November 26, 2009

Happy Thanksgiving DaVita !!

It is Wednesday night.  We have a cabin up in the mountains, and we come up here every Thanksgiving with a few relatives and friends.  I love it.   We also do an annual DaVita planning retreat up here each year, in September.  The senior executives fly in from all around the country.  It is much less expensive than having everyone stay in a hotel and eat in restaurants, because a bunch of us stay in the cabin, the local inn is simple and cheap (but no internet in the rooms!), and we cook most of our own meals.

One of our Thanksgiving traditions is to go around the table and each person says what they are most grateful for in their lives.  Whether you are 9 years old or 90, whether you are in the family or a friend, that is the tradition.

This year, for the 10th year in a row, I will list working at DaVita as one of the things I am most grateful for.  It has been a great gift to my life.  This is primarily because there are so many wonderful human beings who work here and do special things.  I am a better person because of DaVita in my life.  So thanks to the many of you who have made those words come true.

Which raises the question “am I taking this special life seriously enough, am I treating it with the right respect?”  Which brings us, in part, to the MM II Campaign.

I got to bed at 2 am on Monday night when I flew back from Boston.  My first call on Tuesday morning was at 8:15, but I got in a workout later in the day.  It was a high intensity 33 minutes on the lifecycle, one of my most intense in awhile.  A little stretching, a set of push-ups and crunches took me to 43 minutes.  That night I was committed to go to a dinner to be part of a small group giving advice to one of the leaders of a large university about how to deal with the severe economic pressures they are enduring.  I was tired, did not feel like going.  But once I got there and listened to their trials and tribulations, I forgot about my fatigue and actively participated in a robust and thought-provoking conversation filled with many ideas.  I got home about 11 pm, bed at midnight.  1 diet coke.

The next day I was up at 7 am to hit some email and do my first call at 8 am.  At 10 am I got in another strong lifecycle session, 33 minutes again, but only 5 minutes of stretching on top of that.  1.5 diet cokes.

During the 3 hour drive up to the mountains I had a nice conversation with my 19 year old daughter.  Early this evening I shot some baskets with my son, which was special for a bunch of reasons, including a nice conversation.  Tonight I will have a quiet dinner with my wife, her mother, my 2 kids, and our first nanny.  A smaller crowd than normal, all my siblings are elsewhere this year, and Denise’s father passed away in August.  The richness of life in full display, the happy and the sad.

But we are together, our own little, loving community.  I wish for all of you the same.  And I cherish the fact that for many thousands of us, DaVita is a special place to work, and does good things for others.  Thanks to many of you for giving life to others, teammates, patients, physicians, your families, and your communities and friends.  I am honored to be a part of the DaVita team, and proud to consider myself a citizen of the DaVita Village.  To alot of us, it lives.   It lives when teammates decide to make it so.

With intense respect and much affection,

Happy Thanksgiving,

KT