Spectrum Connection: September 2020

From the desk of Dave Smalley: Tethered?

Te t h e r e d

Tethered: verb – to tie with a rope or chain so as to restrict movement. Tie with a rope or chain. What are some things that get tethered? A hot air balloon gets teth-ered. Horses get tethered. I bet you can name a bunch of things that get tethered. If the hot air bal-loon and horse were not tethered, each would either float or run free. But instead we tether them to control them, to restrict them. The length of the tether dictates just how far either of them can go.

Yes, there are many things that get tethered. I would go as far to say that over the last few months I have been tethered. No, not with a rope or chain, but tethered none the less. Tethered by my emotions, by my perceived lack of ability to affect the situation at hand. Unlike the restraint that keeps the balloon from ascending or the horse from running free, I can’t see or touch what is tethering me. That would be much easier to free myself from.

I am restrained by my heart, my mind, and my emotions. And remarkedly, the tether is solely put on by me. I am seemingly facing a constant battle as to how to overcome my emotions, to unshackle myself, to again be-come myself, and not a victim.

If I accept that I am a victim, it is a slippery slope to a victim mentality. There is no question that our current situation is not of our making, but just because we are living in this pandemic does not mean bad times will continue. It does not mean there is no end to this. There is. It does not mean that there is no use in making an effort to change our circumstances. There is. We must control what we can control. If we allow the virus and it’s affect to control us, to tether our minds and emotions to the negative, to instill in us a victim’s mentality, we lose both hope and perspective. More importantly, we lose ourselves.

WE make a difference. WE make the difference in our lives and the lives of others. WE must take responsibil-ity for our own actions, our own lives, and make that difference. We need to take action, find small actions that lead to a betterment of our individual situations. We must avoid sabotaging ourselves with negative talk and focus on what we can do, not what we can’t. Stay in the moment, take steps forward.

How are we going to use this time to be a better person, better professional, better family member? We need to use our self confidence to drive our self-talk, to cut free from the emotional tethers we are experiencing. Cut yourself free of those tethers with the sharp edge of positivity and your self-worth can fly as high as that balloon, and run as fast as that horse. Untether.

With great respect. Know we are a month closer.

Dave Smalley

 

From the desk of Melanie Smalley.

After I Read This, I Started to Speak Less and Listen More…

We’ve been blessed with a very precious gift, my friends: the gift of talking. The gift of language. The gift of being able to ex-press our feelings, emotions, ideas or plans into something called words. But, as with every gift, overusing it may lead to unexpected results.

Speaking and listening in a balanced way are imperative in our world. The noise of useless words that many of us are throwing away in an attempt to get a grip on someone else’s attention, creates a thick fog that makes it really difficult to actually un-derstand each other. Ironically, the more we talk, the less we’re able to communicate.

Read on about these 6 benefits of speaking less and listening more and improve the way you communicate with the world.

 

 

 

Think Before You Speak

So obvious, yet so underused. Under the impulse of “taking the stage,” of speaking before the other one could make his moves, we often open our mouth with-out really knowing what we’re going to say. Some-times we improvise and it may turn out right. But most of the time, we’re just shouting randomly about a topic, without any quality contribution to the conver-sation. The result: no one really listens to us.

Take a deep breath before you respond, no matter how “urgent” the answer may look. Think for a while. Keep in mind the thought that you really have has many options, not just one. Ponder and your answer will not only be well thought out, but people will be more apt to listen.

Listen Before Jumping To Conclusions

Again, the “need for speed” of our current world often forces us to simplify our interactions, to the point where they become useless. Based on just a few words, or a few sentences, we often create a perspec-tive on some thing or some person, which may simply be inaccurate because we didn’t take the time to actu-ally listen.

Really listening means not only giving to the other the time to finish his speech, but also the exercise of “borrowing” his perspective. Listening means to actu-ally see things from their point of view.

Limit Yourself To What’s Important

The infamous “information overload” created by the internet revolution is not about the quantity of the in-formation available out there. But merely about the relevance of that information. Every time you update your Facebook timeline, or you publish a blogpost, or you simply open your mouth to say something, you’re adding up to this fog. Have you ever tried to contem-plate if what you’re going to say is really that im-portant? Sometimes, silence really IS golden.

Too often, the reason is that we’re talking is simply just to hear our voices, no matter if we do this out loud, by writing emails or updating our Twitter. Imagine how silent it would be out there if we could just limit our-selves only to what’s really important.

Get To Know Others Better

And that means doing things together, not only talking about things together. Getting up from the couch and do a short team jog, watching the sunset together, si-lently, playing a game, or having a meal. All these are actions that, apart from the main benefit of enjoying life, have also a secondary, very important outcome: they help you understand other people better.

Create A Better Reality

When you speak less, you do more. It’s obvious. Your focus switches from talking to doing. While talking and expressing your feelings is important, ‘doing’ is equally important. If you could refrain yourself from talking for 5 minutes a day, in a month you will have gained 30 days x 5 minutes = 150 minutes, 2 and a half hours for yourself. What would you do with this time?

Whatever you want, of course. You can go to the gym, cook for your spouse, craft something in the garage, coach someone, help a neighbor, you name it. As long as your goal is to make the world a better place, doing will always beat speaking.

Write More

It’s still a form of expressing yourself, but it has a few perks. If you write, you’re more accountable. Written words last more than spoken words. Also, you will clear your mind without the help of somebody else. Writing in a journal or blogging, as long as you follow the number one rule of this list, (“think before you do it”).

And when you’re writing, something very interesting will happen: you will be forced to “listen” to yourself. You will be exposed to your own thoughts and emo-tions. You will get to know yourself better. Or, to be more precise, you will start to discover who you are.

Written by Dragos Roua

Love, Mel

 

September is “Better Breakfast” Month and Chef Kevin has shared one of his favorite healthy breakfast recipes with us!

Avocado, Feta & Tomato Toast

Ingredients:

• 1 Slice of Whole Grain Bread
• 1 Avacado
• 1 Pinch of Granulated Garlic
• 1 Large Beef Steak Tomato
• 10 oz Feta Cheese
• 1 Lemon
• 1 Egg
• 1 tsp Olive Oil
• Salt
• Freshly Cracked Pepper

Instructions:

1. Clean avocado and place in a small mixing bowl. Add salt, pepper, half of a zest-ed lemon with juice and 1 tsp of olive oil. Mash down with fork, still leaving it a bit chunky and set aside.

2. Next slice your tomato super thin and season with salt pepper, and garlic and set aside. **Chef’s Tip – if you have a favorite flavor of DASH you can sub-stitute your garlic and salt!

3. Set your oven to 375f. Brush one side of your bread with olive or avocado oil. On one side of the bread, season with salt and pepper. Place your bread face down, and put in the oven.

4. Once your bread becomes GBD ( Golden Brown and Delicious), remove from the oven and spread your avocado mixture evenly on the side that was not oiled, then place your seasoned tomato’s, and finish with feta!

5. Cook your egg to desired doneness and slide on top of the bread. You want the egg hot so the feta will melt into the tomato which in return leaches the lushes to-mato juice into the avocado. Then, BOOM—A Series Of Fortunate Fla-vored Events!! **Chef’s Tip—I recommend a sunny side up egg for best ex-perience! ENJOY!!

 

Often times we get feedback from our Spectrum Connection family, which we greatly appreciate. We thought it would be nice to share this one with you and echo the sentiments, that you never know who’s day you may brighten.

 

Good morning, I wanted to reach out to you and Dave and let you know that I’ve been thinking about the both of you and the impact you continue to have in my life.

I know I only briefly, initially, met the both of you at a golf tournament here in Chicago four summers ago. Then, had the chance to travel to Dallas and work both the Byron Nelson and Colonial Golf

Tournaments two summers ago, to learn more about the company. I still receive the company newsletter and share the contents of your articles each month with my aging parents Earl and Marguerite Thompson. As I read your articles to them through the window of their respective rehabilitation hospitals ten miles apart. This October they celebrate 72 years of marriage! The articles you both write in the company newspaper inspire them monthly as they do therapy search for the “whys” of their individual limitations with Covid-19, challenges they each face with age, side effects of medicine, nursing staff and fellow residents. I’ve also been inspired in reading to them the many encouraging words and reminders, to treat others respectfully and to do the best we can in anything and everything we do!I cannot say enough about both of your writing talents in the monthly newsletters! Keep up the great work, as I can imagine the challenging times your company is going through with events and tournaments being cancelled and changes in the food service and hospitality industry. I look forward to staying in touch and when the time maybe right, I’d like to possibly explore additional work with your company for both parties! Keep the faith! I guess you never know who we touch in our lives till you share your “round” with others. Thank you for the opportunity in working with you and your company. I proudly wear my Spectrum golf shirts to this day; at church and at events as they are very comfortable to wear. If

you’re ever in the Chicago area please let me know! Here’s a picture of my parents, Earl (100) and Marguerite (95). The other is of me with clients at Colonial two summers ago.

Sincerely , Jim Thompson

 

 

 

From the desk of Jay & Jung

Well hello and welcome to all of our Spectrum friends, associates, and family! I am excited to report that Julie and I have finally been able to open and get things rolling down here in Melbourne, Florida at the USSSA Space Coast Baseball Complex as of July 1st!!

Julie and I made the move to Florida in early April and were able to begin delivering Spectrum service and hospitality the weekend of July 4th. With the kids out of school, the summer months are the busiest time of the year for this facility as we are open almost everyday hosting tournaments and events in July, August and parts of September! It’s been a fantastic first month of business and everything is moving along won-derfully down here.

We have five separate sales locations with 10 POS if everything is open! Our parking lot holds over 1,000 cars and many days it’s full and overflowing with players, fans, parents, coaches and others. Fortunately, it’s been plenty hot here in Florida and we are quickly becoming one of Pepsi’s biggest new accounts with the amounts of beverages we’re moving!

Our facility is over 80 acres with 15 beautiful baseball fields, available for tournaments and many times eve-ry single one of them are occupied! We typically are open by 7:00 am and run till early evening hours. There are numerous adult events that start early and normally run till 2:00- 3:00 am in the morning which always makes for a fun day!!

We host tournaments with players in age from 8 years old to high school and host spring training events, as well as hosting many adult leagues. We have both boys, girls, adults, and co-ed teams playing so every tournament is a new experience.

As you would expect in Florida, the weather plays a big roll into how our days, events and games go. It’s quite often we go into a weather delay and play simply stops and starts back up after things clear out. There have been quite a few events since opening in July that our games are finally resuming by 11:00 pm or midnight to get the days games completed! You’ve got to love the rain and lightning, ha!

We have been very fortunate to be able to hire a wonderful local staff and look forward to what the remaining months of the year will bring. As summer comes to an end and schools begin, it will be interesting to see how the year finishes out for us and things continue to change.

Julie and I are really enjoying life in Florida and are thrilled to have made this move. However, it’s just a bit awkward being the youngest folks in the neighborhood, but we’re getting used to it and it’s nice to have a new bunch of grandparents to hang out with—LOL!!

Again, we have been very fortunate to bring on a wonderful management team! Torin, from Golf and Mu-sic, (though he lives in Orlando) drives up daily to be our opening runner, ensuring stands are up and ready to roll for our 7:00 a.m. opening times. Torin, it’s been great to have you with us through early prepara-tions, set up, trucks unloading and then finally opening! Cheers to you sir, you are very much appreciated!!

Kelly, who has worked with the previous operator as a key employee and we are so appreciative to have her abilities, knowledge, and experience in successfully getting open and off to a strong start. It’s always nice to have someone on staff that knows where all the bones are buried and Kelly has certainly brought us insight, previous experience behaviors, and just overall great intel of what to expect as we opened. Thanks again Kelly, you are very much appreciated!!

Next is our new chef, Nic Rogers! Nic jumped right into the deep end with our opening and has not missed a stroke yet. We were lucky to have Kenny Carpenter drive in from Miami and assist Nic for the first week and he has done an amazing job ever since. One of our 1st days in operation was just under $20K from a dead stop and Nic and his team did wonderfully! We just received our brand new Old Smokey smoker in last week and Nic has been experimenting with some new BBQ items and looking to really have some fun with it. Great job Nic and hat’s off to Smiley! Smiley is Nic’s full time kitchen assistant! Together these two are doing a wonderful job and making things happen!

Last, Mrs. Julie Jung—In our 30 years of marriage, we have never worked side by side together and believe it or not, we both agree that neither of us would have made it through pre-opening and opening if not for working together! Julie has done a great job as lead Admin, (only admin actually) and has taken on sched-ules, weekly labor rehash, payroll, and everything else one can think of. It’s been a completely new experience working in hospi-tality for Julie and she’s done an outstanding job and is very much appreciated!! Love you honey!

 

I appreciate all the assistance, work, and dedication from the entire Spectrum Team to get us open! This includes all the warehouse folks pulling and loading out an 18 wheeler of equipment and sup-plies from Houston, the Opening Dream team of Jeannelle, Trish, Kenny Carpenter, Torin, Mike S. and Wess–all assisting with set up and everything at Spectrum Headquarters. Tina being so diligent with obtaining all of our operating permits and Maisie in all the back of the house accounting requirements, licenses and sales tax information! Derek, Brenda, Kim and Jazmine with all things Pay-com, payroll, accounting, banking and any other responsibilities no one sees or knows about.

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO HAS BEEN A VITAL PART OF THIS OPENING— YOUR ENERGY, EFFORTS, DEDICATION AND COMMIT-MENT HAVE ALL GOTTEN US TO THE POINT WE ARE AT NOW AND YOU ARE VERY MUCH APPRECIATED!!

We hope everyone is doing well and staying safe in their worlds! If any of your travels bring you down to Florida please call us, we’re only 45 minutes south of Orlando and would love to see you!!