Graduation

When the Inn opened its doors fifteen years ago, its inventory of vacant rooms was legion, reciprocally matched by the scant resources to market them. As do many businesses in similar quagmires, or with generous hearts, we pandered for inexpensive exposure by donating our services to non-profit endeavors, which as a general rule were grateful for a helping hand.
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The stinging exception was The Swan Ball, which - for the uninformed - hosts what could be the toniest of all charity auctions. Its players include the most pedigreed and dandified from here and abroad, from national politicians and international nobility to local millionaires and social luminaries – or more to the point, an affluent and influential market segment.
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When I approached the Ball’s chair, an arrogant blowhard if there ever was one, he spurned our overture. Though he had never visited the Inn, he assumed it wasn’t up to snuff - too rustic to satiate the rarefied appetites of the monied flock he curried. While I’m loathe to admit it and while the bastard certainly didn’t know it, he was right, for peering back on the Evins Mill of fifteen years ago, I now appreciate that we weren’t ready for prime time.
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The overnight accommodations were without the decor, furnishings and amenities they feature today. The Lodge and Gristmill had yet to undergo the additions and renovations of more recent years. The property itself was less tended than it presently is. Though the staff was industrious and well-meaning, none – myself included, had any experience in hospitality, resulting in a less consistent quality of cuisine and service than is currently the case.
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In some respects, today’s Inn is barely recognizable from the Evins Mill of yore – so different in fact that I cringe when someone informs me they visited during those early years, and feel compelled to enumerate on the progress we've made. I may be grading the Inn of yesteryear too harshly, but by present standards, it was rough around the edges.
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With these humble, and humbling, beginnings in mind, you might imagine my delight when more than a decade later another Swan Ball chair, refreshingly gracious and a recent patron of the Inn, solicited our contribution to this year’s auction. We acquiesced, and I understand the bidding was competitive. It felt as though we had finally graduated.
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If this coming of age snippet appears a wee self-congratulatory, we are only as proud of our progress as we are aware of our shortcomings and the work that remains – we still make mistakes, and the litany of proposed improvements grows weekly. If associated with Evins Mill fifteen years hence, I suspect I will grade the Inn of today with as little forgiveness as I’ve assessed its infancy.

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With all the physical and human assets we have, a critical eye may be the most quintessential, for it guarantees that Evins Mill will not become codified and will remain a singular work in progress, soberly striving for but falling regrettably shy of perfection - a struggle that at least ensures it will be slightly better tomorrow than it is today. Hopefully then, we will always be graduating.

Facebook

Within days of creating my Facebook page this past March, a guy named Damon Addison requested my friendship. I don't know Damon and rejected his solicitation, and with some contempt too – I mean, the chutzpah of a total stranger asking ME to be HIS friend. In an ironic if not utterly hypocritical metamorphosis, two months later I had become that very same guy – on steroids, earnestly affiliating with as many facebookers as would indulge me, however tenuous the connection. How did I mutate from detached amusement to headlong embrace? This is my story.

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More than detached, I initially regarded Facebook and its social networking sisters with suspicion and disdain, viewing them as trite playgrounds for teens and twenty-somethings, apparently with too much time on their hands. I diagnosed them as symptoms of a callow and voyeuristic culture and even assigned to their acolytes an effete if unfair stereotype - you know, that of metrosexuals texting from iphones while sipping lattes.
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Though a healthy dose of skepticism may be in order, some of my condescension also arose from my own discomfort with new technologies and unfamiliar platforms. I'm not what they call an "early adapter" but quite the opposite - I used the same cell phone for nearly a decade. Whatever the roots of my initial hesitancy - indignation or fear, the utility of Facebook eventually felled both.
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For the uninitiated, FB permits fellow users to befriend you as you allow. As you've already seen, I originally took the word "friend" at face value, prompting regular struggles over whether to accept certain invitations. Even if I knew the person, I might not like them so much, may not have seen them in twenty years, etc. In short, they weren't really friends at all, and like my touchstone Holden Caulfield in The Catcher in the Rye, I do not well suffer disingenuity and viewed many such invitations as precisely that.
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I soon realized I was applying a more rigorous definition of "friend" than may have been intended - a discovery that would prime my Facebook engine. And as soon as I internalized the potential business applications, the floodgates opened. Unsure whether on-line networking is simply fad or seismic shift in the way people and organizations promote themselves, I bowed to the mammon god, and with missionary-like zeal began sharing the gospel of Evins Mill throughout the FB matrix.
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As of this writing I have accumulated nearly 500 "friends." Of these, the overwhelming majority are patrons of Evins Mill, most of whom I've not met in person, and some not at all. At times I fear I've spoiled some unspoken and hallowed protocol, or offended the Facebook pure of heart with this commercially driven quest. If so, I empathize and take no offense should you part my company.
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While the FB faithful, and even I, may be uneasy with this construct, I am proceeding with all the authenticity that I can muster - and that our guests deserve. With tempered regularity, I share with my "friends" items I hope are of value or substance, whether it be an additional discount for a "fan," recipes from Chef Evans, a lovely picture - or an essay like this one. That many "friends" seem to receive these posts with genuine warmth and appreciation has increasingly allowed me to share them with a more genuine heart and from a more authentic place.
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Authenticity aside - Damon, if you'll give me a second chance, I'd like to be your friend now.