If you take a moment to look around the room you are in now, what do you see?Are you surrounded by things that matter, and were built by people who care?Or, more likely, are you surrounded by mass produced, assembly line, importedgoods that you honestly don’t believe will last all that long? I’ve beenthinking about qualityagain, and how it applies to me, to what I do, and how I spend my time.

It started with our washing machine. After seven years, our washing machinelooks like it’s on its last legs. Seven years sounds like a long time to havean appliance, but its really not. When our grandparents bought appliances theywere built to last for thirty years, now they are built to last five. Wecalled up a repair man who stopped by the house to take a look. He was anolder guy, and didn’t bring the right tools for the job, so he just looked atthe machine and told us his view of the model we own. He said that he had justtold a customer that day that his washing machine, same model as ours, was notworth the cost to fix it, and that it would be cheaper and more economical tobuy a new one. As older people do, he lamented the quality of todays machines,so I asked him what was being built today that was as good as the machines ofthe past.

He looked me in the eye and said “There are none.”

The repairman’s view of the world has become so pessimistic that he trulybelieves that there is nothing built for the common man worth buying. This issad, but I believe he’s wrong. I believe it in part because I’m typing this ona MacBook Pro, in my opinion the best computer ever built. The perfect blendof power and portability, but more than that, an example of manufacturingexcellence. Apple is a company that caresabout details, and they are not alone. I believe we may be at the beginning ofa renaissance of sorts, a return to traditionally crafted goods created byartisans and engineers.

These people have inspired me to do better, to be more, to remember theattention to detail that the Navy demanded of me. Take a minute to read thesestories, watch their videos, and see where they are coming from.

Saddleback Leather,Coudal Partners,DODOcase, BlackboxCase, and finally, StaberIndustries.

Staber may very well replace our Maytag washing machine. Its all they do.

We don’t have to live in a world where all of our things are replaceable,where everything around us falls apart after a couple of years of use. Wedon’t have to live in a world where everything has a computer chip and can’tbe fixed if it breaks. We don’t have to live surrounded by junk. But that’swhat the past thirty years of steadily declining quality of goods has taughtus, it’s become a core belief that affects everything we do. We go to work,and sigh, and think, “here it is, another Monday…”, and do what we have to dountil we can go home. Punch the clock, earn a paycheck, who cares if our workis any good? That’s wrong, and it doesn’t have to be like that.

Living in a world of quality goods and services starts with each one of uscaring more about what we dowith our lives, what we spend our money on, and most importantly, where andhow we spend our time. No matter what you do, if it is writing software orchanging oil, I want to encourage you to do your absolute best. Because nomatter what you are doing, you make an impact on the world around you, youmatter because you are here, and when you start to believe that what you domakes a difference, you start to care a little more, and when you care aboutyour work, you make the world around you a little better every day.

So, today, as you go to work, or prepare for the next day, or think about whatmight come next…

be great.