On the very ground you're standing, something else of significance took place. A child was raised. A man built his career. A confederate soldier lost his life.
For the past few months, I've been exploring the idea of "a sense of place" for STORY, our theme for 2013.
It's not just about your physical space like, say, the way your office is designed or the environment in which you express your craft. It's also about your unique place in the world.
I discovered that just a few blocks from our venue in Chicago sits a nursing home parking lot. It's just an ordinary, old parking lot to the unknowing eye.
But to someone who understands "place," they know that this is the very spot where Al Capone's gang dressed up in police uniforms to gun down seven members of Bugs Moran's gang in the St. Valentine's Day Massacre in 1929.
This gives greater meaning to the work at-hand. You recognize that what you're doing has a history. An importance. You carry yourself a little taller.
George Bush once said that when took over the presidency in 1992, he insisted that every one of his staffers wear suit coats when entering the Oval Office in order to restore a sense of dignity to the room (I was a Clinton intern).
How do you work differently when you have a sense of place? You stop working in sweat pants? You keep a cleaner desk? You print thicker business cards?
No, seriously. What do you do?
