transferred into technical support. From the bayou of Louisiana to the southern comforts of Atlanta, this Chicago city boy became an integral part of supporting these products. As part of the National Systems Support “fly” team, he traveled to the farthest places on the globe to repair both equipment and customers.

His reputation as “the” fix anything guy grew even larger.

Through the 1990s, despite releasing several UNIX-based systems, Data General evolved to specialize in disk storage systems. But financial difficulties resulted in the company being purchased by EMC Corporation, a supplier of disk storage systems, in 1999. Disk storage would become Roy’s sole purpose of support and he did not miss a beat. The remaining fifteen years would see him rise in respect within the engineering community as he had previously.

Roy has been fond of stating when it comes to troubleshooting, “The first thing you do in fixing anything is the most important. Do not let a wrong decision become your legacy.” Most of us understand that as simply meaning to think before you act. And Roy has always been humble enough to know he was not infallible but more times than not, he was always correct. In this business, there are many opportunities to fail but you will never succeed if you do not push the limits.

And push the limits for the better good is what Roy did.

There will be others retiring in time and the wheel of time continues to turn. Eight o’clock on Monday morning will chime the start of another work week. It will be a little quieter around the office from that point forward. And yes, the company will survive his departure as companies always do. For a short while though, he will be missed for what he brought to the table.

Other, younger men and women will step into leadership roles and raise their reputation greatness. New persons will fill the role vacated by Roy. They will prove their own might, their own greatness while serving the job, the position, and the company. Folks are always there, ready or not to fill that void.

Roy Carter has proven himself, has given of himself and now it is time for himself.

He will devote more time to his wife Mary. He will devote more time to other things, non-job things that is. It might be fishing, it might be travel, it might be a host of other things. But be certain, it will not be a job. They have both earned it and the time to do all the nothing that they want.

Congratulations Roy and Mary Carter!

Now get the heck out of this office and into life.

Stay inspired my friends!