When I was 59 and Andy was pushing 51, he made an astounding statement. Astounding to me, anyway.

We were in the office, on a spring afternoon. I can still see him, perched against the little mauve table on which sits our work tracking log, clutching both sides of his head as he blurted his frustration about a work problem: “I don’t think I can do it. This job is just too analytical. I need to return to the creative side, to marketing.”

“What?!” I wasn’t posturing. I really didn’t understand what he said.

“Marketing,” Andy repeated. “You know: creative work.”

I felt like I needed a shovel to lift my jaw off the floor. I would never put the words “marketing” and “creative” together. I’d done a bit of sales in my time and what it took was good communication skills along with a worthy product. There wasn’t anything particularly creative about that. But then again, I keep arguing that ads don’t work, and all my buddies accuse me of naivete or autism (“Nice Ass-pergers, Mom”).

The next time I was in Eugene, during one of my evening conversations with Katie and Sean, I narrated that Andy episode. And experienced another jaw-scraping surprise. They both looked at me like I was crazy when I spoke like marketing wasn’t creative. If I hadn’t already learned not to be a-skeered of them I would have been intimidated by their disdain.

“Of course marketing is creative!” Katie asserted. Okay, I’ll admit there was a glint of love along with the argument in her eye. “Jeez, Mom: what about those Superbowl ads you always watch?”

“Katie,” and I went into the kitchen for the rest of the Pinot Grigio. “What about those blue-screen TV bits? What about classified ads?”

To be continued…