Had one of the most inspiring conversations with Chrissie Brodigan yesterday.  She’s someone I’ve known only as an association for the past couple of years, and after talking with her yesterday, after she left Mozilla about ten months ago, I realized I was missing out on someone who seems to have an amazing capacity for empathy and demonstrates courage and integrity.  The deepest previous impression I’d had of her was when she approached me after I gave a wreck of a speech at a Mozilla all-hands post-Firefox 4.  She stopped me in the hallway to tell me I was inspiring.  I took her comment with grace (at least I think I did), but I was in a terrible state–embarrassed beyond anything I’d ever experienced before.

I like to think I’m able to understand and read people.  Specifically, I like to think that I can tell honest people from dishonest; however, recent experiences have taught me that my success rate is not as high as I’d like.  Chrissie is likely an example of a quick wrong judgement on my part.  Not because I thought her honest or dishonest, demonstrating or not demonstrating integrity, but rather, because I didn’t pay attention.  I should have tried harder to engage her and others around me even though I was in a terrible state.  I would have found it uplifting if I had, just as I experienced yesterday.

To top off the day, Steph was sending great messages all day about her time with the kids, inspecting obsidian knives and objects from Africa at the museum.  She told me I should be outside with my camera to see the skies.

So I did.

Huge skies yesterday reminded me of this shot taken recently, of a very similar day, down in South Bay, on an afternoon having lunch just with Steph, at Freebirds.

Things are wonderful right now.