INSIGHT: What Do I Have To Show For It?

Crossover Artists
So much change is intangible. Ultimately, this pursuit of greater sustainability is about inflecting people. I sometimes yearn for some tangible product of my design practice, an object I can point to and say, without me, that wouldn’t exist. Occasionally, something else just as good arrives. I first met Max almost three years ago when he was a young college student. We’ve worked together in several capacities, right up to a few weeks ago, two months past his college graduation. The email was both an announcement—he’d accepted a sustainability-focused job—and thank you note: you changed my life. I responded with some last, unsolicited advice, not quite ready to accept the line that had just been drawn marking the end our student/teacher relationship, and the start of being colleagues. There are others where Max came from, including his friend Jenny, who Foresight recently hired. A group of alums of Foresight’s summer high school program are starting their college careers this week. The cycle continues. There is a file folder on the back of my desk in which I save thank you notes. I rarely look at them. But on days when the conceptual, strategic, catalytic nature of my work has me wanting some palpable output, I take comfort in knowing they are there.