Tagged: Richard Crowson

One day years ago during a frantic morning, I was darting around and doing the usual scramble-dance of a person with a tight schedule who is running late for work. As I sped my daughter to daycare, I was lamenting the fact that I really needed a few extra minutes. Why wasn’t there a Minutes R Us store nearby where you could pick up some extra chunks of time, take them home, store them on a shelf in the garage, and grab one the next time you’re late for something?

Ah, yes—delayed gratification. I remember it well.

Back in the days before we live on 5-hour Energy drinks, triple-shot Starbucks lattes and the irresistible urge to text while we drive, we were sometimes willing to wait a bit in order to obtain something worthwhile.

I was recently reminded of some of Wichita’s visionary leaders of the past as I drove down Kellogg. I’m talking about the kind of leadership that concerns itself more with the long-term public good instead of handing out quick-fix, instantly gratifying lollipops like tax cuts and such.

We’re in the throes of a kind of “March madness” that most likely will not be going away come April. It is a sort of madness that has a much more profound impact any than basketball game could ever have.

I’m talking about the kind of madness that could leave thousands of Kansas Medicaid recipients stuck in that crazy-making, Alice-in-Wonderland place of having to deal with for-profit companies who will make decisions about those folks’ health care.

Driving down Douglas this past Tuesday I couldn’t help noticing a forelorn figure, shaggy head down, slumped despondently on a street-side bench. His large, bare feet instantly identified him to me and I swung over, pulled to a stop in the parking lot beside him, rolled down my window, and said, “Hey Bigfoot, why so sad?”